My wife and I recently watched (at the recommendation of my friend Andrew) the documentary Athos – Mount Athos Monk’s Republic Documentary on YouTube. I’ve embedded it at the bottom of the post for your viewing pleasure. Do go and watch it.
In case you’re unaware, Mount Athos is a mountainous peninsula in Greece that is populated by nothing but male monks. Some live in community. Some are hermits. Some live with maybe one other monks. Some live in what is called a “lavra”, which is a collection of hermits who get together every once in a while. Most of the monasteries and hermitages, etc., are Greek, but there are also monastic settlements on Athos for Serbians, Bulgarians, Russians, and Romanians. Monks have populated Mount Athos for 1000 years, and they pursue peace (hesychia), purity of heart, pure prayer, and God Himself here to the exclusion of all else.
At one point in the documentary, a monk gets a Christmas package from his sister in Athens. He lives with one other monk — they are forerunners from a monastery on the mainland, making their settlement suitable for more monks from their monastery to come. In the package are a knee brace, four pairs of socks (he gives two to his brother monk), and a pair of boots.
He tries the boots on and says, “They fit. Glory to God.”
My wife’s comment, “I’ve never said, ‘Glory to God,’ for shoes that fit.”
Me, “Neither have I.”
Maybe we’re missing something. The monks in this documentary have the Jesus Prayer on their lips continually. They pray before taking a drink from a water pump. They pray before testing the loaves of bread they just baked. They gives thanks to God over and over again.
Imagine if we laypeople starting cultivating such glorifying of God and such thankfulness…
Classically Christian 