By Bishop Gregorios of Mesaoria
The Holy Church commemorates the memory of Martyrs Proclus and Hilarion, Andreas of the Army and Saint Veronika, as well as the memory of St. Paisios of Mount Athos, whose Sanctification took place on January 13, 2015.
Saint Paisios the Athonite (born Arsenios Eznepidis) was born on July 25, 1924, in Pharasa, Cappadocia. His father was called Prodromos and his mother, Evlambia. He had eight siblings.
On August 7, 1924, a week before the Pharassians were expelled by the Turks, he was baptized by the priest of his parish, later Saint Arsenios the Cappadocian.
After wandering in free Greece, the Eznepides family settled in Konitsa, Epirus, where Arsenios finished intermediate public school. From a young age, it was clear that he was inclined towards the Church and monasticism.
Immediately after his dismissal by the Greek Army in 1949, Arsenios went to Mount Athos to begin his monkhood. However, according to the tradition, he had to give his sisters in marriage before. So for a year he returned to his family.
Then he went back to the monastic state of Athos and settled in the Philotheou Monastery. In 1956 he was ordained a monk, tonsured to the Small Schema, and was given the name Paisios.
For a few years he lived in the Monastery of the Virgin Mary in Stomio and on the Sinai Peninsula, in the cell of Saints Galaktion and Epistimi.
In 1964 he returned to Mount Athos. Later, he moved in Panagouda, an abandoned hermitage belonging to Koutloumousiou Monastery, where many believers visited him for spiritual benefit.
Despite his heavy intellectual program, he continued his intense ascetic life. He only rested two to three hours a day.
In November 1993, he left Mount Athos for the last time and was transferred to Souroti. In 1994, he is having a surgery to remove a tumor.
On Monday, July 11, 1994 (feast of Saint Euphemia), Elder Paisios received Holy Communion and reposed on the evening of Tuesday, July 12, 1994. He was buried at the Cemetary of Saint John the Theologian in Souroti.
One of the phrases he frequently said to the pilgrims was: “You humbly ask for God’s will in your life and everything will go well.”
Source: Church of Crete
