In memory of Montenegrin Metropolitan Amfilochi Radovic

"My memories from Agios Amfilochios of Patmos"

"When I first came to Greece, in 1966-67, I went to Patmos and met the elder Amfilochios Makris ... He was tall, his face had a nice feature, he was gentle, with a lot of love, a lot of compassion. This was his main feature. I confessed. I will never forget that confession. I had gone to him with many terrible wounds from the world. I had already turned to monasticism, but I had not yet made my final decision and I needed exactly one person to stimulate me. I went to him with some hesitation, because I did not yet know the Greek language well. And yet from the first moment of confession, I felt that I could say everything to this man. His presence and the way he treated me dispelled all my hesitations. When I told him everything I had to say and while I was waiting for him to give me a blessing, he hugged me, addressed me by my baptismal name and said: "Brother Christos, should we communicate tomorrow?" I was expecting a thousand and two other things and the only thing I did not expect was this. So much was the love he had inside. He embraced me with his love, me, the one who comes to him. With this love you understood the spirit of the Church and true fatherhood. I, a stranger, to go to an unknown place, to an unknown person and to feel as if this person knew me from my childhood and loved me as if he had given birth to me ". 

FROM THE BOOK "DROSOVOLOS KAFSIS" Publication of the Holy Monastery of the Annunciation of Patmos.