Upon the recommendation of His Eminence Metropolitan Paul of Drama to the Holy Synod of the Church of Greece and then to the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the official canonization to the List of Saints in the Orthodox Church took place of the last emperor of Trebizond, David the Great Komnenos.
Metropolitan Paul of Drama wrote the following to all his spiritual children:
Beloved children in the Lord,
The honor has been granted to me, the least of bishops, and the clergy in having asked from the Holy Synod of the Most-holy Church of Greece, after the sacred-canonical work, for the formal inclusion in the List of Saints of the Eastern Orthodox Church the last emperor of Trebizond David the Great Komnenos, and his three children Basil, George and Manuel, as well as his nephew and successor to the throne Alexios, who faced a martyric end in Constantinople on the 1st of November in 1463.
This inclusion into the official List of Saints of the Church of the martyrs above, in the year 2013, after 550 years have passed since their martyric end (1463-2013) is a sacred obligation of the entire Church, and especially of those who originate from Pontus both in our conscience and those who have the knowledge of the history of our martyric homeland, these being a good beginning for the neomartyrs of Pontus.
The Holy Synod of the Church of Greece, adopting my humble proposition, remitted my file report to the most-sacred Ecumenical Throne.
Wherefore, our venerable Master, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, dispatched this file to be sufficiently studied among the eminent hierarchs of the Sacred Synod with him for their consideration, invoking the All-Holy and sanctifying Divine Spirit, sacred-canonically declaring by a Patriarchal and Synodal Act issued on the tenth of July of the salvific year of two thousand and thirteen, including in the choir of Holy Martyrs of the Eastern Orthodox Church these beautiful conquerors and Neomartyrs, assigning their holy memory to be honored annually on the 1st of November, the day of their martyric perfection.
They fulfilled this sacred purpose towards the end of the recapture of Trebizond, Saint David the Great Komnenos and those gathered with him. We notify with blessed joy by the inspiration of the All-Holy Spirit for the lovers of martyrs to celebrate with those throughout the earth who lived in Pontus, asking his intercessions to our Master Christ for all pious Christians who honor their sacred memory as well as those who were born in our fatherland, the "unforgotten" Pontus.
† Paul of Drama
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos
