Chrysostomos of Smyrna

Saint Chrysostomos the New-Hieromartyr of Smyrna
Photograph of St. Chrysostomos of Smyrna.
Born	8 January 1867 Triglia, Ottoman Empire
Died	10 September 1922 Smyrna, Ottoman Empire
Venerated in	Eastern Orthodox Church
Canonized	4 November 1992 by Church of Greece
Feast	Sunday before the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (7-13 September)
Attributes	Episcopal vestments, usually holding a staff or a Gospel.

Chrysostomos Kalafatis (1867–1922) (Greek: Χρυσόστομος Καλαφάτης), known as Saint Chrysostomos of Smyrna,Chrysostomos of Smyrna and Metropolitan Chrysostom, was the Greek Orthodox metropolitan bishop of Smyrna (Izmir) between 1910 and 1914, and again from 1919 to his death in 1922. He was born in Triglia (today Zeytinbağı), Turkey in 1867, and was killed by a lynch mob after the sacking of Smyrna by Turkish troops at the end of the Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922. He was declared a martyr and a saint of the Eastern Orthodox Church by the Holy Synod of the Church of Greece on 4 November 1992.

Kalafatis studied at the historical Theological School of Halki from the age of 17. He became the Metropolitan of Drama in 1902 and the Metropolitan of Smyrna in 1910.

He had not been in good terms with the Ottoman/Turkish authorities and he was displaced. When the Greek army occupied Smyrna in 1919, at the beginning of the Greco-Turkish war, Kalafatis was reinstated to his office as bishop.

On 10 September (Julian style – 27 August) 1922, soon after the Turkish army had moved into Smyrna, a Turkish officer and two soldiers took Chrysostomos from the office of the cathedral and delivered him to the Turkish commander-in-chief, Nureddin Pasha. The general decided to hand him over to a Turkish mob who murdered him.

According to French soldiers who witnessed the lynching but were under strict orders from their commanding officer not to intervene: