Strofades Monastery and the Massacre of 1537

The quiet island of Strofades and its monastery were for centuries the target of brutal pirates, Turks and Algerians looking for treasures. One of the most horrific acts of terror occurred on 29 July 1537. It was on this date that Turks, who were at war with the Venetians over the island of Kerkyra (Corfu), came and burned Strofades Monastery down and massacred the monastic fathers within.

Their memory is commemorated annually with a feast at Strofades Monastery and the Monastery of Saint Dionysios in Zakynthos on September 29th. The monk Pachomios Rousanou wrote the Service in their honor.

Strofades (in Greek Στροφάδια; in Latin Strophades; also Stamphane Islands; Strivali) is a group of two small Greek islands in the Ionian Islands. They lie about 44 km (27 miles) south-southeast of the island of Zakynthos. Administratively they are part of the Municipality of Zakynthos. The larger island, Stamfani, is inhabited by one person, a monk who lives in the islands' only real structure, an impressive old monastery. The smaller is Arpia. Both are sparsely vegetated and rocky. The islands currently belong to the Greek Orthodox Church, which has prohibited hunting on the islands.

In 1241 the Roman princess Irene, daughter of Emperor Theodoros Laskaris I of Nicea, established an impressive fortified monastery dedicated to the Transfiguration of Christ on the bigger of the islets. She did this after being saved from a shipwreck by the two islands as a thanksgiving to God. Dedicated also to the Virgin Mary, the monastery is also known as the Monastery of “Panagia Pantohara” (The Joy of All). In 1440 Emperor John Paleologos restored the monastery to make it into a fortress for protection. It is in this monastery that Saint Dionysios of Zakynthos, the protector saint of the island, lived as a monk for several years.

In 1570 Saint Dionysios was abbot of the Strofades Monastery. Following his death in 1622 he remained its protector through his miraculous holy relics which remained there until 22 August 1717. His relics were removed for safe-keeping since other Hagarene invasions were taking place as well as massacres of monastics. His incorrupt relics were brought to the island of Zakynthos on August 22, where they remain till this day and are yearly commemorated on that date.

The complex of the buildings is really impressive. In fact the monastery is strongly fortified to avoid the pirates invasions, very common in the past; Strofades Monastery has always been an ideal shelter for the pirates in cases of bad weather. The walls of the Monastery, 25 meters high, were really a good protection for those invasions and an impressive spectacle for the visitors of today. Stamfani has also an old lighthouse, constructed in 1887, one of the older lighthouses of Greece.

Before World War 2 the monastery was only inhabited by a few monks and two or three lighthouse keepers. After the war it was uninhabited until 1976. The building of this historic monastery suffered great damage from a violent earthquake (6.6 on the Richter scale on the 18th of November 1997).

Below is a video about Fr. Gregorios Kladis, who since 1976 has lived alone at Strofades Monastery and preserved its inheritance. Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Zakynthos also speaks in this video about his sorrow in not fully restoring this monastery. This is from a news report on "Mega" in March of 2008.

Below is an excellent documentary on the Strofades islands in four parts.





A 93-page study of the Strofades Monastery can be read at this PDF file (in Greek).

Απολυτίκιον. Ήχος α'. Της ερήμου πολίτης.
Εν μονή των Στροφάδων θεαρέστως βιώσαντες και της εν Χριστώ απαθείας εποφθέντες κειμήλια υπέστητε βαρβάρων την ορμήν, Πατέρες, και μαρτύρων κοινωνοί ανεδείχθητε ως άρνες στυγνώς σφαγιασθέντες, οσιόαθλοι. Δόξα τω ενισχύσαντι υμάς, δόξα τω στεφανώσαντι, δόξα τω δωρουμένω δι' υμών πιστοίς τα κρείττονα.

Κοντάκιον. Ήχος πλ. δ'. Τη υπερμάχω.
Των αρετών τα τιμαλφέστατα κειμήλια και τα λαμπρότατα αθλήσεως αλάβαστρα, εν τη νήσω της Στροφάδος χειρί βιαία τους κτανθέντας ασκητάς ανευφημήσωμεν ως Πατέρων ιερόν και θείον σύλλογον ανακράζοντες: Χαίροις, Άγιον άθροισμα.

Μεγαλυνάριον.
Χαίροις, των Πατέρων σεπτός χορός, των αναιρεθέντων εν Στροφάσιν ανηλεώς, χαίροις, συστοιχία λαμπρέ οσιοάθλων, οφρύν η των βαρβάρων καταπατήσασα.

The translation of the relics of St. Dionysios from Strofades to Zakynthos

The battered skulls of the holy martyrs of Strofadon

The memorial to the martyred fathers of Strofades Monastery

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A Maiden Named Mary and Her Shocking Tale

Years ago I purchased a low-budget movie titled The Drama of a Nightingale. This movie was directed by Christopher Murray and stars Dana Behan as the maiden Maria (Dana also starred in the movie on the life of Saint Theodora of Vasta which was also directed by Murray). It was made in Greece in 1986 with many Greek actors, though the film is in English with Greek subtitles. In Greece it was originally distributed with the title Το δράμα μιας πριγκίπισσας ή Ένα θαύμα της Παναγίας, though a year later the title was changed to Η αγία κόρη Μαρία ή Το δράμα μιας μοναχής. A few years later it was distributed by Greek Video Distributors Inc. which no longer operates. Because of this, the movie has become almost impossible to find without getting it second-hand. I have personally seen this movie at least five times, but it was not until many years later that I discovered that this moving story was told by Saint Kosmas Aitolos in one of his sermons. Despite the low-budget production of the movie and graininess, it is fairly well-done and possesses something many blockbusters do not - a heart filled with simplicity and faith. There are a few moving scenes that can not be seen without tear-filled eyes, and I have always found it to be an inspiration.

As a special offer to my blog readers, since it is practically impossible to find this movie, I will be willing to copy this movie and send it out to anyone interested for a small offering of $10. If you are interested, please send your payment through the DONATION button above with instruction where to send it.

Below is the little-known story the movie is based on.

by Saint Kosmas Aitolos

THERE WAS A MAIDEN named Mary whose father was a Christian and sought to have her married. But she didn't want to, wishing to preserve her virginity. He placed her in a nunnery and handed her over to the abbess to keep her as her child. After her father had died, a new ruler took over that land. One day he went to the monastery where Mary was, and as soon as he saw her, he immediately was overcome by a satanic love for her. Returning to his home, he sent a letter to the abbess which said: "Send Mary to me immediately, because I have seen her and she has seen me. She has fallen in love with me and I with her."

The abbess read the letter and called Mary and said to her: "My child, what good did you see in the Pasha which made you look upon him with love? Look what he writes to me here."

Mary answered: "I don't know anything about it. I looked at him with a different purpose in mind. I said to myself: 'My God, will the Pasha have the same glory in the next world which he has in this one?' But he looked at me with a diabolical purpose. If I wanted marriage, my father would have given me [in marriage], and I would have married a Christian."

The abbess then wrote to the Pasha: "I would prefer to send you my head rather than send you Mary."

The Pasha sent another letter which said: "Either you send me Mary or I will come and take her myself and I will burn down the monastery."

Mary heard this and said to the abbess: "When the Pasha's men come, send them to my cell and I shall answer them."

When they came to Mary's cell she asked them what they wanted. They replied: "The Pasha sent us to take you because he saw your eyes and he desires them."

She asked them to wait for her to go to the church. She then took a knife and a dish and, standing before the icon of Christ, she said: "My Lord, you gave me earthly eyes so that I might walk along the good road, and for me to go voluntarily along the bad road is not right; and because these earthly eyes will take out my spiritual eyes, see how I take them out for your love, so that I can escape from the mire of sin."

And she immediately put the knife to her eye and plucked it out and placed it in the dish. She then went before the icon of the Theotokos and took out the other eye and put them together. She then sent them to the Pasha. When he saw them his satanic love was transformed into contrition and reverence. He immediately got up and went to the monastery and begged the nuns to pray to God to heal Mary.

All the nuns accompanied the Pasha. They fell on their knees, and begged Christ and the Theotokos to return Mary's sight.

The Theotokos then appeared as lightning to Mary and said to her: "Hail, Mary. Because you preferred to put out your eyes for the love of my Son and for me, behold take back your eyes and no longer will you be tempted."

Seeing the miracle, those who were present rejoiced greatly and glorified God and the Panagia. Then the Pasha gave the monastery a lot of gold and he was forgiven by the nuns. He left and did good things and was saved.

Did you hear, my brethren, what Mary did with the power of the Panagia? This is why we too must honor the All-Holy Theotokos by doing good works.

From Father Kosmas: The Apostle of the Poor by Nomikos M. Vaporis (Third Teaching).

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Greek Archaeologists Claim They Discovered Odysseus' Palace

August 24, 2010
Novinite

Greek archaeologists have claimed they have found the palace of Odysseus during excavations on the Ithaca island in the Ionian Sea.

On Tuesday, the archaeologist, Thanasis Papadopulos, who has been leading the excavation team on Odysseus' home island for 16 years, said that he knew the right place of the remains since 2006.

“We found the ruins of a three-level palace with a staircase carved into the rock,” Papadopulos said, adding that they also found a well, dating back to 13th century BC, when the Trojan War is believed to have taken place.

According to the archaeologist, the discoveries are identical to the ones described in Homer's Odyssey, presumably written about 8th century BC.

The Greek Ministry of Culture has provided more funding for the continuation of the excavations.

The mayor of Ithaca, Spiros Arsenis, has stated that Papadopulos' discovery is easily one of the most important discoveries in modern archeology, as reported by the Russian news agency RIA Novosti.

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Church Attendance Leads To A More Satisfying Life

by St. Nikolai Velimirovich

If you were to ask many people why they do not go to Church to pray, they will generally answer you: "I have no time, I have to work!"

Just look at those people who only work and do not go to Church, placing their trust only in their work and compare them with those who divide their time between work and prayer and you will quickly be convinced that the latter are more well off and, what is more important, they are more satisfied.

It is said about two neighboring tailors how unequal they were according to their work and prayer and according to their wealth and satisfaction. One of them had a large family and the other was a bachelor. The first had the habit of going to church every morning for prayer and the bachelor never went to church. Not only did the first work less but was even less a skillful master than the other. He had enough of everything and the other lacked everything. The first one asked the other how is it that he has everything although he works less? The one who prays to God responded that he attends church every day and, along the way, finds lost gold and he invited his neighbor, the bachelor, to go with him to prayer and they will share the discovered gold. Both neighbors began to attend church regularly and soon both became equal in abundance as well as in satisfaction. Naturally, they found no gold along the way but the blessing of God multiplies the abundance of true devout men.

Those who "Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness" (Matthew 6:31), God adds and multiplies all that is necessary for their physical life.

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Muslim Prayer Dominoes

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The Appearance of the Most Holy Theotokos to St Sergius of Radonezh

The Appearance of the Most Holy Theotokos to St Sergius of Radonezh (Feast Day - August 24)

Once, late at night, St Sergius (1314-1392) was reading an Akathist to the Mother of God. Having finished his habitual rule, he sat down to rest a bit, but suddenly he said to his disciple, St Micah (May 6): "Be alert, my child, for we shall have a wondrous visitation." Scarcely had he uttered these words than a voice was heard: "The All-Pure One approaches!"

St Sergius rushed from the cell to the entrance, and suddenly it was illumined by a bright light, brighter than the sun. He beheld nearby in imperishable glory the Mother of God, accompanied by the Apostles Peter and John. Unable to bear such a vision, St Sergius reverently prostrated himself before the Mother of God. She said to him, "Fear not, My chosen one! I have come to visit you. Your prayer for your disciples and your monastery has been heard. Do not be troubled, for your habitation shall prosper, not only in your lifetime, but also after your departure to God. I will be with your monastery, supplying its needs abundantly, and protecting it." Having said this, the Mother of God became invisible.

For a long time St Sergius was in an inexpressible rapture, and having come to himself, he raised up St Micah. "Tell me, Father," he asked, "what is the meaning of this miraculous vision? My soul nearly left my body from terror!" But St Sergius was silent, and only his luminous face spoke of the spiritual joy which he had experienced. "Wait a bit," he said finally to his disciple, "my soul also trembles because of this wondrous vision."

After a while St Sergius summoned two of his disciples, Sts Isaac and Simon, and shared with them the vision and the promise of the Theotokos. They all sang a Molieben to the Mother of God. St Sergius spent the remaining part of the night without sleep, calling to mind the divine vision.

The appearance of the Mother of God at the cell of St Sergius, at the present place of the Serapionov chamber, was on one of the Fridays of the Nativity Fast in the year 1385. The commemoration of the visit of the Mother of God to the Trinity monastery and of Her promise was reverently kept by the disciples of St Sergius.

On July 5, 1422 the holy relics of St Sergius were uncovered, and soon after an icon of the Appearance of the Mother of God was placed on the grave of St Sergius. The icon was honored with great reverence.

In the year 1446 Great Prince Basil (1425-1462) was besieged at the Trinity monastery by the armies of Princes Demetrius Shemyaka and John of Mozhaisk. He barricaded himself into the Trinity cathedral, and when he heard that he was being sought, he took the icon of the Appearance of the Mother of God and with it met Prince John at the southern church doors, saying: "Brother, we kissed the Life-Creating Cross and this icon in this church of the Life-Creating Trinity at this grave of the Wonderworker Sergius, that we would neither intend nor wish any evil to any of our brethren among ourselves. Now I do not know no what will happen to me here."

The Trinity monk Ambrose reproduced the icon of the Appearance of the Mother of God to St Sergius, carved in wood (mid-fourteenth century).

Tsar Ivan the Terrible took the icon of the Appearance of the Mother of God on his Kazan campaign (1552). The most famous icon, painted in the year 1588, was by the steward of the Trinity-Sergiev Lavra, Eustathius Golovkin on a board from the wooden reliquary of St Sergius, which was taken apart in the year 1585 when the relics of St Sergius were placed in a silver reliquary (August 14).

Through this icon, the Mother of God repeatedly protected the Russian army. Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich (1645-1676) took it on the Polish campaign in 1657. In the year 1703, the icon took part in all the military campaigns against the Swedish king Charles XII, and in 1812 Metropolitan Platon sent it to the Moscow military levy. The icon was carried in the Russo-Japanese War of 1905, and during World War I it was at the quarters of the supreme commander-in-chief in 1914.

A church was built over the grave of St Micah and at its consecration on December 10, 1734 was named in honor of the Appearance of the Most Holy Theotokos and the holy Apostles to St Sergius of Radonezh.

On September 27, 1841 the church was restored and consecrated by Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow , who said: "By the grace of the All-Holy and All-Sacred Spirit the restoration of this temple is now accomplished, fashioned before us in honor and memory of the Appearance of our Lady the Most Holy Theotokos to our holy God-bearing Father Sergius, to which St Micah was also an eyewitness."


The commemoration of this grace-bearing event is rightly marked by the consecration of a church, however, this whole monastery is a memorial of that miraculous visit. Therefore, its purpose in the continuing centuries was the fulfillment of the promise of the heavenly Visitor: "This place shall endure."

In memory of the visit of the Mother of God at the Trinity-Sergiev monastery, an Akathist to the Most Holy Theotokos is sung on Fridays, and a special service in honor of the appearance of the Mother of God is celebrated at the monastery on August 24, on the second day of the leave-taking of the Feast of the Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos.

Source

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The Salvation of a Thief Named John

by Saint Kosmas Aitolos

A MAN NAMED JOHN was defeated and he became a thief. He became the captain of a band of one hundred thieves, but he had great reverence for the Theotokos. Each morning and evening he read the service of Supplication to the Theotokos.

Wishing to save him because of the great reverence he had for the Theotokos, the gracious God sent a holy monk who was immediately captured by the thieves.

The monk said to them: "I beg you to take me to your captain because I have something to tell you for your own good."

They took him to the captain and he said: "Ask all the men to come so that I can tell you something."

The captain called them and they came. The monk said: "Aren't there any more?"

"I have a cook," the captain replied.

"Ask him to come." But when he came, the cook was unable to look at the monk and turned his face aside.

The monk then said to the cook: "In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ I command you to tell me who you are, who sent you, and what you are doing here."

The cook replied and said: "I'm a liar and I always speak falsely. But since you have bound me with the name of Christ, I can't but tell you the truth. I'm the devil and I was sent by my superior to work for the captain and to wait for the day when he wouldn't read the service of Supplication to the Theotokos to put him into hell. I have been watching him now for fourteen years and I have never found a day when he hasn't read the service."

The monk said: "I command you in the name of the Holy Trinity to disappear and no longer tempt Christians." And immediately the devil disappeared like smoke.

The monk then taught the thieves. Some became monks, others married and did good works and were saved. This is why I advise you all, men and women, to learn the service of Supplication and to use it in your prayers. And if you wish, take the book, The Salvation of Sinners, which contains the seventy miracles of the Theotokos, of which I told you one so that you might understand.

From Father Kosmas: The Apostle of the Poor by Nomikos M. Vaporis (Third Teaching).

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Press Conference for the Rebuilding of Ground Zero Church

August 23, 2010

FORMER GOVERNOR PATAKI REITERATES HIS SUPPORT FOR REBUILDING ST. NICHOLAS AT GROUND ZERO: Archbishop Demetrios Issues Statement

NEW YORK – As the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks approaches there is a ground-swell of public support for the re-building of St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church which was destroyed under the rubble of the fallen south tower on September 11, 2001 and a renewed and increasing media interest. Former Governor of New York George Pataki had from the very beginning committed his support for the re-building of St. Nicholas, in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy.

Today, representing His Eminence Archbishop Demetrios of America, Bishop Andonios of Phasiane, the Chancellor of the Archdiocese, joined former Governor Pataki and George Demos, candidate for U.S. Congress, in a press conference held at Ground Zero about the re-building of St. Nicholas and the stalled negotiations with the Port Authority.

Governor Pataki called upon the Port Authority to resume negotiations with the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese immediately, so the re-building process at 130 Liberty Street, the site that the Port Authority had promised all along, can start as soon as possible.

Archbishop Demetrios of America, who is on a trip visiting the island of Imvros with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, issued the following statement:

STATEMENT OF ARCHBISHOP DEMETRIOS

I take this opportunity to convey my heartfelt appreciation to former Governor George Pataki for his initiative this afternoon to address the concerns of not only our own community but also citizens across our nation and the world regarding the

rebuilding of St. Nicholas Church. Very soon after 9/11, the Governor expressed his commitment that this church would be rebuilt and this gathering manifests yet again that he is an honorable person who stands by his word. We are encouraged and deeply touched by this.

As it is well known, on September 11, 2001 our city and nation suffered a terrorist attack of unparalleled proportions. In addition to the tragic and horrific loss of almost 3,000 innocent victims, a number of whom were members of our own community, the world witnessed the unimaginable collapse of the Twin Towers. When the second Tower fell, it landed on and erased all traces of the Greek Orthodox Church of St. Nicholas, the only house of worship destroyed that day. Opened in 1916 by a group of Greek immigrants, the church not only served the spiritual needs of its parishioners but was also a sacred space in which people of all ethnic and religious backgrounds working in the surrounding area would often stop, light a candle and spend a few moments in prayer and reflection.

The Archdiocese and parish leadership of St. Nicholas remain firmly committed to the rebuilding of the church at 130 Liberty Street, honoring the long-standing agreement with the LMDC and the Port Authority. We believe and affirm that the new Church of St. Nicholas will have a far greater scope and outreach than a parish house of worship and envision the site as an appropriate memorial to the 3,000 innocent people of all Faiths who lost their lives that day. Trusting in Almighty God, we are hopeful that we will be successful in this sacred endeavor especially with the assistance and support of people such as our dear friend, Governor Pataki.

I convey my warmest paternal greetings and best wishes and invoke upon all of you the abundant blessings of the Almighty.

Archbishop Demetrios of America

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17 Worthwhile Quotes of G.K. Chesterton

Gilbert Keith Chesterton (29 May 1874 – 14 June 1936) was a British writer, critic and author of verse, essays, novels, and short stories. He often wrote from a Christian perspective.

1. "Impartiality is a pompous name for indifference, which is an elegant name for ignorance." The Speaker (15 December 1900)

2. "The truth is that Tolstoy, with his immense genius, with his colossal faith, with his vast fearlessness and vast knowledge of life, is deficient in one faculty and one faculty alone. He is not a mystic; and therefore he has a tendency to go mad. Men talk of the extravagances and frenzies that have been produced by mysticism; they are a mere drop in the bucket. In the main, and from the beginning of time, mysticism has kept men sane. The thing that has driven them mad was logic.

...The only thing that has kept the race of men from the mad extremes of the convent and the pirate-galley, the night-club and the lethal chamber, has been mysticism — the belief that logic is misleading, and that things are not what they seem." Tolstoy (1903)

3. "Reason is always a kind of brute force; those who appeal to the head rather than the heart, however pallid and polite, are necessarily men of violence. We speak of 'touching' a man's heart, but we can do nothing to his head but hit it." Twelve Types (1903) Charles II

4. "Briefly, you can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it." Daily News (25th February, 1905)

5. "When people impute special vices to the Christian Church, they seem entirely to forget that the world (which is the only other thing there is) has these vices much more. The Church has been cruel; but the world has been much more cruel. The Church has plotted; but the world has plotted much more. The Church has been superstitious; but it has never been so superstitious as the world is when left to itself." Illustrated London News (14 December 1907)

6. "The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected. Even when the revolutionist might himself repent of his revolution, the traditionalist is already defending it as part of his tradition. Thus we have two great types -- the advanced person who rushes us into ruin, and the retrospective person who admires the ruins. He admires them especially by moonlight, not to say moonshine. Each new blunder of the progressive or prig becomes instantly a legend of immemorial antiquity for the snob. This is called the balance, or mutual check, in our Constitution." Illustrated London News (1924)

7. "The riddles of God are more satisfying than the solutions of man." The Book of Job: An introduction (1907)

8. "When learned men begin to use their reason, then I generally discover that they haven't got any." Illustrated London News (7 November 1908)

9. "Among the rich you will never find a really generous man even by accident. They may give their money away, but they will never give themselves away; they are egotistic, secretive, dry as old bones. To be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough to want it." A Miscellany of Men (1912)

10. "These are the days when the Christian is expected to praise every creed except his own." Illustrated London News (11 August 1928)

11. "Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions." Illustrated London News (19 April 1930)

12. "What embitters the world is not excess of criticism, but an absence of self-criticism." Sidelights on New London and Newer New York (1932)

13. "For children are innocent and love justice, while most of us are wicked and naturally prefer mercy." The Coloured Lands (1938)

14. "The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful." Orthodoxy (1908)

15. "The great ideals of the past failed not by being outlived (which must mean over-lived), but by not being lived enough. Mankind has not passed through the Middle Ages. Rather mankind has retreated from the Middle Ages in reaction and rout. The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult and left untried." What's Wrong With The World (1910)

16. "A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it." The Everlasting Man (1925)

17. "It's the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense." The Oracle of the Dog (1923):

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The Annual Miracle of Panagia of Harou in Leipsi

Panagia of Harou is the name of the unique icon which depicts the Virgin Mary cradling the crucified Christ, rather than the Christ child, hence its name (haros in Greek means "death"). This icon is found in the Church of St. John the Theologian in Leipsi, Greece. The annual commemoration of the icon takes place on August 23 when the island of Leipsi fills with pilgrims from all over the Dodecanese, to witness the procession of the icon around the entire island and see the annual blossoming of the dead bouquet of lilies on the icon.

In 1943, during the Nazi Occupation, a family whose home was adjacent to the church tried faithfully and respectfully to save some of its meagre supply of oil in order to light the Virgin's vigil light. On the 25th of March 1943, the feast day of the Annunciation, the families youngest daughter left six white lillies in front of the Panagia's icon, together with a prayer for a speedy liberation of the country. The lillies wilted, then in August the flowers started to revive and on the 23rd of August they had sprouted 12 new buds and gave off a beautiful fragrance.

Ever since then, this miracle is repeated every year,except the year of the death of that devout young woman who first brought the flowers to the church. In spring, the devotees put lillies on the icon and the flowers are left there to wither. In an inexplicable way, the withered branches start giving buds and on the day of the celebration, they blossom and become fragrant. The inhabitants of the island consider this a special celebration. The pilgrims and the locals enjoy a feast after the Great Vespers, with food, drinks and dance to traditional music.

The Monastery of Panagia of Harou was built in the early 17th century when two monks from the island of Patmos came to Leipsi. The icon today is placed nearby at the Church of Saint John the Theologian for convenience.

A video about Leipsi and the miracle (6:40 and on in the first video) can be seen below.




ΑΠΟΛΥΤΙΚΙΟΝ: Ήχος α’. Της ερήμου πολίτης.
Την σεπτήν σου Εικόνα προσκυνούμεν Πανύμνητε, η του χάρου τη κλήσει προσφυώς επικέκληται. εν ταύτη γαρ τα κρίνα χλοερά, ορώντες μετά χρόνου παρολκήν, ανυμνούμεν σου την χάριν πανευλαβώς, Παρθένε ανακράζοντες. δόξα τοις μεγαλείοις σου Αγνή, δόξα τοις θαυμασίοις σου, δόξα τη προς ημάς σου προμηθεία Άχραντε.

ΚΟΝΤΑΚΙΟΝ: Ήχος δ’. Επεφάνης σήμερον.
Εν Λειψώ προστρέχοντες την σην εικόνα την του Χάρου Δέσποινα, περιπτυσσόμεθα πιστώς, την ευωδίαν καρπουμένοι, των εν αυτή θείων κρίνων υμνούντες σε.

ΜΕΓΑΛΥΝΑΡΙΟΝ
Έχει την εικόνα σου την σεπτήν η Λειψώ, Παρθένε, ως θησαύρισμα ιερόν, ήτις παρά πάντων, ωνόμασται του Χάρου, χαράν και ευφροσύνην πάσι παρέχουσαν.

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Preparing the Body of St. Dionysios in Zakynthos For Tonights Feast

The translation of the relics of St. Dionysios from the island of Strofadon to Zakynthos, which occurred in 1717, is celebrated annually on August 24th. The fathers of the monastery which hold his incorrupt relics reverently prepare the relics of their Protector by standing him in front of the Holy Altar. According to the order of services, he will stand here until tonights Great Vespers service, before which his relics will be processed around the Katholikon three times.

See photos here.

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The Miraculous Panagia Faneromeni of Nea Artaki in Evia

The Miraculous Appearance of the Faneromeni in Evia

The history of the original icon of Panagia Faneromeni dates back to the 12th century. It's location was revealed in a miraculous manner to the people of Kizikou in Asia Minor, who named it "the revealed one" (Faneromeni). Eventually a monastery was built on the spot of the discovery, and the icon was housed there until 1922 when the Orthodox were forced out of the region. Taking the icon with them, the people went to Constantinople, and the holy icon was placed in the Church of Saint George in the Patriarchate where it remains till this day.

These refugees, deprived of their homeland, their monastery and their holy icon, eventually came to Evia, Greece and settled in Nea Artaki. On 29 April 1951, which was Pascha Sunday, a miraculous event happened that was to forever change their ecclesiastical lives.

Eight girls between the ages of ten and twelve years old were playing near the beach and singing songs. Suddenly, a short distance from where they were, a woman of exceptional beauty dressed in black and kneeling in prayer appeared. She was wearing a golden wrist band (χρυσά επιμανίκια) and over her head was a black veil and a halo.

Seeing this, the girls became frightened and ran to their parents to tell them of this strange vision. When the parents arrived, the black-clad woman was gone. However, a trace of her presence was left behind with the imprint of her knees still in the dirt.

The little girls related their experience to the local parish priest the blessed Fr. Spyridon Athanasiou, and he in turn informed the blessed Metropolitan Gregory (Pleiatho) of Halkida (1922-1968). The Metropolitan invited the little girls to explain to him everything, informing him also that the woman had appeared in their dreams and explained she was the Panagia and on the spot of her appearance a church ought to be built. Following this, the Metropolitan gave his blessing to have a church erected in honor of the Panagia.

The Building of the Holy Shrine

The foundation stone of the holy church was laid by Metropolitan Gregory on 12 August 1951. Eventually a magnificent church was erected to the glory of God and the magnification of the All-Holy Theotokos. It was dedicated in 1969 by the blessed Metropolitan Nicholas of Halkidos (1968-1974).

On the spot where the vision of the black-clad woman was seen, a small chapel was built, and over this is the bell-tower. In the courtyard small shrines were made to different scenes of the life of Christ and the Panagia. On the southern part of the courtyard is the Lazareio Spiritual Center which contains the offices of the parish, a school to learn Byzantine music, a library, and other things for the spiritual development of the community. In the west side of the courtyard is a hall where refreshments are served following the Divine Liturgy for the fellowship of the faithful.

The Church celebrates its feast day on August 23rd, which is the Apodosis of the Dormition of the Theotokos.

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The Monastery of Panagia Mavriotissa in Kastoria

The Monastery of Panagia Mavriotissa (Greek: Παναγία Μαυριώτισσα) is a monastery that is built on the spot where troops of Roman military commander George Palaiologos encircled the attacking Normans in 1083. It is believed that the emperor Alexios I Komnenos (r. 1081-1118) built the monastery there to commemorate the event and to honor the Panagia to whom he ascribed the victory.

Surrounding the region of the lake of Kastoria there are 72 churches and chapels, Mavriotissa being one of the earliest of them.

The monastery was initially named Mesonesiotissa ("in the middle of the island") and in the beginning of the 17th century it renamed itself to Krepenitissa ("of Krepeni") after the name of the nearby village Krepeni. Sometime from the middle to late 17th century it changed its name to Mavriotissa ("of Mavrovo") after the Greek village Mavrovo near Kastoria.

The monastery was a significant landowner in the village of Krepeni. It was occupied at one time by many monks. It no longer functions as a monastery and up until recently was in severe disrepair. In 1998 Metropolitan Seraphim of Kastoria undertook a restoration of the monastery and began celebrating services once again. Its feast day is August 23, the Apodosis of the Dormition of the Theotokos, and is celebrated with an all-night vigil in which many faithful attend.

Apolytikion
Καστορίας της λίμνης Κυρία πάνσεμνε, η δωρουμένη την νίκην κατά βαρβάρων ορδών ευσεβέσι, Θεοτόκε Μαυριώτισσα, πάντας αξίωσον πιστούς θριαμβεύσαι τον εχθρόν και πέμψον σην ευλογίαν και χάριν τοις προσκυνούσι την θαυματόβρυτον εικόνα σου.

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Anchi Icon of the Savior Is Travelling the World

August 20, 2010
ROCOR Official Website

Late in the evening of August 4, 2010, a group of Georgian Orthodox pilgrims brought a copy of the Anchi Icon of the Savior to Archangel Michael Church in Cannes, France. This is a copy of the oldest Orthodox icon of Georgia. By the blessing of His Holiness the Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II, a group of pilgrims has been traveling with this icon throughout Orthodox churches and monasteries of the world. The aim of the visits is to return the original icon from the State Museum of Art of Georgia, where it has been located since the 20th century.

The Anchi Savior is one of the most venerated of Georgian images. In ancient times, the icon was in Anchi Monastery in southwest Georgia, whence in 1664 it was transferred to the 6th-century Nativity of the Theotokos Church in Tbilisi, at which time it became known as the “Anchiskhati” icon. According to Bishop John of the 12th century, a famous Georgian hymnographer, the Anchi Savior was brought by Holy Apostle Andrew the First-called from Hierapolis to Klarjeti. Georgian tradition identifies this icon with the Edessa Icon “Not-made-by-hands.”

The copy of the Anchi Icon, traveling throughout France, has already visited the Georgian Church of Holy Queen Tamara in the outskirts of Paris and St Nicholas Cathedral in Nice. Priest Maksim Massalitine performed a moleben to the Lord Jesus Christ before the icon at the Russian Orthodox Archangel Michael Church in Cannes with the presence of local representatives of the Georgian diaspora. After the service, at which Georgian prayers were sung, the pilgrims shared a small trapeza with the parishioners of the church.

The Anchi Savior Icon also visited Orthodox churches in Rome and Bari, Italy, after which it departed for Holy Mount Athos.

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The Power In Crossing Ourselves

by St. Nikolai Velimirovich

Mysterious is the power of the Cross no matter how unexplainable, it is true and indisputable.

Yet, St. John Chrysostom speaks of the custom of his time that the sign of the cross is attached "on the emperor's diadem, on the accouterments of the soldiers and tracing it on parts of the body: the head, the breast [chest] and the heart and also on the table of oblations and over beds." "If it is necessary to expel demons", says he, "we use the cross and it also helps to heal the sick."

St. Benedict made the sign of the cross over a glass which contained poison and the glass burst as though it were struck by a stone.

St. Julian made the sign of the cross over a glass of poison brought to him and drank the poison, but he did not feel any pain in his body.

The Holy Female Martyr Vasilissa of Nicomedia enveloped herself with the sign of the cross, stood amidst the flames and remained unharmed.

The Holy Martyrs Audon and Senis crossed themselves when the wild beasts were released on them and the beasts became docile and meek as lambs.

Among the ascetics of old, as it is today, the sign of the cross was the most powerful weapon against the temptations of the demons.

The most horrible fears of the devil vanish into nothing, as smoke, when man traces the sign of the cross over himself.

Thus, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself willed to the one time sign of crime and shame, the Cross, following His crucifixion on the wood of the cross, all victorious power and might.

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A Miracle of the Panagia in 1694 Kefallonia

In 1694 the island of Kefallonia was invaded by fierce pirates, as was common on the island in those days. Along with their treasures and their booty, they would also steal young men and women to sell for a hefty price at their bazaars in the East.

In the village of Agios Dimitrios which neighbors Lixouri, they arrested three young men and brought them bound in chains to the North African city of Algiers. There they were thrown in a dark cell awaiting their ill-fated end. There the walls of the prison groaned with pain emanating from the other prisoners. The prison was filled with Greek-speaking Romans who would constantly offer up supplications to the All-Holy Virgin to deliver them and console them. The prisoners knew they were hopeless without her aid.

In the midst of such hopelessness, darkness and pain the three young men prayed to the Panagia to deliver them from a martyric end and have them die there in the prison quietly. They said:

"Our Panagia, do not abandon us to an evil death. Take us with you. Ease us from our pain."

As they prayed, they fell asleep...and awoke hearing birds. With their hands and feet tied with heavy chains, the three young men questioned this. "What is that sound, my brothers?" asked one of the Kefallonians. With that question they began to hear a joyful bell. And in front of them they saw their village! The Panagia brought them miraculously from North Africa to their village which was celebrating the Apodosis of the Dormition of the Theotokos on August 23rd.

They went to the church of the Panagia and saw their mothers and relatives. Still in chains, the three young men embraced them and all were in tears from their joy and their miraculous deliverance. After venerating the icon of the Panagia, the three young men mutually decided to become monastics and dedicate their lives to God.

If you visit this village and church today you will see the chains which held these young men in bondage hanging near the icon of the Panagia as a testimony to the reality of their miraculous deliverance. It was near this church that they built two monastic cells which became the first Hesychasterion.

To commemorate this event, a plaque reads: "The miracle occurred on 23 August 1694. Iakovos, Georgios, and Ioannis. Rejoice, for you were freed from the corruption of death through the prayers of the Mother of God."

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Mariza Koch's "Panagia Mou, Panagia Mou"

Mariza Koch is a popular Greek folk singer and was born in Athens on March 14, 1944 to a Greek mother and a German father. Her father was executed by the Nazi occupation forces the very year of her birth and Mariza and her sister Eirini grew up in her mother's native Santorini. At age 19 she returned to Athens to take music lessons. She first recorded an album - "Arabas" - in 1971 and soon established herself as a premier folk singer.

On 13 April 1976 she took part in the Eurovision Song contest, held in The Hague, Netherlands, with the song "Panagia mou, Panagia mou". This was the second entry for Greece in Eurovision, the first being in 1974. Greece did not take part in Eurovision in 1975 due to the Turkish invasion of Cyprus and Eurovision allowing Turkey to participate. "Panagia mou, Panagia mou" was written in protest of the Turkish occupation of Cyprus and is an outcry against Turkish foreign policy.

Composed by Koch herself with lyrics by Michael Fotiades, Michalis Rozakis conducted the orchestra. At the close of voting, the performance had received 20 points, placing it 13th in a field of 18.

Koch was 31 years old for this performance and applied her background in Byzantine and folk music with the contemporary popular music of the 1970's to offer Europe one of Greece's best performances. It is a song to the Virgin Mary to look upon devasted Cyprus and console her people.

Lyrics in Greek

Κάμπος γεμάτος πορτοκάλια, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Που πέρα ως πέρα απλώνετ' η ελιά
Γύρω χρυσίζουν τ' ακρογιάλια, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Και σε θαμπώνει, θαμπώνει η αντηλιά

Στον τόπο αυτό όταν θα πάτε, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Σκηνές αν δείτε, αν δείτε στη σειρά
Δε θα 'ναι κάμπινγκ για τουρίστες, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Θα 'ναι μονάχα, μονάχα προσφυγιά

Παναγιά μου, Παναγιά μου, παρηγόρα την καρδιά μου!
Παναγιά μου, Παναγιά μου, παρηγόρα την καρδιά μου!

Κι αν δείτε ερείπια γκρεμισμένα, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Δεν θα 'ναι απ' άλλες, απ' άλλες εποχές
Από ναπάλμ θα 'ναι καμένα, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Θα 'ναι τα μύρια χαλάσματα του χτες

Κι αν δείτε γη φρεσκοσκαμμένη, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Δεν θα 'ναι κάμπος, 'ναι κάμπος καρπερός
Σταυροί θα είναι φυτεμένοι, όι-όι, μάνα μου!
Που τους σαπίζει, σαπίζει ο καιρός

Παναγιά μου, Παναγιά μου, παρηγόρα την καρδιά μου!
Παναγιά μου, Παναγιά μου, παρηγόρα την καρδιά μου!



Lyrics in English

Fields full of oranges, oh oh my Mother!
Where olive trees spread from end to end
Around them, the seashores shine like gold, oh oh my Mother!
And you're blinded, blinded by the intense light

When you go to this place, oh oh my Mother!
And you see, you see tents in a row
It's not a camping place for tourists, oh oh my Mother!
They're only, only refugees

Panagia mou, Panagia mou soothe my heart
Panagia mou, Panagia mou soothe my heart

And if you see shattered ruins, oh oh my Mother!
It's not from other, from other eras
It is burnt by napalm, oh oh my Mother!
Since yesterday, there are countless crumbled rocks

And if you see newly dug land, oh oh my Mother!
They're not fertile fields, fields
There will be crosses planted on them, oh oh my Mother!
Which will decompose, decompose through time

Panagia mou, Panagia mou soothe my heart
Panagia mou, Panagia mou soothe my heart

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The Danger of Remembrance of Past Sins

by St. Nikolai Velimirovich

When a man once truly repents, he need not think any more about the sins he committed so that he will not sin again.

St. Anthony counsels: "Be careful that your mind not be defiled with the remembrance of former sins and that the remembrance of those sins not be renewed in you."

Again, in another place, St. Anthony says: "Do not establish your previously committed sins in your soul by thinking about them so that they not be repeated in you. Be assured that they are forgiven you from the time that you gave yourself to God and repentance. In that, do not doubt."

It is said of St. Ammon that he attained such perfection that from much goodness he was not aware that evil exists anymore. When they asked him what is that "narrow and difficult path" (Matthew 7:14), he replied: "That it is the restraining of one's thoughts and severing of one's desires in order to fulfill the will of God."

Whoever restrains sinful thoughts, does not think of his own sins or the sins of others neither of anything corruptible nor of anything earthly. The mind of such a man is continually in heaven where there is no evil. Thus, in him, sin gradually ceases to be, even in his thoughts.

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Bruce Chatwin's Journey to Mount Athos

Nicholas Shakespeare, the acclaimed biographer of Bruce Chatwin, follows the great travel writer on his final mysterious journey – to Mount Athos, a monastery overlooking the Aegean Sea.

By Nicholas Shakespeare
16 August 2010
Telegraph.co.uk

A strange osmosis takes place when you write the life of another person. After Bruce Chatwin died, his widow Elizabeth gave me the maté gourd that he had taken with him on his travels, together with its silver bombilla – the metal straw through which he sucked his addictive tea, like any Argentine farmhand. At times over the next seven years, I had the sudden deep conviction that I was absorbing the world through his perforated silver straw.

In the course of following Chatwin’s songline, I met his family and friends – some of whom became my friends. In Birmingham, I had tea with the charlady responsible for dusting the contents of his grandmother’s cabinet, including the scrap of giant sloth that had formed the genesis for In Patagonia. “It used to put the creeps up on me, an old bit of blacky, browny bristly stuff as didn’t look very nice at all… I thought it was only monkey fur.” In 1991, I drove with Elizabeth from Buenos Aires to Tierra del Fuego, to the cave on Last Hope Sound from where Chatwin’s cousin had salvaged the original hide – believed by the infant Chatwin to be a piece of brontosaurus.

In Sydney, I poked my nose into Ken’s Karate Club, a “sex on premises” venue designed in imitation of a fantasy Roman baths, with horned satyrs and concrete putti (from a garden supply shop). Near Alice Springs, I camped under the stars with the man on whom Chatwin had modelled Arkady, the protagonist of The Songlines. And so on, through 27 countries.

My biography of Chatwin was published in 1999, 10 years after he died of AIDS. But in all the travels I had undertaken, there was one significant journey I overlooked.

In 1985, following his second visit to Australia, where he had picked up a mysterious illness, Chatwin was in Greece, grinding out another draft of The Songlines, when he interrupted his work to make a pilgrimage to Mount Athos. Before leaving, he wrote breezily to the Australian novelist Murray Bail: “Athos is obviously another atavistic wonder.”

Up until that moment Chatwin had not impressed friends as religious. “There was never, not a word talked about God,” says Patrick Leigh Fermor, his host in Greece, reflecting on their conversations over five months. Elizabeth was, and remains, a practicing Catholic. In preparation for their wedding, Chatwin had taken religious instruction from a Jesuit in London. “Nearly became a Catholic,” he wrote in his notebook. Then, just before they were married, Elizabeth’s parish priest in New York State gave her a leaflet explaining why she should not marry a non-Catholic. “That put Bruce off forever,” says Elizabeth. Thereafter, his religious faith became subsumed in his nomadic theory: he believed that movement made religion redundant and only when people settled did they need it.

Since his illness, there were signs of a sea change. One entry in his notebooks reads: “The search for nomads is a search for God.” Another: “Religion is a technique for arriving at the moment of death at the right time.” While recuperating with Elizabeth in Nepal, his thoughts had turned to a man’s athos “in the Greek sense of abode or dwelling place – the root of all his behaviour for good or bad, his character, everything that pertained to him.”

Of Chatwin’s friends, the diarist James Lees-Milne and the artist Derek Hill were regular visitors to the sacred, all-male enclave of Mount Athos. He importuned both to take him. Lees-Milne recorded in August 1980: “No, Bruce, I said, ‘you can't’. I was, I fear, rather bossy.” Next, Chatwin asked Hill, who had visited 15 times. Hill was a friend of the Abbot of Chilandari Monastery, who could facilitate their permits. Finally, in May 1985, Hill agreed to accompany Chatwin. He told me: “I was slightly apprehensive because he was a great complainer. I thought he’d find the monks smelly or the beds hard or that the loos stank. But it was a revelation to him.”

One afternoon after his usual maté (mistaken by the cook for hashish), Chatwin walked to the monastery of Stavronikita, once painted by Edward Lear. He puffed towards it with his heavy rucksack. “The most beautiful sight of all was an iron cross on a rock by the sea,” he wrote. From where he stood – just below the monastery – the black cross appeared to be striving up against the white foam.

Then these words: “There must be a God.”

Beyond this entry in his notebook, Chatwin was uncharacteristically silent. “He didn’t talk about it, but I knew by his whole bearing that it had affected him,” said Hill. The artist had known Chatwin for 20 years and had no doubt that as Bruce gazed down on that iron cross he was ambushed by a spiritual experience that unfroze something in him. “I think it hit him like a bomb.”

Elizabeth says: “When he came back, he said to me, ‘I had no idea it could be like that.’ It wasn’t like his other voyages of discovery. It was completely internal.”

The memory of that moment returned to Chatwin a year later when he collapsed, hallucinating, in Zurich. One of his hallucinations was of a fresco of Christ on Mount Athos. Back in England, during a brief period of remission, he went several times to see Kallistos Ware, a Bishop of the Greek Orthodox faith living in Oxford, to discuss the possibility of becoming Orthodox. “What he wanted was to be received by baptism on the Holy Mountain since the Holy Mountain had played such a decisive part in his conversion,” Ware tells me.

Unknown virtually to anyone, Chatwin planned a second trip to Athos in which, as part of the baptism ceremony, he would renounce the devil, breathe and spit on him and return to Christ. “I offered to receive him myself,” Ware says, “but we were overtaken by events.” On January 19 1989, Chatwin died in Nice. At his memorial service in the Greek Orthodox Church in Bayswater, Ware relayed his wishes to a frankly astonished congregation: “Bruce was always a traveller and he died before all his journeys could be completed and his journey into Orthodoxy was one of his unfinished voyages.”

Last September, after finishing with Elizabeth the editing of Chatwin’s letters, I decided to visit Mount Athos. My aim was simple: to find that simple metal cross. But an English priest warned me on the eve of my departure: “Nobody goes to Athos by accident. Whatever you think you are going for is not the reason.”

Mount Athos is actually a finger of steep wooded land that extends 37 miles into the Aegean, culminating in a 9,842ft peak of crystalline limestone. The peninsula is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, who stopped off here on her way to Cyprus and jealously forbade any subsequent woman to set foot. This rule, enshrined in AD970 in the charter of the Grand Lavra, the first of Athos’s 20 monasteries, stated that monks “may not defile their eyes with the sight of anything female”, a stricture not relaxed even in favour of chickens. Under Greek law, a woman caught on Athos today faces an automatic prison sentence of up to 12 months.

“With no one to nag them, the monks often live to a hundred,” says a stout pilgrim whose whiskers sprout at a brigandish angle from his chin. We are on board the ferry from Ouranoupolis, the only way to reach Athos.

It’s a bright, hot day. I elect to walk to the Monastery of Vatopedi where I am staying the night. The journey takes all afternoon, the white cobbled path twisting through woods of Spanish chestnut, past ruined stone fountains, over bridges spanning dried-up rivers. Thirsty and perspiring, I long for a freshwater stream to plunge in – although, from a former British diplomat, John Ure, I have gathered that Athonite monks deplore nakedness. Ure told me how, as a young pilgrim here, he once stripped off to splash himself in a stream, when a hermit emerged from a cave above him, screamed and ran off covering his eyes. Later, Ure arrived at the Grand Lavra to find the monks in a state of excitement. They had received a visit from one of the holiest hermits on the peninsula, who had broken his vow of silence to report a vision he had seen: John the Baptist baptising in his local stream – his telltale body radiating with “a shining whiteness unlike any normal mortal”. Already they were discussing the erection of a stained-glass window.

The gatekeeper at Vatopedi is Father Theano from Brisbane. Does he miss Australia? “The grace of God sustains you. You forget the past and keep an eye on the future.” He is dead to the world he has left behind, which is why he wears black. But Father Theano is far from gloomy. He brims with news of a minor miracle that occurred at Vatopedi last July. An old monk, Father Joseph, had died in huge pain with a terrible expression on his face. “We couldn’t close his mouth. We asked the Abbot if we should bind it shut, but he said, ‘No, let it hang open’ – and when we came out of the liturgy his mouth was closed in a tremendous smile. Look, I have a photo,” and from his black robe Father Theano produces a portrait of a bearded corpse with cheeks like polished doorknobs, beaming. “That is what sanctification is. It comes from within you.”

Vatopedi, founded in 972, is the peninsula’s second oldest monastery and its largest. Its luxuriant church accommodates 107 monks from 12 countries. I watch them at Vespers flit across the water-veined marble floor. Their destination: half a dozen holy icons which they proceed to kiss in a way that reminds me of a scatter of swallows sipping the surface of a glassy pond; then, adjusting their hats, they sit down in squeaking stalls, faces in mid-distance reverie, beneath frescoes that Robert Byron, revered by Chatwin beyond all writers, considered the finest in the world.

Chatwin was so enthralled by the chanting of the Kyrie eleison, the words unchanged for more than a millennium, that he made a scene with some noisy Greek pilgrims, “demanding hushes at once and interrupting the service”. My solecism is to sit cross-legged. From nowhere, a black stick appears and wallops me – the wielder, a small wax-faced monk whose long white beard accounts for a quarter of him.

Chastened, I uncross my legs and go on listening. To the singers, the plainsong serves to enthrone their veneration for the Mother of God. Whatever one’s belief – and as Patrick Leigh Fermor reminds us, “no living man, after all, is in a position to declare their premises true or false” – the mysterious scallops of sound are absolutely transporting to hear live. “To anyone who has sojourned beneath the Holy Mountain,” Robert Byron wrote of Athos, “there cannot but have come an intensification of his impulse to indefinable, unanalysable emotion.”

In roughly such a state, Chatwin must have shouldered his rucksack and wandered down to Stavronikita.

Father Theano watches me leave. He arrived on Athos 20 years ago, but has never done the walk to Stavronikita. “I liked walking when I was young, but all things in moderation.”

It’s late in the morning when the castle-like building comes into sight, perched on a cliff above the Aegean. There is no swell and the sea is smoother than shell. Suddenly I spot it. A small black metal cross on a ledge of white rock, facing the bay.

It’s too dangerous to clamber down, so I stand and contemplate it. I shall not attempt to describe the sensation of trying to shed the load of a 19-year involvement, but my anticipation is shot through by an extraordinary blankness. I realise that I had been willing for some sign or emotion, however slight, to tell me that my journey was really over.

After a long interval I turn and walk up the hill to the monastery, where a surprise awaits me.

Fumblingly at the gate, I explain my mission to the monk who brings out a silver tray containing the traditional offering of loukoumi (Turkish Delight), tsipouro (ouzo) and water. He invites me inside to look at the church. I follow him though a door, into a chapel at once more intimate than at Vatopedi, small, dark, marvellous. In pride of place beneath the gold corona, staring out from the top of a base shaped like a squat grandfather clock, is a glassed-in icon of a bearded man.

The face is composed of mosaic fragments and there is a deep gash from the left brow down to the lip.

The monk explains that the icon arrived over the sea of its own volition from Byzantium.

“And the gash?”

Caused either by pirates who tossed it into the sea, or else by an oyster that a local fisherman found clamped to its forehead when he dragged it up in his net.

“Who is he?”

The monk gives me an impatient glance. “Saint Nicholas” – to whom Stavronikita is dedicated.

A name can mean nothing. But in that moment, in that space, it humbled me to learn, as I gazed around at frescoes that depicted scenes from the life of my patron saint, a name can mean more than a lot.

* Under the Sun: the Letters of Bruce Chatwin, selected and edited by Elizabeth Chatwin and Nicholas Shakespeare, will be published in September by Cape

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A Miracle of Panagia Pantanassa at Porto Lagos in 2005

Saint Nicholas of Porto Lagos on Lake Vistonida is an old monastery dependency of Vatopaidi Monastery on Mount Athos. The complex of the monastery is built on two small islands in the lagoon of Porto Lagos. A wooden pedestrian bridge connects the two islands and a second one links them with the mainland. On one island resides the Church of St. Nicholas and on the second one the more modern Chapel of Panagia Pantanassa where there is a copy of the miraculous image whose original resides at Vatopaidi Monastery.

In August of 2005 a great miracle happened at the Chapel of Panagia Pantanassa that made the newspapers in Greece. It concerns a little girl named Anastasia, who was buried in Cyprus after a battle with cancer, yet seen in Porto Lagos walking the bridge of the church later that day holding the hand of a nun.


Fr. Nimphonos of Vatopaidi Monastery, an eye-witness, relates his experience as follows:

"We are moved because these past days we were chanting Supplications to our Panagia, for the feast of her Dormition, especially on behalf of a nine year old girl from Cyprus, little Anastasia, who was suffering from lung cancer.

On Sunday little Anastasia fell asleep in the Lord, and on Monday was her funeral in Cyprus. At 4:30 in the evening a pilgrim from Kavala, unknown to us and not knowing anything about the little girl, went to venerate the Panagia in our church. Coming out of the church he met on the bridge of the church a nun who was holding the hand of a little girl. The nun told him that the little girl was not hers but was taking her with her, and she went towards the church.

The young man was confused and thought that the nun was taking the little child to the monastery to become a monastic. He followed her to ask her from which monastery she was from. He waited fifteen minutes for her to come out, but seeing that she was taking a long time he entered the church, but the nun and the little girl had disappeared. He looked everywhere, even in the altar area, but all in vain for she was not to be found.

He then ran to me, told me what happened, and asked me to search even hidden corners of the altar area. I asked him about the little girl and what she was wearing. I showed him photographs we have here from other Supplication services, and once he saw young Anastasia, he told me with conviction: 'This is the little girl'. I asked him: 'Are you sure?' He emphatically answered: 'YES!' I explained to him that this little girl was buried this morning in Cyprus and explained the whole story. I was moved to tears, as was the young man, and he asked me: 'And who was the nun?'

'It must have been the Panagia', I told him, and it was then that the young man was very moved and began to cry hard and continually.

We know the Panagia is always present in this place and it is our only boast that she comes near us."


From the newspaper Χρόνος (Hronos) out of Xanthi. The photos in the newspaper article below first show the copy of Panagia Pantanassa, and below is a photo of Fr. Nimphon and another of little Anastasia.

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Excavations Begin in Nyssa in Western Turkey

August 19, 2010
Hurriyet Daily News

Archaeologists have begun excavations at the ancient Greek city of Nyssa, in western Turkey, where they hope to find new artifacts around the theater, agora and gymnasium.

Professor Vedat İdil, head of the excavation team from Ankara University, said the team, comprised of Turkish, Canadian and American architects, archaeologists and historians, plans to work until October this year.

Nyssa is located in the Sultanhisar district of Aydın province, 50 kilometers east of the Ionian city of Ephesus. There are important ruins on the site from the Hellenistic period, the Roman period and the Byzantine era. Much of the open-air Greek theater and its walled entrances are still intact. The library currently has three walls.

There are remnants of a gymnasium, a Roman bath and a bouleuterion. The 100-meter Nyssa Bridge, a tunnel-like substructure, was the second largest of its kind in antiquity.

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The Conversion of Egypt Prophecied By Isaiah the Prophet

by St. Nikolai Velimirovich

"And the Lord shall be known to Egypt and the Egyptians shall know the Lord in that day and shall do sacrifice and oblation; yes, they shall vow a vow unto the Lord and perform it" (Isaiah 19:21).

O how changeable is the heart of man! But, of all of his changes, one is more shameful than the most shameful and that is: when a believer becomes an unbeliever.

Of all his changes, one is more glorious than the most glorious and that is: when the unbeliever converts and becomes a believer.

The first change occurred with the Israelites who killed Christ and the other occurred with the Egyptians who believed in Christ.

At one time, Egypt was the greatest persecutor of those who believed in the one, living God, for at one time, the Egyptians had many lifeless gods, idols and things that they worshipped, fables and soothsayers by which they were deceived. But behold what the prophet fortells! What a wonderful vision! The Egyptians will recognize the One and the Living Lord at the time when the Lord appears in the flesh among mankind. Idols will be destroyed, the temples of the demons and animals will be overthrown and the altar of oblation of the Living and One God will be established and raised up. The Bloodless Sacrifice will be offered in place of the bloody sacrifice and the rational in place of the irrational.

Hundreds and thousands of monks will take upon themselves the vows of poverty, obedience, fasting, and prayer out of love for the Lord. The greatest ascetics will appear in this once darkened Egypt; the bravest martyrs for Christ the Lord; the most enlightened minds; the most discerning miracle-workers. O, what a wonderful vision! And how wonderful is the realization of that vision!

St. Chrysostom writes: "Neither the sun, with its multitude of stars, is not as glowing as much as the wilderness of Egypt with all of its monks." All was realized in truth, that was foreseen and foretold by Isaiah, the son of Amos, the discerning and true prophet.

O compassionate Lord who showed mercy on Egypt, the one time persecutor of Your faithful, and illumined it with the light of truth, illumine us also and strengthen us by Your Holy Spirit and by the example of the great Christians of Egypt. To You be glory and thanks always. Amen.

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The Church and Relics of the Prophet Samuel in Constantinople

The Holy Prophet Samuel (Feast Day - August 20)

1 Samuel 25:1 says the Prophet Samuel was buried in his own house in Ramah, and over his tomb a sanctuary was built. This place housed the relics of the Prophet until the early fifth century.

According to the historians of the time, especially through the Chronicon Paschale, the arrival of the relics of the Prophet Samuel in Constantinople was a joyous and reverential event and he was received as if the living Prophet himself made his way into the city. His ashes, deposited in a golden vase, and covered with a silken veil, were delivered by the bishops into each other's hands. There had been an uninterrupted procession from Palestine through the highways leading up to Chalcedon by “one great swarm of people”; the emperor Arcadius himself, at the head of the most illustrious members of the clergy and senate, advanced to meet his extraordinary guest, who had always deserved and claimed the homage of kings. According to the Chronicon Paschale, the prophet’s body arrived in Constantinople “with Arcadius Augustus leading the way, and Anthemius, pretorian prefect and former consul, Aemilianus, city prefect, and all the senate.” When the prophet finally arrived at the ‘Chalcedonian jetty’, his body was carried to the Great Church, where he was “laid to rest for a certain time”. This occurred on May 19, 406. A few years later, on 5 October 411, the relics were removed from Hagia Sophia and laid to rest in a sanctuary dedicated to the name of the Prophet Samuel newly built near the Church of St. John the Baptist at the Hebdomon. The church collapsed during the earthquake of December 14, 557 and it was probably never repaired after that as it does not appear in any other historical records.

The horn which the Prophet Samuel had used to anoint David was stored in Nea Ekklēsia which was a church built by Roman Emperor Basil I the Macedonian in Constantinople between the years 876–80.


Below is an excerpt of a letter of St. Jerome to Vigilantius in which he defends the veneration of holy relics, and in which he mentions the transfer of the relics of the Prophet Samuel from Judea to Thrace in his lifetime:

Are we, therefore guilty of sacrilege when we enter the basilicas of the Apostles? Was the Emperor Constantius I guilty of sacrilege when he transferred the sacred relics of Andrew, Luke, and Timothy to Constantinople? In their presence the demons cry out, and the devils who dwell in Vigilantius confess that they feel the influence of the saints. And at the present day is the Emperor Arcadius guilty of sacrilege, who after so long a time has conveyed the bones of the blessed Samuel from Judea to Thrace? Are all the bishops to be considered not only sacrilegious, but silly into the bargain, because they carried that most worthless thing, dust and ashes, wrapped in silk in golden vessel? Are the people of all the Churches fools, because they went to meet the sacred relics, and welcomed them with as much joy as if they beheld a living prophet in the midst of them, so that there was one great swarm of people from Palestine to Chalcedon with one voice reechoing the praises of Christ? They were forsooth, adoring Samuel and not Christ, whose Levite and prophet Samuel was.


Apolytikion in the Second Tone
As we celebrate the memory of Thy Prophet Samuel, O Lord, through him we beseech Thee to save our souls.

Kontakion in the Plagal of the Fourth Tone
Thy hallowed mother dedicated thee unto the Lord even before she had conceived thee; and when thou wast born thou didst serve Him from thine infancy like an Angel. And, O Prophet of the Most High, for thy fervent faith, thou wast granted to foretell things that should come to pass. Hence, we cry to thee: Rejoice, O ven'rable Samuel.

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