It was with
immense sorrow and great surprise that we were informed of the
issuance of the Warrant for Your arrest and the immediate
remanding into custody of Your Eminence.
The hurried
issuance and dispatch of the said Arrest Warrant on the Eve of
the feast of the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the
inexplicable haste as well as the immediate mobilization of a
powerful police detachment along with the urgent dispatch of a
Prosecuting Attorney, in defiance of Hagiorite tradition, in
order to arrest You as if You were a criminal and an extremely
dangerous one, caused us, as well as the whole of the
Hagiorite population, profound grief. These actions are an
insult to the religious sentiment of the faithful, to our most
Holy Church, and Hagiorite Monasticism.
Holy fathers
and brethren,
We all share
in the pain and the magnitude of this unprecedented ordeal and
the cross that You are bearing during these holy days, in which
Your Spiritual Father is unjustly abused and led to detention,
albeit well-known since His youth for His love for the Church
and Monasticism and the years he has been offering, both to Your
Sacred Monastery as well as to the Holy Mountain in general.
Thus, in his
person, the entire Holy Mountain Brotherhood is insulted.
In
participation and in common grief for this ordeal of Yours, we are expressing
through the present, officially sealed by the Sacred Community letter, the
wholehearted support of our Sacred
Community, and we surround the holy Abbot with our undivided
trust, respect, and our in-Christ love.
We pray from
the heart that our Lord, Who was incarnated for our sake, along
with the unalterable mediations of the Trustee of our Holy-named
Locus - the Lady Theotokos - will strengthen You all, will
ensure a favourable outcome for this ordeal and divert the wills
of the wicked one and of the adversaries of the Church.
With all the
aforementioned, we remain, with bounteous love in Christ and in
brotherly love.
(signed by)
All the Representatives and Overseers
in
the common Meeting
of the twenty Sacred Monasteries
of the Holy Mountain Athos
