Gerasimos of Mikra Agia Anna

Saint Gerasimos Mikragiannanitis (born Anastasios-⁠Athanasios Graikas, 5 September 1903 - 7 December 1991) was a Greek monk of Mount Athos and one of the most prominent contemporary hymnographers. He was officially glorified as a saint by the Ecumenical Patriarchate on 10 January 2023. He is commemorated on 7 December.

Youth

He was born at Drovjani, in the Delvina region of Northern Epirus, in 1903. He first learned at the primary school of his birthplace. When he had finished it, he left the village, where his mother and younger brother remained, to join his father, who had already settled and was working in Piraeus. He settled first in Piraeus, near his father and his aunt, then they moved to Athens, where he attended high school. After high school he continued his studies in a higher school and attended church regularly. He said later that his parish was Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, but they usually went to Saint George of the Rizarios School, on Vasilissis Sofias Avenue, adding: "There Nectarios of Pentapolis also served several times, whom I saw". In Athens the thought of becoming a monk grew in him, and he reached Mount Athos on 15 August 1923.

On the Holy Mountain

On Athos he lived as a novice at Little Saint Anne's, in the cell of the Holy Forerunner, under the guidance of the Asia Minor hieromonk Meletios Ioannidis. On 20 October 1924, during the vigil in memory of Saint Gerasimus, he received monastic tonsure and the saint's name. After a few years Fr. Meletios left permanently for Athens, leaving Gerasimos alone.

Below the cell of the Forerunner is the cell of the Dormition of the Theotokos, where the ascetic Avimelech (died 1965) lived. In 1946 the future hieromonk Dionysios became his disciple. Gerasimos bound himself to Dionysios, and in 1966 they united in a single brotherhood. Monk Gerasimos became the founder of the church of the Holy Fathers Dionysius the Rhetor and Mitrophanes. In 1956 he built a small chapel in the cave where the two venerable saints had struggled, and in 1960 he completed it with a narthex (lite).

During his life he was librarian and typikaris of the Kyriakon of the Skete of Saint Anne. As librarian he worked on compiling and publishing a catalogue of the manuscript codices of the Kyriakon's library. Monk Gerasimos is among those hymnographers whose work was, for the most part, immediately taken into the liturgical life of the Church. His rich hymnographic work is reckoned to include more than two thousand sacred services. On 28 December 1968 the Academy of Athens honored him with a silver medal. He reposed on 7 December 1991.

Canonization

On 10 January 2023 the Holy and Sacred Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate decided to include Monk Gerasimos in the Calendar of Saints of the Orthodox Church.