"Iona of My Heart..."
Pilgrimage on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean

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Let us make the necessary references in the form of a riddle: It is an oblong island, or rather islet, since its length is just over 5,5 km and its width is barely 2,5.Many of its plains as its hills are covered with a thick layer of grass, constantly reinforced by the rains. One of its sides has a view towards mainland Scotland and the other is caressed by the Atlantic. To the traveler, it usually appears emerging from the fog. Its permanent residents are nearly a hundred and their religion is that version of Christianity that prevailed sweepingly in Scotland in the 16 th century: Presbyterianism. The name of this island sounds with melodiousness coordinated with the beauty of its landscape: Iona.

Iona has a special place in the missionary history of the Church, and, as Orthodox Christians, we are particularly concerned, even though it is completely unknown to our country. We had discovered its existence and history years before through our missionary readings, and in August 1996 our desire to visit it was fulfilled. It took us six hours of journey from Edinburgh, with changes in the buses and ferries used in order to get there. From the maritime Oban we went across to the island of Mal, crossed it and from its west end we went across, to Iona.

Having various assumptions concerning the origin of its name, Iona could have meant, in the Celtic language (Gaelic), "land of the fir trees", or "island of the waves", or perhaps, "island of the druids". The last speculation alludes to a connection of the island with the ancient pagan religion of the druids.

In 563, Iona enters the Christian scenery. In that year, Saint Columba disembarks on the island, accompanied, according to the tradition, by twelve companions. Columba (circa 521-597) was Irish, with royal lineage, who chose the way of monastical and missionary service. According to his legendary, what he asked from God as a "gift in return" for his dedication, was purity, wisdom and strength for walking. This final thing, that is, the ideal of the continuous movement, was a particular characteristic of the dynamic Irish seclusion of that time.

Columba disembarked on a bay at the southern end of Iona, which is named after him nowadays. The characteristic of this bay (which one can only reach through footpaths) is its beautiful, round and colorful pebbles. According to tradition, Columba moved to the inner part of the island, seeking a place to settle from which the shores of his homeland, Ireland, would not be seen. The place that was finally chosen is located on the eastern coast of the island, looking towards Scotland. Iona was chosen by Columba probably because of its strategic position in the British islands, without excluding an intention of purgation of the island from its past as a sanctuary in the druid religion.

Columba and his companions built a monastery which turned out to be one of the most important centres of Christianity for nearly three centuries (6 th -8 th ) and the main base of operations of missionary monks, who realized a true evangelic epic, primarily operating in the Picts of Northern Scotland and after that they continued running across Britain, moving on to Europe, reaching as far as Germany and Russia. At the same time, the monastery was a center of liturgical life, theological production, transcription of manuscripts and creation of ecclesiastical art.

According to certain researchers, in Iona of the 8 th century, took place the creation of a magnificent hand-written Gospel, decorated with beautiful Celtic drawings, grafted with Byzantine, Coptic and Italian elements.

The monastery of Iona is related not only to the name of its founder and first Reverend Father, but also to the names of other students and descendants, such as St. Adomnan (circa 627-704), who was the ninth Reverend father and biographer of Columba, St. Kenneth (circa 525-600), St. Kentigern (passed away circa 612), St. Aidan (circa 636), and others, all charged with important missionary action. We must note here that those figures are part of the body of the saints of the Orthodox Church, being members of the Church before the schism of East and West (1054). They are part of the Celtic Church, that is, the Church which sprouted in the British islands since the 2 nd century, developed an interesting native set of features (in spirituality, art, ecclesiastical organization) and had spiritual influences of the Eastern Church (Byzantine).

Typical of its tradition is the fact that when the influence of the Church of Rome was intensified in Britain, the leaders of the Celtic Church were surprised with the roman demand for uniformity in the liturgical customs of the local Churches, etc. The reaction f the Celtic Church was bent gradually, mainly after the middle of the 7th century. Furthermore, the Celtic Church and the Celtic civilization were hurt by the Saxon conquest of Britain in the 5th century and by the Reformation of the 16th century, when a dramatic course of religious and political conflicts arose, ending up in the domination of Presbyterian Protestantism in Scotland and to the betrayal of the Orthodox heritage.

Nowadays, the few Orthodox Scots remaining honor those Saints, feel like the successors of the Celtic Church and the name Columba is given as a Christian name.

The story of the monastery of St. Columba (to return to Iona) was briefly the following:

After its thriving period, it was overwhelmed by consecutive raids of the Vikings (end of the 8th-beginning of 9th century), who caused terrifying and irreparable disasters. Around 849 the precious brotherhood abandoned Iona, taking along with it the precious remains of St. Columba and settled in Ireland. AS bay in Iona, nearly 1km to the south of the monastery, is named nowadays "The bay of the Martyr" and, according to certain assumptions, was the point of departure of the monks.

Let it be noted that the refugee monks took along with them, half-finished the manuscript Gospel of theirs and placed it in the Abbey of Kells in S. Ireland, from which it was named ("The Book of Kells"). This great sample of Celtic ecclesiastical art we were able to admire in the College of the Holy Trinity in Dublin.

In the following three centuries, attempts to revive the monastery of Iona did not succeed. Circa 1200 the ruler of the islands, Reginald, Duke of Argil, took care of the situation and built an Abbey in the place of Columba's monastery, thus hosting a brotherhood of the Benedictine order. In this way it occurred so as to fill the place with monks of a different way of thinking but originating from the tradition of St. Benedict (6th century), who was deeply influenced by Eastern monasticism and the rules of St. Basil the Great. At the same time, not far away, an Augustinian nunnery was founded. Both of the monasteries lasted till the Protestation (1560), when they were abandoned.

In 1899, the ruler of the islands, George, conceded the monastery and the buildings in Iona to a special committee, which was established to preserve them. One of the terms that George set with this transferring document was the capability to use the Abbey as a place of worship by any Christian confession. Since 1938 in the Abbey has settled the Christian "Community of Iona", founded by Pastor George McLeod, from Glasgow. The "Community" attempts to combine the spiritual and social work in today's urban societies and is filled with ecumenical beliefs. The Abbey has been reconstructed and excavations have been held. The Orthodox people (mainly of Scotland and England) go on pilgrimage to the island and perform the Divine Office.

The pilgrim finds the Benedictine Abbey take up part of the space to where the monastery of Columba extended. No buildings of this monastery have remained, but their positions that have been marked and very few traces of them. Inside the yard of the Abbey and a few meters away from its entrance lies a hillock, upon which was probably located Columba's cell. Traces of stone foundations are detected.

In the front of the Abbey's entrance rises a characteristic couple of "high crosses", to which the names of St. Martin and St. John have been given equivalently. These crosses, reaching nearly five meters tall, are carved with biblical scenes and decorative shapes.

The kind of crosses that is characteristic of the Celtic art in northern Britain and Ireland dated to the beginning of the 8 th century. Both of these crosses were placed there around 800 A.D. St. Martin's cross has remained in its place ever since, but St. John's cross is a copy, because the original has broken into a lot of pieces and is located in the museum of the Abbey. In the museum (which is hosted in the old hospital of the Abbey) we find, among other exhibits (tombstones, etc.), the so-called "pillow of St. Columba". It is a stone engraved with a cross. It is claimed to be the ascetic, stone pillow of the Saint, which is mentioned by his biographer.

We will not extend ourselves to the mention of other monuments and places. We are confined in mentioning the cemetery of St. Oran, which is situated next to the Abbey. By tradition, Oran was one of the companions of Columba and the first to be buried there. In the following centuries, this cemetery received the bodies not only of the locals, but also of the prominent people considered fitting to be placed in the grounds of the holy island. It is as the "holy reserve of the ancestors and guardian of their bones" that it is mentioned in Shakespeare's: "Macbeth", Kolme Keel, which means "Columba's Cell", Iona. A traveler in 1549 reports that he had found there the graves of 48 Scottish kings, 4 Irish and 8 Norse ones; information bearing testimony on the range of the island's reputation.

The pilgrim of Iona will not be deprived of the calmness and the purity of the ambience, the air, the rain and the wind, the hiking and the smell of grass, the charges of the seabirds and the promenade of the numerous black-headed Scottish sheep. But what would be a shame not to perceive is the Iona as a place of prayer and missionary bastion.

From the bay of St. Columba to the northern coast, where the wind impedes your walking, and from the monastery to the other coast of the Atlantic, you pray to have the Saint and his companions as your own fellow travelers. That is, when you remember his prophecy:

"In the Iona of my heart, the Iona I love,

Instead of the voice of the monks, shall the moaning of the herds be heard,

But just before the end of the world, Iona shall become as it was before..."