Saint Paisios of Mount Athos would have turned 100 today. The venerable monk was born on July 25, 1924, in Pharasa, Cappadocia (present-day Turkey).
He was given the name Arsenios at his baptism. At the age of 20, he enlisted in the army, serving as a radio operator during the Greek Civil War.
He entered monastic life in 1953 at the Esphigmenou Monastery on Mount Athos, where he was given the duties of working in the refectory and later in carpentry.
After spending a few months in the monastery, on March 27, 1954, he was tonsured a rassophore and received the name Averkios.
The venerable monk lived in various hermitages and monasteries in Mount Athos, Mount Sinai, and Thessaloniki. He was tonsured as a monk at Philotheou Monastery and received the name Paisios.
In August 1958, he arrived at the Stomio Monastery, where he began rebuilding the monastery and stayed there until 1962, when he became a hermit on Mount Sinai.
After a period in Sinai, he returned to Mount Athos, settling in the Cell of the Holy Archangels.
Due to health problems, he moved to the Hut of Hypatios the Vlach in Katounakia for a year in July 1967.
Two years later, at the request of the Holy Community of Mount Athos, Elder Paisios moved to Stavronikita Monastery to help reorganize the monastic community. After assisting in establishing the newly formed community, he settled for more solitude in the Cell of the Honourable Cross, where he lived for 11 years.
He reposed in the Lord on July 12, 1994, after many sufferings, and was secretly buried behind the church of Saint Arsenios.
The Venerable Paisios was canonized on January 13, 2015, by the Ecumenical Patriarchate. In June 2015, the Holy Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church decided to include him in the local Orthodox calendar.
Photo: Lumina Newspaper
