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April 7, 2021

Elder Savvas Lappas, a Spiritual Child of St. Savvas of Kalymnos and St. Amphilochios Makris


Elder Savvas Lappas, born in 1903 and baptized with the name Nikephoros, was a spiritual child of Saint Savvas of Kalymnos (1862-1948) on the island of Kalymnos and then a spiritual child of Saint Amphilochios Makris (1888-1970) on the island of Patmos. After living in asceticism on the island of Patmos for about twenty years, in 1960, at the age of 57 he returned to Kalymnos, took the name of his first spiritual father, Savvas, and lived in asceticism in the Hut of the Elevation of the Honorable Cross in Kantouni of Kalymnos until his death in 1992, on the 7th of April, which is the feast of his Elder, Saint Savvas of Kalymnos.

Monk Moses the Athonite wrote a book about Elder Savvas, noting his many virtues and spiritual gifts. He was most distinguished for his clairvoyance, silence and tears. Among the noteworthy events of his life together with his two holy spiritual fathers, 1) on one occasion in Kalymnos, while helping Saint Savvas of Kalymnos during the Divine Liturgy, he saw with his own eyes the consecrated Bread and Wine change into a slaughtered Infant on the Altar, with blood running down, which shocked him at his core, and 2) one night in Patmos, while praying on his knees outside his cell, he saw a pillar of light descend from Heaven and he was immersed in it, and not knowing what to make of it, Saint Amphilochios explained to him what the uncreated light of God was.