{"id":69070,"date":"2020-06-03T05:56:12","date_gmt":"2020-06-03T05:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/?p=69070"},"modified":"2020-06-03T05:57:37","modified_gmt":"2020-06-03T05:57:37","slug":"prayers-in-solitude-ascetic-life-at-mount-athos-deeply-influenced-me-metropolitan-mar-seraphim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/?p=69070","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Prayers in solitude, ascetic life at Mount Athos deeply influenced me\u2019: Metropolitan Mar Seraphim"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Visit of an Oriental Orthodox Metropolitan to the Monastic Republic of Mount Athos<\/em><\/p>\n

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REPUBLIC OF MOUNT ATHOS, Greece: Metropolitan Abraham Mar Seraphim of Bengaluru of the Indian Orthodox Malankara Church was a guest at the Simonopetra Monastery (Monastery of Simonos Petra).
\nThe Monastery at Mount Athos, \u2018the Holy Mountain\u2019 in northeastern Greece and a significant center of Eastern Orthodox monasticism, warmly welcomed the Metropolitan who perhaps is the only Indian Orthodox (Malankara) Bishop to have visited in recent times.
\nHis Grace stayed in the monastic state of Mount Athos, Greece, for five days in February 2019.
\nAbbot Archimandrite Eliseus warmly received Met Seraphim at the monastery, a World Heritage site since 1988, and held talks.
\nSimonopetra ranks thirteenth in the hierarchy of the Athonite monasteries.
\nThe Metropolitan was made comfortable at the beautiful guest house overlooking the Aegean Sea with its steep, densely forested slopes, which made for panoramic views.
\nThe visiting bishop attended the lengthy prayers and holy liturgical services but was barred from receiving the Holy Communion as the Indian Orthodox Church (Oriental Orthodox) is not in communion with Eastern Orthodox or the Byzantine churches. The bishop was also excluded from the veneration of relics of the saints that takes place during the weekends.
\nMetropolitan Seraphim was amazed at the eerie silence that prevailed at the monastery, the ascetic life of the elderly monks, who are full of grace.\u2019 Their prayers, reflection, service, and total isolation from the rest of the world were exemplary\u2019, he revealed in a telephonic interview.
\n\u201cThe monks devote their time in continuous Greek chants and prayers and even during mealtime (only twice a day) never speak among themselves,\u201d Met Seraphim mentions.
\nA Greek monk Seraphim of his namesake was with the Metropolitan as the caretaker.
\nThe Bishop began his rigorous day along with the monks early at 3 am with long continuous prayers ending with sacred liturgy at 8 am.<\/p>\n

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\nAt 10 am they enter the chapel again for prayers in groups and an hour later disperse for breakfast which comprises a combination of barley, cheese, bread, fruits, and egg.
\nAfter this, they indulge in the farming of medicinal plants, maintain gardening at the monastery and carpentry works. By 4 pm they begin the next prayers for an hour and have their last meal of the day. Later they disperse to the chapel and retire for the day by 6.30 pm.
\nHis Grace recalls the cool and serene atmosphere at the monastery located on the southern coast of the Athos peninsula, between the Athonite port of Dafni and Osiou Grigoriou monastery.
\nBuilt on top of a single enormous rock, practically hanging from a cliff 330 meters over the sea, the monastery currently houses 54 monks, with Archimandrite Eliseus as the Abbot.<\/p>\n

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\nMount Athos is practically accessible by ferry from Thessaloniki, a Greek port city of the Aegean Sea.
\nFr Dr Vinu and Fr Vivek Varghese also accompanied the Metropolitan to the monastery.
\nHaving visited the Armenian Monastery earlier, Mar Seraphim has set his sights on visiting the Ethiopian and Coptic Orthodox monasteries later this year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Visit of an Oriental Orthodox Metropolitan to the Monastic Republic of Mount Athos \u00a0 REPUBLIC OF MOUNT ATHOS, Greece: Metropolitan Abraham Mar Seraphim of Bengaluru of the Indian Orthodox Malankara … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":69072,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69070","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-diocesan-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69070","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=69070"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69070\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":69078,"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69070\/revisions\/69078"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/69072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=69070"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=69070"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=69070"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}