Description
St. Nectarios was born in 1846 in Selevria of Thrace in Greece into a poor family. When he was 14 he went to Constantinople to work. While there, he worked for a tobacco merchant who underpaid him and treated him poorly, so St. Nectarios turned to prayer for his only consolation. With great faith in God, in his innocence he even wrote a letter to God asking for his ready help. While still young, he visited the Holy Land, calming a storm-tossed sea on his journey and saving many by his prayers. In his twenties, he became a monk at Nea Moni at Chios, and later went to Egypt, where he was raised up to be the Metropolitan of Penta-polis. Sadly, however, he was greatly slandered by other jealous hierarchs, and this followed him all the rest of his life.
After heading a school in Athens, he desired a more reclusive life, and went to the Island of Aegina, where he helped found a convent for women monastics. He died in a poor hospital in Athens. St. Nectarios was a great wonder-worker, healing thousands, and his relics were incorrupt for years. Pictured here as a monk, he is giving the priestly blessing and holding the Gospel.