On Expatriation and Voluntary Exile 4

A Serbian monk from Chilandari did not leave his cell for forty years.

* * *

St. Leontios from Dionysiou did not know where the exit door of the monastery was for seventy-five years, until he departed eternally to the Lord.

* * *

One hundred years ago there lived and reposed in peace in a barren hut of St. Anne's Skete a Serbian prince of the family of Vragovich, called Monk Theokletos. As an ascetic he laboured hard in exile. For this reason he was blessed with the grace of the all-giving and merciful God.

* * *

Hieromonk Euthymios earned a good reputation as a spir¬itual guide, a discerning father confessor, and a scholar of many patristic books. He lived in a cell of ICoutloumousiou. This ever memorable monk used to tell the following inci¬dent:

* * *

After the liberation of Crete in 1912, the Turks were selling properties on the island which they had owned dur¬ing their occupation. At that time, someone who had a brother on Mount Athos went to the skete to ask for some money to buy a property too. His monk brother did not want to give him any money, since he knew that money coming from a monastic does not bring good to relatives. A monk is dedicated to God alone. But finally he was per¬suaded by his natural brother to give him some money he had. As soon as his brother returned to Thessaloniki, he fell into grave danger. He was robbed of all the money he had received, and killed.

* * *

Elder Bartholomew was born in 1860 on Mount Athos, where his mother and other women and children had taken refuge during the rebellion of Chalkidiki. His mother dedi¬cated him to Panagia. Another one to follow in his foot¬steps was Hierodeacon Vasilios (Davilas) who died in 1979: he demonstrated such complete denial of the world that he never left Mount Athos or his cell for forty years, not even to go to ICaryes.

* * *

In the same way the natural brothers Benedictos, Agathangelos, and Sawas (all three from the cell of the Dormition) and their brother Hieromonk Gregorios of St. Nicholas cell in Karyes, never went back to the world from the time of their tonsure. Hieromonk Gregorios, in fact, came to Mount Athos when he was only nine years old. He had forgotten what a woman's face looks like, having only the vaguest memory of his own mother.

* * *

Father Neophytos of St. Anne's, an aged elder who once went out of Mount Athos just for a short time on urgent business, used to tell me: "I pray that Panagia will never allow me to go out into the world again."

ΑΝ ATHONITE GERONTIKON PUBLICATIONS OF THE HOLY MONASTERY OF ST. GREGORY PALAMAS KOUPHALIA- THESSALONIKI- GREECE