October 31, 2024, almost exactly a year ago, I was blessed to take a pilgrimage to a distant land in the Balkans where I spent ten days in Greece visiting Thessaloniki and the Holy Mountain.
I can only explain my Athos trip as a once in a lifetime experience that I would recommend every male take, at least, one time in his life albeit with good planning and prayer. I do not recommend this as a trip for a newcomer to Orthodoxy as it requires some time to marinate in the faith in order to garner a breath of Orthodox reverence. It’s not a trip to be taken as just another excursioner’s destination. In fact, I would encourage any location in the Balkans to be viewed with such reverence as the entire peninsula is full of Holy Orthodox sites that require the understanding that you would be treading soil that very holy men and women once hailed and roamed.
I had traveled extensively to the region in the past, especially during my university studies, and was privy to the mindset change over the last thirty years in western attempts to incorporate Southeastern Europe into the European Union. Western Nations have gone at great lengths to convince these nations that their Orthodox Christian heritage is nothing more than a tourist attraction to be put on a keychain and monetized. To large extent, the business minded were successful in masking the eschatological ethos of the region with a devalued price tag taking advantage of the, at best, mediocre economic situation of these nations to promote the merchandising of their culture. This resulted in countless falling for the narrative that salvation rests in a European Future without Christ, taking for granted the salvific treasures they had inherited. Even to this day, many still hold true that the blue flag with ring of stars is their only hope. However, what I witnessed last year on Mt. Athos opened my eyes. The Churches were alive, and the youth remained in attendance. It invigorated me; helped me heal from what is lacking in my life in the West: Reverence to All Things Holy.
My first destination on the Holy Mountain took place at Serbian, Hilander Monastery, which is isolated from the rest of the Monasteries and Sketes on Mount Athos. It was told to me by my guide that you must plan a trip to the Holy Mountain but that the Most Holy Theotokos actually decides where you go, as many times when you get there, there are remarkable devices of plan waiting for you. Besides, it is her mountain, and she decides what you will do when you get there. As it should be. Interestingly enough, when the ferry dropped us off at the port before the long road to get to Hilander, we were met by a monk who asked us where we were going. We mentioned to him that we were given a blessing to stay at Hilander overnight. He smiled and said something in Serbian that I could not fully make out. You see we were planning on taking the long trek to the monastery by foot. Then out of nowhere a caravan of three vans came tumbling down the hill ready to pick us up along with the bushels of Serb pilgrims and all their packages for the monastery. It was an experience in itself to be loaded up to the neck with Serbian brethren and their huge bags and boxes filled with supplies for the monks of Hilander. This Offensive Tackle sized Deacon barely fit in the seat designed for more of a Midfielder on the Partizan Belgrade squad, but I made it work, barely. I never knew that my knees could reach my chin from a seated position. But I also never expected comfort on the mountain, and it rarely came. At least, not in the ways that I would anticipate it in the world. But somehow, this was transfigured into a blessing for me. Eventually we would reach the gates of the Monastery, and we were greeted with a warm smile and some sweet Rakija and Turkish delights in the visitor quarters by the lay house leaders. It was a nice way to soothe your nerves for the true spiritual events that were about to occur.
About now, I should mention that the Hilander Monastery was my main request to visit when the trip first began. I have had some connection with the Monastery years earlier due to the wonderworking St. Simeon the Myrrh Gusher and the Holy Oil from the Lampada hanging from the well-known Icon of the Theotokos of the Mother of God The Three Handed (in Serbian Богородица Тројеручица), which found its way to the monastery from Damascus as it initially belonged to St. John of Damascus. This Icon famously performed a miracle for the saint during his time. But I’ll let the readers do their diligence in learning about this story. This icon also performed a miracle for my family, along with the grapes that grow from the grape vine that sprouted from the tomb of St. Simeon the Myrrh Gusher whose tomb is situated there within the principal Church of the Monastery, also known as a Catholicon in Greek. As you see, miracles do happen to us if we’re awake enough to notice them. Mt. Athos, along with our missions and parishes are here as a reminder. That is, again, if we’re awake.
My time at Hilander will be mostly kept to myself as I experienced a personal miracle there that I still choose to keep silent on for now. My heart fills with excitement every time I am reminded of this occurrence. But maybe someday, if the Lord wills, I will expand upon. Let it be known that the entire Catholicon, which is dedicated to the Presentation of the Most Holy Theotokos, is inundated with the smell of roses. As a young, sweet monk with a Wisconsin accent explained to us, the Cathedral was, at one time, flooded by St. Simeon’s Myrrh and the fragrance of the wonderful flower is what is left for us to remember and rekindle our faith. My time at Hilander filled me with the urgency to hopefully visit again. We were treated with love, and I was even placed at a Deacon’s Table for Trapeza where I sat with an elderly Deacon from Macedonia (the country to the north of Greece) who was a monk at Hilander. We only exchanged glances and smiles as he minced his garlic, onions, peppers, and put them on his baked beans.
From Hilander we had a monk drive us to the other side of the mountain to visit the remainder of the Monasteries we were going to visit and overnight. We managed to hike to the hut of St. Paisios and spend some time there, and from there hiked to the Monastery of Iviron. At that point, all the hiking had taken its toll. I mentioned my discomfort earlier, right? Well, I had prepared for this the months beforehand by hiking the hills of Arizona with a weighted vest, but Arizona’s heat walks seemed not to do the hills and trails of Athos justice. Did I also mention that I was built like an Offensive Tackle? The size of my stature didn’t help, but there seemed to be a different sort of weight there on the Mountain. One that was intent on keeping you grounded and focused. One that I was not used to in my scattered and splintered world back home. Regardless, when I reached the monastery, some of my co-pilgrims were already talking to a smiling monk from Australia who took one look at my condition and joked, you know, the monastery doesn’t have a hospital. Oh, the sweet Irony, I thought. What hospital did I need other than Iviron? I could only grin back at that point and asked him where I could find some water. He smiled back and with his hand gestured the circumference of the grounds to show the abundance of faucets all over the monastery. Our time at Iviron was short as we had planned other visits, which ended with the group breaking apart — me and a Deacon from Wichita going on a separate adventure. You see, the Most Holy Theotokos decided this. If you ever see me in person, ask me, and I will tell you the details of the rest of my trip.
But what did I learn?
Visiting these holy sites was a reminder to me that sometimes we must travel to meet Christ as the men who carried the paralytic traveled and climbed the filled, noisy house to meet Christ. If we’re honest with ourselves, we understand that not only are we these men, but we’re the paralytic in this world, and we are also the noise that drowns out Christ in our hearts, so we must move to find Him. We must do something physical to get out of our own selves, to get out of our own way. There is still much to learn for us in American Orthodoxy. Looking at these men and women in the Orthodox World we see Icons with the Mind of the Church. Something that we may yet lack in the West. In fact, if we’re truthful, much of American culture goes in the opposite direction of this Mind. And we have a tendency of bringing this unorthodox mindset with us when we enter Orthodoxy as it provides comfort for us to stay in our old habits. The self-centeredness that we’re accustomed to. Orthodox Clergy, most of us have come to the Orthodox Church from heterodox pasts, still holding onto the image of the pastor as the center of the parish who runs the show, giving the long-winded sermon, entertaining the crowds, seeking the temptation to be popular and loved. This doesn’t exist in the Orthodox world, at least very rarely. Priests are not viewed as the center of the parish. They don’t do Podcasts or YouTube videos, they’re not as visible except on the street with their cassocks. This does not diminish their office, or the fact that they’re still revered by their flock. But they have no need to be bombastic, their sermons are short, and succinct. Yet, they still somehow manage to get their point across. There is no need to entertain the crowds. This is Orthodoxy in its truest form. It’s time for us to follow their lead, not reinvent it to suit our taste. I had to leave my surroundings, to move, in order to find this.
The West, where for too long consumerism, war, and now social media, have become bastions of our beloved narcissism, models these pillars of death to Orthodox nations as needful to become civilized, even while verbally appealing to the world that they’re opposed to them. But Orthodox Nations are starting to see through this, and they’re growing weary.
Beloved, I am not immune to this spiritual sickness, which is why I write so strongly against it. I am right in the middle of it, seeing for myself the effects while visiting the graveyards of my Orthodox brethren in the East. And this culture of death that we live in the West knows that The Orthodox Church is what stands in the way of their quest, which is why they pit brother against brother in the Orthodox world. I mean, who would have thought that we today would have to choose between Russians and Ukrainians as good versus evil? Who would have thought that we today would have to view jurisdictions with skepticism, as pawns to meet the needs of domination for material gain and power? I certainly did not. And I certainly will not. They’re all my kin of the One, Holy Chalice. Not corporate assets. We must reject this line of thinking. No other entity will save us but Christ.
But every parish is a revolution against this culture. Every new mission that sprouts behind the lines is a victory for Christ and a hit against the culture of death. We must see this. For the Truth of Christ shines forth in every American small town that has an Orthodox Church where the Divine Liturgy is served, where the externals are shed away, where we do not worry about the social media likes or the extracurricular activities, the cliques, or the court jesters to appease the crowds. We can change culture, but we first must change ourselves.
Let us remove all earthly care and keep our eyes on the Chalice of Christ where we do as He commands. Taking and eating in remembrance of Him. The Victor of all Victors. The one, true, and only exclusive History of Mankind: Christ Incarnate, Christ Crucified, Christ Resurrected, and Christ Ascended. Amen!
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Rev. Deacon Christopher Purdef
