Saint Gervasios of Patras According to Saint Kallinikos of Edessa
By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou
By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou
The first feast of Saint Gervasios of Patras brought me memories of the stories of my Elder, Saint Kallinikos Metropolitan of Edessa, Pelle and Almopia about him. He often told me about his life and conduct. He met him as Chancellor of the Sacred Archdiocese of Athens, when he was a student, and then from his ministry in Patras from two sides.
First, from his close friend Spyridon Tsantilis, later Father Hierotheos, Chancellor of the Sacred Metropolis of Patras and later Metropolitan of Hydra. They were friends as laypeople and together they discussed their induction into the Priesthood. Father Hierotheos had a spiritual father, Father Gervasios, and this was the reason why he also got to know him.
Secondly, his sister lived in Patras with her family who were connected to Saint Gervasios and heard a lot about his missionary activity.
Thus, he attended his funeral service as Chancellor of the Sacred Metropolis of Aetolia and Acarnania and spoke eloquently about him interpreting the saying "the tall oak has fallen".
In Edessa, in the Hierarchical Conferences, he referred to the views of Saint Gervasios, mainly on liturgical matters, drawing arguments from his book "Interpretive Supervision on the Divine Liturgy". In one of his Encyclicals, which he sent to the Clergy of the Sacred Metropolis of Edessa, he writes: "The recently reposed Archimandrite, Father Gervasios Paraskevopoulos, who worked very fruitfully in Patras, writes in his well-studied work 'Interpretive Supervision on the Divine Liturgy'...".
In the archives of Saint Kallinikos, I found a sermon by him about Father Gervasios, without any indication that he delivered it. Apparently it comes from the 1970s and maybe it is from the commemoration of the tenth anniversary of his death.
In his homily, he presents Saint Gervasios, "as an imitator of John the Baptist, of the Prophet Elijah, of the older and later Fathers, including the Hieromartyr, Ethnomartyr and Equal to the Apostles Kosmas the Aitolos." He considers that his work was "the work of an Evangelist," he was an "Apostle of Christ," a "Gospel Preacher of the golden patristic age," an "Apostle of God," he was a "fighter for the Truth," he was an "Apostolic man." He talks about "his holy life and his fruitful actions,", "his ascetic form," etc.
I quote it in its entirety below:
Firm and Immovable:
Archimandrite Father Gervasios Paraskevopoulos
Archimandrite Father Gervasios Paraskevopoulos
“What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind?" (Matt. 11:7)
No, the Honorable Forerunner was not a "reed". He was fearless, rigid, inflexible. He did not give in even before King Herod. He was beheaded, but not shaken. He fell fighting for the Truth, but he did not bend.
The Honorable Forerunner was the hero of the late Archimandrite Father Gervasios Paraskevopoulos, who has recently fallen asleep in the Lord. The angelic life and superhuman actions of the glorious Prophet inspired the pure Hieromonk, Father Gervasios. The figure of that lion of the Jordan Desert electrified him.
The deceased was detached from the rocks of Gortynia and remained a rock in life, a rock in his moral life. He struggled until old age to remain faithful to the Lord's orders. He was pure, as when he came out of his mother's womb. He was clean, as the Clean Lord wants us to be. He was ethical in the narrow and broad sense. He was faithful to God. He was a chosen disciple of the Lord, a living Christian. He was right in everything. He was a fighter in order to become "perfect and complete and lacking in nothing" (John 1:4). Profit did not sway him. Whatever God wanted was Law for him. The sorrows and circumstances of life fell upon him and they did not lead him astray. "He built his house on the rock, and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock" (Matthew 7:24-25).
He was an immovable rock even in the work of an Evangelist. The renowned Father as an imitator of John the Baptist, of the Prophet Elijah, of the older and later Fathers, including the Hieromartyr, Ethnomartyr and Equal to the Apostles Kosmas the Aitolos, knew how to live and teach the Gospel Truth genuinely, purely and unadulterated even in the form of his literature. "My speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom" (1 Cor. 2:4). He preached the truth and only the truth. He was interested in one thing: the transmission of the saving Truth. He did not look upon a human face. He was not flattered. He did not bend. He learned to preach the gospel of Christ to all regardless of the consequences that the boldness would have on him. The words of the Apostle Paul "if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ" (Gal. 1:10) were an inviolable law for him. He was disgusted by the maneuvers. He was outraged by expediency. A pure man drunk on the spiritual wine of the Holy Scriptures, he wanted to water his Christians with the same drink. "I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 3:14). Christ's apostle had one interest: to enlighten, to teach, to help in the salvation of the immortal souls of his listeners. Neither the powerful of the day, nor the movements of the age led him astray. He spoke precisely, as a Gospel Preacher of the golden patristic age would speak. Technical and artificial civilization did not affect him. As a messenger of God, he proclaimed the will of God.
And what did he gain by this rigidity, perhaps those who judge by sight will say? What did he win? Was he left on the sidelines? You are horribly mistaken! The Priest of the Most High God on the sidelines? The Liturgist of the Awesome Mystery, of the Bloodless Mystagogy, on the sidelines? The toucher of the Divine Body on the sidelines? The biblical man Father Gervasios on the sidelines? It is the greatest folly to admit such a thing. Father Gervasios lives because he experienced joy, satisfaction, rejoicing, honor, which other officials did not experience. A rock on top of the rock of the ages was filled with deep satisfaction, when they saw that "many are the children of the desert rather than of her who had a husband" (Gal. 4:27), that as a Hieromonk he was surrounded by innumerable children, the souls and the innocent children were angelic songs for him. Only those who have understood what it means to be an Apostle of Christ are in a position to understand that there is no happier person in the world than "the unashamed worker of the gospel" (2 Tim. 2:15). Labors, toils, persecutions, contempts, privations and death, even martyrdom, are awards, glory, greatness, honor, incalculable goods.
Father Gervasios won in this world. He also won eternity. He won everything. A fighter of Truth will receive the crown of Truth. "Be faithful unto death and I will give you the crown of life" (Acts 2:10). He will receive from the Lord the just reward, from the One who sent him the wages of the work. "The worker is worthy of his wages" (1 Tim. 5:18). He won what "eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man" (1 Cor. 2:9).
Society also benefited from the passing of the blessed man from this world. Myriads of souls benefited from his Teaching. Myriads of Christ's sheep were refreshed by the water of life, which he gave even from his bed. Myriads of the faithful found the Good Shepherd through Father Gervasios. Many crowds ran to him and found "rest for their souls", because he led them to the Savior and Redeemer. And only the number of the crowd, who watched with great emotion and deep pain his funeral service, testifies to what the apostolic man offered to the Christian fullness. A fruitful olive tree gave oil for nourishment and illumination to waves of pious people of the Apostolic Church of the Patras and beyond it. Only the Heart-Knowing Lord knows exactly the magnitude of Father Gervasios's offering.
The ever-memorable Liturgist of the Lord has reposed. He has reposed. "He rests from his labors" (John 8:13). However, his example remains, his holy life and his fruitful actions. Among those who knew him, his ascetic form, his dynamic character, his integrity and his rigidity remain. In the Clergy and Laity remains the example of piety, orthopraxy and Orthodoxy. And we need, in fact, in the present age, such men, such men, firm and immovable. In our generation, in which extreme expediency shuts mouths, and in which political theories and beliefs dry the flowers of Faith and Holiness, courageous men like Father Gervasios are needed.
Let us pray that the Lord and Owner of the Divine Vineyard, of our Holy Church, will raise up imitators of the late Father. Let us ask "the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest" (Matt. 9:38).
***
It seems that what applies to spiritual things, also applies to all subjects, that the saints know the saints best!
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
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