Letter from Mount Athos
Global leaders have made pilgrimages to the Vatopedi Monastery before going on to the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. This was reported by Bloomberg news on January 23, 2005. In his article, A. Craig Copetas wrote: «’Davos Men’ Go to Holy Mountain to Ponder Globe, Confess Sins.» And World Economic Forum founder and Executive Chairman Klaus Schwab once confessed: «Davos is a search for the meaning of life and the meaning of what you’re doing in it… Davos is the modern take on monastic endeavors.» US President George H.W. Bush and Cuba’s Fidel Castro have been here. Understandably not together. In addition, Britain’s Prince Charles is a frequent visitor to Mount Athos. His first visit took place shortly after the death of Princess Diana in 1997. According to one monk on Athos, «Prince Charles is Orthodox in his heart.» Nonetheless, whatever Charles’s interior state, he is limited in his range of actions since, unless he is to renounce his right to inherit the British throne, he cannot become Orthodox. It is said that his favorite monastery is Vatopedi, celebrated as one of the Western world’s most fashionable retreats. Pilgrims such as Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, King Juan Carlos of Spain and former US President Jimmy Carter have all come here to ponder the state of their souls and the state of the world. Recently the monastery – as well as its chief monk Ephraim – was involved in a financial scandal concerning a land exchange between the state and Vatopedi. It is estimated that Greek taxpayers have been swindled out of more than 100 million euros. Both New Democracy and PASOK ministers were allegedly involved in the affair. The monks held an emergency meeting on Mt Athos on Friday to discuss the controversy. A communique is to be announced today. «Nevertheless, don’t expect much… In the good old Byzantine system, it won’t say anything clearly. You’ll see. All monasteries have something to hide on the Holy Mountain,» said Nikos Naoumidis, an actor who for years contemplated a monastic life. He was accompanying Pantelis Savvidis, a journalist from ET3 TV, who visited the sacred peninsula over the weekend with a news camera in tow, which proved useless. No one talked on camera. The good journalist was denied entrance to Vatopedi. Unfortunately, «Anix-nefseis,» one of the rare significant talk shows on Greek TV, will not include the main protagonists on Wednesday. The scandalous land exchange has attracted great controversy because it has been discovered that the property given by the state to the monastery was significantly undervalued. The government has – somewhat belatedly – revoked the deal, pending a judicial investigation which got under way last week. At a time when the advance of Islam is a tremendous source of concern for Christians, considering the diminished status of their numbers in the East, and as Western secularism continues to adopt a rather hostile attitude toward the expression of Orthodox faith in public life, Orthodox Christians are faced with a great many difficulties in the world today. Do they need to create more? The divide between Orthodoxy and Western Christianity seems far greater than that between Orthodoxy and Islam. Why? No doubt it is because there has been greater conflict between the first pairing throughout the ages. Hostilities Here on Athos there are Orthodox Christians who are hostile toward one another and even resort to force to resolve differences. Such is the case in the repeated divisive and counterproductive attempts to force the monks of the Esphigmenou Monastery to leave it. Esphigmenou has frequently been in the news for the scenes of violence at the Mt Athos port of Karyes, the intervention by police, prison sentences for monks, expulsions from the Holy Mountain, riot squads on hand for a visit by the ecumenical patriarch and the appointment of a special investigator to examine the monastery’s property assets. «No, we are no Vatopedi. We are the poorest monastery on Mount Athos. We have no bank accounts. Only what each monk might have and whatever the faithful might donate. We have not taken money from the EU – 5 billion euros that had been earmarked for Esphigmenou – because they will want something in return,» say the monks. On the other hand: «All the mules on the Holy Mountain would not be enough to carry the gold in the treasury of Vatopedi,» one anonymous 16th-century pilgrim wrote in the guestbook. Nowadays they are even richer. Last week, the newspapers were full of the figures of hundreds of millions of euros supposedly in the bank accounts of Vatopedi. Esphigmenou was founded 1,502 years ago on the eastern side of the Athos peninsula by Saint Poulheria, the sister of Emperor Theodosius II, and is dedicated to the Ascension of Christ. Over the centuries it was often attacked and raided because of its service to national liberation struggles. During the War of Independence of 1821, the monks refused to surrender the chieftain Emmanouil Pappas, who had taken refuge at Esphigmenou, to the Turkish governor of Athos, despite calls to do so from the other 19 monasteries, which were cooperating with Turkish rule. Once again, the other 19 monasteries are at odds with the 105 monks at Esphigmenou, and for two main reasons: First, the zealot monks of Esphigmenou refuse to name the ecumenical patriarch in their prayers because he has held services and prayed in the company of the pope, something they claim is forbidden by holy Apostolic rules. Secondly, they refuse to accept billions of euros in European Union aid so as not to be beholden to the EU in future. Differences over issues of faith have led to violence, excommunications, criminal trials, exclusions and expulsions and the deprivation of fundamental human rights. Monks at the monastery who have died have been buried without a death certificate being issued by a doctor, as the law requires, because the monks are no longer allowed to call in a doctor from Karyes. Speaking of doctors, Ierotheos, a monk I have known for decades, was operated on in Thessaloniki two days ago for prostate cancer and is recovering well. Ierotheos is one of the very rare cases of this kind of cancer. According to data presented recently by urologist Haralambos Aidonopoulos, the dietary and lifestyle habits of the monks on Mount Athos have kept the incidence of prostate cancer remarkably below international averages. In fact, 4.5 times lower. And positive factors such as proper sleep patterns and the lack of air pollution, according to the research, surely help. Moreover, despite all the scandals caused by the Vatopedi land exchange, this rocky outpost is still the ideal destination for those seeking to abandon the stresses of daily life and find spiritual enlightenment.
