ST. ANTHONY’S MONASTERY, FLORENCE AZ ELDER EPHRAIM OF ARIZONA AND MONASTICISM IN AMERICA

ST. ANTHONY’S MONASTERY, FLORENCE AZ
ELDER EPHRAIM OF ARIZONA AND MONASTICISM IN AMERICA
One of the great stumbling blocks in the development of Holy Orthodoxy in America in the twentieth century has been the lack of monastic communities.  As a Greek Orthodox priest who has traveled extensively to the monastic communities of Greece and the Holy Land, I have always felt that the presence of monasticism in America was vital for the Church to truly flourish.  Ever since Holy Orthodoxy was established in North America by the Russian Orthodox Church in Alaska there has never been an organized and sustained effort to establish monastic communities in our midst.  This changed about twenty years ago when the Elder Ephraim arrived in North America from Mount Athos.  I would like to share with you the history of this development in the recent past.  

The blight of “Bavarocracy”* in the Church of Greece

Excerpt taken from the book: “I want to drink all of the Bosporus”

by Archmandrite Dositheos. (Comments by T.F.D.)

 

Upon the founding of the neo-Hellenic State, Adamantios Korais’ Protestantizing “Enlighteners”, who had taken over the leadership of the land, had hastened to LOOT AND CLOSE DOWN monasteries, which were the “heart” of Orthodoxy and the teachers of the pure Orthodox Faith. This is what led the people of Hellas to a (continuing) ignorance of their own tradition, given that it was replaced by imported Western and heretic notions.

*“Bavarocracy”:  A loose term alluding to the period of time that Hellas was governed by Bavarian families, following the 1821 Liberation Revolution against the Turks and after the assassination of Hellas’ first Greek Governor, Ioannis Kapodistrias.

Monasticism.Georgios I. Mantzarides Professor of the Theological School Aristotle University of Thessaloniki

The innermost spiritual sense of Orthodox Monasticism is revealed in joyful mourning. This paradoxical phrase denotes a spiritual state in which a monk in his prayer grieves for the sins of the world and at the same time experiences the regenerating spiritual joy of Christ's forgiveness and resurrection. A monk dies in order to live, he forgets himself in order to find his real self in God, he becomes ignorant of worldly knowledge in order to attain real spiritual wisdom which is given only to the humble ones. (Ed.)
With the development of monasticism in the Church there appeared a peculiar way of life, which however did not proclaim a new morality. The Church does not have one set of moral rules for the laity and another for monks, nor does it divide the faithful into classes according to their obligations towards God. The Christian life is the same for everyone. All Christians have in common that "their being and name is from Christ" ¹. This means that the true Christian must ground his life and conduct in Christ, something which is hard to achieve in the world.