“Let us pray with all our hearts and with all the strength of our souls for the freedom and for the safety of Greece and Cyprus, knowing that the United States of America and all the free nations of the planet consider Greece the mother of the Republic” . This remark was made by the Archbishop of America Elpidophoros during the reception of the Euzones of the Presidential Guard at the Holy Church of Agios Nikolaos and a sacred national pilgrimage of America to the Zero Point of New York.

“It is our duty”, underlined Archbishop Elpidophoros, “as free people to advocate the principles and values ​​of the Republic and to defend them against all those who want to threaten our freedom”.

The reception was followed by an official Doxology for Greek independence, in the presence, among others, of the ambassador of the permanent delegation of Greece to the United Nations, Evangelos Sekeris, the ambassador of the permanent delegation of Cyprus to the United Nations, Andreas Hatzichrysanthou, the secretary general of the Hellenic Parliament , Giorgos Mylonakis, and the consul general of Greece in New York, Konstantinou Konstantinou.

This is the first Doxology, which was performed in I.N. of Agios Nikolaos which was built with the same marbles that bear the Parthenon and is, as the Archbishop pointed out, “a deep symbol of our ties with the motherland”.

The Archbishop especially thanked the President of the Hellenic Republic, Katerina Sakellaropoulou, for giving permission to the members of the Presidential Guard to travel to the USA and take part in the Diaspora celebrations for the annual parade as part of the national independence anniversary that will take place tomorrow.

The Archbishop of America was, after all, the person who assumed the responsibility of organizing, coordinating and finding resources for the presence and stay of the Euzones in New York. As he said, “nothing could have been done without the valuable help of expatriate donors and especially the Lord of the Order of Saint Andrew, Peter Vlita”.

After the end of the Doxology, the Archbishop of America Elpidophoros with the members of the Greek-American community and the members of the Presidential Guard marched together with the students of the Greek schools and under the coordination of the Greek associations of Greater New York from the Holy Church of Agios Nikolaos to Bowling Green, where the Greek and American flags were raised.