ATTIKA MONASTERIES

Osios Ephraim
One of the oldest monasteries in Attica, St Ephraim of Mount Amomon, located in modern day Nea Makri. Many monks and priests remained there for long periods of time for prayer. In the days of Ottoman rule, barbarian killers came and wiped out the monastery - one of the victims was our saint Ephraim. St. Ephraim's name and biography, complete with exact dates and details, is said to have been revealed to a hermit nun in a series of divinely inspired dreams in 1950. Following these dreams, his body was discovered and was kept at the site as a holy relic, which became the object of popular veneration, as he became known as a worker of miraculous healings. A mulberry tree, believed to be that on which the saint was hanged, is today shown as an object of veneration inside the re-erected monastery.

Moni Kleiston
The ancient reverend holy monastery of "Assumption of the Virgin Mary" Kleistis-Filis is the oldest monastery in the Holy Metropolis of Attica. The monastery is built on a site distinguished for its natural beauty and wild landscape. The date of its foundation is not known. Some say it was founded when Christianity became predominant in Attica and others believe it was before the conquest. It was founded as many icons of the Virgin Mary were discovered in a monastery opposite. Up until the 1930s it was confined only to men but was afterwards opened to women. The holy monastery made a significant contribution to the Olympic Games. Crowds came to visit the miraculous icon of the Virgin Mary, whose feast day is celebrated on 15th August.

The monastery of St. Irene Chrysovalantou is located in Lykovrisi, Attica and belongs to the Old Calendar. It comprises a building which occupies approximately 50 acres. It was founded and developed in the years following the civil war. Many couples who wish to have a child frequently visit this place.

In Mandra Attica an Athens suburb about 35 kilometers west of the city, on a hill, is the Nunnery of Our Lady Gorgoepikoos (or Gorgoupikoou), where the eponymous image of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The monastery offers a stunning view of the sea of Eleusis. The Holy Icon of the miraculous Virgin Gorgoepikou, painted on Mount Athos in 1900 before Our Lady holding "the divine infant in her arms like a cherubic throne. The image acquired from Mount Athos a family of Smyrna as a precious heritage passed down from generation to generation and eventually came into the hands of Iphigenia Anapliotis shortly before the destruction of Smyrna.

Τhe monastery of St. Cyprian and Justine (followers of the old calendar) was founded in 1961. It is located approximately 2 km north of the municipality of Filis, at an altitude of 500 m. In a location on a top of a hill about 15 km northwest of Athens. It's a male Coenobiac Monastery of Saints Cyprian and Justina the Martyrs was built in 1961 by the elder of the monastery, Metropolitan Cyprian.