Valerie Kontakos’ documentary “Mana” is the true story of six nuns and 60 children. It took Kontakos three years to convince the nuns to share their story because they had their fair share of publicity when they made the top headlines in the Sixties for running away from home.

The nuns’ story began with scandal on April Fools’ Day of 1962 when they were still young girls and ran away from their homes near the port of Piraeus. They traveled all the way to a monastery in Kalamata, the Peloponnese. Outraged, their parents brought the young runaways back… but the two Marias, Dorothy, Kalliniki, Phaedronia and Sevasti escaped a second time.

Their story was considered a scandal at the time. Nobody could understand the young girls who prefered to leave their families and head to the other side of Greece just to pray, but the girls had a plan in mind. Their goal was to rise up the Greek monastic hierarchy and establish their own monastery that wouldn’t be a secluded hideaway but an open family that would offer homes to abused children.

In 1967, their dream came true when the Monastery of Penteli, northwestern Athens, offered them their own convent in Nea Makri that they used to create an open community of neglected children known as the Lyrio Children’s Village. Fifty years onward, the monastery is now an open foster family that continues to operate despite the odds, without help from church or state.

Kontakos’ documentary traces the inspirational story of the six girls who ran away from home to become mothers. The story of the creation of the documentary is interesting within itself as it was created thanks to $46,117 raised through crowdfunding.

“Mana” is now screening twice daily for a full week, starting at October 8 at “Lais” – Greek Film Archive (48 Iera Odos and 134-136 Megalou Alexandrou Street, Metro Stop Kerameikos).

The director’s story: