Geronta Ephraim (1928 - 2019)

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It was April 1941, World War II, when Germany and Italy invaded and occupied Greece for 4 brutal years. Mass starvation and massacres engendered a state of constant fear. Ioannis (John) Moraitis, the future Geronta Ephraim, was only 14 years old, living where he was born, Volos, Greece. Hunger was so intense that he quit high school in order to work, first in his father’s carpentry shop, and later as a trader in the markets, selling anything he could find: biscuits, matches, buttons, in order to help the family. Through his pious mother’s constant spiritual teachings, Ioannis turned to God, his only hope and consolation. His mother, Victoria, served as his model. Always in prayer on her knees with tears of repentance, she took Ioannis, from a little boy, to church with her every day. It was during this period that an interest in and a love for monasticism was kindled by a hieromonk, Fr. Ephraim from Mount Athos, who was serving in one of the churches in Volos. Fr. Ephraim told Ioannis all about Elder Joseph, who he said was a very holy man and great ascetic.

When the Occupation was over, retreating armies and communist guerillas destroyed anything they could find, leaving hunger and malaria in their wake. Ioannis was left weak and ill, a 19 year-old young man but full of fervor for the Holy Mountain, and in September 1947, he departed the world with the blessings of his mother, to seek Elder Joseph, the Hesychast. He arrived at sunset to the empty harbor of St. Anne’s Skete. A little old man with a cane (Fr. Arsenios, the Cave Dweller) approached him and asked, “Aren’t you Johnny from Volos?” Astounded, Ioannis asked how he knew to which he replied, “The Honorable Forerunner (St. John the Baptist) appeared to Elder Joseph last night and said to him: ‘I am bringing you a little Lamb. Put it in your sheepfold.’ Let’s go now because Geronta (Elder Joseph) is waiting for us.”

From his very first meeting with Elder Joseph, the Elder looked into his soul and said he would make him a priest. The spiritual training of the Elder led one to spiritual progress and to sanctity if followed in perfect obedience. Elder Joseph placed obedience above all ascetic endeavors, including noetic prayer (prayer not of intellect but of the heart). The training ground for Ioannis became the cenobitic life and learning the meaning of genuine and blind obedience: the giving up of one’s own will and desires and absorbing and living the will and desires of the Elder. Elder Joseph told his Brotherhood, “The more reverence and faith you have in your elder, the more grace you will earn...through perfect obedience as Christ was obedient to the Father.” Obedience leads to the crushing of one’s ego and to true humility in imitation of Christ. Ioannis, full of zeal and dedication to his holy Elder’s teachings, made great spiritual strides acquiring the prayer of the heart. In 1948, Elder Joseph tonsured him a rassaphore monk and named him “Ephraim.” He was subsequently ordained a deacon and then a priest. He remained in strict obedience to his Elder until his Elder’s repose in 1959.

For the next 14 years, Elder Ephraim lived in strict asceticism until 1973, when he was enthroned the Abbot of Philotheou Monastery. It is noteworthy that in the 1700’s the New Hieromartyr and Equal-to-the-Apostles Kosmas Aitolos became a monk and later a priest at Philotheou Monastery. At the time Elder Ephraim became the Abbot, most of the monasteries on Mount Athos were idiorrhythmic. That is, each monk lived separately, worked independently and owned property. Their life was more like that of a hermit. Elder Ephraim and the remaining Brotherhood of Elder Joseph the Hesychast changed the monastic life of many of the monasteries of Mount Athos to become cenobitic communities. All monks were regulated by defined precepts. They lived and shared meals together; attended church services together and worked for their monastic community. Elder Ephraim and his brothers also brought with them the highest level of spiritual inheritance from their Elder Joseph, and that was the Prayer of the Heart, “Lord Jesus Christ Have Mercy On Me”. This elevated the spiritual state of monasteries and sketes throughout Mount Athos.

Having succeeded at elevating the spiritual life and expanding the Brotherhood of Philotheou, Elder Ephraim was asked by the council of Mount Athos to revive and expand several other monasteries on Mount Athos which had dwindled in numbers of monks. These monasteries were Xeropotamou, Konstamonitou, and Karakallou. Along with the monasteries on Mount Athos, there are women’s monasteries in Greece under Elder Ephraim’s spiritual guidance, including the monastery of St. John the Forerunner in Serres; that of Panagia the Odigitria (Directress) in Portaria in Volos, which is the monastery that Gerontissa Taxiarchia came from; and that of the Archangel Michael, a metochion of Philotheou on the island of Thasos. Geronta Ephraim’s spiritual guidance extended beyond the confines of his monasteries to include to this day, thousands of spiritual children throughout the world.

In 1979, Geronta became ill and his illness required surgery. He was convinced by his spiritual children in Canada to go there for his procedure and he agreed, which ended in a successful surgery. During his month of recovery, Geronta became acquainted with many people in the Greek community who flocked to him for confession and spiritual advice. He returned to Mount Athos but made the decision to frequent Canada and, in 1980, was invited to the United States. Seeing the need for greater spirituality amongst the people in Canada and the United States, and after a great deal of prayer, God revealed to him that his place was in America. In 1989, along with Bishop Maximos, he founded the first Greek Orthodox women’s monastery in the Americas, the Nativity of the Theotokos Monastery. Geronta left the Holy Mountain permanently in 1995 to reside in America. In addition to the Nativity of the Theotokos Monastery, he founded 16 additional monasteries throughout the United States and Canada.

Geronta Ephraim brought Anthonite monasticism to America where it has grown and flourished.