Talk:Stavronikita

Theophylactos account

I removed the part about Theophylactos, as it is not directly relevant to the monastery. I moved it here, in case someone wants to incorporate things into the article. Note that the part is unsourced and needs extensive cleanup and wikification. --Michalis Famelis (talk) 16:08, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

It should be of some interest to the Orthodox in the diaspora, especially those in Australia and New Zealand that a Stavronikitian monk, Theophylactos (Papathanassopoulos ) originating in the city of Pyrgos in Elia, of the Peloponesus, who had been "instructed" by his spiritual father to go out into the world, due to his poor state of health, after having studied theology at the University of Athens where he obtained his master's degree and held minor clerical appointments in the Greek capital, was appointed, by then an Archimandrite, as the Patriarchal Vicar of the Metropolitan Diocese of Australia and New Zealand in 1928, that see having become vacant. He held this appointment till 1932, braving the crisis caused by the first schism within the flock and the shock waves caused by the Great Depression. Upon the appointment of Timotheos Evangelinidis as the second Metropolitan, he was prevailed upon to remain in Australia as Rector of the Greek Orthodox Church in Melbourne and Vicar-General for Victoria. This post he held till 1947, when upon the translation of Timotheos to Rhodes, he was elected by the Patriarch-in-Synod (Constantinople)to succeed him. During his episcopacy he had to deal with the complex problems posed to his diocese by mass immigration from Greece and elsewhere. His pastoral career was abruptly terminated when he was killed in a car accident in Melbourne in August 1958, soon after the celebrations held in Sydney and Melbourne to mark thirty years of pastorall work in Australia and the tenth anniversary of his Enthronment. An erudite man, an avid reader, an intellectual of the first calibre and a confessor of some skill, Theophylactos exuded a quiet spirituality; he had never forgot his spiritual training and monastic links to Holy Mount Athos, especially his old monastery which he visited as a bishop and to which he left a modest legacy in his will.