Archbishop Chrysostomos II fell asleep on Monday morning at the age of 81.
It is recalled that recently his health condition had worsened.
With the death of the Archbishop, the Metropolitan of Paphos Georgios takes over as guardian of the throne, until the election and enthronement of the new Archbishop.
Who was Herodotus Demetrius and later Archbishop Chrysostomos II
Herodotos Dimitriou was born on April 10, 1941 in the village of Tala in Paphos. Immediately after primary education, he became a probationary monk at the Holy Monastery of Agios Neophytos and then attended Paphos High School. He graduated from high school in 1963 and on November 3 of the same year was ordained a deacon. In 1968, he began his studies at the Theological School of the University of Athens, from where he graduated in 1972. On October 19 of the same year, he was unanimously elected abbot of the Monastery of Agios Neophytos, he was ordained elder and installed as abbot on November 12 by Archbishop Makarios III. On February 25, 1978, he was elected Metropolitan of Paphos, Exalted and Exarch of Arsinois and Romans by acclamation.
After a long, irreversible illness of Archbishop Chrysostom I, an Enlarged Synod convened under the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew in Chambézy, Geneva in May 2006, which declared the Archbishopric Throne of Cyprus widowed. His enthronement took place on November 12 and, as reported by the media, he is the only archbishop of Cyprus who performed the funeral of an archbishop of Cyprus.
In the elections for the appointment of an archbishop, he received a little more than 8% of the popular vote (that is, the male Orthodox Christians of Cyprus). His counter-candidates were then Kykkou Nikiforos and the Metropolitan of Limassol Athanasios. In November 2006, in the vote of the representatives of the faithful, Nikiforos got 46 votes, Athanasios 45 and Chrysostomos got 9. In the ballot box of ex officio representatives, Kykkou got 11 votes, Limassol 7 and Chrysostomos 12. In the ballot box of the general representatives, Limassol got 48 votes and advanced to the final phase of the voting, Kykkou 46 and Chrysostomos 6, i.e. three fewer than in the first round. In the ex officio ballot box, which would elect the second archbishop candidate, the Metropolitan of Limassol reinforced the Metropolitan of Paphos Chrysostomos. Within this context, the final candidates were the Metropolitans of Paphos and Limassol and Bishop Kykkos was left out of the electoral process. Then Paphos and Nikephoros came to an agreement and Nikephoros' representatives voted for Chrysostomos as archbishop.