He was born in Vryoulla or Vourla in Asia Minor. As a seventeen-year-old, he and six other Christians were deceived and converted to Islam. When he appeared before his mother in Turkish clothing, she threw him out, saying: “I gave birth to a Christian, not a Turk”. He left, greatly saddened and soon came to understand the harm he had done himself. In Smyrna, he confessed to an Athonite spiritual father, who advised him to go to the Holy Mountain. He came under the guidance of Elder Stefanos at the skete of Saint Ann, at the house dedicated to Saint John the Theologian. “Persecuted and reviled”, he underwent “many trials and tribulations, because of the envy of the hater of good, ...
