Athenagoras Kavadas (1884-1963), born in Corfu (Greece),  studied theology in Athens. In 1909, he was ordained deacon and priest in 1910. The same year he became the vice rector of the Rizarion Seminary, until 1917. In the 1918-1919 academic year, he studied in Oxford on a scholarship. In 1921, he was called by Metropolitan MELETIOS (Metaxakis), who later became Ecumenical Patriarch, to America, where served several Greek parishes. After he was named vicar general of the Archdiocese of America. In 1937, he was appointed rector of "Holy Cross" Institute of Theology in Brookline (Boston). A year later, the Ecumenical Patriarchate elected him auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of America. In 1949, he became Metropolitan of Philadelphia (residing in Athens) and in 1951 Metropolitan of Thyateira and Exarch of Western and Central Europe (with his See in London).