Slanci, Serbia, March 24, 2025
Photo: spc.rs
The primate of the Serbian Orthodox Church led the rite of tonsuring for new monks at a monastery outside Belgrade over the weekend.
On Saturday, March 22, His Holiness Patriarch Porfirije visited the St. Stephen the Archdeacon Monastery in Slanci for the evening service. Following Vespers, three new monks were tonsured into the small schema, reports the Serbian Orthodox Church.
Thus, the novices Igor, Dobrivoje, and Mihailo took monastic vows and received the monastic names Nikita, Matej, and Mihailo. Their place of repentance, St. Stephen Monastery, is a dependency of Hilandar, the Serbian monastery on Mt. Athos.
His Holiness proclaimed the glory of the monastic tonsure, saying:
Dear Father Abbot, brothers of this holy monastery, newly tonsured monks, Heaven and earth rejoice today together with us, and above all, the angels and archangels rejoice, because today we’ve taken the first step, a good and blessed beginning, by adding to this holy monastery three new monks who were novices here, three new monks who should live an angelic life, a life that resembles the Heavenly way of life in this world.
And, behold, the Lord shows in this way that He loves the world, that He loves His creation, and that He opens possibilities and paths and blesses a way of life that is in accordance with the rules, in accordance with the principles of His Kingdom.
Man is created for fullness and perfection, Pat. Porfirije said, though we all struggle with ego and pride which lead to various sins. Those within the Church recognize sinful life as wrong while acknowledging that God’s love enables us to taste His Kingdom despite our weaknesses. Monastic life represents a complete rebirth in Christ, calling monks to transcend natural life and become witnesses to God’s Kingdom, he preached.
A true monk seeks to be completely permeated by Christ, thinking, seeing, hearing, and speaking as Christ would, primarily through the virtue of obedience, His Holiness emphasized. This obedience is practiced toward one’s elder, paralleling how members of families should practice obedience to one another. Through humility—which alone can save us—monastics find peace and become living examples of the Gospel, offering comfort to all who struggle in the world, accepting others’ troubles as their own ascetic struggles and transforming them into prayer.
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Photo: hilandar.info
It’s unknown exactly when the monastery was built or who its founder was. In the oldest data, from 1560, the monastery is mentioned in Turkish documents as the Monastery of the Presentation near the village of Oršljan, which then had only one monk. Folk tradition connects the monastery to the Nemanjić dynasty. Two versions of events are preserved in popular tradition. According to the first, it was founded by St. Sava at the beginning of the 13th century, and the second tells us that the founder of Slanci was King Dragutin at the end of the 13th century.
Throughout the centuries, the monastery shared the tumultuous history of its people. In the first half of the 15th century, when the Serbian capital was transferred to Belgrade during the reign of Despot Stefan Lazarević, the monastery experienced its flourishing alongside the rapid development of the new capital. During this period, it could accommodate a large number of monks who, fleeing from the southern regions, found refuge from the Turks in Slanci. The monastery also flourished during the reign of Despot Đurađ Branković. Then, out of respect for the restorer and in honor of the patron saint of the Branković family, the monastery, which until then had been dedicated to the Presentation of the Most Holy Theotokos, changed its feast day and began to celebrate St. Stephen the Archdeacon. According to tradition, Despot Đurađ then donated a particle of the relics of St. Stephen to the monastery.
The Ottoman army conquered the monastery in the 16th century, and a very difficult period followed for the monastery. However, the monks persistently returned and restored it, although they knew that the Turks were merciless to those found in the monastery.
The monastery experienced its flourishing from 1961 when its restoration began, with a new church being built along with dormitories and a chapel. The new church was built according to the description of the old one found in historical sources.
In the foundations of the monastery church and dormitories, charters written on parchment were placed which stated: “Restoring this holy place of the Nemanjićs with God’s help, we assign to it the holy mission that in it, as a metochion of the Hilandar Monastery on Mt. Athos, young monks will be prepared for the ascetic life in Hilandar Monastery.”
Today, Slanci Monastery is the only active and living metochion of Hilandar in Serbia.
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