Rural resurrection: A Greek village leans into faith in fight against demographic collapse

FOURNA, Greece (AP) — Fourna, home to 180 people and hidden in the fir-tree covered mountains of central Greece, is a vanishing village that is determined to keep its place on the map.

A winding four-hour drive from Athens, it enjoys near total silence, periodically broken by church bells and howling dogs. Elderly residents measure the village’s chances of survival by the number of children enrolled at the local primary school.

Last year, there were only two.

But Fourna’s fortunes have been reversed by an unlikely and tireless partnership. The local schoolteacher, a Ph.D. student studying artificial intelligence, found common cause with the Rev. Constantine Dousikos, a burly Orthodox priest and former lumber machine operator who was ordained shortly before turning 50.

They started a despair-fueled campaign to attract families to Fourna, offering settling-in money raised from private donations and municipal programs.

It’s working: Two families have moved to the village, five more are on a 2025 wait list, and hundreds of others have made inquiries. Eight children now attend elementary classes.

Dousikos, equally at ease behind the wheel of his pickup or in front of the church altar, says the initiative was partly inspired by calls from the Orthodox church hierarchy urging clergy to promote family life.

“I think we did the obvious thing: Help the people here keep our village alive,” he says, standing in the Church of Transfiguration of Christ on the main square. “Of course, village life is not for everyone. You need to be good at manual work.”

Greece has one of the world’s oldest populations with 23% aged 65 or older in 2023, according to World Bank data. The central Greek region of Evrytania, home to Fourna, faces low birth rates and rural depopulation, with an average age of 56.2 – one of the three highest in the European Union.

Panagiota Diamanti, Fourna’s only elementary schoolteacher and co-founder of the family campaign “New Life in the Village,” says the urgency of the situation is palpable.

“If the kids don’t come, the teacher gets transferred and the school will close. And a closed school will never reopen,” she says. “We need bold action.”

More than 200 publicly run schools and kindergartens were shut down across Greece in the current school year due to low enrollment, many in remote parts of the country with sparse populations due to its mountainous mainland terrain and numerous small islands.

Several local authorities have reached out to the Fourna campaign, and asked Diamanti to help them start a similar program.

After class, she joins her eight students in a game of dodgeball at the school yard which overlooks Evrytania’s jagged mountains. The kids enjoy a local-celebrity status; their birthdays are often celebrated in the main village square.

Vassiliki Emmanouil relocated to Fourna with her six children – five sons and a daughter – and says she has been showered with kindness. Village residents leave food outside her door overnight and are encouraging her to restart an old bakery when her husband returns from a spell of work in Germany.

“I’ve been here for nearly three months, and I would be ungrateful to say I’ve struggled,” Emmanouil says. “The local priest and his wife treat me as if I’m part of their family. The entire village has been by our side, from offering daily essentials to emotional support.”

Deaths overtook annual births in Greece in 2010 as the country sank into a severe financial crisis and the numbers have steadily worsened since then, reaching almost double the birth level in 2022.

The conservative government last year created a ministry of family and social cohesion. It has increased family benefits in the 2025 budget and reached out to the Orthodox Church for help.

Last year, the church’s governing Holy Synod issued a circular that was read out at all of Greece’s Orthodox churches, arguing that financial incentives will not be enough to reverse the dire demographic trends.

“Experts propose various solutions to address the issue, emphasizing its significant social, economic, and geopolitical implications,” the message said.

“The Church underscores the spiritual dimension of family life, advocating for unity, love, and the creation of families as a testament to divine purpose,” it added. “Children, considered gifts from God, bring meaning to life and symbolize hope and renewal.”

For Fourna’s residents, even church attendance is tied to village survival. Two dozen churches in the area remain empty most of the year, but are well maintained and open for important dates on the religious calendar.

The appearance of children in church and on the village’s long-quieted streets caught most residents off guard.

“At the start, I never thought families would come to live here. It’s a remote village, very small, without much here,” local business owner Giorgos Vassilikoudis said.

“But to my surprise, families did come and they’re happy,” said Vassilikoudis, who runs a restaurant and guesthouse. “It’s very good for the village and for people who have shops and businesses. For other villages, it serves as an example. It’s a good start.”

AP journalist Lefteris Pitarakis contributed to this report.

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

Student Panagiotis leaves the primary school in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Rev. Constantine Dousikos celebrates the Blessing of the Five Loaves ceremony at the Orthodox church of Agios Stylianos in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Schoolteacher Panagiota Diamanti puts magnetic letters on a board during class in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Primary school students Panagiotis, right, and Loukas play in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Vassiliki Emmanouil holds her daughter Ekaterini alongside her other children, from left, Evaggelos, Dimitris, Loukas, Georgios, and Pavlos, outside their temporary home in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. The family relocated to the village a few months prior, as the first under a placement program to attract families to Fourna. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

A local walks through Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Students read maps with schoolteacher Panagiota Diamanti during class in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Students play ball as as schoolteacher Panagiota Diamanti stands under the basket in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Rev. Constantine Dousikos gives communion to children at the Orthodox church of Agios Stylianos in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Locals gather at the main square of Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Fourna village stands in central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Schoolteacher Panagiota Diamanti poses for a portrait in her classroom in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Rev. Constantine Dousikos, left, and Father Ilarion patronize a cafe in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

A truck drives through a forest in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Schoolteacher Panagiota Diamanti poses for a portrait outside the primary school in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Rev. Constantine Dousikos poses at the Orthodox church of Transfiguration of Christ in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Locals leave the church after a liturgy in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Vassiliki Emmanouil, mother of six who relocated to Fourna village a few months prior, holds her daughter Ekaterini as she plays with her children, from left, Georgios, Pavlos and Loukas at their temporary home in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

A woman stands outside her shop in Fourna village, central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Fourna village stands in central Greece, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

Rev. Constantine Dousikos celebrates the Blessing of the Five Loaves ceremony at the Orthodox church of Agios Stylianos in Fourna village, central Greece, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Becky Pepper-Jackson finished third in the discus throw in West Virginia last year though she was in just her first year of high school. Now a 15-year-old sophomore, Pepper-Jackson is aware that her upcoming season could be her last.

West Virginia has banned transgender girls like Pepper-Jackson from competing in girls and women's sports, and is among the more than two dozen states with similar laws. Though the West Virginia law has been blocked by lower courts, the outcome could be different at the conservative-dominated Supreme Court, which has allowed multiple restrictions on transgender people to be enforced in the past year.

The justices are hearing arguments Tuesday in two cases over whether the sports bans violate the Constitution or the landmark federal law known as Title IX that prohibits sex discrimination in education. The second case comes from Idaho, where college student Lindsay Hecox challenged that state's law.

Decisions are expected by early summer.

President Donald Trump's Republican administration has targeted transgender Americans from the first day of his second term, including ousting transgender people from the military and declaring that gender is immutable and determined at birth.

Pepper-Jackson has become the face of the nationwide battle over the participation of transgender girls in athletics that has played out at both the state and federal levels as Republicans have leveraged the issue as a fight for athletic fairness for women and girls.

“I think it’s something that needs to be done,” Pepper-Jackson said in an interview with The Associated Press that was conducted over Zoom. “It’s something I’m here to do because ... this is important to me. I know it’s important to other people. So, like, I’m here for it.”

She sat alongside her mother, Heather Jackson, on a sofa in their home just outside Bridgeport, a rural West Virginia community about 40 miles southwest of Morgantown, to talk about a legal fight that began when she was a middle schooler who finished near the back of the pack in cross-country races.

Pepper-Jackson has grown into a competitive discus and shot put thrower. In addition to the bronze medal in the discus, she finished eighth among shot putters.

She attributes her success to hard work, practicing at school and in her backyard, and lifting weights. Pepper-Jackson has been taking puberty-blocking medication and has publicly identified as a girl since she was in the third grade, though the Supreme Court's decision in June upholding state bans on gender-affirming medical treatment for minors has forced her to go out of state for care.

Her very improvement as an athlete has been cited as a reason she should not be allowed to compete against girls.

“There are immutable physical and biological characteristic differences between men and women that make men bigger, stronger, and faster than women. And if we allow biological males to play sports against biological females, those differences will erode the ability and the places for women in these sports which we have fought so hard for over the last 50 years,” West Virginia's attorney general, JB McCuskey, said in an AP interview. McCuskey said he is not aware of any other transgender athlete in the state who has competed or is trying to compete in girls or women’s sports.

Despite the small numbers of transgender athletes, the issue has taken on outsize importance. The NCAA and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committees banned transgender women from women's sports after Trump signed an executive order aimed at barring their participation.

The public generally is supportive of the limits. An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll conducted in October 2025 found that about 6 in 10 U.S. adults “strongly” or “somewhat” favored requiring transgender children and teenagers to only compete on sports teams that match the sex they were assigned at birth, not the gender they identify with, while about 2 in 10 were “strongly” or “somewhat” opposed and about one-quarter did not have an opinion.

About 2.1 million adults, or 0.8%, and 724,000 people age 13 to 17, or 3.3%, identify as transgender in the U.S., according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.

Those allied with the administration on the issue paint it in broader terms than just sports, pointing to state laws, Trump administration policies and court rulings against transgender people.

"I think there are cultural, political, legal headwinds all supporting this notion that it’s just a lie that a man can be a woman," said John Bursch, a lawyer with the conservative Christian law firm Alliance Defending Freedom that has led the legal campaign against transgender people. “And if we want a society that respects women and girls, then we need to come to terms with that truth. And the sooner that we do that, the better it will be for women everywhere, whether that be in high school sports teams, high school locker rooms and showers, abused women’s shelters, women’s prisons.”

But Heather Jackson offered different terms to describe the effort to keep her daughter off West Virginia's playing fields.

“Hatred. It’s nothing but hatred,” she said. "This community is the community du jour. We have a long history of isolating marginalized parts of the community.”

Pepper-Jackson has seen some of the uglier side of the debate on display, including when a competitor wore a T-shirt at the championship meet that said, “Men Don't Belong in Women's Sports.”

“I wish these people would educate themselves. Just so they would know that I’m just there to have a good time. That’s it. But it just, it hurts sometimes, like, it gets to me sometimes, but I try to brush it off,” she said.

One schoolmate, identified as A.C. in court papers, said Pepper-Jackson has herself used graphic language in sexually bullying her teammates.

Asked whether she said any of what is alleged, Pepper-Jackson said, “I did not. And the school ruled that there was no evidence to prove that it was true.”

The legal fight will turn on whether the Constitution's equal protection clause or the Title IX anti-discrimination law protects transgender people.

The court ruled in 2020 that workplace discrimination against transgender people is sex discrimination, but refused to extend the logic of that decision to the case over health care for transgender minors.

The court has been deluged by dueling legal briefs from Republican- and Democratic-led states, members of Congress, athletes, doctors, scientists and scholars.

The outcome also could influence separate legal efforts seeking to bar transgender athletes in states that have continued to allow them to compete.

If Pepper-Jackson is forced to stop competing, she said she will still be able to lift weights and continue playing trumpet in the school concert and jazz bands.

“It will hurt a lot, and I know it will, but that’s what I’ll have to do,” she said.

Heather Jackson, left, and Becky Pepper-Jackson pose for a photograph outside of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Heather Jackson, left, and Becky Pepper-Jackson pose for a photograph outside of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Becky Pepper-Jackson poses for a photograph outside of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

The Supreme Court stands is Washington, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

FILE - Protestors hold signs during a rally at the state capitol in Charleston, W.Va., on March 9, 2023. (AP Photo/Chris Jackson, file)