On the 1st of October 2018, the final day of the visit of His Beatitude Theodoros the 2nd Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa to Odessa, he visited the Holy Monastery of the Prophet Elijah in the center of the city. The Holy Monastery was originally a Dependency of the Holy Skete of the Prophet Elijah, of the Holy Monastery of the Pantokrator, on the Holy Mountain.
At the official welcome, waiting for him with enthusiasm, to receive his blessing were many Greeks who live in Odessa and who knew him personally from his 10 year ministry as Exarch of the Patriarchate of Alexandria.
In his address, His Beatitude thanked Metropolitan Agathangelos of Odessa for his Abrahamic hospitality throughout the past days of his stay in his jurisdiction, saying that he departs greatly moved by the expressions towards him as well as the great participation of the faithful Christians. He praised the faithful for being part of the Canonical Church having denied the existing schisms which have torn the Garment of Christ. “Heresy and Schism is not expunged by the blood of Martyrdom,” the Patriarch said definitively.
With love and with warm supplication, he urged the gathered faithful saying: “My beloved children, you struggle spiritually and you pray for peace in the blessed Land of the Ukraine. What has moved me was the pained tone of the voice of Metropolitan Agathangelos, when he spoke about the Ecclesiastical problem in the country. This proves his enormous anxiety, as well as his love for our Church.”
In conclusion, the Abbot of the monastery, His Grace Bishop Viktor, gave him an Icon of the Venerable Father Gabriel the Agioritis, whose Holy Relics are kept at the Monastery.
