Metropolitan Athanasius of Limassol - on the Pope's visit to Cyprus


Most people know that the famous "Fr. Maximos" in The Mountain of Silence: A Search for Orthodox Spirituality is the Metropolitan of Lemesos, Athanasios. He was a monk on Athos, who had the opportunity to spend time with such holy elders as Elders Paisios and Ephraim of Katounakia and others. He was, at the time of the writing of the book, the Abbot of the Monastery of the "Panagia Machera". Since then, he has been consecrated Bishop of Lemesos (or Limassol).


The Metropolitan of Limassol Athanasius separates his position from that of the official position of the Church of Cyprus on the matter of Pope Benedict's visit to Cyprus. He boldly declares that he is opposed, with the argument that Papism is a heresy and that the visit here of the Primate of the Catholic Church will scandalize the souls of innocent pious Christians. At the same time, he stresses that there should be no displays of unseemliness, no rudeness, no bad behaviour. He has personally stated that he will not participate in the reception schedule.

Q: Why would the Church and her flock be scandalized by the impending visit to the island by Pope Benedict XVI ?

I believe that the Pope's visit to Cyprus will cause several problems to the conscience of many pious Christians. It would be better if he did not come, because I believe that it will not benefit us in any way, given that I have not seen any positive intervention by the Vatican until now, with regard to our national issues. Enough unrest has already been caused, which was not something we needed at this point in time.

Q: Are we in danger from something?

I am not saying that we are in danger with the arrival of the Pope, or that we will betray our Faith or that the Orthodox Church will be subdued. It has merely given rise to various circles of (schismatic) Old Calendarists to accuse us of being compliant, of having lapsed from the principles of the Orthodox Faith and quite a number of questions have been raised in many people. Of course the Pope was invited by the President of the Republic and the Archbishop gave his consent.

Q: Did you discuss this with the Holy Synod?

In the last Synod, the matter of our presence -or not- in events with the Pope was brought up. I had refused to participate and said that we knew nothing. We learnt about the Pope's arrival from the newspapers.

Q: Do you usually learn the news from the newspapers?

The Archbishop of Cyprus has increased privileges and we definitely do not want him to interfere in our affairs. We do however preserve our personal right to say that we did not know that the Pope was coming, and that if asked, I would personally have declared "no", because it would have caused a scandal in the souls of innocent pious Christian Orthodox, the way we are seeing it happening.

... To be continued