Learn How To Make Money From Home Using Your Smartphone In 2025
By using this site, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
Accept
AfricaNews360AfricaNews360
  • Politics
    PoliticsShow More
    The future is African – Ghana President declares at UN Assembly
    September 26, 2025
    Burkina Faso to ‘street honour’ late Ghanaian President Jerry John Rawlings
    May 19, 2025
    Burkina Faso honours late president Thomas Sankara with memorial park
    May 19, 2025
    Nigeria Presidency refutes Catholic leaders’ criticism of economic hardship
    March 11, 2025
    Ghana’s President Mahama strengthens ties with Mali during Bamako visit
    March 10, 2025
  • Business
    BusinessShow More
    Ghana’s President Mahama seeks investment partnerships during Singapore visit
    August 25, 2025
    Ghana’s Tourism Minister commends Emirates at grand opening of Travel Store
    May 15, 2025
    Burkina Faso strengthens Russian ties with new mining licence
    April 27, 2025
    Ghana Bauxite Company targets 6 million tonnes production by end of 2025
    April 7, 2025
    Ghana to launch ‘River Guards’ program to combat environmental Impact of illegal mining
    March 17, 2025
  • Showbiz
    ShowbizShow More
    Davido releases ’10 Kilo’ Music Video
    August 13, 2025
    Nigerian Star Davido’s Foundation supports 500 orphanages in annual Charity drive
    February 13, 2025
    Nigerian president Tinubu celebrates Nollywood icon Nkem Owoh ‘Osuofia’ at 70
    February 8, 2025
    Burkina Faso’s Bissa music sensation Eunice Goula drops new Banger ‘Mariage’
    September 25, 2024
    Kenya’s president hosts national music festival
    August 16, 2024
  • Sports
    SportsShow More
    Ghana name squad for final World Cup qualifiers against Central African Republic and Comoros
    October 2, 2025
    Fifa sanctions SAFA with 3-0 defeat to Lesotho and £7,000 fine following Teboho Mokoena breach
    September 30, 2025
    Botswana declares public holiday after winning gold medal
    September 22, 2025
    Ghana smashes national record to reach 4x100m final at World Championships
    September 20, 2025
    Nigeria held to frustrating draw by South Africa in World Cup qualifier
    September 9, 2025
  • Biographies
    BiographiesShow More
    Michael Gallup Bio, Age, Net Worth, Height, Parents, Siblings, Wife, Children
    July 25, 2024
  • Columns
    ColumnsShow More
    Ghana Government does not subsidize Hajj Pilgrims: Debunking the myth with facts
    March 7, 2025
    Full Speech: South African president’s address at first G20 Foreign Ministers’ meeting 2025
    February 22, 2025
    Ing. Abdullah Mohammed Billey: The Ghanaian road expert victimised for political reasons by the ousted Government
    February 3, 2025
    Ghana President Mahama’s speech at Africa Prosperity Dialogues 2025
    February 2, 2025
    An American opinion on the impending NDC Government structure
    December 17, 2024
  • Travel
    TravelShow More
    Ghana’s Tourism Minister commends Emirates at grand opening of Travel Store
    May 15, 2025
    Thousands of Ethiopian diaspora heed PM’s call to ‘come home’
    May 2, 2024
    Malawi and Ghana sign visa waiver agreement to enhance bilateral ties
    March 21, 2024
    Ghana signs visa waiver agreement with Bahamas
    February 22, 2024
    Malawi scrapes visa restrictions for 79 countries
    February 9, 2024
  • Editorial
    EditorialShow More
    FEATURE: Kigali City- A glittering jewel of Africa
    September 2, 2023
    All eyes on INEC as Nigeria decides
    February 26, 2023
    Feed Africa Summit: Continent Plans to Achieve Zero Hunger by 2030
    January 25, 2023
    Africa must speak with one voice at COP27
    November 8, 2022
    Nigerian headteacher sentenced to death after pupil’s murder
    July 28, 2022
  • World
    WorldShow More
    Robert Prevost
    American prelate Robert Prevost elected New Pope
    May 9, 2025
    Rwanda cuts diplomatic ties with Belgium amid Congo conflict tensions
    March 17, 2025
    ICC issues arrest warrants for Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu, Ibrahim Al-Masri
    November 21, 2024
    Voting underway in US as Donald Trump faces Kamala Harris for presidency
    November 5, 2024
    Biden directs US forces to aid Israel’s defence against Iran
    October 2, 2024
Reading: An extraordinary church in the sky
Share
Notification Show More
Latest News
Newly qualified radiographer kidnapped in Nigeria
October 2, 2025
Nigeria’s anti-trafficking agency rescues 24 in major airport operation
October 2, 2025
Ghana name squad for final World Cup qualifiers against Central African Republic and Comoros
October 2, 2025
Fifa sanctions SAFA with 3-0 defeat to Lesotho and £7,000 fine following Teboho Mokoena breach
September 30, 2025
The future is African – Ghana President declares at UN Assembly
September 26, 2025
Aa
AfricaNews360AfricaNews360
Aa
  • Technology
  • Science
  • Education
  • Health
Search
  • Topics
    • Business
    • Columns
    • Gossip
    • News
    • Politics
    • Showbiz
    • Fashion
    • Climate
    • World
    • Videos
Have an existing account? Sign In
Follow US
AfricaNews360 > Travel > An extraordinary church in the sky
Travel

An extraordinary church in the sky

In Georgia's remote Imereti region, monks scale the 40m-high Katskhi Pillar in a daring, nerve-jangling ascent. The reason: to get closer to God.

Posted omni21 September 9, 2022 13 Min Read
Updated 2022/09/09 at 8:17 AM
(Image credit: Feng Wei Photography/Getty Images)
SHARE

Georgia’s daring, death-defying pilgrimage.

As I drove through the remote Imereti region of central-western Georgia, rolling hills and lush pine forests flanked the empty roads and grazing cows dotted the verdant landscape. It was a picture-perfect rural scene. Suddenly, the car rounded a bend and an incongruous sight appeared high above the canopy: up ahead, a massive limestone monolith jutted into the sky, about 40m tall, with a small church perched on the top.

I’d finally reached the Katskhi Pillar.

I had travelled 220km from Georgia’s capital Tbilisi to visit this soaring stone structure. I’d long been fascinated by the famous Greek monasteries of Meteora – which are also precipitously built on natural rock pillars – and when I’d heard of an extraordinary church where daring monks climb to be closer to heaven, I knew I had to visit. Monks lived on top of the Katskhi Pillar for centuries; the last one only came down for good in 2015. Today, it’s a pilgrimage site for many Orthodox Christians, as well as a tourist attraction for people who flock here to here to witness the nerve-jangling sight of monks dangling off the steep rock edge.

Learn How To Make Money Online Using Your Smartphone In 2025

Dedicated to a monk named Maximus the Confessor, the church is one of the world’s highest and most isolated churches. It is thought to have been built somewhere between the 6th and 8th Centuries by Stylites, or “pillar monks”, who believed that praying on top of pillars or high cliffs would distance them from worldly temptations.

Story continues belowFather Ilarion lives in Katskhi Monastery below the monolith but climbs up to the church several times a week (Credit: Nika Ergemlidze)

Father Ilarion lives in Katskhi Monastery below the monolith but climbs up to the church several times a week (Credit: Nika Ergemlidze)

While this form of praying was popular in antiquity – one of the most renowned pillar monks is a Christian ascetic named St Simeon Stylites, who reportedly lived for 37 years from 423 CE on top of a pillar in Aleppo, Syria – the practice has now become virtually extinct. Katskhi Pillar is one of the few remaining places where this extreme form of asceticism exists, albeit in a highly modified form.

This pillar is the symbol of the true cross. Even before there was a church on top, idols of Gods have been found below the pillar

“Some monks are keen to give up all earthly pleasures and live and pray on top of pillars,” said Father Ilarion, who lives in Katskhi Pillar Monastery below the monolith. “We feel being this high gets us closer to God.”

According to local legend, the Katskhi Pillar has always been a holy place and was once used by ancient religions for fertility rites. After Christianity was introduced to Georgia in the 4th Century, the pillar became a place of worship for Orthodox Christians.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU  Why is my CANADA STUDENT application REFUSED?

“This pillar is the symbol of the true cross,” said Father Ilarion. “Even before there was a church on top, idols of Gods have been found below the pillar.”

Historians believe that monks started living on the pillar around the 10th Century, though they are still unsure how they reached the top, let alone carried the building materials to construct the church.The church on the summit is thought to be one of the world's highest and most isolated churches (Credit: Feng Wei Photography/Getty Images)

The church on the summit is thought to be one of the world’s highest and most isolated churches (Credit: Feng Wei Photography/Getty Images)

But in the 15th Century, when the Ottoman Empire invaded Georgia, this method of praying was abandoned and remained so for centuries. “We don’t know why exactly the monks stopped climbing up this pillar under the Ottomans,” said Tbilisi-based scholar Natia Khizanishvili, from the Korneli Kekelidze National Centre of Manuscripts. “Despite the invasion of the Ottomans, in Western Georgia, Christianity was not in danger of being abolished.”

However, the church lay shrouded in mystery until 1944, when, for the first time in modern history, a group from outside the religious order scaled the pillar. “In 1944, Georgian writers Levan Gotua and Akaki Beliashvili, architect Vakhtang Tsintsadze and alpinist Aleksandre Japaridze climbed the Katsakhi pillar and they found the ruins of the church,” Khizanishvili explained.

The observations from the expedition, which found three hermit cells and a wine cellar in addition to the church, revealed the pillar method of praying. “Tsintsadze, the architect, explored the ruins for several hours and linked it to a place of worship built by Stylites,” Khizanishvili noted.

A few decades after this rediscovery, in the early 1990s, a monk named Maxime Qavtaradze revived the Stylites’ method of praying. With the help of locals from the surrounding region and the National Agency for Cultural Heritage Preservation of Georgia, he restored the sacred church to its former glory, using ropes and pulleys to transfer materials to the top, and even installed a 40m-long iron ladder to make scaling the pillar easier.The only way to ascend the pillar is via a 40m-long iron ladder (Credit: Nika Ergemlidze)

The only way to ascend the pillar is via a 40m-long iron ladder (Credit: Nika Ergemlidze)

Father Maxime then climbed the ladder, renounced earthly life and lived at the sky-high church for more than 20 years, coming down only occasionally for prayer meetings in the monastery below. He spent most of his time in isolation, reading and praying, and had food supplies hauled up to him with the help of pulleys. However, once tourists started to arrive and the site no longer offered the peace and tranquillity it once did, he descended for good in 2015 and is now the current leader of the Katskhi Monastery.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU  Ghana warns citizens to consider only essential travels to China

“The pillar has become a tourist attraction and it is quite noisy around this site. So as monks we don’t get the peace and seclusion we yearn [for] on top because we can still hear all the sounds below,” Father Ilarion explained. “So most of us, including Father Maxime, only go on top for a few hours and come back down.”

Since the Stylite method of praying only allows one monk in the church at a time, monks from the Katskhi monastery take turns to scale the ladder once or twice a week. Although no monks were climbing the day I visited, Father Ilarion told me that the most daring monks, clad in their long black robes, make the 20-minute ascent as free climbers, using only the rungs of the ladder for support (a less-terrifying option is to use a rope and harness). Monks must first seek Father Maxime’s blessings; once they reach the top, they pray in the church and tend to the wine cellar where they make wine for the monastery. They then descend before dusk to participate in the monastery’s nightly prayer session.

My heart was in my throat just thinking about making the death-defying ascent, since just a thin steel scaffolding encircles the ladder for safety. But “focussing on reaching the top helps,” Father Ilarion told me. “The first time I climbed, I didn’t dare to look down,” he added. “But I have now got used to it and can complete this deadly pilgrimage in about 15-20 minutes without a rope or harness.”The church of Simeon Stylites is named after the Christian ascetic who lived on top of a pillar in Aleppo, Syria, for 37 years (Credit: Feng Wei Photography/Getty Images)

The church of Simeon Stylites is named after the Christian ascetic who lived on top of a pillar in Aleppo, Syria, for 37 years (Credit: Feng Wei Photography/Getty Images)

He explained that visitors are only allowed to ascend to the first level of the limestone pillar, where you can light candles and pray by a 6th-Century cross that has been enshrined into the monolith. Yearning to scale at least a tiny section of the rock, I jumped at the opportunity, climbing the narrow stone stairway constructed just behind the ladder. I soaked up the serenity for a few moments before climbing down to explore the church of Simeon Stylites, located at the foot of the pillar, which is adorned with beautiful artefacts and religious paintings.

Father Ilarion told me that even nuns who are in the same religious order aren’t allowed to undertake the dangerous pilgrimage to the summit. Rules in the Georgian Orthodox Church state that monks and nuns must pray in separate monasteries; while nuns are allowed to enter the religious complex, they have to pray at the church of Simeon Stylites below, which was constructed around 1999.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU  France to abolish visa restrictions for Morocco nationals

“The reason why women aren’t allowed to climb up this pillar to pray at the church on top is because they aren’t pillar monks like us. We are different kind of monks who want to reach the highest points to pray,” Father Ilarion told me.

He explained that this rule isn’t about gender discrimination in religion.

As monks we believe that if men are the head, women are the spine. Both can’t work without each other

“In Georgia, our first Queen Tamar, who reigned from 1184 to 1213, was also declared a saint by the Georgian Orthodox Church. As monks we believe that if men are the head, women are the spine. Both can’t work without each other. So, at this pillar the nuns support us below by giving us food and praying with us on important occasions,” he said.Only one monk is allowed in the church at a time, so they take turns to scale the ladder once or twice a week (Credit: k_samurkas/Getty Images)

Only one monk is allowed in the church at a time, so they take turns to scale the ladder once or twice a week (Credit: k_samurkas/Getty Images)

While I was still intrigued to see what was at the top of the pillar, Kellerdashvili, another tourist visiting the pillar, had a different point of view. “I don’t really want to climb to the top. Just looking at it from below is heaven on Earth for me,” she told me, glancing towards the top of the pillar in awe.

Monk Amirani, another monk at the Katskhi monastery, believes that such rules are important to preserve the history and culture of Georgia. “When I climbed to the top of the pillar for the first time in 1992, I realised it is a special place and very important for Christianity,” he said. “It is important that the rules of this pillar are preserved. It is a spot to pray and for troubled men to find peace of mind and solitude.”

But for Father Iliarion, whether or not you can climb to the top, anyone can find inner peace and solace here. “The world has many beautiful places but the main thing about this pillar is the serenity it offers,” he said. “Before the limestone pillar existed, this entire region was the sea. Somehow, I can still feel the calming presence of the sea in this place today, though it is miles away, making it the perfect spot to get closer to God.”

RSS EDITORS’ SUGGESTIONS

  • 2026 FIFA WCQ: Otto Addo names Black Stars squad for CAR, Comoros games
  • 2026 FIFA WCQ: Fatawu Issahaku rejoins Black Stars for CAR, Comoros games
  • 2026 FIFA WCQ: Medeama SC midfielder Prince Owusu gets first Black Stars call-up after electrifying GPL season so far
  • 2026 FIFA WCQ: OGC Nice defender Kojo Peprah Oppong earns first Black Stars call-up for CAR & Comoros matches
  • Kotoko coach Karim Zito hails Heart of Lions ahead of Baba Yara clash
TAGGED: Church, pilgrimage
SOURCES: bbc.com
omni21 September 9, 2022
Share this Article
Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Whatsapp LinkedIn Telegram Email Print
Previous Article Children missing school in sub-Saharan Africa rising
Next Article Kim Kardashian adds private equity firm to her portfolio
Leave a comment Leave a comment

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Latest on AfricaNews360

  • Newly qualified radiographer kidnapped in Nigeria
  • Nigeria’s anti-trafficking agency rescues 24 in major airport operation
  • Ghana name squad for final World Cup qualifiers against Central African Republic and Comoros
  • Fifa sanctions SAFA with 3-0 defeat to Lesotho and £7,000 fine following Teboho Mokoena breach
  • The future is African – Ghana President declares at UN Assembly

More recommendations for you

  • Ghana forward Antoine Semenyo scores brace as Bournemouth thrash Fulham
  • Ghana Premier League: Bechem United and Hearts of Oak play out goalless draw as Benjamin Asare gets another clean sheet
  • 2026 FIFA WCQ: Otto Addo names Black Stars squad for CAR, Comoros games
  • 2026 FIFA WCQ: Fatawu Issahaku rejoins Black Stars for CAR, Comoros games
  • 2026 FIFA WCQ: Medeama SC midfielder Prince Owusu gets first Black Stars call-up after electrifying GPL season so far

You Might Also Like

BusinessTravel

Ghana’s Tourism Minister commends Emirates at grand opening of Travel Store

May 15, 2025
Top StoriesTravel

Thousands of Ethiopian diaspora heed PM’s call to ‘come home’

May 2, 2024
Travel

Malawi and Ghana sign visa waiver agreement to enhance bilateral ties

March 21, 2024
Travel

Ghana signs visa waiver agreement with Bahamas

February 22, 2024
  • Bereavement
  • Debt Management
  • Finance
  • Job Creation
  • Small Business
  • Climate
  • Education
  • Fashion
  • Health
  • Rights
  • Science
  • Sanitation
  • Mobilisation
  • Secondary Education
  • Celebrity News
  • Tertiary Education
  • Culture
  • Security
  • Corruption
  • Creed
  • Athletics
  • Basketball
  • Boxing
  • Formula 1
  • Rugby
  • Soccer
  • Tennis
  • Minning
  • Gaming
  • Technology
AfricaNews360AfricaNews360
Follow US

© 2024 - AfricaNews360 | All rights reserved.

  • About
  • Advertise with us
  • Contact

Removed from reading list

Undo
Welcome Back!

Sign in to your account

Register Lost your password?