Piraeus, Greece, July 13, 2021
Photo: imp.gr
A new chapel dedicated to St. John the Forerunner and three of the greatest saints of the 20th century was consecrated and opened in Piraeus, Greece, on Sunday.
The Chapel of Sts. John, Paisios the Athonite, Porphyrios of Kavsokalyvia, and Iakovos of Evia at the Church of St. Paraskevi in Piraeus was blessed by His Eminence Metropolitan Seraphim of Piraeus of the Orthodox Church of Greece, reports Romfea.
“Every altar, every holy church is a gate to Heaven,” His Eminence said during his sermon, emphasizing that through the Sacraments celebrated on the holy altars, we can enter into the uncreated life of God; “we defeat death and transcend the created reality.”
Photo: imp.gr Referring to the saints to whom the chapel is dedicated, the Metropolitan noted that St. John the Baptist unites the Old and New Testaments, while Sts. Paisios, Porphyrios, and Iakovos are examples of great holiness in our own generation.
The hierarch spoke with great emotion, noting that he himself had met all three of these modern-day saints.
“Three persons who lived in our time and who received the gift of holiness. This proves that the Church is not a religion, it’s not man-made, but the communion of God and men. It’s the share in the uncreated life of God,” Met. Seraphim stressed.
“The work of the Church is to make saints, to be the holy womb from which saints are born,” and we are called “to imitate the lives of the saints … to rejoice in the lives of the saints,” His Eminence concluded.
Another chapel was consecrated to St. Paisios on the same day, at the Church of St. Nektarios in Trikala, Greece.
A side altar at the Church of the Great Martyr Demetrios in Athens was dedicated to Sts. Paisios and Porphyrios in 2017.
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