599
edits
Changes
m
Correction of expression
[[Image:Ephraim_Nea_Makri.jpg|right|200px|thumb|St Ephraim of Nea Makri]]
'''St. Ephraim of Nea Makri''' or '''St. Ephraim of Mount Amomon''' (Greek: Άγιος Εφραίμ Ἅγιος Ἐφραίμ Νέας Μάκρης / του Όρους των Αμωμώντοῦ Ὅρους τῶν Ἀμωμών), believed to have lived from 1384 to 1426, is a [[martyr]] and [[miracle]]-working [[saint]]. Saint Ephraim is regard regarded as a "newly revealed" ("νεοφανείς") saint. He has become one of the most beloved saints in the last thirty years and his church is a center of pilgrimage for the entire country of Greece. His martyric death is commemorated by the church [[May 5]] and the discovery of his [[relics]] [[January 3]]. The His holy relics were discovered through divine intervention in 1950; , 524 years after his death. The saint was glorified by March 2011.
==History==
St. Ephraim's name and biography was were revealed to a hermit [[nun]], Sister [[Makaria Desypri]] (1911-1999), in a series of divinely inspired dreams in 1950. Following these dreams, she was led by God to restore the Monastery of the Annunciation in Nea Makri, which had been destroyed by pirates in the fifteenth century.
With the permission of the local [[bishop]], she took possession of the partially built [[chapel]] and as she worked , she eventually cleared away the rubble and prayed to find out more about the [[monk]] who had once lived there. This prayer was answered with a strong thought to "Dig up the earth here and you will find what you are looking for". With the assistance of a young worker , they uncovered a fireplace, three small windows, and a partially ruined wall, indications that this had been a [[cell]].
A body believed to be that of the saint was found in the ground near the nun's hermitage, on the site of an abandoned medieval [[monastery]] on the slopes of Mount Amomon, near the town of Nea Makri, in Attica. The saint, whose body was kept as a holy relic, quickly became the object of popular veneration, as he came to be known as a worker of miraculous healing. On the site of his supposed life and martyrdom a Monastery of the Annunciation of Our Lady (Ιερά Ἱερά Μονή Ευαγγελισμού της Εὐαγγελισμοῦ τῆς Θεοτόκου) was later re-founded. In 1998, Ephraim was officially glorified a saint by the Synod of the [[Church of Greece|Orthodox Church in Greece]], pending approval by the [[Patriarch of Constantinople]].
==Biography==
The Holy and Sacred Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate inducted St Ephraim of Nea Makri to its List of Saints of the Church of Greece '''March 4, 2011'''.<ref>Aimilios Polygenis, March 4, 2011, Romfea.gr http://romfea.gr/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=8049:-l-r&catid=13</ref>
An epistle was sent out by the Holy Synod of the Church of Greece to Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew requesting the recognition of Saint Ephraim, who was martyred in 1436 and whose miraculous relics were divinely revealed in 195o1950, within the membership of the List of Saints of the Orthodox Church. Sixty years after the discovery of the relics of the Saint, the Standing Holy Synod of Greece, in a letter sent - as required - to the Ecumenical Patriarch as the sole power to promote the request, requested that his memory be celebrated on May 5th as well as January 3rd, since on the latter date his holy relics were discovered.
The Holy Synod wrote to the Patriarch that Saint Ephraim is widely acknowledged by Orthodox throughout the world as a saint. They further stated that
:'' "the influx of pilgrims is massive, almost daily, and on Sundays and holidays the monastery is flooded with pilgrims from all of Greece.... The honor towards Saint Ephraim the New is clearly widespread throught throughout Greece and outside of it.... There are churches dedicated to the Saint in Sitia and Tinos.... Icons of the Saint are venerated throughout the Orthodox world." ''
Previous attempts to induct Ephraim were attempted during the course of the Archbishopric of the Archbishop of Athens and All Greece Christodoulos in 1997 prompted then by Metropolitan Panteleimon (Bezeniti) of Attica. The Metropolitan wrote in a letter that