Father Ioil Giannakopoulos

Father Ioel (née Photios) Giannakopoulos was born in 1901 in the village of Mathia (Dragka) in the province of Pylias, Prefecture of Messinia. A little later his parents settled in Kalamata, where Fotios attended Primary School and then High School. After he was discharged from the ranks of the Army, he enrolled in the Theological School of the University of Athens from which he received his diploma in 1925. He was already a Deacon ordained by the then Meletios of Messinia, and had received the name Joel. After receiving the diploma he was appointed as a professor of Theology in Kalamata, and then served in Artemisia Alagonia, Methoni Pylias and Kavala Macedonia. He was ordained an elder in 1929 and received the office of Archimandrite three years later.

He was a great personality of the Orthodox Church in the 20th ^century century. A prolific author of many apologetic studies, he was also the first translator and commentator of the Old Testament in Greece, a work for which he was honored by the Academy of Athens. He was the spiritual guide of many holy figures of the Church such as Fr. Epiphanios Theodoropoulos, Bishop Meletios Kalamaras and others. She fell asleep on December 23, 1966.