A monk, like every other creature, is born and dies. Yet the birth of a monk does not identify with the biological birth, but with a new identity he acquires following a long-standing and intense initiation and test. The norms of the Orthodox monasticism and especially of Mount Athos require such a path. Father Philotheos is a unique carpenter in the Monastery of Dochiarios. A self-taught woodworker, he learned how to build everything out of wood: from roof tablets and iconostasis to wooden sculptures, floors and stairs. His woodcarving is another prayer through which he sculpts the uphill road of asceticism.