FEAT BY STUDENTS FROM POŽEGA THAT AMAZED SERBIA: Instead of excursions, children go to Hilandar to prune vineyards and help monks!

It is the one and only such high school in Serbia whose teachers and students act in this way: instead of a tourist trip “knocked out” of their parents’ pockets, every year they set off toward the Holy Imperial Serbian Lavra, on a pilgrimage, to the Hilandar Monastery.

The hint of spring and the need to prune the Mount Athos vineyards and arrange the olive groves, orchards, and gardens, led the students of the Požega Agricultural School with the “Ljubo Mićić” student dormitory to obedience once again, and we can already imagine them on this shore, in the peace of Sava’s Field among the vine stocks, at the Holy Liturgy, at matins or evening service, in a place where prayer has remained uninterrupted for centuries…

-Under vineyards, the monastery has 20–25 hectares of land. Due to many rainy days, the pruning of the vines is late; that was our most important job in the previous days. Work was also done on arranging the olive groves, in the gardens where onions are planted, and it has happened in previous years that we were met with the tasks of sowing or picking potatoes – Milijan Đoković, a counselor at the Agricultural School Student Dormitory and a chemistry professor, tells Novosti.

Professional practice on Mount Athos

-This time we were in Hilandar for ten days, thirteen of our students, religious education teacher Deacon Milan Selenić, and four teachers and counselors. The obedience is also a part of the professional practice for our students. The children come from various departments; there are agricultural and veterinary technicians, and there was work for a mechanic and a baker in the kitchen… We have been doing this since 2010, when this tradition was started by our teacher Milovan Vuksanović, now retired.

The students receive their residence permit, the diamonitirion, thanks to the Faculty of Agriculture in Zemun and the Hilandar Endowment, with whom the school cooperates. This cooperation encourages the professional development of the students and equally testifies that there is a living care and love for the children, for their spiritual strength. The support of the Požega municipality is also important, as it pays the travel costs, while the monastery itself refunds the money for documents and the boat trip from Ouranoupolis to the Hilandar pier, Jovanjica.

-A good portion of the local vineyards was restored and planted by Prof. Nebojša Marković from the Faculty of Agriculture, a great man and expert, so students are always present on the Holy Mountain. The groups rotate because there is a lot of work on Athos, except on Sundays. Our students come from different families, with different degrees of participation in liturgical and church life, and here they have all found peace: not once was “hurry up” heard, and encounters with the monks and elders of Mount Athos are a true blessing for every human being, especially during these days of the Lenten fast – Đoković explains.

-Dawn, day, evening, or night, it depends on each person individually whether, alongside the work in the field, they will manage to make it to all the worship services, and the students see to it that they do.

Some students arriving at the Holy Mountain are good in religious education, others in civic education. In the encounter with the richest treasury and archive of the medieval heritage of the Serbian people, with prayer that has not ceased here since the 12th century, and even more so with the living faith of about 50 local monks, the children from the school—which is regional and gathers children from all the towns and villages of western Serbia—return home richer.

A veterinary student went into theology and became an abbot

-Some of the children, if it wasn’t celebrated in the house, restored their Slava (patron saint day). Everyone learned a lot and deepened their faith. In 2010, we had a student with a calling from God who was on our first school pilgrimage to Hilandar. Thus, a student of our school went from veterinary studies to theology and later became the abbot of one of our great monasteries. It has happened here that monks give gifts to the children, expressing a wish for the students to come to them again. Such grace makes everyone want, with God’s help, to come to Hilandar again – Đoković adds.

-Spiritual Gospel lessons, the proximity of the venerable fathers, all this makes the children return home even better and continue their friendships, and their lives in general, more meaningfully.

The Hilandar Monastery on the Holy Mountain has about 8,500 hectares of land under its economy. There are new and old vineyards with about 50,000 vine stocks. The monastery also has about 3,000 old olive trees and about 1,000 renewed ones on 6 hectares. Furthermore, there are plums, lemons, oranges, apricots, peaches, apples, hazelnuts, and a large vegetable garden with plots has been planted… All of this is the result of the great love and work of the Hilandar monks, experts from Serbian universities, and pilgrims who accept obedience on the economy – the work of the Lord and the Orthodox man.

Among these people are the students of, for now, wonder of wonders, the only Serbian high school whose children have the opportunity to grow in the graceful light of Athos.