Hieromonk, The Bridge Between Monk And Priest

A hieromonk is a monk who has additionally been ordained to the priesthood, combining a monk's vows of poverty, chastity and obedience within a specific monastery with a priest's sacramental authority to celebrate the liturgy and administer most sacraments; not every monk becomes a hieromonk, since many remain simple monks devoted to prayer and monastic labor without seeking priestly ordination, and a monastery's hieromonks typically serve its own liturgical needs and, where the monastery maintains a public church, the needs of lay visitors and pilgrims as well.

The hieromonk rank holds particular structural importance in Orthodox church governance because it represents the entry point into the specifically monastic, celibate clergy from which, alone among Orthodox clergy, bishops are drawn; a married parish priest, however senior or respected, cannot become a bishop without first being widowed or otherwise released from marriage and then formally entering monastic life. Advancement from hieromonk toward the episcopate typically passes through the intermediate rank of archimandrite, so that the great majority of Orthodox bishops have held all three ranks, monk, hieromonk and archimandrite, in sequence before consecration.