I can’t forget about one amazing event. Meniko and Akaki in Cyprus became the first villages in the world to depict it in their churches.
One day Fr. Evmenios (at that time he was still Fr. Sophronios), put St. Nikephoros to bed. It was very cold in winter, so he turned on the electric fire in the saint’s cell, but Fr. Nikephoros told him:
“My child, turn the fire off before leaving!”
“All right, Geronda, bless me!”
Fr. Evmenios went to his cell. And while he was praying there, the thought came to him whether he had turned the electric fire off in Fr. Nikephoros’ cell. And since this thought kept bothering him, he said to himself:
“I’ll go and quietly, without waking the elder, check if the electric fire is off.”
And so he went. We are talking about a paralyzed and blind man—St. Nikephoros. Elder Evmenios opened the door of his spiritual brother’s cell quietly, thinking that he was asleep. And what did he see there?
He found St. Nikephoros in the air five feet above his bed, praying in the midst of a great light, raising his hands towards the icon of the Most Holy Theotokos. Elder Evmenios was astonished. He closed the door soundlessly so as not to disturb the saint in contemplation of the uncreated light, came back to his cell, knelt down and said:
“Forgive me, O Lord, for interfering in Thy communion with my elder!”
Afterwards Elder Evmenios told me:
“Then such joy seized me—it filled my whole body in waves, and I said to myself: ‘My Christ, Thou hast sent me this great saint, this spiritual mentor. Lord, in my prayers I asked Thee to send me a man as a mentor, and Thou sent me a saint!”
Of all the events that was the best for me, and I told myself that when I found a good iconographer, I would ask him to paint an icon of St. Nikephoros. And when we were frescoing the church in Meniko and by the grace of God the work was finished, I asked Anthony, a Russian iconographer, to paint a fresco with this saint’s image.
The church singer Yorgos was very ill and dying. His children came, and I told them to order an icon of St. Nikephoros. I visited Yorgos at the hospital. The disease struck him where his strength and joy were—his vocal cords. And I told him, “My God, when Thou wantest to strike, Thou strikest the spot!”
I knew that St. Nikephoros was a good singer, as was our Yorgos, who lost his voice after a tracheotomy. I was thinking about which book to bring him to read. And I decided to take one on St. Nikephoros. And do you know what happened?
The night before he told his wife, “Nikephoros is coming to me tomorrow.”
Maria, his wife, asked, “Which Nikephoros? Metropolitan Nikephoros of Kykkos?”
“No. Another Nikephoros will come. I don’t know. But the day before yesterday I was told in a dream that certain Nikephoros would come to me tomorrow.”
The next day I went to the hospital and brought him a book on St. Nikephoros. Once Yorgos saw it, he and his wife burst into tears.
“Nikephoros is here! And we believed that Metropolitan Nikephoros would come today!”
And I told him, “Yorgos, my friend, if the saint wants to, he can heal you. You may not be healed physically, and then St. Nikephoros will accompany you to eternal life.”
He replied, “It will be better if the latter happened!”
He was a wise man and chose eternal spiritual good. A few days later, Yorgos died.
His children remembered this and paid for the painting of St. Nikephoros’ icon. Every year on January 4 it is displayed for the veneration of the parishioners.
The saints inspire us by their lives to not lead an impious life where we eat and drink and tomorrow we die! Thus, if the saints’ way of life inspires us, then our life has meaning, there is grace and joy in it.
Let me share some other very good news with you. When Fr. Evmenios entered St. Nikephoros’ cell again, he found him praying a prayer of repentance:
“My Christ, forgive me, a liar! My Christ, forgive me, a lecher! My Christ, forgive me, a robber! My Christ, forgive me, one who judges, says spiteful things to others, is easily irritated, and upsets others!”
Fr. Evmenios said nothing. The next day, when they were having a meal together, he asked his spiritual father:
“Geronda, yesterday I heard you praying. What kind of prayer was that?”
“It was a prayer of repentance.”
“But Geronda, isn’t it extreme? When did you have time to commit all these sins? You contracted leprosy at the age of sixteen. When did you fornicate? When did you steal? When did you murder? Why are you saying such things?”
“Because, my child, maybe I didn’t commit these sins, but I thought about them! And in the Gospel Christ tells us that whether you have sinned in thought, in words, or in deeds, it is almost the same thing. And we know such a saint as St. Anthimos, who was strict with us. Therefore, it is useful to blame ourselves in our prayers.”
This is the only way a person comes to repentance, which leads him to mercy. Mercy leads him to compassion, and compassion leads to holiness. You will not hear of any saint who did not have repentance, mercy, and compassion for his neighbors. This is precisely what St. Nikephoros teaches us.
St. Nikephoros (Tzanakakis) The Leper One day Elder Evmenios was alone. It was very hot, there were a lot of mosquitoes. Someone brought him some insect repellent, and he began to spray it all over his cell. The whole cell was filled with the smell of poison. After that, he walked back into his cell and went to sleep. And he would certainly have died there. It was like entering a furnace with poison.
“As soon as I went to bed,” he later related, “and fell into the first sleep, I saw St. Nikephoros take me by the shoulders, throw me out of my cell, and command me, ‘My child, what are you doing? You’ll die this way! Don’t you understand that? Don’t come into the cell until the morning!’”
If you’re a father, you take care of your child. You control him after even your death. And St. Nikephoros said to Elder Evmenios:
“Don’t enter the cell again! Open the doors, open the windows and ventilate the cell!”
Elder Evmenios also related:
“I was extremely upset: something very bad happened to me, my heart turned ‘black’ with anguish, I fell into despair, was sad and crying. I said, ‘Where are you, Father Nikephoros? You were my support, inspiration and consolation, and now I’m left alone and in agony.’
“As I was thinking about that, I felt someone’s hand stroking my head. I turned around, and who did I see? The reposed Father Nikephoros! He said to me: ‘Father, don’t get too frustrated, you shouldn’t do that. We have the Holy Spirit, and we shouldn’t get so upset.’
“When he stroked my head, it was as if a breeze had blown into my heart, which gradually became stronger and stronger, and anxiety vanished, giving way to the joy in the Holy Spirit.”
This is how saints of God communicate with each other and transmit each other the power, inspiration and grace of the Holy Spirit, and this is the most important thing. As we have already said, neither our fathers nor our mothers will abandon us as long as they are righteous. The righteous will live forever and ever. Perhaps we are unworthy to have such an intercessor as the holy Elder Evmenios, whom St. Porphyrios called “the hidden saint of Athens.” When St. Porphyrios was going to Mt. Athos for respite, his spiritual children asked him:
“What will we do without you? Are you really going to leave us orphans?”
He sent most of them to Elder Evmenios, who was the successor of Sts. Pachomios, Nectarios, Anthimos and Nikephoros.
Elder Evmenios (left) and Metropolitan Neophytos of Morphou (right) Such was the wonderful life of St. Nikephoros.
Not long ago, two people from the metropolis fell very ill. I was also sick and couldn’t go outside. The abbess of St. Nicholas Convent told me:
“I’ll go and visit the sick people.”
This abbess was a mutual acquaintance of ours.
I answered her:
“Don’t go alone! Take St. Nikephoros with you for company. Take his relics and make the sign of the cross over the sick people with them.”
And so she did. One of them was at a Nicosia hospital, and the other was at hospital in another city. First the abbess went to see the latter, named Anastasios. No sooner had she entered the ward where Anastasios was than the holy relics began to exhale fragrance, which filled not only the ward, but also the entire floor. The nurses came up wondering:
“Why does it smell like this? Mother, did you bring perfume to the ward?”
“No, I have no perfume,” the abbess replied and showed them the reliquary, and they came up and venerated St. Nikephoros’ relics.
The same thing occurred when she arrived at the hospital in Nicosia.
You see how God arranges such events to show us that we have holy fathers and mothers who take care of us. They do it not only to heal us from physical illness—not all of us will recover, and miracles will not occur to everybody—but to show us that we must all live by the miracle of our spiritual and mental healing, namely by repentance and regular Communion, mercy and compassion. In this way we will become true children of St. Nikephoros.
A second icon was recently painted. It depicts St. Anthimos of Chios, in the center is St. Nikephoros, and on the right is Elder Evmenios (Saridakis), who has not yet been canonized, but for us he is a modern saint and will soon become one for the whole world [Elder Evmenios was canonized in 2022.—Ed.].
Before my consecration as bishop, I went to Elder Evmenios. The elder was bedridden at Evangelismos Hospital, and I went to receive his blessing. I also sent Fr. Michalis from Peristeron, who was young and preparing for ordination as well. I told him:
“My son, if you are going with your wife [he had just gotten married] on your honeymoon to Athens, go and see a real saint!”
So he went and met Elder Evmenios. And he told me:
“Once my wife and I went outside, we cried for half an hour, without knowing why we were crying.”
I replied to him, “This is an effect of holiness. One of the ways to feel holiness is through tears.”
I told Elder Evmenios: “Geronda, thank you for everything. Pray for me continuously, because now that I have become a bishop, I am beginning to have problems!”
“I will always be with you!”
“And whatever may happen to you, I’ll come,” I said, meaning his funeral.
And what did he tell me?
“You want to, and I want you to, but you can’t.”
“Why?”
“On the day of my funeral a high-ranking guest will come to you and you will not be able to attend my funeral. But I’ll come to keep an eye on you.”
Sts. Anthimos, Nikephoros and Evmenios The day of his funeral was May 24. At that time, the feast of St. Cyriacus of Eurychou was being celebrated, and the Archbishopric decided to receive the ever-memorable Pope and Patriarch Petros of Alexandria in Eurychou. He was on an official visit to Cyprus. A visit to the Archdiocese of Morphou was scheduled for that day. A year earlier the elder had foretold it to me.
Eighteen years later I decided to go to Crete, which produced these saintly men: St. Nikephoros and the holy Elder Evmenios. They, together with Elder Iakovos (Tsalikis), are the greatest boon to me. I decided to serve a litiya at the grave of our Elder Evmenios in his native village of Ethia. And I did it. I returned to Athens very tired and told my friend Andreas with whom I was staying that I wanted to get some rest and sleep the following day. But the next morning I suddenly heard Andreas talking on the phone loudly:
“Madam, it’s impossible, he’s very tired! He’s sleeping now.”
Since I was awake, I told him:
“Andreas, who is there?”
“A woman who says that she called the diocese in Eurychou. She was told that you were in Athens and that you must meet with her.”
“Give me her phone number.”
I called the woman back. She gave me her name and I asked her:
“Why do we need to meet?”
“Don’t you remember me?”
“No.”
“Twenty-five years ago, I came from Germany, you brought me to Elder Iakovos (Tsalikis), and I confessed my sins to him.”
“But I have brought many people to Elder Iakovos—how can I remember them all!”
“I asked Elder Iakovos: ‘Should I come to you for confession?’ He answered, ‘No, I’m going to die soon. I don’t want to leave you a spiritual orphan.’ I asked, ‘Then who should I go to confess to?’
“He told me: ‘Ask the deacon; he knows and will tell you what you should do.’
“I asked you: ‘Father, where should I go to confession?’
“And you told me: ‘Go to Father Evmenios.’
“Then you gave me the best gift in my life.”
Believe me, I don’t remember anything of what the woman told me. She went to confession to Fr. Evmenios until his repose in 1999. Shortly before his death he said to her:
“I want you to perform the prayers I taught you in your apartment in Athens for the rest of your life.”
I wondered, “What prayers did he teach you?”
“The prayers that Elder Evmenios himself performed.”
“But that’s five hours of praying?”
“Well, yes, five hours! I’m a single woman. What should I do alone in my apartment? I read the texts of the services, as Father Evmenios did.”
I said to myself, “There have always been secret ascetics in Athens.”
Here’s what she told me: “Your Eminence, these days, while you are in Crete, I heard Father Evmenios’ voice, and he said to me: ‘Give St. Nikephoros’ cane to the Metropolitan of Morphou!’”
I said to her, “Oh my God! Do you really have St. Nikephoros’ cane?”
When Elder Evmenios was still alive, multitudes of people flocked to him, and he gave something to each, because he knew when he would die. Someone even asked him:
“Geronda, when will you depart from this world?”
And the elder replied, “Well, it will be in May. Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three. I don’t see any other numbers.”
On May 23, Elder Evmenios fell asleep in the Lord.
He told the woman, “You will perform the services that I performed, and I will give you two particles of St. Nikephoros’ relics and his cane as a blessing. When the time comes, I will let you know, and you will take these to another place.”
And now this sister was in Athens. She lived in a poor neighborhood. She was already an elderly woman and devoted five hours a day to prayers. She called the diocese and was told that I was in Crete.
“In Crete?” she asked.
“She is in Crete now to order a litiya.”
“For whose repose?”
“Father Evmenios’. That’s why I hear his voice!”
I told her, “Sister, why are you in Crete? Have you brought me the relics and the saint’s cane? I must come to the saint, not vice versa!”
“No!!!” she shouted into the phone. “You should not come to my sinful home! I’ll come and find you! Tell me where you are now.”
I told her where I was. She came to me, brought St. Nikephoros’ cane, two particles of the saint’s relics, and we made a shrine for them for the nursing home in Peristeron.
You see that our life is like a circle. In the center is Christ, and around Him, like bright stars, are the saints who send us their light and power. Don’t lose heart—we are not alone regardless of what may happen to us. We have God as our Father, the Most Holy Theotokos as our Mother, and the saints as our brothers and sisters in Heaven who take care of us all!
