Artemios of Iviron

Artemios of Iviron, a hieromonk, with the secular name Michael Karagiannis, was born in 1889 in the village of Rafti in Arcadia. In 1909 he came to the Iviron cell of the Transfiguration of the Saviour. It was formerly called "of the Despot," because it had been built by Bishop Galaktion in the seventeenth century, the same who built the tower of Iviron Monastery. In the last years of the nineteenth century the Moreote elders Gerasimos and Kosmas, from the neighbouring Iviron cell of the Three Hierarchs (Saravari), rebuilt it from the foundations in stone, beautiful, and since then it was called "Moreote." Michael submitted to these elders. At his tonsure, in 1912, he received the name Artemios.

In 1927 he was ordained deacon and priest and made a confessor. He gained a reputation as a discerning confessor. He heard many monks and lay people. He always preferred to speak what is good. He liked to reconcile people. Peaceful himself, he wanted to make peace for all. He was also a faithful keeper of the holy canons. When in one monastery the abbot did not keep what he had told him about a monk of his whom he confessed, he preferred never to go to that monastery again. He did not accept gifts from the monasteries he served. He was very reticent, always advising, sweet of speech, kindly, simple and approachable. He wrote well, though he had not much schooling. The Holy Community also called on him. He left a reputation as a very merciful father: once he returned from Karyes without his cassock, because he had given it to the poor.

He reposed in the Lord on 29 June 1957, the feast of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, in Athens, where he had fallen ill. He is venerated by the faithful, without synodal canonization.