Arsenios Machairiotis

Father Arsenios Machairiotis, in the world Nicholas Patsalos, was abbot of the Monastery of Machairas in Cyprus, who died on 11 September 2004 in a helicopter crash on the way to Mount Athos with Patriarch Peter VII of Alexandria. He is honoured by the faithful as a holy young abbot, without synodal canonization.

He was born in 1969 and in 1986 went to study theology at Thessaloniki. From his youth he loved God much and felt the call to monasticism. He often visited Mount Athos, especially New Skete and Vatopedi Monastery, and became attached to the blessed Elder Joseph of Vatopedi. He became a spiritual child of Metropolitan Athanasios of Limassol. In 1992, with the blessing of Elder Joseph and at the invitation of Archbishop Chrysostomos I of Cyprus, he went with Frs Athanasios, Isaac and Nicholas to the Monastery of the Iereon in Paphos. In 1993 they settled in the Monastery of Machairas, which they made a coenobium.

Father Arsenios lived a pure life with a pure heart; he loved the saints and tried to imitate them. He loved the services and the Liturgy, but had an ascetic spirit. Though he stayed a short time on Athos, he received the Athonite spirit fully, being devoted to the counsels and writings of Elder Joseph the Hesychast. He was ordained a priest in Cyprus, and in 1999, when Abbot Athanasios was elected Metropolitan of Limassol, he became, in obedience, abbot of Machairas. Despite his young age the monastery advanced much spiritually under him, and the brotherhood grew with the arrival of young monks, so that in 2003 monks of Machairas went to settle in the Monastery of the Honourable Forerunner at Mesa Potamou.

On 11 September 2004, travelling to Mount Athos with Patriarch Peter VII of Alexandria to attend the feast of the Honourable Belt at Vatopedi, the helicopter carrying them crashed near the coast of Athos, killing all aboard. Metropolitan Athanasios tells that the father was afraid of this journey and had told him by telephone the night before that he feared the helicopter; he also told a brother: "I will go, but I will not come back." An ascetic on Athos later told that another ascetic had seen Father Arsenios in spirit saying: "They are looking for us in the sea, but we are in heaven." His body was found and brought to Cyprus, and his body rests in the Monastery of Machairas, which he had visited since childhood.