Dorotheus of Athens

Not to be confused with the 14th-century metropolitanDorotheus I of Athens.

Grave of Dorotheus of Athens

Dorotheus(Greek:Δωρόθεος,secular nameIoannis KottarasGreek:Ιωάννης Κοτταράς) wasArchbishop of Athens and All Greecefrom 1956 to 1957. He was born inHydrain 1888 and studied theology at theUniversity of Athens,from where he graduated in 1909. He then studied law at the Universities of Athens andLeipzig,and specialised inecclesiastical law.For a brief period, he was a schoolteacher inSparta.

He became amonk,and was ordained adeaconon 18 September 1910 by Ioasaph, the Metropolitan Bishop of Hydra and Spetses, and served as a deacon for nine years in the Church of St George Carytses in Athens. On 18 December 1922 he was ordained apriestby Procopius, the Metropolitan Bishop of Hydra and Spetses. Two days later, he was ordained a bishop by the Metropolitan Bishops of Fthiotida, Ambrosius and Syros Athanasius, and was appointed Metropolitan Bishop ofKytheraandAntikythera.

On 15 January 1935 he was transferred to theMetropolis of Larissa and Platamonfrom where he was appointed Archbishop of Athens and All Greece on 29 March 1956, succeedingArchbishop Spyridon.

Dorotheus went to London to meet withGiorgos Seferis,thepoet-diplomatthen serving asGreek ambassador to the United Kingdom,on 13 June 1957. After the meeting, Dorotheus commented that he felt unwell. He was admitted to a hospital on 22 June, at which point he was diagnosed with abrain tumor.He died in aStockholmclinic on 26 July 1957; his death was announced in Athens by telegram.Konstantinos Karamanlis,thenPrime Minister of Greece,responded to the new of Dorotheus's death by saying "The Church has prematurely lost a wise, humble and hardworking hierarch, one whom it sorely needed in these difficult times for the nation."During his life, he wrote over forty treatises onecclesiastical law.