George of Palaiomonastiro

George of Palaiomonastiro, with the secular name Branko Vitkovic, was born in 1920 in the village of Mirusi in the Bileca district of Serbia. He finished school with distinction, the military engineering school with exceptional success, the school of mechanical and electrical engineering in Munich and the Saint Sergius Theological Institute in Paris. In the war of 1941 he ended as a prisoner in Italy and France. In 1954 he left for Jerusalem and stayed a time at the monastery of Saint Sabbas. From there he came to the Holy Mountain to become a monk at Hilandar. He remained a time as novice, making many prostrations each night. But the stillness of the wilderness drew him. He became spiritually bound to Elder Joseph the Hesychast (d. 1959), who revealed to him the secrets of the prayer of the mind. He was tonsured a monk at Palaiomonastiro, where Saint Sava of the Serbs (d. 1236) had also lived.

Stillness, solitude, silence, extreme fasting, vigil, prayer and study were his life here. Illnesses did not interrupt his strict rule. He had left all hope to the Mother of God; his only thought was the mercy of Christ. He had unceasing war with the demon. He provided what he needed to live by making brooms. He was rich in his extreme poverty. In privation and want he lived a wonderful joy. He greeted visitors with "Christ is risen" all year. "We are children of the Resurrection," he said. "We monks, without the joy of the Resurrection, can neither live nor be saved." His friend and biographer, Elder Mitrophanes of Hilandar (d. 1999), said: "From this spiritual joy sometimes came also a fitting and edifying humour, which he always used in his struggles with temptation, with the devil."

This learned and polyglot monk had calluses on his knees and hands from countless prostrations. Elder Cherubim of the Paraklitou monastery, who knew him, says: "The flame of divine love that burned in him was boundless. Whole nights he melted in prayer for others, for the Church, for the sorely tried and especially for the sinners of the earth." The late Elder Joseph of Vatopedi (d. 2009) adds: "At Palaiomonastiro, where he lived, even in winter with frost several degrees below zero, he had no heating, although stoves and as much wood as he wished were available, nor did he use suitable covers. His strict industry was the general rule of his life and he never relaxed this 'merciless' life until his death." Mitrophanes concludes in his fine biography: the monk George reposed on the night of the eve of the Nativity of the Theotokos, 8 September 1972, at the Old Russian monastery. He is venerated by the faithful, without synodal canonization.