Venerable Elder Daniel of Katounakia

Venerable Daniel of Katounakia, born Daniel Dimitriadis, was born in 1844. He spent the first five years of his monastic path (1875-1880) at Vatopedi Monastery on Athos, after which he moved to Katounakia — a desolate, waterless area on the southeastern slope of the Holy Mountain. The elder spent the first three and a half years in his new home in complete solitude, hard labor, and hardship. Gradually his fame as an experienced spiritual father, skilled in fasting and prayer, spread throughout Athos, and pilgrims began to flock to him from all over Greece. From 1883 onward, monks began to gather around Venerable Daniel, and a brotherhood gradually formed, known as the "Danileon." The elder taught his spiritual children iconography, establishing an icon workshop where icons painted by his own hand have survived. He wrote over 70 works, the first of which — "On Renunciation of the World" — he wrote at the age of 18 and which received the approval of Elder Kallinikos the Hesychast. Venerable Daniel died on September 7, 1929. His memory is kept on September 7/20.