The Holy Mountain or Agion Oros is an amazing space that seems to belong to another sphere of the world, located in the middle of European territory.
Whoever knows, even just once, the holy land of Mount Athos, remains engraved in his heart all his life. And not so much because of the unexpected beauty and purity of these places but, especially, because of the spirit here.
Spiritual practice on Athos
From the beginning we must emphasize something:
do not go to Athos as tourists!
But as fervent practitioners of the hesychastic prayer of the heart.
http://www.adanima.org/2009/11/14/despre-rugaciune-initierea-in-meditatia-crestina-a-inimii/
With so little time (if we are just visitors) we should put in more zeal than any other man on the mountain who lives there longer.
Only in this way does our approach have a purpose and gives us a fruit, noted by many… but above all through peace of heart and the elevation of our feeling to a level that sums up both the visible and the holy and invisible into a natural and complete whole.
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The parents go to bed very early, as they wake up every night for the Mass that lasts from 2:00 AM to about 6:00 AM.
Order of services: Matins begins at two o’clock after midnight. At one o’clock the alarm bells toll. Up to two all monks make their canons in their cells. Between two and five is the service of Matins and St. Liturgy, after which the monks retire to their cells for two hours of rest, and then go out for various community obediences.
At four o’clock in the afternoon, Vespers is celebrated, then dinner is served and again they gather at the church for Compline and the akathist of the Annunciation. From eight in the evening to one in the morning, people go to rest.
In a monastery with an even stricter discipline such as Esphigmenou (schismatic Greek monastery), the service begins at 1:00 a.m.
In Romanian hermitages, pilgrims (who are accommodated and fed free of charge) are generally not obliged to attend so early, but they are expected to appear at the liturgy starting at 4:00 a.m. Our opinion is that not a moment should be wasted and that participation in any service or prayer is mandatory for an authentic seeker.
However, in Esphigmenou a parent passes through the cells of guests, waking them up and calling them to Mass as early as 2:00 AM.
The meal is always shared and silent. Everyone is as attentive as he can to the spiritual heart and to the food offered, which is regarded as a sacrifice for the maintenance of the body in prayer.
Simple and healthy food: lentil soup, rice, pasta, fruit. Some monasteries also offer a glass of wine, which, on a Sunday morning, after so many hours of prayer, is welcome.
One thing to remember is that the time to eat ends when the ruling monk gives the signal to end. It doesn’t matter if you got to feed or not, they say a blessing and that’s it.
Not infrequently a monk reads a Christian spiritual text during the meal, because this way the spirit and body go more easily together.
From time to time, a brother passes by murmuring alone, a sign that he is a practitioner of the incessant prayer of the heart.
Mount Athos is known for the zeal with which the male monks here worship the Mother of God and for the fervor of practicing the hesychastic prayer of the Heart, which brings Jesus perceptibly into the peace of the heart unified with Life, in the midst of life.
About Mount Athos
It is a quasi-state within a state (the largest state being Greece) and it behaves like a world capital of Orthodoxy. Interestingly, this aspect manifests itself not so much on an administrative level, but especially on a spiritual level.
That is, here an intense, pure, brilliant Christianity is practiced, or, as a man in one piece would say, here we find the “Mother” and Father of Orthodoxy.
The Holy Mountain is truly an imposing mountain, with a height of over two thousand meters, rising suddenly and rising conically from the sea. It looks exactly as you would like a holy mountain to be, symmetrical, majestic, tall, but accessible enough to be able to reach its top.
It is not located on an island, although it seems so at first glance. It is a peninsula with a narrow land connection, which is blocked with barbed wire barriers.
Mount Athos can only be reached by sea.
One first arrives in Ouranopolis (Uranopolis) or the city of Uranus, after which one takes the boat to the port of the Mountain, named Daphne.
For this, however, you need diamonitirion, a kind of visa that is obtained from this Christian quasi-state and that is relatively easy to obtain only if someone invites you from one of the 20 main monasteries of the Holy Mountain.
For a spiritual seeker in Romania, one solution is to ask a Romanian monk from our monasteries to get in touch with an Athonite spiritual brother. For example, many Romanians in Athos are away from Sihăstria monastery, but, of course, from many other Christian places of worship.
Although, theoretically, it is possible for someone to go directly to Ouranopolis and apply for a permit, in practice it is recommended that the potential pilgrim contact the monastery or hermitage he wants to go to in advance, leaving the formalities to the superiors there, who will take care of the diamonition.
The pass is granted for a maximum period of 4 days (4 days and 3 nights).
Orthodox pilgrims have priority in obtaining a permit.
Most often the permit is no longer controlled at the exit of Athos, and many discovered their monastic vocation reaching the Mountain and remained permanently.
If you come accompanied by a lady or a young lady, she can wait for you during the Christian journey on the Holy Mountain in Uranopolis, because it is a wonderful place, filled with the fragrance of Orthodoxy emanating from every shop with Orthodox things and souvenirs or from every restaurant or resting place. Uranopolis is ready to fill everyone’s heart.
Yes, it is true, in order to protect the privacy of Athos residents, women are not allowed to enter the Holy Mountain, which is frustrating for women and, really, a loss for them. However, this sacrifice had to be made to protect the monks from inner and outer temptations on their spiritual journey on the Mount.
In no way should it be confused with a violation of the right of free movement, it is, in fact, an intimate need of monastic isolation.
http://www.adanima.org/2009/10/22/de-ce-sfantul-munte-athos-nu-poate-fi-deschis-pentru-a-fi-vizitat-de-femei/
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From Daphne, the monastic port, take the bus to Karia, the medieval city in another world, and from here you take another bus for the largest Romanian hermitage – Prodromu (dedicated to Saint John the Baptist) or for the other larger Romanian hermitage – Lacu Hermitage.
Buses and minibuses-taxis are driven, in particular, by Romanians who come to work at the Holy Mountain.
Notice that, although the Romanian voivodes supported with a lot of money and aid almost all the Athonite monasteries over time (as if the Holy Mountain were in Romania and not in Greece), there is now no Romanian monastery here, only hermitages.
The spiritual life of Romanian Orthodoxy has always been closely linked to Mount Athos. However, the Roman monks from Mount Athos have an inferior situation compared to monks from other Orthodox countries. Following a historical injustice, the Romans were not recognized as having the right to have a monastery on Athos, which means that the Romanian monks have been, for more than eight decades, scattered on the properties of one or the other of the 20 officially recognized monasteries.
Indeed, after World War I, the status of the Holy Mountain was introduced into the Greek Constitution of 1926. Of the dozens of settlements that functioned there for centuries, only 20 were retained as having the rank of “monastery”. Of those 20, 17 are Greek settlements, one is a Serbian monastery, a Bulgarian monastery and a Russian monastery. Until the nineteenth century, monasteries were not organized on ethnic criteria.
The emergence of nation-states caused the composition of monasteries to become homogenized. The Romans were until then scattered through the already existing settlements. Despite the fact that the princes and kings of Romania have, over the centuries, made danes to all the monasteries of Athos, at a time when neither Bulgaria nor Serbia existed as a state, and despite the fact that the population of Romania far exceeds the population of Serbia and Bulgaria reunited, the Romanian monks remained, from the foundation of the modern Greek state onwards, in this lower status. Even today, the two Romanian hermitages (of which Prodromou exceeds in size some establishments with official monastery status) are totally excluded from decision-making, which takes place only between representatives of the 20 official monasteries, which meet weekly in Caries, within what is called Saint Chinotita.
Romanian settlements, unlike Bulgarian, Russian and Serbian ones, thus depend hierarchically on one or another of the Greek monasteries: any initiative, whether it is repairs to the monastery or bringing a new brother from Romania, must be approved by the Greek superiors.
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The main Romanian hermitage, Prodromou is located in the eastern part of the Athos peninsula, in a deserted, steep and stony land hit by storms.
The monks come, in particular, from Moldavia and Wallachia.
All of them automatically received Greek citizenship the moment they entered Athos.
The Romanian Hermitage Prodromu (where we can find a piece of the relics of the great Saint John the Baptist) was founded by the Moldavian monks Justin, Patapie and Grigore in 1810. In 1840 the hermitage was laid waste by Turkish armies. In 1848 two other Moldavian monks, Nifon and Nectarie, built a new hermitage in place of the scattered one, with help from Prince Grigore Ghica. It was completed and consecrated in 1866.
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The Romanian Hermitage Lacu is a small hermitage with self-life, with a beautiful stone church, dedicated to the Holy Martyr Dimitrie. It was founded in the eighteenth century by some monks from Neamt, Caldarusani, Cernica and from the Bessarabian monasteries.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Lacu Hermitage had over 30 cells in which up to 80 hermit monks lived and it was the second Romanian monastic settlement in the Holy Mountain, after the Prodromul Hermitage, which then had over 120 monks.
Unfortunately, the Greeks have introduced the status of the mountain into the Constitution, and the Constitution can only be amended by a national referendum, which is a very difficult undertaking.
On Athos we can encounter, however, a nationalism that has no place in such a place, (especially on the part of Greek monks).
The religious establishments in Athos live primarily on donations, but they also receive generally large sums from their respective governments. Thus, the Romanian Parliament grants annually a donation of 250,000 euros to the Prodromou hermitage, which, although smaller in number of monks than Lacu (35 compared to 52), takes precedence as older.
The fact that the number of monasteries must be, according to the Greek Constitution, exactly 20 (“absolutely no change in the number of monasteries is permitted”, says the Statutory Book of Holy Mount Athos to which the Constitution refers) also had unpredictable consequences. One of the 20 reigning monasteries, the Greek monastery of Esphigmenou, was excommunicated by the Patriarch of Constantinople because the monks there refused ecumenism, and even the dialogue between the Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church. The monks of Esphigmenou, under the leadership of Abbot Methodios, also excommunicated the patriarch.
From the moment of excommunication, monks from nearby monasteries began to physically attack those of Esphigmenou, who for several years have been barricaded, having no contact with the outside except at sea. On several occasions, the Greek state sent special forces trying to expel the monks from Esphigmenou. As Saint Chinotita cannot function with 19 representatives, it was decided then to create a false monastery of Esphigmenou, on land belonging to the former, the representative of this fictitious monastery now participating in all the necessary ordinances and decision-making in the Holy Mountain. The damnation and excommunication of the schismatics of Esphigmenou could have been the ideal occasion for raising the Romanian hermitage Prodromou to the rank of a monastery, but instead, Saint Chinotita, dominated by the 16 Greek abbots, preferred to invent a ghost monastery to conform to the letter of the Constitution. And Romanians continue to depend on one or another of the 20 monasteries.
Small guide for aspirants to Christian spirituality in Romania
To get to Ouranopolis, you can take the bus from the Filaret
bus station. The bus journey takes about 13 hours, but it’s worth it, because you get directly to Ouranoplis, where the miracle of Athos begins.
By car you can go through Bulgaria – Ruse – Sophia – on the ring line.
At some point – when there is an intersection with the railway of a tram – turn right (although there is no signpost). Passers-by can be asked for details.
We then look for a road to Kulata – the border with Greece.
Variants:
– Seres – Drama-Amphipolis- towards Thessaloniki (but on the right it is towards Agios Oros (Stavros – Olympiad))
or towards Thessaloniki – signpost Halkidiki and then signpost Mount Athos – Seres- and then towards Uranopolis.
Once in Ouranopolis, we address the office where we can buy diamonitirion or, as Romanians call it, diamonitir.
For a Romanian, the solution is to ask a Romanian monk from monasteries in the country to get in touch with an Athonite spiritual brother. For example, many Romanians in Athos are away from Sihăstria monastery, but, of course, from many other Christian places of worship.
Although, theoretically, it is possible for someone to go directly to Ouranopolis and apply for a permit, in practice it is recommended that the potential pilgrim contact the monastery or hermitage he wants to go to in advance, leaving the formalities to the superiors there, who will take care of the diamotirion.
The permit is granted for a maximum period of 4 days (4 days and 3 nights).
Orthodox pilgrims have priority in obtaining a permit.
Most often the permit is no longer controlled at the exit of Athos, and many have discovered their monastic vocation arriving there and have remained permanently.
If you come accompanied by a lady or a young lady, she can wait for you during the Christian journey on the Holy Mountain in Uranopolis, because it is a wonderful place, filled with the fragrance of Orthodoxy emanating from every shop with Orthodox things and souvenirs or from every restaurant or resting place. Uranopolis is ready to fill everyone’s heart.
We wish you success, in accordance with the Divine Will!
Leo Radutz
AdAnima
Academic Society Bucharest, 24.01.2010