Samuel of St Anne's Skete

Samuel of St Anne's Skete, with the secular name Alexander Paspalevris, was born in 1870 at Kontopouli on Lemnos. He came in 1894 to the hut of the Annunciation, the old kyriakon of Saint Anne's Skete, and was tonsured a monk the next year. For a time he lived on holy Mount Sinai, which is why the skete's monastic register calls him a former Sinaite.

Elder Cherubim of St Anne's (d. 1979) says little about him, but it is telling: he was almost always shut in his hut; he saw him very rarely during his stay in the skete, and to meet Old Samuel was considered a great event. How he lived, what he ate, what his schedule was, all were unknown. He avoided association with the other fathers. Many regarded him as a great ascetic and struggler, while others suspected that such a life might have led him into delusion. He lived always alone, in his poor hut. No one could say more about this hidden struggler. The "glorious inglory," in the words of Saint Gregory the Theologian, magnified him.

He grew old alone, without help; then another solitary elder, Vikentios, of the hut of Saint Demetrius, took him in to care for him. He reposed blessedly on 3 February 1960, the memory of Saint Symeon the God-⁠Receiver. He is venerated by the faithful, without synodal canonization.