By John P. Bougas, Theologian
Father Joel Yiannakopoulos, well-known to the Orthodox world, was an enlightened ascetic, neo-patristic figure of the Orthodox Church. His life has been successfully outlined by the theologian G. D. Kouvelas in his book: Archimandrite Joel Yiannakopoulos (1901-1966): An Enlightened Figure, 3rd Edition, Kalamata 2001.
Father Joel was the founder in 1962 of the women's Hesychasterion of the Prophet Joel, in Kalamata.
This article presents Father Joel's speech during the Consecration on May 31, 1964 of the Holy Temple of the Hesychasterion, named after the Prophet Joel.
This handwritten speech of Father Joel has remained unpublished until now (2016 - the 50th anniversary since his repose) and belongs to the archive of the Sacred Monastery of the Prophet Joel in Kalamata.
In this speech there is a personal confession of Father Joel, who describes his personal journey and his call to the Church of Christ. In general, this speech shows the philanthropic ethos of the Elder Joel, the simplicity of his words and his human speech, as he himself was full of humanity in life. He was honorable with human things, knowing from his own experience the problems, and all the experiences of human society as a full member of it, avoiding of course all sin. The simplicity of the Elder is demonstrated by his participation in gatherings and friendly meals as well as in excursions with his spiritual children.
He especially emphasizes in his speech that monasticism is not a social work, but a work of prayer, a struggle to meet Christ and create the kingdom of God from now. He compares the newly founded Hesychasterion with other similar ones in Greece and with Mount Athos and defines the day and night schedule of the nuns, wanting the nuns to be undivided in their dedication to Christ away from the influence of lay friends and relatives.
He mentions that the first 10 nuns of the Hesychasterion live by the labor of their hands and their main work is prayer. In fact, these nuns to this day maintain the monastery, which was left to them as a sacred inheritance by Father Joel, and with their blood and sweat, under the late Pelagia Kotsonis the first abbess, after the earthquakes of 1986, they built the Monastery from the ground up. Even today they observe the rules and inheritance of their Elder, leading a strict monastic life.
Below is transcribed for the first time the handwritten speech of Father Joel during the ceremony of the Consecration of the Temple of the then Hesychasterion.
Speech at the Consecration of the Temple of the Prophet Joel and Saint Irene
(May 31, 1964)
Your Eminence, liturgists of the Lord and pious congregation. There are two works of the angels in Heaven: to praise God and serve people. Two also must be the works by us their representatives on earth: to thank God and God's people and enlighten the ignorant people. Let's take a look at both.
First: Giving Thanks
Happiness is not for the one who receives a free gift, but for the one who says thank you, whether he gives a free gift or receives it. Let us also enjoy a little of this happiness. And first of all let me thank God for the following reason.
When 52 years ago, at the age of 12, a crooked woman of the people led me to the then only light of the divine word, existing in the Hermitage of Panagoulakis, I immediately saw the Hermitage of this man with the white crosses, the black cells, small and narrow, and the Lord kindled a fire in me, my heart ignited for a life dedicated to Him, the fire-starter of hearts. This fire was maintained for 15 whole years, during which I remained between learning and studying the Fathers of the Church and the ascetics of the desert. How grateful I am to the Lord in retrospect, because those crazy years of youth passed like that!
Then came the sickness of the body and my scientific education. Both of these are contrary to the ascetic life, because theoretical knowledge more or less dries up the zeal for asceticism, and illness of the body deprives the physical strength for asceticism. The flames of asceticism subsided, but I was taught that I must be kind and not indifferent to the ailments of others. I thank the Lord for this too.
However, apart from the physical illness and the dry education, I also encountered other forces inhibiting the consecrated life, the monastic that is, not only from secular people but also from pious people, from laymen and clergy, who "all cannot accept this saying" as the Lord says, that is, whose mind was not penetrated by the monastic life, depreciating the worship of God at the expense of social action. But I praise the Lord again and thank Him, because with Holy Scripture and the Fathers of the Church I was able to fight back against these reactionary thoughts, as we will see below.
Fighting like this, I arrived at the first settlement of the Monastic brotherhood, at the Monastery of the Annunciation in Kampos of Avia, but this too was disbanded due to a lack of security on the ground. Then it appeared that everything was dissolved, "so that we despaired even of life." But suddenly two years ago, a full fifty years or half a century after I knew the light, the Lord promised that these works would be done within two years and be blessed under the head of the Church. I thank the Lord, because even after fifty years He blessed His work. This is God's work and not mine!
After God, I thank the Metropolitan and Overseer of the Metropolis of Messenia for the following reason. It is known to all of us, that when his predecessor died, everyone mourned for the Institutions, which the deceased Metropolitan founded. And yet not only did these Institutions operate for more than three years after the death of the deceased, but his successor dared to establish new buildings, such as the Church Boarding School, where 60 students are housed and 100 needy students are fed, and he founded a home for the blind, where 20 individuals are, and erected privately owned Offices of the Sacred Metropolis in order to save money from rents to cover serious financial obligations of the Sacred Metropolis. All this happened without drumbeats, but invisibly and quietly.
The people of Messenia must thank God and the Metropolitan, because he increased the Institutions. To our Metropolitan and Overseer, Mr. Eustathios, we owe more thanks for the work he is doing today, because he not only deposited his obol but also blessed a work whose minister was another of his subordinates. This material and spiritual blessing of his is of a higher spirit, because the other works can be assumed to have been carried out by a heavy inheritance of his predecessor, by social need, by dignity, by philanthropy, by noble selfishness. The blessing of this work, however, shows a man inexhaustible. Envy, this first-born child of selfishness, has a long age, deep roots, because it begins with Adam and Eve. So the conqueror of envy is superior to honorable and noble selfishness.
After our Metropolitan, I must also thank the Chancellor of the Sacred Metropolis, Father Agathangelos, because he too not only deposited his obol, but also demonstrated a fervent interest and example of his unenviable and good soul.
I also have to thank the Engineer, Mr. Panagiotis Theophilopoulos, who not only unselfishly but very willingly and very successfully offered his work with the plan, his supervision.
Finally, I would like to thank all the pious Christians, who with their generous donations helped bring the church to this point, so that it could be consecrated.
Let us now address enlightenment.
Second: Enlightenment
This Institution is called the Hesychasterion of the Prophet Joel. The word "Hesychasterion" is the title of a Monastic Institution, which is financially and administratively independent, but spiritually subordinate to the relevant Hierarch. The title of this type of monastic fraternity is perhaps new, but its essence is ancient, since the entire Mount Athos, whose millennium we celebrated last year, is an immense Hesychasterion, because all the Monasteries there are economically and administratively independent and only spiritually subordinate to the Ecumenical Patriarch. These Hesychasteria have also been founded in Greece, such as that of Aegina under Saint Nektarios, Saint Menas in Aegina, Saint Photini in Hydra and others similar.
As for the name of the Prophet Joel, I have to give the name of my Prophet, because that is how I thought that I would avoid the misfortune of Panagoulakis. As you know, there is a Church of the Annunciation in the Hermitage of Panagoulakis. But no one names this Temple, because everyone says "Let's go to Panagoulaki's." Therefore, if I gave another name to the Temple and the Hesychasterion, it would disappear and it would be heard "Let's go to the Monastery of Father Joel, or of Joel."
So I thought that if I dedicated the Temple to the Prophet Joel, the language of my friends and acquaintances would easily slip from Father Joel to Prophet Joel. I submitted this opinion to three of my archimandrite friends, who approved my opinion. So if I have stolen from Satan and I also ask to steal from you, let the Lord forgive.
However, what I am asking is this: that you will say - Let's go to the Hesychasterion not of Father but of the Prophet Joel.
After this enlightenment on the double title of this Monastic Institution, let me come to the content, as the monastics will ask and many have asked. What is the purpose of the Monastic life? Wouldn't it be better if maidens went out into the world and lived as good mothers and young men as good fathers? What do they offer to society?
The Good Lord gave us two precious gifts: His Divine Word and Human Reason. It would be good to view the dedicated celibate and single life based on these two criteria.
The Lord Himself was a virgin, He was born of a virgin mother, and she was a virgin before birth, during birth and after birth. These give a serious meaning, that the Lord loved and blessed the marriage in Cana, but for Himself chose the higher, the virginal life. The Lord valued the virgin life when He said to the rich man who kept all the commandments of the law and asked Him "what do I lack?" The Lord answered: "If you want to be perfect, sell your possessions and follow Me." How will you proceed? Unbound from marital obligations, as the Lord Himself was. When the Sadducees asked the Lord about that woman, who received seven men in succession, at the resurrection of the dead whose wife will she be? The Lord answered: In the kingdom above they neither marry nor are given to marry, but are as angels of God. Therefore virginity is the angelic life.
But besides the Lord, the Apostle Paul also says: "The unmarried man cares for what pleases the Lord, and the married man what for what pleases the woman." And about the woman he says: " There is a difference between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman cares about the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit. But she who is married cares about the things of the world — how she may please her husband." Paul concludes by saying: "He who marries does well, but he who does not does better."
This is what the word of God says, but also human reason. We know that there are three heads of sin: matter, flesh, ego. The Monastic, with poverty, fasting and obedience, beats greed on the head, because he has nothing, beats the flesh because he fasts and keeps vigil, and beats his ego because he obeys. And so through his poverty, his fasting and his obedience he is humbled materially, physically, psychically.
Besides that, look at the history of our Church. Almost all the Saints of our Church are celibates from the Monastic life. You see the administration of our Church, the body of Bishops. They are unmarried people and from the Monastic life. You see the religious movements of modern Greece came from people who were unbound by family obligations: Kosmas Aitolos, Papoulakos, Makrakis, Eusebius Mathiopoulos.
Therefore, not only God's word but also human reason confirm that the consecrated life played and plays a great role in society and history.
But let's also come to the present Hesychasterion. 9-10 persons gathered today, not failures in life, nor advanced in age but in the prime of their age, who at night pray for the peace of the whole world and during the day embroider embroideries and weave weaves, which you will see. If these were in the world, what would they offer? Only their work. Here they offer this work and chanting. When are they better?
So let us thank God and people, and let us be enlightened in the works of God.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
