Fourna, dwelling to 180 folks and hidden within the mountains of central Greece, is a vanishing village that’s decided to maintain its place on the map.

A winding four-hour drive from Athens, it enjoys close to whole silence, periodically damaged by church bells and howling canine. Aged residents measure the village’s probabilities of survival by the variety of youngsters enrolled on the native major college.

Final 12 months, there have been solely two.

However Fourna’s fortunes have been reversed by an unlikely and tireless partnership. The native schoolteacher, a Ph.D. scholar learning synthetic intelligence, discovered widespread trigger with the Rev. Constantine Dousikos, a burly Orthodox priest and former lumber machine operator who was ordained shortly earlier than turning 50.

They began a despair-fueled marketing campaign to draw households to Fourna, providing settling-in cash raised from non-public donations and municipal applications.

It’s working: Two households have moved to the village, 5 extra are on a 2025 wait checklist, and a whole lot of others have made inquiries. Eight youngsters now attend elementary courses.

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Dousikos, equally comfortable behind the wheel of his pickup or in entrance of the church altar, says the initiative was partly impressed by calls from the Orthodox church hierarchy urging clergy to advertise household life.

“I feel we did the apparent factor: Assist the folks right here preserve our village alive,” he says, standing within the Church of Transfiguration of Christ on the principle sq.. “In fact, village life is just not for everybody. You have to be good at guide work.”

A map of Fourna:

Greece has one of many world’s oldest populations with 23% aged 65 or older in 2023, in line with World Financial institution information. The central Greek area of Evrytania, dwelling to Fourna, faces low start charges and rural depopulation, with a mean age of 56.2 – one of many three highest within the European Union.

Panagiota Diamanti, Fourna’s solely elementary schoolteacher and co-founder of the household marketing campaign “New Life within the Village,” says the urgency of the scenario is palpable.

“If the children don’t come, the trainer will get transferred and the college will shut. And a closed college won’t ever reopen,” she says. “We want daring motion.”

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Greater than 200 publicly run faculties and kindergartens have been shut down throughout Greece within the present college 12 months as a consequence of low enrollment, many in distant components of the nation with sparse populations as a consequence of its mountainous mainland terrain and quite a few small islands.

A number of native authorities have reached out to the Fourna marketing campaign, and requested Diamanti to assist them begin the same program.

After class, she joins her eight college students in a sport of dodgeball on the college yard which overlooks Evrytania’s jagged mountains. The children take pleasure in a local-celebrity standing; their birthdays are sometimes celebrated in the principle village sq..

Vassiliki Emmanouil relocated to Fourna together with her six youngsters – 5 sons and a daughter – and says she has been showered with kindness. Village residents go away meals exterior her door in a single day and are encouraging her to restart an previous bakery when her husband returns from a spell of labor in Germany.

“I’ve been right here for almost three months, and I might be ungrateful to say I’ve struggled,” Emmanouil says. “The native priest and his spouse deal with me as if I’m a part of their household. The complete village has been by our aspect, from providing each day necessities to emotional help.”

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Deaths overtook annual births in Greece in 2010 because the nation sank right into a extreme monetary disaster and the numbers have steadily worsened since then, reaching nearly double the start stage in 2022.

The conservative authorities final 12 months created a ministry of household and social cohesion. It has elevated household advantages within the 2025 funds and reached out to the Orthodox Church for assist.

Final 12 months, the church’s governing Holy Synod issued a round that was learn out in any respect of Greece’s Orthodox church buildings, arguing that monetary incentives is not going to be sufficient to reverse the dire demographic traits.

“Specialists suggest varied options to handle the problem, emphasizing its vital social, financial, and geopolitical implications,” the message mentioned.

“The Church underscores the non secular dimension of household life, advocating for unity, love, and the creation of households as a testomony to divine goal,” it added. “Kids, thought of items from God, convey that means to life and symbolize hope and renewal.”

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For Fourna’s residents, even church attendance is tied to village survival. Two dozen church buildings within the space stay empty many of the 12 months, however are effectively maintained and open for vital dates on the spiritual calendar.

The looks of kids in church and on the village’s long-quieted streets caught most residents off guard.

“In the beginning, I by no means thought households would come to reside right here. It’s a distant village, very small, with out a lot right here,” native enterprise proprietor Giorgos Vassilikoudis mentioned.

“However to my shock, households did come they usually’re pleased,” mentioned Vassilikoudis, who runs a restaurant and guesthouse. “It’s superb for the village and for individuals who have retailers and companies. For different villages, it serves for instance. It’s a superb begin.”