[simage=2454,288,n,left,]Abbot Nicholas (Zachariadis) was born in Cairo, Egypt on January 4, 1957 of Greek parents who had both lived their entire lives in Egpyt. His father was Greek Orthodox. His Mother was Roman Catholic. Father Nicholas is the youngest of three brothers.
In 1963 the Zachariadis family emigrated to Australia. Fr. Nicholas grew up in Melbourne–which then had the third largest number of Greeks of all cities in the world after Athens and Thessaloniki! The young Nicholas attended primary and secondary schools in the area of South Yarra, a suburb of Melbourne.
In 1977 he began tertiary studies in philosophy and theology at the United Faculty of Theology in Melbourne. After three years he entered the Province of the Assumption of the Order of Preachers (Dominicans). Having completed his postulancy and novitiate, Fr. Nicholas completed his training in preparation for ordination to the priesthood at Yarra Theological Union. He was ordained a priest in 1987. The ordaining hierarch was the then Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Eparch of Australia, Kyr Ivan Prasko.
In 1988/89 he obtained permission to live outside his Dominican community. He spent much of this time living and studying in Rome, including for some time at the Italian Greek-Catholic monastery of Grottaferrata. Returning to Australia, Fr. Nicholas sought and obtained permission to continue to discern a vocation to live as a monk within his own Byzantine tradition. Finding two other Australians, laymen at the time, with a similar sense of vocation, the three came to the United States in 1993 with a view to obtaining formation as Byzantine Catholic monks. In the end, this led to the foundation of Holy Resurrection Monastery in 1994.
In 1995 Fr. Nicholas led his small community to a new home in Newberry Springs, California. In 2000 the monastery was canonically established as a monastery sui juris of Eparchial right in the Eparchy of Van Nuys of the Ruthenians (now Holy Protection of Mary Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Phoenix). Fr. Nicholas was elected hegumen (abbot) of the new monastery by the community, and Bishop George Kuzma installed him in that position.
In 2005, following the transfer of the monastery to the Romanian Catholic Eparchy of St. George in Canton, Abbot Nicholas was blessed to the position of Archimandrite by Bishop John Michael Botean.
In addition to his pastoral care of the monks of Holy Resurrection, Abbot Nicholas is also responsible for overseeing the [simage=2437,144,n,right,left]nuns of Holy Theophany Monastery, a dependency of Holy Resurrection.
Articles by Abbot Nicholas include:
“Primacy and Conciliarity: Finding a Common Vision”, subtitled “Primacy and Conciliarity in the Byzantine Catholic Metropolia of the USA: A model for the future?” Abbot Nicholas’ paper at Orientale Lumen Conference, 2001
