Browsing: Mouint Athos

Source: The New York Times By Neil MacFarquhar MOUNT ATHOS, Greece — The skulls, lined up five deep on wooden shelves, date back hundreds of years, with the names of the more recently deceased scratched onto their foreheads — Monk Theolothelis, 91, 26-6-1986, or Monk Kyprianos, 100, 14-8-87. They are exhibited in Xenophontos Monastery here on Mount Athos, a peninsula in northern Greece that is the spiritual heart of the Eastern Orthodox Church. One skull carries a more philosophical message: “Brother, Look at the glory of man.” That invitation to reflect on mortality encapsulates why the dead are exhumed and their…