The Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Bogorodichno-Rozhdestvenskaya Desert was built in 1796 with funds from the noble family of Poznyakov, Alexander Adrianovich and Anna Vasilyevna. The architecture of the church is in the Empire style. It has two altars: the main one is consecrated in honor of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the second, in honor of Saints Cosmas and Damian of Rome.

After the 1917 revolution, the church functioned until 1938, when the abbot Archimandrite Euphrasin (Fomin) and the chairman of the church council Andrei Anokhin were arrested and executed on fabricated charges, while the starosta Elena Kondratieva was sentenced to 10 years in camps. After the church was closed, all its property was confiscated, and the orchard was cut down. During the fascist occupation, the Germans used the church building to house livestock. In the 1950s, the church was reopened. Its restoration was carried out by Priest Andrei Pavlikov, a retired colonel and participant in the Great Patriotic War, who was awarded many orders. Father Andrei served in the church for 17 years and cared for the monastics who settled in the surrounding villages after the monasteries were closed. Initially, services were held in the small altar in honor of Cosmas and Damian, and later the main altar was restored.

On February 28, 1972, the church was led by Hieromonk Arkady (Afonin), a monk from the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. He served with a break from April 1, 1974, to September 1, 1975, until March 25, 1991, when he was appointed Bishop of South Sakhalin. By the blessing of Bishop Donat (Shchegolev) of Kaluga and Borovsk, Father Arkady began to establish a women's monastic community. He built a house with cells for the sisters near the church and invited experienced nuns who had been tonsured in old monasteries. The community included Nun Anastasia (Kuzmina), Schema-nun Martha, tonsured by the Optina hieromonk Meletius (Barmine), Schema-nun Tikhon, nuns Dorothea, Nikodim, Agnia, Ksenia, blind nun Julia, and others. Young sisters also joined the community, three of whom took monastic vows, and four, the monastic habit.

With the opening of new monasteries and due to the advanced age of the sisters, by the early 1990s, only four residents remained in the community. On April 4, 1993, by the blessing of Archbishop Clement, several residents from the Holy Nicholas Chernoostrov Monastery were sent to strengthen the community in Baryatino. Nun Theophila (Lepeshinskaya) was appointed as the senior sister. The community began to develop: new buildings were constructed, and the number of residents increased. On December 26, 1995, by the decision of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, the monastic community was transformed into the women's monastery of the Bogoroditsyn-Rozhdestvenskaya Desert, and Nun Theophila became the abbess.