Eugene of Xiropotamou

Hieromonk Eugene of Xiropotamou Monastery was an Athonite elder of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, who lived more than fifty years on the Holy Mountain and reposed on 21 March 1924. He is honoured by the faithful as a man pleasing to God, though he has not been formally numbered among the saints. Monk Moses the Athonite included him in his Great Gerontikon of virtuous twentieth-⁠century Athonites.

He was born in 1853 at Agra on the island of Lesbos, and in the world his name was Demetrios Efstratiou. In 1871 he came to Xiropotamou Monastery, and in 1874 he was tonsured a monk. His elder, Hieromonk Agathangelos (d. 1898), gave him the name Eugene in honour of his own elder, Eugene (d. 1876). He studied at the Athonite Academy, which was flourishing at that time.

He was ordained deacon in 1875 and priest in 1879, and in 1883 he was raised to the council of the monastery's elders. He had a deep love for the divine services and cared greatly for the progress of the monastery of his repentance. At the common labours he was the first to arrive and the last to leave, and at the olive harvest he worked like the humblest labourer. He spoke with ease, and his words at table moved those who heard him.

Former Abbot Evdokimos of Xiropotamou (d. 1938), the monastery's historian, wrote that he was marked out by the gentleness of his character, his ascetic life and his boundless zeal for his monastery. His name is kept in the brotherhood's records, and he is remembered on the day of his repose, 21 March.