Month: November 2021

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WORKING IN THE GARDEN OF THE MOTHER OF GOD

I am fast asleep when a strange noise wakes me, checking my watch it is 3 am and very dark. I am in a Greek monastery overlooking the Aegean Sea, which laps at the walls one hundred feet beneath my room. This is the call to prayer, and it is being sounded on a semantron which is a piece of wood about four feet long which is being carried about by a monk who hits it with a mallet to make the rhythmical noise. I am in the monastery of Saint Gregory, one of twenty monasteries on Mount Athos, known to the Greeks as the Garden of the Mother of God. They believe that the Virgin Mary came ashore from a boat to avoid a storm and she blessed the land. Since then, no other woman or female animal has been allowed there.

The Holy Monastery of Saint Gregory

The monks begin to gather in the main church of the monastery for the main service of their day called Orthos. But I am here with a twenty strong group to work on clearing the footpaths, so we do not get up yet, we are allowed to lie in. At 6 am I rise and go for a shave in the visitors’ quarters. The water is sometimes hot and sometimes cold. It seems to me that washing in cold water must be a kind of penance. After dressing I make my way down to the church, which is of the Orthodox religion, as other pilgrims join me. As I am non-orthodox, I am not allowed into the main body of the church but must take a stall at the back. These individual stalls are comfortable with a seat that one can sit on, or it can be raised when one stands. Cleverly it has a half-up position which allows one to half sit while appearing to stand!

As more monks and pilgrims arrive, they move from icon-to-icon venerating (kissing) the frescos and paintings of the Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ, the apostles, and saints. The service is in Greek and although the liturgy is based on the same eucharist that we find in the Anglican church it is, frankly, difficult to follow. The singing and chanting are however very pleasant and soothing. Soon we hear the clinking sound of the censor being swung and the smell of raspberry flavoured incense meets us before the monk who, in splendid robes, appears swinging the metal censor which is emitting clouds of smoke. Everyone receives a swing of the device, though monks receive a double swing.

After the service a great bell chimes for the opening of the refectory and we all file in after the monks for the first meal of the day. This is where it gets confusing. The monks live on Byzantine time and have been up for five hours and so the meal is their main repast of the day and includes three courses, all vegetarian, with wine produced at the monastery. The meal is eaten in strict silence as a monk reads from the book of the Saints. A bell sounds to mark the end of the meal and we all file out after the monks. In this monastery, there were 99 monks and about 30 pilgrims of many nationalities.

The historic paths which link the monasteries were laid over one thousand years ago. They allowed monks on foot and mules or donkeys to move on paved routes from place to place. But now roads have been bulldozed in and most people travel by vehicle, so the paths are less used and are quickly overgrown. We gather our tools, loppers, shears, sickle and saw and are soon climbing up the steep path to start work on clearing the route. The monks have decided which routes need our attention and we are quickly hard at work. Working in teams of four we hack and saw until the leader calls us to stop for lunch which, every day, is feta cheese, olives, hard brown bread, and fruit. We carry on after a short break by which time the sun is high and the mountain is very hot.

We aim to return to the monastery by 4 pm as we must shower, wash our clothes and be in the evening service, Vespers, by 5 pm. It is a bit of a rush to get there, and it is bad manners to arrive after the censor has passed. As the service ends, we file back into the trapeza or dining hall where another meal awaits us. When we leave the six chef monks are lined up and are all bowing from the waist as we pass, and we in turn show our appreciation of their efforts.

At this point, the monks and pilgrims walk straight back into the katholikon (church) for the night service, compline, but as workers we are not obliged to attend that, so we make for our rooms. It is said that as a pilgrim you are either praying, working, eating, or sleeping. Surprisingly even remote corners of Greece have far better mobile networks than here in the UK, so some people call home before retiring. By 9 pm we are all in bed after a good day’s work.

I am fast asleep when a strange noise wakes me, checking my watch it is 3 am and very dark. I am in a Greek monastery overlooking the Aegean Sea, which laps at the walls one hundred feet beneath my room. This is the call to prayer, and it is being sounded on a semantron which is a piece of wood about four feet long which is being carried about by a monk who hits it with a mallet to make the rhythmical noise. I am in the monastery of Saint Gregory, one of twenty monasteries on Mount Athos, known to the Greeks as the Garden of the Mother of God. They believe that the Virgin Mary came ashore from a boat to avoid a storm and she blessed the land. Since then, no other woman or female animal has been allowed there.

The monks begin to gather in the main church of the monastery for the main service of their day called Orthos. But I am here with a twenty strong group to work on clearing the footpaths, so we do not get up yet, we are allowed to lie in. At 6 am I rise and go for a shave in the visitors’ quarters. The water is sometimes hot and sometimes cold. It seems to me that washing in cold water must be a kind of penance. After dressing I make my way down to the church, which is of the Orthodox religion, as other pilgrims join me. As I am non-orthodox, I am not allowed into the main body of the church but must take a stall at the back. These individual stalls are comfortable with a seat that one can sit on, or it can be raised when one stands. Cleverly it has a half-up position which allows one to half sit while appearing to stand!

As more monks and pilgrims arrive, they move from icon-to-icon venerating (kissing) the frescos and paintings of the Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ, the apostles, and saints. The service is in Greek and although the liturgy is based on the same eucharist that we find in the Anglican church it is, frankly, difficult to follow. The singing and chanting are however very pleasant and soothing. Soon we hear the clinking sound of the censor being swung and the smell of raspberry flavoured incense meets us before the monk who, in splendid robes, appears swinging the metal censor which is emitting clouds of smoke. Everyone receives a swing of the device, though monks receive a double swing.

After the service a great bell chimes for the opening of the refectory and we all file in after the monks for the first meal of the day. This is where it gets confusing. The monks live on Byzantine time and have been up for five hours and so the meal is their main repast of the day and includes three courses, all vegetarian, with wine produced at the monastery. The meal is eaten in strict silence as a monk reads from the book of the Saints. A bell sounds to mark the end of the meal and we all file out after the monks. In this monastery, there were 99 monks and about 30 pilgrims of many nationalities.

The historic paths which link the monasteries were laid over one thousand years ago. They allowed

monks on foot and mules or donkeys to move on paved routes from place to place. But now roads have been bulldozed in and most people travel by vehicle, so the paths are less used and are quickly overgrown. We gather our tools, loppers, shears, sickle and saw and are soon climbing up the steep path to start work on clearing the route. The monks have decided which routes need our attention and we are quickly hard at work. Working in teams of four we hack and saw until the leader calls us to stop for lunch which, every day, is feta cheese, olives, hard brown bread, and fruit. We carry on after a short break by which time the sun is high and the mountain is very hot.

We aim to return to the monastery by 4 pm as we must shower, wash our clothes and be in the evening service, Vespers, by 5 pm. It is a bit of a rush to get there, and it is bad manners to arrive after the censor has passed. As the service ends, we file back into the trapeza or dining hall where another meal awaits us. When we leave the six chef monks are lined up and are all bowing from the waist as we pass, and we in turn show our appreciation of their efforts.

At this point, the monks and pilgrims walk straight back into the katholikon (church) for the night service, compline, but as workers we are not obliged to attend that, so we make for our rooms. It is said that as a pilgrim you are either praying, working, eating, or sleeping. Surprisingly even remote corners of Greece have far better mobile networks than here in the UK, so some people call home before retiring. By 9 pm we are all in bed after a good day’s work.