Roussanou

Day thirty-seven, Greece. Roussanou is one of six monasteries left on the Meteora rocks. There were once twenty-four. The first recorded hermitages go back to the eleventh century.

„Up here the monks and nuns could let go of everything worldly. These were fortresses that couldn't be taken,“ says a guide, towing a bunch of tourists behind him. He describes the life: up before sunrise, prayer, work. When war went over the country, the people up here stayed out of it.

Today they are mostly keeping something alive. They want to stand as witnesses of a Christian life in an age they consider poor in spirit and in morals. Faith, as they see it, is a spring, and the thirst is real.

Photographs are not allowed in the chapel. Visitors come and go. A young woman is deep in prayer. Beside her an older woman wipes her face, crosses herself and leaves. The young woman does the same.

Why did those two come in here? I don't ask.

The guide's group arrives. A man with a bum bag looks at the icons without saying anything. His wife whispers to him. Outside the door a nun is reading her Bible.

This chapel has heard a great many prayers. You can see the work in the walls, and the work was not done quickly.