Persecution of Mount Athos' Esphigmenou Monastery by the EP

[尼古拉前执事]

December 20 2006: ESPHIGMENOU MONASTERY MONKS ARE ATTACKED AND HOSPITALIZED BY PATRIARCH BARTHOLOMEW'S FALSE BROTHERHOOD.

Posing as the authentic Esphigmenou Monastery, a "false brotherhood" broke into the Kanaki, that is, the Administration Building of the true Esphigmenou Monastery, with sledge hammers & crowbars, and attacked Esphigmenou monks while sleeping in the early dawn. Below is an exclusive interview with a Friend of Esphigmenou in Athens Greece:

NK: Can you give us some details concerning the attack?

FE: There were at least eight Esphigmenou monks residing at their Kanaki in Karyes, the headquarters for Mt Athos. They had finished their morning prayers shortly after 3 AM and were in bed at the time of the criminal entry and assault of the false brotherhood at 5 AM. The Kanaki is separate from their historical Esphigmenou Monastery where over 100 monks reside. They also have monks at a farm in Ierisso Greece.

NK: Who specifically were the attackers of this false brotherhood?

FE: All 5 of the false brotherhood took part in the attack including an Albanian worker of theirs. The so called, "Fr Gabriel," a thug of the lowest kind, was again wielding his sledge hammer which he used against the historical Esphigmenou Monastery last year. The others had various entry tools, which included crowbars and sledge hammers. Once they broke in with their sledge hammers and crowbars, they started swing madly at the sleeping monks.

NK: What happened to the Esphigmenou monks?

FE: With wounds, multiple bruises on their arms and hands, and bleeding skulls, the Esphigmenou monks did what they could to ward off the blows by holding up the fire extinguishers and chairs which were next to their beds. Four of them were injured so badly that they were taken to Polygero Hospital 500 miles north of Athens. These were Fathers Cleopas, Mardarios, Chrysostom and Ambrosios. But Fr. Ambrosios, who was celebrating his patron saint, St. Ambrose, was so seriously injured, that he was transferred to a larger hospital in Thessalonica for special treatment. He is suffering from a serious blow to his skull from a crowbar, and he has an acute cracked skull and multiple bruises all over his body.

NK: Did the Greek Police arrest the false brotherhood attackers?

FE: No. The 5 attackers got off scot-free, but the victims now have a restraining order against them, forbidding them to return to Mt. Athos by the Greek Police. What is especially criminal, besides the illegal break-in and assault, is that the innocent Esphigmenou monks were the ones charged with wielding the crowbars and the sledgehammers! Now what would they be doing with crowbars? They used the best that they could find to deflect the blows, which were fire extinguishers and chairs next to their beds. Abbot Methodios, answng questions by reporters from the BBC and Reuters, as expected, stated that the monks had the right to defend themselves against the crowbar-wielding "monks" of Patriarch Bartholomew.

NK: What was Patriarch Bartholomew's intention by using violence against the Esphigmenou monks?

FE: This attack was an obvious set-up by Patriarch Bartholomew and his accomplices the Greek Government and the Police, to find a pretext to remove the monks from their Kanaki and move the false brotherhood in instead. But the entire world now knows that Bartholomew has resorted to violence and twisted the facts against the innocent monks to achieve his evil designs. We still have monks residing at the Kanaki, and we trust in the Mother of God, the Protectress of those who uphold true Orthodoxy on Mt. Athos, will protect and defend the faithful monks of Esphigmenou Monastery.

Please visit http://www.esphigmenou.com/ and call and contact the authorities and protest!

See Greek Police standing idly by, aiding and abbetting the assault @ http://www.esphigmenou.com/ (Scroll Down To The Picture of the Slegehammer, entitled, "Video.")

See Today's New York Time's Report @
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/21/world ... monks.html

See Today's London Time's Report @
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0, ... 72,00.html

See Today's Miami Herald's Report @
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/ne ... 286449.htm

[Priest Siluan]

(From John Rigas´Email)

I have just been informed that Ms. Bakoyianni in the Greek government has given the order to Esphigmenou Monastery to empty the Konaki by this Sunday.
The fathers feel this is an illegal order by Ms Bakoyianni and will not comply.
They along with many lay people already there as well as others who are coming, will defend the Monastery.

Local Police Christmas leaves have been canceled!

Please call Bakoyiannis office in Greece, to protest to them right now. Speak to them in English.
For telephone numbers go to our web site listed below.

Please contact everyone and relay this URGENT message!

sincerely,

John Rigas

[Priest Siluan]

BREAKING NEWS -DECEMBER 22, 2006

Greek Foreign Minister, Ms. Bakoyianni has given the order to empty the Konaki building of Esphigmenou Monastery at Karyes, the capital of Mount Athos by this Sunday.

Christmas leaves for the local Police have been cancelled!

The government is trampling on the civil rights of the Esphigmenou monks, a brotherhood that has existed there continuously since the early Christian times for over 1500 years.

The monks simply want to be left alone to live out their monastic commitment to a peaceful monastic life of prayer. The government wants to forcibly throw these 100 monks out of their only home and on to the street in the days before Christmas.

The government seeks to hand the monastery to another group of 5 men who have repeatedly engaged in violent attacks on Esphigmenou over the last year, including a particularly violent one last week when these men attacked the Esphigmenou monks with sledgehammers and crowbars in the early dawn hours while they were still asleep, inflicting life threatening injuries.

We call on Patriarch Bartholomew to publicly condemn the violent actions of the attackers representing his holiness as barbaric and unchristian; to stop exporting violent religious extremism from his Muslim country into Mt Athos; and to respectfully embrace the Esphigmenou brotherhood with the same enthusiasm and pastoral love with which he has for other Christian groups whose differences are infinitely greater than the issues raised by these monks.

Neither the Greek State nor the Patriarch owns the Esphigmenou property, but as is typical in cases of abuse of power, they take what does not belong to them and give it to others, even if it undermines universal understandings of fairness and justice. In Greece as in Turkey, the strong do what they will, and the weak suffer what they must.

Abbot Methodios and the fathers have sworn that they will not willingly give up an inch of any of the Monastery or its possessions on Mount Athos but will fiercly fight to the death along with hundreds of layman who are arriving to assist the fathers.

Please call Bakoyiannis office in Greece, to protest this immediately, pick up the telephone and call right now. On Friday, their offices close early, so call now.

Speak to them in English.

Their telephone numbers are listed below.

Please contact everyone and relay this URGENT message!

http://www.esphigmenou.com/

[Jean-Serge]

It seems that the Greek police is plannig to evict the monks this week end! The web site www.esphigmenou.com reports :

"BREAKING NEWS - DECEMBER 23, 2006 - The Greek government has deployed heavily armed Special Forces Police to Mt. Athos to forcibly remove the monks from their monastery home THIS WEEKEND. At this moment, the police are spending the evening in Ouranoupolis, and have numerous Police vehicles and prisoner transport trucks in preparation for their raid on the monastery. It is expected they will mobilize in the next few hours so they can make short work of the defenseless and unarmed Esphigmenou monks with a pre-dawn raid.

Please call Ms. Bakoyiannis (+30-210-368-1800) and demand that she stop the planned attack of the monastery building, and that she PROTECT the monks of Esphigmenou, who are Greek citizens."

[Myrrh]

Has more been heard about this? I haven't been able to find anything posted after 24th December.

[Jean-Serge]

Neither have I. No news at the moment...

[尼古拉前执事]

BREAKING NEWS- DECEMBER 23, 2006 - The Greek government has deployed heavily armed Special Forces Police to Mt. Athos to forcibly remove the monks from their monastery home THIS WEEKEND. At this moment, the police are spending the evening in Ouranoupolis, and have numerous Police vehicles and prisoner transport trucks in preparation for their raid on the monastery. It is expected they will mobilize in the next few hours so they can make short work of the defenseless and unarmed Esphigmenou monks with a pre-dawn raid.

BREAKING NEWS- DECEMBER 26, 2006- After an outpouring of your calls, emails, letters and prayers the Greek Government has backed down from its plans to forcibly remove the monks from Esphigmenou this past weekend. Abbott Methodios and the monks of Esphigmenou Monastery thank you for your support and ask that you continue to contact the Greek Government to end the brutal embargo of food, medicine, heating fuel, mail and visitors in place since 2003.