The Weeping Icon of Tinos

The Church of Panagia Evangelistria on Tinos island holds the most venerated icon in Greece — the Megalochari, discovered in 1823 following visions received by the nun Pelagia. The icon draws over a million pilgrims each year, particularly on August 15th, the Feast of the Dormition. But beyond the official miracle of its discovery, locals speak of a second phenomenon: the icon is said to weep on the eve of national catastrophes.

Church records, kept under lock in the monastery archive, document apparent moisture appearing on the icon's surface on the nights of October 27, 1940 (the eve of the Italian invasion), April 20, 1941 (as German forces entered Athens), and July 15, 1974 (the eve of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus). Two priests independently described the moisture as "warm to the touch and faintly saline, not like water from condensation." The records were first disclosed by a retired metropolitan in a 2001 theological journal.