A new abbot of the Zograf Monastery on Mount Athos has been elected, and this is Hieromonk Gavriil, the monastery office reports. Information about the election is also published on the website of the Bulgarian Patriarchate.
"Today, on the day of Lazarus Saturday, in our Zograf holy monastery on Mount Athos, elections were held for an abbot after the death of our father Archimandrite Ambrose. The election was held according to the requirements of the internal statute of the monastery, as well as the organic statute of Mount Athos. Hieromonk Gabriel was elected as the new abbot, the announcement says.
Father Gabriel, with the secular name Georgi Karatotev, was born on December 11, 1973 in Sofia. He arrived at the Zograf holy monastery on December 20, 1997, and received monastic tonsure exactly one year later - on December 20, 1998.
He was ordained a hieromonk on October 24, 2003. Since the beginning of 2003, he has been the first epitrop of the holy monastery almost continuously.
Archimandrite Ambrose died on January 27 of this year. He began his spiritual path from early childhood, later completing the five-year course of the Sofia Theological Seminary at Cherepish station. In 1973 entered obedience at the Bachkovo Holy Monastery, and four years later he accepted monasticism. In 1981 he went to Mount Athos, and since 1997 he has been abbot of the Zograf Holy Monastery, BTA notes.