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 bones displayed, explained Father Jerome, 50, who has an untamed salt-and-pepper beard and wore washed-out gray robes. “Today you are here, the next day you are not,” he said. “If you remember death every day, it keeps you from doing evil.”

Source: New York Times October 20, 2018 07:00 UTC