Deacon Ordination in the Holy Metropolis of Corfu
His Eminence the Bishop of Corfu, Paxos & Diapontian Islands Mr. Nektarios on Sunday 31st October, 2021, did the Divine Liturgy at the Church of Saint Spyridon in Saroko, where he ordained Mr. Christos Vrachliotis as a deacon, Me. Vracliotis is also a dentist and chanter in the chruch.. The young deacon is married and the father of two children, living a Christian life and longing for the priesthood from his childhood.
During the ordination, the newly ordained person addressed His Eminence and thanked God for all the blessings that God reserved for him in his life and reached the most mature moment of his age to serve the sacred altar with self-denial. Addressing his ordained, His Holiness reminded him of the great responsibility and weight of the priesthood, which you call to honor and respond to the honorary invitation made to him by our Lord Jesus Christ. The time in which he was called is one of the most difficult times when the temptation of secularization is challenging for the modern priest. The values of the past in the priesthood and consequently in the church have been irretrievably lost. Today it is necessary for the priest to lift the cross of the priesthood with more force in various opposing currents of the time and to be armed with the Grace of God, the deep faith and the devotion to the work entrusted to him by God.
In today’s apostolic passage when the Apostle Paul prayed to the Lord to tempt him with sickness, the Lord Himself replied that the Trust that has been entrusted to him is manifested through sickness and strengthens him in the work entrusted to him. So he urged him not to stop at the limits of the present life and the diseases, whether physical or even spiritual, because the Grace of God will be the one who will strengthen him in the task entrusted to him. Our Lady, Saint Spyridon, but also all the Saints of our Church will be his protectors who will lead him to his new priestly life.
