Saint Hilarion the Great was born to pagan parents in the year 291 in the Palestinian village of Thabatha near Gaza. As a young man, he was sent to Alexandria for his education. There he became acquainted with Christianity and was baptized. After hearing an account of the angelic life of Saint Anthony the Great (January 17), Hilarion went to meet him, desiring to study with him and learn what is pleasing to God. Hilarion soon returned to his native land to find that his parents had died. After distributing his family’s inheritance to the poor, Saint Hilarion went forth into the desert surrounding the city of Maium.

In the desert the Saint endured violent struggles with impure thoughts, vexations of the mind, and the burning passions of the flesh, but he defeated them through heavy labor, fasting and fervent prayer. The devil sought to frighten him with phantoms and apparitions. While he was praying Saint Hilarion would sometimes hear children crying, women wailing, and the roaring of lions and other wild beasts. He understood that the demons were causing these terrors in order to drive him out of the wilderness. He overcame his fear by resorting to fervent prayer. Once, some thieves fell upon Saint Hilarion, and he persuaded them to forsake their lawless life by the power of his words.

Soon all of Palestine heard about Saint Hilarion and of the miracles he worked. The Lord granted the holy ascetic the power to cast out unclean spirits. With this gift of grace he loosed the bonds of many of those who were afflicted. The sick came for healing, and the Saint cured them without asking for any payment, saying that the grace of God is freely received, and must be freely given (Matthew 10:8).

Such was the grace that he received from God that he could tell by the smell of someone’s body or clothing which passion was afflicting his soul. They came to Saint Hilarion desiring to save their souls under his guidance. With his blessing, monasteries began to spring up throughout Palestine. Going from one monastery to another, he instituted a strict ascetic manner of life.

About seven years before his death (+ 371-372) Saint Hilarion moved back to Cyprus, where the ascetic lived in a solitary place until the Lord summoned him to Himself.

Saint Hilarion is sometimes depicted holding a scroll which reads: "The tools of a monk are steadfastness, humility, and love according to God." In iconography, is depicted as an old man with a brown, rush-like beard divided into three points.

The Transfer of the Relics of Saint Hilarion, Bishop of Meglin, to the Bulgarian city of Trnovo, occurred in the year 1206. Prior to this event, the body of the saint rested in the city of Meglin.

Saint Hilarion received a fine Christian upbringing. At eighteen, he entered a monastery. Because of his virtuous and strict life he was chosen to be igumen of the monastery. He was very concerned about the salvation of the monks’ souls. He unceasingly exhorted those souls entrusted to him not to waste precious time intended to prepare for salvation, and eradicated drunkenness in the monastery.

In 1134, when the Bogomil heresy was spreading through Bulgaria, he was consecrated bishop of Meglin. The followers of the heresy believed that “good and evil manifest themselves as independent principles, and a struggle between the two ensues.” Saint Hilarion tirelessly fought against the Bogomils with apostolic zeal and fervent prayer. He continually unmasked their heresy and exposed their hypocritical guise of piety. In refuting the teaching of the heretics, Saint Hilarion said:

“You are not Christians at all, since you are hostile to the Cross of Christ the Savior. You do not acknowledge the One God, you slander the teachings of the Old Testament venerated by Christians. You deceive people by hypocritical meekness while full of pride. True piety is not possible in those who do not see their own heart’s corruption, but by those who ask God’s grace with prayer and humility. Evil thoughts, envy, vanity, greed, lies are not the deed of some evil thing within man to be conquered by mere fasting. These vices are the fruit of self- love which demands rooting out by spiritual efforts.”

Because of the saint’s exhortations many of the heretics abandoned their false teaching and returned to the holy Church. Saint Hilarion also successfully struggled against the rise of the Armenian Monophysite heretics in Bulgaria, who acknowledged only the divine nature of Christ. The saint fell asleep in the Lord in 1164.

Saint Hilarion, Schemamonk of Kiev Caves, a strict ascetic, was a disciple and co-ascetic with Saint Theodosius (May 3). Imitating the example of his teacher, Saint Hilarion prayed to God with tears day and night, while observing a strict fast. His contemporaries knew him as a chronicler, who toiled over the copying of books in the cell of Saint Theodosius. During this time his teacher chanted Psalms and spun wool. Saint Hilarion lived an ascetic life during the eleventh century. His memory is also celebrated on August 28 and on the second Sunday of Great Lent.

Saint Hilarion of Gdov and Pskov Lake, was a disciple of Saint Euphrosynus of Pskov (May 15). In 1460 on the banks of the River Zhelcha, not far from Gdov, he founded the Ozersk [Lake] Monastery of the Protection of the Mother of God. The monastery bordered the territory of the Livonian Knights, and the monks constantly suffered the incursions of that military order. Despite harsh conditions and insufficient means, Saint Hilarion maintained a high level of pious and ascetic life at the monastery, and made great efforts to adorn and build up the monastery.

Saint Hilarion reposed on March 28, 1476 and was buried in the church of the Protection of the Most Holy Theotokos in the monastery he founded. Afterwards, a church was built at the monastery in honor of the Nativity of Christ. The left chapel was dedicated to the founder of the Gdov monastery. Saint Hilarion of Gdov is also commemorated on October 21, on the Feast of his heavenly patron and namesake.

Saint Theophilus and James, Abbots of Omutch in Pskov, lived the ascetic life on the island of Konev together with Saint Arsenius (June 12). In the year 1396, in the Pskov diocese at the River Omutch, not far from the city of Porkhov, Saints Theophilus and James established a wilderness monastery in honor of the Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos. They fell asleep in the Lord about the year 1412.

The Martyrs Gaius, Dasius, and Zoticus of Nicomedia suffered martyrdom in the year 303, under the emperor Diocletian (284-305), because they destroyed a pagan temple. After enduring many tortures, they had stones tied around their necks, and were drowned in the sea.

Saint Philotheos of Dionysiou Monastery on Mount Athos was a native of Elateia, and was born in 1526. Fearing the Turks, his parents moved away to Chrysoupolis in Macedonia, where his father soon died. The child Philotheos and his brother were seized by the Turks and then thrown into prison.

They were delivered in a miraculous manner by the Mother of God. She appeared to the children in the likeness of their mother and led them to the monastery of the Most Holy Theotokos in the city of Neapolis in Asia Minor. At this monastery the brothers received the monastic tonsure. By progressing through all the obediences assigned by the Igoumen they attained the position of ecclesiarchs.

Meanwhile, Eudokia, the mother of Saint Philotheos, had also settled into a women’s monastery in this same city, through the mysterious guidance of Divine Providence. For many years she knew absolutely nothing of the fate of her children. Visiting a men’s monastery with several other nuns for the Feast Day of its church, Eudokia recognized her sons. In answer to her question about how they chanced to be there they replied, “You ought to know, for you yourself freed us from the Turks and led us from the prison.” Thus Eudokia became convinced of the intercession of the Mother of God, for it had only been in praying to the Theotokos that she had found any consolation. When the brethren learned of the joyous reunion of the mother and her sons, as well as their miraculous deliverance, they gathered around them and glorified the Lord.

In 1551, after his mother’s repose, Saint Philotheos went to the Holy Mountain at the age of 25. He joined the brethren of Dionysiou Monastery, where his ascetic struggles were an example to many. Later, seeking greater quietude, he pretended to have suffered from an illness and become deaf, and then he retired to a cave outside the monastery. There he emerged as an admirable ascetic and a conqueror of demons. When his feigned illness was revealed, he was forced to change his place of residence, so that people would not honor him. In his new home he acquired three disciples. Devoting himself to deeds of prayer, Saint Philotheos attained high spiritual perfection and was granted the gift of clairvoyance.

In 1610 the venerable one peacefully fell asleep in the Lord at the age of eighty-four. Before his death he bade his disciples not to bury his body, but rather to cast it dishonorably into the forest to be eaten by beasts and birds. His disciples fulfilled the wish of their Elder, but the All-Good God glorified the saint’s relics with a wondrous radiance. A monk took his skull and gave it to the saint’s disciples.

The skull is still preserved in the monastery of Petra, Thessaly, in a silver case, and receives great honor from the faithful. In 1972, the late Archimandrite Gabriel transferred a portion of the venerable one’s precious relic from the monastery of Koroni to the monastery of Dionysiou.

The life of the venerable one was written by the monk Daniel of Dionysiou, copying an older codex, which was compiled by the monk Agapios Lantos in 1802, which was later published in Venice in 1872.

Saint Bessarion (Sarai) was a Serb who was born in Bosnia in 1714. Longing for the monastic life, he was tonsured at the Monastery of Saint Savva in the Holy Land in 1738. He returned to Serbia and lived in a cave for several years as a hesychast, and received from God the grace of working miracles.

About this time there was a great deal of unrest in the regions of the Banat and Transylvania because many Romanian Orthodox Christians had been forced into union with Rome. At Karlovits, Patriarch Arsenius had heard of Saint Bessarion’s holy and ascetical life, and asked to see him. After ordaining him to the holy priesthood, he sent him to defend the Orthodox Faith northwest of the Carpathian Mountains.

Saint Bessarion left for the Banat in January of 1774, and was warmly received by the local people. Hundreds of people came to hear him preach, and many of them returned to the Orthodox Church. He encouraged his listeners not to abandon the faith which their fathers had passed down to them, but to remain firm and steadfast in it.

Preaching at Timishoara, Lipova-Arad, Deva, Orashtie, Salishtea of Sibiu, and other places, he would set up a wooden cross in the middle of each village, and people would gather to hear him. In each place, he was able to bring most of the people back into the fold of the Orthodox Church. This, of course, did not please the Roman Catholic authorities.

On April 26, 1744, Saint Bessarion was arrested by the Austrian army while on his way to Sibiu. They took him to Vienna, where he was placed on trial, and then thrown into the Kufstein prison on the orders of Empress Maria Teresa. There he endured much suffering because of his confession of the Orthodox Faith. After about a year in chains and tortures, he surrendered his soul to God.

Saint Bessarion the Confessor was glorified by the Holy Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church in 1950, and the date of his annual commemoration was designated as October 21.

Saint Sophronius was originally from Ciorara-Sebesh in Alba county in Romania. From his childhood, he demonstrated a great love for Christ and the Church, so it was not surprising that he eventually received the monastic tonsure.

He returned to his village in 1756, and established a small hermitage called Cioara Skete in the forest. Several disciples came to join him there, drawn by reports of his holy life. Seeing the persecution of the Orthodox by the Catholic authorities at that time, Saint Sophronius traveled through many villages of Ardeal, encouraging people to remain firm in the Orthodox Faith.

Saint Sophronius was so effective in his preaching that the Crai of Ardeal ordered him thrown into prison, where he was beaten. After his release from prison, he went to preach in the villages of the Apuseni Mountains, and once again he was incarcerated and tortured for Christ.

After being freed on February 14, 1761, Saint Sophronius assembled a great crowd of people in the city of Alba Iulia, and demanded equal rights under the law for Romanians. He also demanded an Orthodox bishop for Ardeal. That very year his demands were granted, and he retired to the Curtea de Argesh Monastery. He departed to the Lord not long afterward.

The Orthodox Church of Romania numbered Saint Sophronius among the saints in 1955, appointing October 21 as the date of his annual commemoration.

Saint Oprea Nicholas of Salistie suffered martyrdom in Romania at the hands of Roman Catholics in 1776.

Saint Hilarion, Metropolitan of Kiev, lived during the era of the Great Prince Yaroslav the Wise (+ 1054), son of Saint Vladimir. In the history of the Russian Church he is remembered as the first Russian installed as Metropolitan by a Council of Russian bishops. The Russian Church up to that time had been a Metropolitan See, under the patriarchate of Constantinople. Russia’s first metropolitans were Greeks, and they were appointed by Constantinople.

Saint Hilarion, priest of the prince’s village of Berestovo near Kiev, was the spiritual Father and companion of Prince Yaroslav. Saint Nestor the Chronicler relates:

“God-loving prince Yaroslav loved Berestovo, and built the church of the Holy Apostles there, and he honored many priests. Among them was the presbyter Hilarion, a man of virtue, knowledge, and given to fasting. He made his way from Berestovo to the Dniepr, where the old Kiev Caves monastery is now, and he made his prayer in the deep forest there. Having dug out a shallow 14 foot cave, he chanted the Hours and prayed in solitude to God….”

Saint Hilarion, as his works attest, was not simply a “man of books”, but was endowed with great spiritual gifts and profound theological knowledge. He devoted all his efforts to the service of the Russian Church. When Metropolitan Theopemptus died, Rus was in a state of war against Byzantium. By decision of a Council of the Russian hierarchs, a resolution was made to establish a Metropolitanate at Kiev, not subject to Constantinople.

Saint Hilarion was famed among the Russian clergy for his heightened spiritual life and gift for preaching. Prior to this, he gave a eulogy in the “Tithe” church of Kiev to the holy Prince Vladimir with his acclaimed “Discourse Concerning Law and Grace,” in which he provided a theological explanation of the place of the Russian Church in the history of the divine economy of Salvation.

The choice of the Council hierarchs was dear to the heart of Yaroslav the Wise. Saint Hilarion was installed as Metropolitan at the Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia) cathedral in the year 1051 and was later confirmed by the Patriarch of Constantinople. He was not the primate of the Russian Church for long. The chronicle does not mention the year of his death, but the saint was not at the death of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (February 20, 1054), and in the year 1055 a new metropolitan had arrived at Kiev. Evidently, Saint Hilarion had died in 1053.

His spiritual legacy lives on in the Russian Church especially in a fine example of Russian church literature, the “Discourse Concerning Law and Grace.” Its content is profound and multi-faceted. At the heart of the “Discourse” is the teaching concerning salvation and grace. Secondly, great attention is devoted to the question of the superiority of Christianity over Judaism. This theme was essential during those times in Kievan Rus. The Jews had approached Saint Vladimir, hoping to convert him to their faith, and Saint Theodosius of the Kiev Caves (May 3) had gone to the “Jewish Quarter” in Kiev to preach Christ Crucified. It is also known that the Jews had attempted to convert the holy hierarch Nikḗtas the Hermit to Judaism when he was still a monk of the Kiev Caves monastery (1088). Saint Simon relates this in the Kiev Caves Paterikon. This explains the attention which Saint Hilarion devotes to the question “about the Law given to Moses, and about grace and truth, through the coming of Jesus Christ.”

And finally, the third theme, the occasion of the uttering of the “Discourse” was the glorification of the apostolic work of holy Prince Vladimir. The kingdom of nature, the kingdom of grace and the future Kingdom of Glory are perceived in the spiritual experience of the Church as inseparably connected. The Law is only the forerunner and servant of grace and truth. Truth and grace are but servants of the future age and true life. Saint Hilarion teaches thus about the superiority of the Church: “Moses and the prophets foretold the Coming of Christ, whereas Christ and His Apostles bore witness to the Resurrection and the future age.”

The saint explains that from the moment the Savior came into he world, the Old Covenant of man with God ceased to be in effect. With the theological symbols of the Old and New Covenants the saint employs images borrowed from the holy Apostle Paul (Gal. 4:22-31) relating to the two wives of Abraham: the freeborn Sarah and the maidservant Hagar. “Hagar was cast out, a slave, together with her son Ishmael; and Isaac, the free son, was heir to Abraham. Thus also were the Jews cast out and dispersed through the lands, whereas the sons of grace, the Christians, have become heirs to God the Father. As the light of the moon fades at the shining of the sun, so also the Law fades at the shining forth of grace. The cold of night vanishes when the warmth of the sun heats the earth, and mankind is no longer bent over under the burden of the Law, but instead walks freely in grace.”

The joy of Christ fills the holy preacher when he speaks about the entry of his native Rus into the host of Christian peoples. “The grace of Christ has filled all the earth,” and especially, the youthfully alive peoples, to which the Russian people also belong. “It becomes grace and truth to shine forth in new peoples. They do not, in the words of the Lord, pour new wine (this being the teaching of grace) into old wineskins (referring to the Jews) but the rather put the new teaching, into new wineskins, into new peoples,” Thus the faith “throughout all the earth has spread and reached our Russian tongue. Here now we too, glorify the Holy Trinity with all Christians, and the Jews be silent. Pagans are accepted, but the Jews are spurned.”

Now the Orthodox Russians “are not termed idolaters, but rather Christians. No longer do we build heathen temples, but rather the churches of Christ. No longer do we sacrifice others to the demons (Varangian Martyrs, July 12), but instead, Christ has been slain for us in sacrifice to God the Father. The Blessed God has had mercy on all lands, and has not despised us, for He also desired to save us and bring us to our senses in truth.”

The great apostolic exploit of the enlightening of the Russian Land was made by holy Prince Vladimir (15 July 15), “like Saint Constantine,” who “commanded throughout all his land that they be baptized in the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In a clear and loud voice, he ordered all in the cities to glorify the Holy Trinity and to be Christians, the small and great, slave and free, young and old, rich and poor.” Saint Hilarion speaks with pride about his native land, “Saint Vladimir did not exercise sovereignty in a bad or ignorant land, but the rather in Russia, which is known and heard of by all the ends of the earth.”

The “Discourse Concerning Law and Grace” was the first work of its time in the Russian Church in which the holy Baptizer of Rus is acclaimed blessed among the ranks of the equals-to-the-Apostles. “Rejoice in the midst of sovereigns, O apostle, not in having dead bodies resurrected, but our deadened souls resurrecting: for by you have we been made alive in God and given to know life in Christ.” Such is the content of this remarkable memorial of ancient Russian theology. Among the other works of Saint Hilarion is his episcopal “Confession,” having become the model for a bishop’s vow in the Russian Church. Usually appended to the manuscripts of the “Discourse Concerning Law and Grace” is the “Prayer of Saint Hilarion.” This work of the saint also possesses a long history within the tradition of his native church. In the year 1555, upon his journey to the newly-formed Kazan diocese, Saint Gurias ordered that there be read to him the prayer, “The Work of Metropolitan Hilarion the Russian”, at Moscow and in the other cities, through which he was to travel.

Saint Hilarion was buried in the Kiev caves. In the inscribed titles to his works, in the manuscripts of saintly literature and lists of holy hierarchs, Saint Hilarion is invariably termed a saint and described as a wonderworker. His assured literary veneration as a saint is evidenced in the services to the Fathers of the Kiev Caves. Both in the service of the Synaxis of Fathers of the Near Caves (September 28), and also in the service to all the Kiev Caves Saints (second Sunday of Great Lent), Saint Hilarion is numbered among the saintly hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Saint Moses Macinic was ordained to the holy priesthood in Bucharest around 1746, and worked to oppose the Unia. Because of his activities he was arrested and jailed in Sibiu for seventeen months. Ultimately, he was released with the understanding that he would cease to function as a priest, and live as an ordinary peasant.

In 1752 he was chosen to go to Vienna with Saint Oprea Nicholas of Salistie to deliver a petition to Empress Maria Theresa. The petition asked her to recognize the rights of the Orthodox Church in Transylvania. She received them, but she had them thrown into the Kufstein Prison in the Tyrolean Mountains.

Although representatives from Transylvania repeatedly asked the Hapsburg rulers to free the two saints, they denied all knowledge of them.

Saint Moses Macinic was glorified as a martyr by the Orthodox Church of Romania in 1992.

Saint John of Galesh was a priest who was consecrated bishop at Bucharest, since there was no bishop for Transylvania. He resisted the plans of the Hapsburg authorities to persuade Orthodox Christians to convert to Catholicism. He was arrested and thrown into prison at Sibiu in 1756, then Empress Maria Theresa ordered him confined in the prison of Deva Castle until he died.

Saint John was transferred to a prison in Graz, Austria at the end of 1757. Later, he was brought to the notorious Kufstein Prison, where many Orthodox from Transylvania ended their lives.

In 1780, Gennady Vassie, a Serb who was incarcerated there, was able to send a letter to Empress Catherine II of Russia asking her to intervene on behalf of the Orthodox prisoners. In his letter he mentioned a Romanian priest named John, who had been kept there for twenty-four years because of his Orthodox faith.

Saint John of Galesh died in prison, and was glorified as a martyr by the Orthodox Church of Romania in 1992.

Holy Great Martyr Artemius of Antioch was a prominent military leader during the reigns of the emperor Constantine the Great (May 21), and his son and successor Constantius (337-361). Artemius received many awards for distinguished service and courage. He was appointed viceroy of Egypt. In this official position he did much for the spreading and strengthening Christianity in Egypt.

Saint Artemius was sent by the emperor Constantius to bring the relics of the holy Apostle Andrew from Patras, and the relics of the holy Apostle Luke from Thebes of Boeotia, to Constantinople. The holy relics were placed in the Church of the Holy Apostles beneath the table of oblation. The emperor rewarded him by making him ruler of Egypt.

The emperor Constantius was succeeded on the throne by Julian the Apostate (361-363). Julian in his desire to restore paganism was extremely antagonistic towards Christians, sending hundreds to their death. At Antioch he ordered the torture of two bishops unwilling to forsake the Christian Faith.

During this time, Saint Artemius arrived in Antioch and publicly denounced Julian for his impiety. The enraged Julian subjected the saint to terrible tortures and threw the Great Martyr Artemius into prison. While Artemius was praying, Christ, surrounded by angels, appeared to him and said, “Take courage, Artemius! I am with you and will preserve you from every hurt which is inflicted upon you, and I already have prepared your crown of glory. Since you have confessed Me before the people on earth, so shall I confess you before My Heavenly Father. Therefore, take courage and rejoice, you shall be with Me in My Kingdom.” Hearing this, Artemius rejoiced and offered up glory and thanksgiving to Him.

On the following day, Julian demanded that Saint Artemius honor the pagan gods. Meeting with steadfast refusal, the emperor resorted to further tortures. The saint endured all without a single moan. The saint told Julian that he would be justly recompensed for his persecution of Christians. Julian became furious and resorted to even more savage tortures, but they did not break the will of the saint. Finally the Great Martyr Artemius was beheaded.

His relics were buried by Christians. After the death of Saint Artemius, his prophecy about Julian the Apostate’s impending death came true.

Julian left Antioch for a war with the Persians. Near the Persian city of Ctesiphon, Julian came upon an elderly Persian, who agreed to betray his countrymen and guide Julian’s army. The old man deceived Julian and led his army into the Karmanite wilderness, where there was neither food nor water. Tired from hunger and thirst, Julian’s army battled against fresh Persian forces.

Divine retribution caught up with Julian the Apostate. During the battle he was mortally wounded by an unseen hand and an unseen weapon. Julian groaned deeply said, “You have conquered, Galilean!” After the death of the apostate emperor, the relics of the Great Martyr Artemius were transferred with honor from Antioch to Constantinople.

Saint Artemius is invoked by those suffering from hernias.

Holy Righteous Artemius of Verkola was born in the village of Dvina Verkhol around the year 1532. The son of pious parents, Artemius was a child who was courageous, meek and diligent for every good deed. On June 23, 1545 the twelve-year-old Artemius and his father were taken by surprise in a field by a thunderstorm. A clap of thunder broke right over their heads, and the child Artemius fell dead. People thought that this was a sign of God’s judgment, therefore they left the body in a pine forest without a funeral, and without burial.

Some years later, the village reader beheld a light over the place where the incorrupt body of the Righteous Artemius lay. Taken to the church of Saint Nicholas in 1577, the holy relics were shown to be a source of numerous healings. In this village a monastery was later built, called the Verkhol. In 1918, the impious Soviets chopped the holy relics into pieces and threw them into a well. The memory of Saint Artemius is also celebrated on October 20.

Saint Gerasimus the New Ascetic of Cephalonia was born in the village of Trikkala in the Peloponessos. As a young adult, he became a monk on the island of Zakynthos. On the Holy Mountain he became a schemamonk and studied with the ascetics of Mt Athos. Receiving a blessing from the Elders, the monk went to Jerusalem to worship at the Life-bearing Tomb of the Savior. After visiting many holy places in Jerusalem, Mount Sinai, Antioch, Damascus, Alexandria and Egypt, he returned to Jerusalem where he became a lamp-lighter at the Sepulchre of the Lord.

The monk was ordained a deacon and then a priest by the Patriarch of Jerusalem, Germanus (1534-1579). Saint Gerasimus maintained the discipline of an ascetic. For solitude he withdrew to the Jordan, where he spent forty days without respite. Having received the Patriarch’s blessing for a life of silence, Saint Gerasimus withdrew to Zakynthos in solitude, eating only vegetation.

After five years he was inspired to go the island of Cephalonia, where he lived in a cave. He restored a church at Omala, and he founded a women’s monastery where he lived in constant toil and vigil for thirty years. He prayed on bent knees stretched out on the ground. For his exalted life he was granted a miraculous gift: the ability to heal the sick and cast out unclean spirits.

At 71 years of age, the venerable Gerasimus knew that he would soon die. He gave his blessing to the nuns and peacefully fell asleep in the Lord on August 15, 1579. Two years later, his grave was opened and his holy relics were found fragrant and incorrupt with a healing power.

Since the Feast of the Dormition falls on August 15, Saint Gerasimus is commemorated on August 16th. Today’s Feast celebrates the uncovering of his holy relics in 1581.

Saint Matrona was born in the village of Volissos on Chios of wealthy and pious parents, Leon and Anna sometime in the fourteenth century. From her youth she showed an inclination for monasticism. One day she left her parents and went to live in an unpopulated area, where she founded a small monastery for women. Soon other nuns joined her in her ascetical struggles.

Saint Matrona worked many miracles both during her life and after her death, and was revered throughout Chios for her virtuous life and holiness. She showed charity to the poor, and was able to heal the sick.

The service to Saint Matrona was composed by Metropolitan Nikḗtas of Rhodes. It was found in a codex from 1455, which would indicate that she died sometime before this date.

Saint Matrona is also commemorated on July 15 (the finding of her head).

No information available at this time.

In Belogorod, an event of great spiritual significance occurred: the recovery of the relics of the Hieromartyr Νikόdēmos of Belgorod. Now, in the Cathedral of the Transfiguration of the Savior at Belgorod, the relics of two Belgorod Saints are buried. The shrine of Saint Joasaph of Belgorod (December 10) is under a canopy on the south side of the altar, and on the north side is a wooden chest with the newly-discovered relics of Bishop Νikόdēmos. His incorrupt relics were recovered from his burial place on October 20/November 2, 2012.

During the first week of Lent there were solemn services in the Transfiguration Cathedral, which were led by Metropolitan John of Belgorod and Stary Oskol. While the Magnification was being sung for the Hieromartyr Νikόdēmos, his revered relics were taken from the altar and placed on the kathedra, after which Vladyka knelt and read prayers before them. He also read the resolution of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia: “At the anniversary Bishops' Council in 2000 Bishop Νikόdēmos (Kononov) of Belgorod was numbered among the Holy New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Orthodox Church."

After identifying the remains, Patriarch Kirill determined: “Having recognized these remains as the relics of the Holy Martyr Νikόdēmos (Kononov), Bishop of Belgorod, let the Uncovering of the relics of the Holy Martyr Νikόdēmos be included in the Menaion of the Russian Orthodox Church.”

When the crypt was opened, the Hierarch's episcopal vestments were intact, but his miter and the Gospel were missing.

Saint Νikόdēmos is also commemorated on December 28.

The Prophet Joel (800 B.C.) predicted the desolation of Jerusalem. He also prophesied that the Holy Spirit would be poured out upon all people, through the Savior of the world (Joel 2:28-32).

The hymnographer Anatolius links Joel’s prophecy to the Nativity of the Lord. In the Praises at Matins on the Sunday following the Nativity, he refers to Joel 2:30, saying that the blood refers to the Incarnation, the fire to the Divinity, and the pillars of smoke to the Holy Spirit.

Martyr Varus lived in Egypt during the period of several persecutions against Christians (late third to early fourth century). Varus (Ouaros) was a military commander and secretly a Christian. He gave assistance to many of the persecuted and imprisoned Christians, and he visited the prisoners at night. He also brought food to the prisoners, dressed their wounds, and gave them encouragement.

Once Varus spent a whole night talking with seven imprisoned monks. These men were Christian teachers who had been beaten and starved. Varus marched with the teachers when they were led to their execution. The judge, seeing Varus’ strong faith, had him fiercely beaten. Varus died during the beating. After his death, the monks were beheaded.

Today we commemorate the transfer of the relics of Saint John, Abbot of Rila in Bulgaria (1238).

The relics of Saint John were transferred from the city of Sredets [Sofia] to Trnovo, the capital of the Bulgarian realm, in the year 1238. See August 18 for his Life.

Saint Cleopatra and her son John came from the village of Edra near Mount Tabor in Palestine. She was a contemporary of the holy Martyr Varus and witnessed his voluntary suffering. After the execution, Saint Cleopatra brought the body of the holy martyr to her own country and buried him with reverence. Cleopatra had one beloved son, John, who had attained the honorable rank of officer. To the great sorrow of his mother, John suddenly died. Cleopatra with tears of grief turned to the relics of the holy Martyr Varus, begging him for the return of her son.

Varus and her son appeared to Cleopatra in a dream, radiant in bright attire with crowns upon their heads. She realized that the Lord had received her son into the heavenly Kingdom, and was comforted. After this vision blessed Cleopatra started to live by a church she built over the relics of the holy martyr Varus and her son John, and performed many good deeds. She distributed her property to the poor and spent her time in prayer and fasting. After seven years she fell asleep in the Lord.

Hieromartyr Sadoc was the hierarch of a Persian district. When the Persian emperor Sapor learned that Sadoc was preaching faith in Christ, he gave orders to arrest and imprison him together with 128 Christian believers. For several months they attempted to persuade the righteous martyrs to repudiate the holy Faith, but unable to accomplish this, they executed them.

No information available at this time.

The Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke, was a native of Syrian Antioch, a companion of the holy Apostle Paul (Phil.1:24, 2 Tim. 4:10-11), and a physician enlightened in the Greek medical arts. Hearing about Christ, Luke arrived in Palestine and fervently accepted the preaching of salvation from the Lord Himself. As one of the Seventy Apostles, Saint Luke was sent by the Lord with the others to preach the Kingdom of Heaven during the Savior’s earthly life (Luke 10:1-3). After the Resurrection, the Lord Jesus Christ appeared to Saints Luke and Cleopas on the road to Emmaus.

Luke accompanied Saint Paul on his second missionary journey, and from that time they were inseparable. When Paul’s coworkers had forsaken him, only Luke remained to assist him in his ministry (2 Tim. 4:10-11). After the martyric death of the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, Saint Luke left Rome to preach in Achaia, Libya, Egypt and the Thebaid. He ended his life by suffering martyrdom in the city of Thebes.

Tradition credits Saint Luke with painting the first icons of the Mother of God. “Let the grace of Him Who was born of Me and My mercy be with these Icons,” said the All-Pure Virgin after seeing the icons. Saint Luke also painted icons of the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul. Saint Luke’s Gospel was written in the years 62-63 at Rome, under the guidance of the Apostle Paul. In the preliminary verses (1:1-3), Saint Luke precisely sets forth the purpose of his work. He proposes to record, in chronological order, everything known by Christians about Jesus Christ and His teachings. By doing this, he provided a firmer historical basis for Christian teaching (1:4). He carefully investigated the facts, and made generous use of the oral tradition of the Church and of what the All-Pure Virgin Mary Herself had told him (2:19, 51).

In Saint Luke’s Gospel, the message of the salvation made possible by the Lord Jesus Christ, and the preaching of the Gospel, are of primary importance.

Saint Luke also wrote the Acts of the Holy Apostles at Rome around 62-63 A.D. The Book of Acts, which is a continuation of the four Gospels, speaks about the works and the fruits of the holy Apostles after the Ascension of the Savior. At the center of the narrative is the Council of the holy Apostles at Jerusalem in the year 51, a Church event of great significance, which resulted in the separation of Christianity from Judaism and its independent dissemination into the world (Acts 15:6-29). The theological focus of the Book of Acts is the coming of the Holy Spirit, Who will guide the Church “into all truth” (John 16:13) until the Second Coming of Christ.

The holy relics of Saint Luke were taken from Constantinople and brought to Padua, Italy at some point in history. Perhaps this was during the infamous Crusade of 1204. In 1992, Metropolitan Hieronymus (Jerome) of Thebes requested the Roman Catholic bishop in Thebes to obtain a portion of Saint Luke’s relics for the saint’s empty sepulchre in the Orthodox cathedral in Thebes.

The Roman Catholic bishop Antonio Mattiazzo of Padua, noting that Orthodox pilgrims came to Padua to venerate the relics while many Catholics did not even know that the relics were there, appointed a committee to investigate the relics in Padua, and the skull of Saint Luke in the Catholic Cathedral of Saint Vico in Prague.

The skeleton was determined to be that of an elderly man of strong build. In 2001, a tooth found in the coffin was judged to be consistent with the DNA of Syrians living near the area of Antioch dating from 72-416 A.D. The skull in Prague perfectly fit the neck bone of the skelton. The tooth found in the coffin in Padua was also found to fit the jawbone of the skull.

Bishop Mattiazzo sent a rib from the relics to Metropolitan Hieronymus to be venerated in Saint Luke’s original tomb in the Orthodox cathedral at Thebes.

Saint Luke is also commemorated on April 22.

The Martyr Marinus the Elder at Anazarbus was from Cilicia (Asia Minor). For his confession of faith in Christ the Elder was subjected to fierce beatings, and then killed on the orders of Lysias, governor of Tarsus, during the reign of the emperor Diocletian (284-305).

Saint Julian the Hermit of Mesopotamia lived an ascetic life of fasting and prayer near the River Euphrates.

Once, as he was praying, he heard a voice saying that the emperor Julian the Apostate would soon perish. Soon the prophecy was fulfilled. Through the efforts of Saint Julian, a church was built on Mount Sinai in memory of the obtaining of the tablets of the Law by the holy Prophet Moses on the spot where Moses was standing when he received the tablets.

Saint Joseph of Volokolamsk, in the world John Sanin, was born on November 14, 1440 (1439 according to another source) in the village of Yazvisch-Pokrov, not far from the city of Volokolamsk. He was born into a pious family with his father named John (in monasticism Joannicius) and his mother Marina (in schema Maria). The seven-year-old boy John was sent to the pious and enlightened Elder Arsenius of the Volokolamsk-Exaltation of the Cross monastery to be educated.

Distinguished by rare qualities and extraordinary aptitude for church service, for one year the talented youth studied the Psalter, and, the following year, the entire Holy Scripture. He became a reader and singer in the monastery church. Contemporaries were astonished at his exceptional memory. Often, without having a single book in his cell, he would do the monastic rule, reciting from memory from the Psalter, the Gospel, the Epistles, and all that was required.

Even before becoming a monk, John lived a monastic lifestyle. Thanks to his reading and studying of Holy Scripture and the works of the holy Fathers, he dwelt constantly in contemplation of God. As his biographer notes, he “disdained obscene and blasphemous talk and endless mirth from his childhood years.”

At twenty years of age John chose the path of monastic striving and, leaving his parents’ home, he went off into the wilderness nigh to the Tver Savvin monastery, to the renowned Elder and strict ascetic, Barsanuphius. But the monastic rule seemed insufficiently strict to the young ascetic. With the blessing of Elder Barsanuphius, he set off to Borov to Saint Paphnutius of Borov (May 1), who had been a novice of Elder Nikḗtas of the Vysotsk monastery, who in turn was a disciple of Saint Sergius of Radonezh and Athanasius of Vysotsk.

The simple life of the holy Elder, the tasks which he shared with the brethren, and the strict fulfilling of the monastic rule suited John’s spiritual state. Saint Paphnutius lovingly accepted the young ascetic who had come to him, and on February 13, 1460 he tonsured him into monasticism with the name Joseph, thus realizing John’s greatest wish. With love and with zeal the young monk shouldered the heavy obediences imposed upon him, in the kitchen, the bakery, the infirmary. Saint Joseph fulfilled this latter obedience with special care, “giving food and drink to the sick, taking up and arranging the bedding, so very anxious and concerned with everything, working, as though attending to Christ Himself.”

The great spiritual abilities of the young monk were evidenced in the Church reading and singing. He was musically talented and possessed a voice that “in church singing and reading was like that of a swallow and wondrously harmonious, delighting the hearing of listeners, as much as anyone anywhere.” Saint Paphnutius made Joseph ecclesiarch in church, so that he would observe the fulfilling of the Church rule.

Joseph spent about seventeen years in the monastery of Saint Paphnutius. The strict efforts of monastic obedience under the direct guidance of the experienced abbot was for him an excellent spiritual schooling, having educated him into a future instructor and guide of monastic life. Towards the end of the life of Saint Paphnutius, Joseph was ordained hieromonk and, in accord with the final wishes of Saint Paphnutius, he was appointed Igumen of the Borov monastery.

Saint Joseph decided to transform the monastic life along strictly coenobitic principles, following the example of the Kiev Caves, Trinity-Saint Sergius, and Saint Cyril of White Lake monasteries. But this met with strong opposition from a majority of the brethren. Only seven pious monks were of one mind with the igumen. Saint Joseph decided to visit Russian coenobitic monasteries, to investigate the best arrangement for monastic life. He arrived together with the Elder Gerasimus at the Saint Cyril of White Lake monastery, which itself presented a model of strict asceticism on the principles of a coenobitic monastery rule.

His acquaintance with the life of these monasteries strengthened Saint Joseph’s views. But, after he returned to Borov monastery at the wish of the prince, Saint Joseph encountered again the former staunch resistance of the brethren to change from their customary rule. Therefore, he resolved to found a new monastery with a strict coenobitic rule, so he took seven like-minded monks to Volokolamsk, his native region, to a forest known to him since childhood.

In Volokolamsk at the time, the prince was Boris Vasilievich, the pious brother of Great Prince Ivan III. Hearing of the virtuous life of the great ascetic Joseph, he gladly received him and allowed him to settle on the outskirts of his principality, at the confluence of the Rivers Struga and Sestra. The selection of this spot was accompanied by a remarkable occurrence: a storm blew down the trees before the eyes of the astonished travelers, as though clearing the place for the future monastery. Here the ascetics set up a cross and built a wooden church in honor of the Dormition of the Mother of God in June 1479, which was consecrated on August 15, 1479. This day and year stand in history as the date of the founding of the monastery of the Dormition of the Most Holy Mother of God as “volok’ lamsk” [“broken-up peninsula”], later named after its founder.

The monastery was built rather quickly. Much of the work in the construction of the monastery was done by the founder himself. “He was skilled in every human craft: he felled trees, carried logs, he chopped and sawed wood.” By day he toiled with everyone at the construction of the monastery, but spent his nights in solitary cell prayer, remembering always that “Desires kill the sluggard, for his hands do not choose to do anything” (Prov 21:25).

Good reports about the new ascetic attracted disciples to him. The number of monks soon increased to a hundred men, and the venerable Joseph strove to be a good example for his monks in everything. Preaching temperance and spiritual sobriety in all things, his external appearance was no different than the others. His simple, cold-weather rags were his constant clothing, and bast shoes (made from bark) served as his footwear.

He was the first one to appear in church, he read and sang in the choir beside the others, he gave instruction and was the last to leave church. At nights the holy igumen walked around the monastery and the cells, safeguarding the peace and prayerful sobriety of the brethren entrusted him by God. If he chanced to hear a frivolous conversation, he rapped on the door and quietly withdrew.

Saint Joseph devoted much attention to the inner ordering of the life of the monks. He himself led a strict cenobitic life in accord with the Rule he compiled, to which all the services and obediences of the monks were subordinated, and it governed their whole life, “whether in their comings or goings, their words or their deeds.” At the core of the rule was total non-covetousness, detachment from one’s own will, and constant work. The brethren possessed everything in common: clothing, footwear, food and other things.

None of the brethren could take anything into their cell without the blessing of the igumen, not even a book or an icon. Part of the trapeza meal of the monks, by general consent, was given away to the poor. Work, prayer, spiritual efforts filled the life of the brethren. The Jesus Prayer never vanished from their lips. Festivity was viewed by Saint Joseph as a chief weapon for demonic seduction. Saint Joseph invariably imposed upon himself quite burdensome obediences. The monastery was occupied with the copying and transcription of Service Books and the writings of the holy Fathers, so that the Volokolamsk book collection soon became one of the finest of Russian monastic libraries.

With each passing year the monastery of Saint Joseph flourished all the more. In the years 1484-1485 a stone church of the Dormition of the Mother of God was built in place of the wooden one. In the Summer of 1485 “artistic masters of the Russian land” painted within it, Dionysius the Iconographer with his sons Vladimir and Theodosius. Saint Joseph’s nephews, Dositheus and Bassian Toporkov, participated in the adornment of the new Church. In 1504 a heated church in honor of the Holy Theophany was set up, followed by the establishment of a bell-tower and next to the bell tower, a church named in honor of the Hodēgḗtria (Directress)Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos.

Saint Joseph trained a whole school of renowned monks, some of whom gained notoriety in the arena of church-historical activity since they were “good pastors,” while others gained fame with works of enlightenment. Some were remembered as worthy examples of pious monastic struggles. History has preserved for us the names of many disciples and co-ascetics of the holy Volokolamsk igumen, who continued to develop his ideas.

Among the disciples and followers of Saint Joseph were: the Metropolitans of Moscow and All Rus Daniel (+ 1539) and Macarius (+1563); the Archbishop of Rostov Bassian (+1515); the Bishops of Suzdal Simeon (+1515), Dositheus of Krutitsa (+1544), Savva of Krutitsa (called “the Black”), Acacius of Tver, Bassian of Kolomets, and many others. Monastics of the Volokolamsk monastery occupied the most important Archepiscopal sees of the Russian Church: the holy hierarchs of Kazan Gurias (December 5) and Germanus (November 6 ), and Saint Barsanuphius, Bishop of Tver (April 11).

The activity and influence of Saint Joseph were not limited to the monastery. Many laypeople went to him to receive advice. With a pure spiritual insight he penetrated into the deep secrets of the souls of questioners and clairvoyantly revealed to them the will of God. Everyone living around the monastery considered him their spiritual Father and protector. Eminent nobles and princes asked him to be godfather for their children. They revealed their souls to him in confession, they asked for letters of guidance to help them fulfill his directives.

The common folk found at the monastery the means for sustaining their existence on occasions of extreme need. The number of those fed through monastery resources sometimes approached 700 people. “All of the Volotsk land are inclined to good, enjoying peace and quiet. And the name Joseph, as something sacred, is on everyone’s lips.”

The monastery was famed not only for its piety and help for the suffering, but also for its manifestations of the grace of God. During Matins of Holy Saturday, the righteous monk Bessarion once saw the Holy Spirit in the form of a white dove, sitting upon the Shroud of the Lord, which was being carried by Saint Joseph. The Abbot, bidding the monk to keep silent about the vision, himself rejoiced in spirit, hoping that God would not forsake the monastery. This monk had seen the souls of dying brethren, white as snow, issuing forth from their mouths. To Saint Joseph himself was revealed the day of his end, and he fell asleep in the Lord with joy, having received the Holy Mysteries and assuming the schema.

The saintly life of Saint Joseph was neither easy nor placid. In these difficult times for the Church in Russia, the Lord raised him up as a zealous defender of Orthodoxy in the struggle with heresies and churchly disputes. Saint Joseph exerted quite a great effort in denouncing the Judaizers, who tried to poison and distort the foundations of Russian spiritual life. Just as the holy Fathers and teachers of the Ecumenical Councils had elaborated on the teachings of Orthodoxy in responding to the ancient heresies (which contended against the Spirit, Christ, or icons), so also Saint Joseph was summoned forth by God to oppose the false teachings of the Judaizers and to compile the first manual of Russian Orthodox theology, his large book The Enlightener.

Even earlier, preachers from the Khozars had come to Saint Vladimir (July 15), trying to convert him to Judaism. But the great Baptizer of Rus repudiated the pretensions of the rabbis. After this, Saint Joseph writes, “the Great Russian land dwelt for five centuries in the Orthodox Faith, until the Enemy of salvation the devil, should bring the cunning Jew to the city of Novgorod.”

Along with the retinue of the Lithuanian prince Michael Olelkovich, who came to Novgorod in 1470, the Jewish preacher Skhariya (Zachariah) accompanied them. Playing upon the deficiencies of faith and of learning on the part of certain clergy, Skhariya and his accomplices sowed distrust among the petty-minded towards the church hierarchy, inclining them towards a revolt against the spiritual authorities, tempting them with the idea of “self-authority,” i.e. a capricious self-determination of each individual in matters of faith and salvation. Those they tempted gradually pushed towards a full break with the Church: they disdained the holy icons, and repudiated the veneration of the saints, basic elements of Orthodox popular morality.

Ultimately, they led the religiously blind and deluded to a denial of the saving Mysteries and the fundamental teachings of Orthodoxy, outside of which there is no knowledge of God: the teaching of the Most Holy Trinity and the teaching of the Incarnation of the God-man our Lord Jesus Christ. If decisive measures were not taken, “all of Orthodox Christianity would be doomed by heretical teachings.” So the question was posed for history. The Great Prince Ivan III, enticed by the Judaizers, invited them to Moscow. He had two of the most prominent of the heretics made archpriests, one at the Dormition, the other at the Archangel Michael cathedrals of the Kremlin, and he summoned to Moscow even the arch-heretic Skhariya himself.

All those close to the prince were led astray by the heresy, beginning with the clerk heading the government, Theodore Kuritsyn, whose brother became a ringleader of the heretics. Even the in-law of the great prince, Elena Voloshanka, accepted the Judaizers. And finally, the heretical Metropolitan Zosimas was installed upon the bishop’s Throne of the great Moscow Hierarchs Peter, Alexis and Jonah.

Saint Joseph and Saint Gennadius, Bishop of Novgorod (December 4), called for a struggle against the spread of the heresy. Saint Joseph wrote his first epistle “Concerning the Mystery of the Most Holy Trinity” while still a monk at the Paphnutiev Borov monastery in the year 1477. From the very beginning the Dormition Volokolamsk monastery became a bulwark of Orthodoxy in the struggle against the heresy. Here Saint Joseph wrote his chief works, The Enlightener, engendered with his fiery anti-heretical epistles, or as the monk himself unassumingly called them, “book exercises.” The works of Saint Joseph and Archbishop Gennadius were crowned with success. In 1494 the heretic Zosimas was deposed from the bishop’s Throne, and in the years 1502-04 the malicious and unrepentant Judaizers, who blasphemed against the Holy Trinity, Christ the Savior, the Most Holy Theotokos and the Church,were condemned at a church council.

Saint Joseph had many other trials and tribulations, but each time the Lord tried him according to the measure of his spiritual strength. The saint angered the Great Prince Ivan III, who only towards the end of his life reconciled with the saint and repented of his former weakness for the Judaizers. The saint also angered the Volotsk appenage prince Theodore, on whose lands Joseph’s monastery was situated. In 1508 the saint suffered wrongful interdiction from Saint Serapion, Archbishop of Novgorod (March 16), with whom, however, he soon reconciled.

In 1503, a Council at Moscow, under the auspices of Saint Joseph and his disciples, adopted a “Conciliar Reply” concerning the indissolubility of church properties, “therefore all church-acquired property is essentially the acquired property of God, pledged, entrusted, and given to God.” The legacy of the canonical works of Igumen Joseph is notably in “The Nomocanon Codex,” a vast codex of canonical rules of the Orthodox Church, begun by Saint Joseph and completed by Metropolitan Macarius.

There are opinions about the differences of outlook and discord between the two great pedagogues of Russian monasticism at the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth centuries: Saint Joseph of Volotsk and Saint Nilus of Sora (May 7). In the historical literature these views usually present them as proclaiming two “contrary” currents within Russian spiritual life: external action and inner contemplation. This is profoundly incorrect. Saint Joseph in his Rule synthesized these two aspects of the Russian monastic tradition, proceeding without interruption from the Athonite blessing given to Saint Anthony of the Kiev Caves, through Saint Sergius, and down to our own day.

The Rule presupposes the need for a full inner regeneration of man, submitting one’s whole life to the task of salvation and deification [Greek theosis] not only for each individual monk, but also for the collective salvation of the whole human race. A great emphasis in the Rule is put on the demand to monastics for constant work in connection with inward and churchly prayer, “the monk should never be on holiday.” Work, as “a collective deed,” comprised for Joseph the very essence of church life: faith, embodied in good works, is the realization of prayer.

On the other hand, Saint Nilus of Sora had lived the ascetic life for a number of years on Mt. Athos, and he brought from there the teaching about the contemplative life and “the Jesus Prayer” as a means of a hesychastic service of monks to the world, as a constant spiritual activity, in connection with the physical work necessary for sustaining one’s life.

But spiritual work and physical work are but two aspects of the same Christian vocation: a vital continuation of the creative activity of God in the world, encompassing as much the ideal as well as the material spheres. In this regard Saints Joseph and Nilus are spiritual brothers, varied in continuing the Church Tradition of the holy Fathers, and are heirs to the precepts of Saint Sergius of Radonezh. Saint Joseph highly regarded the spiritual experience of Saint Nilus and sent his own disciples to him to study inner prayer.

Saint Joseph was also an active proponent of a strong centralized Moscow realm. He was one of the originators of the teaching about the Russian Church as the recipient and bearer of the piety of the Byzantine Empire, “the Russian land has now surpassed all in piety.” The ideas of Saint Joseph, possessing tremendous historical significance, were further developed later by his disciples and followers. From them came the Pskov Spaso-Eleazarov monastery Elder Philotheus with his own teaching about Moscow as the Third Rome. He declared, “Two Romes have fallen, Moscow is the third, and a fourth there shall not be.”

These views of the Josephites on the significance of monasteries possessing properties for church building, and the participation of the Church in social life, were set amidst the conditions of the struggle for centralized power by the Moscow prince. His opponents were separatists who tried to disparage these views for their own political ends, surreptitiously using the teaching of Saint Nilus of Sora about “non-acquisitiveness,” the withdrawal of monastics from worldly matters and possessions.

This supposed opposition engendered a false view on the hostility between the trends of Saints Joseph and Nilus. In actuality, both trends legitimately coexisted within the Russian monastic Tradition, complementing each other. As is evidenced from the Rule of Saint Joseph, its basis was complete non-acquisitiveness, and renunciation of the very concepts of “yours-mine.”

The years passed. The monastery flourished with the construction work and efforts of Saint Joseph, and as he got old, he prepared himself for life eternal. Before his end he received the Holy Mysteries, then summoned all the brethren. He gave them his peace and blessing, and peacefully fell asleep in the Lord on September 9, 1515.

The funeral oration to Saint Joseph was composed by his nephew and disciple, the monk Dositheus Toporkov.

The first Life of the saint was written in the 1540s by a disciple of Saint Joseph, Bishop Savva the Black of Krutitsa, with the blessing of Macarius, Metropolitan of Moscow and all Rus (+ 1564). It entered into the Great Menaion Readings compiled by Macarius. A second redaction of the Life was written by the Russified Bulgarian writer Lev the Philolog with the assistance of Saint Zenobios of Otensk (October 30).

Local celebration of Saint Joseph was established at the Volokolamsk monastery in December of 1578, on the hundred year anniversary of the founding of the monastery. On June 1, 1591, the church-wide celebration of his memory was established under Patriarch Job. Saint Job, a disciple of the Volokolamsk saint, tonsured Saint Germanus of Kazan, and was a great admirer of Saint Joseph and was author of the Service to him, which was included in the MENAION. Another disciple of Saints Germanus and Barsanuphius was also the companion and successor to Patriarch Job, the Hieromartyr Patriarch Hermogenes (February 17), a spiritual leader of the Russian people in the struggle for liberation under the Polish incursion.

The theological works of Saint Joseph comprise an undeniable contribution within the treasury of the Orthodox Tradition. As with all Church writings inspired by the grace of the Holy Spirit, they continue to be a source of spiritual life and knowledge, and they have their own theological significance and pertinence.

Saint Joseph’s chief book was written in sections. Its original form, completed at the time of the 1503-1504 councils, included eleven sections. In the final redaction, compiled after the death of the saint and involving a tremendous quantity of scrolls, The Book against the Heretics or The Enlightener includes sixteen sections, prefaced by An Account of the Newly-Appeared Heresies. The first section expounds the Church teaching about the teaching of the Most Holy Trinity; the second, about Jesus Christ, the True Messiah; the third, about the significance within the Church of the prophecies of the Old Testament; the fourth, about the Incarnation of God; the fifth through seventh, about the veneration of icons. In the eighth through tenth sections, Saint Joseph expounds on the fundamentals of Christian eschatology. The eleventh section is devoted to monasticism. In the twelfth the ineffectiveness of the anathemas and sanctions imposed by heretics is demonstrated. The final four sections consider methods of the Church’s struggle with the heretics, and the means for their correction and repentance.

Saint Joseph is also commemorated on September 9 and February 13.

Saint James lived in the seventh century, and assisted Saint Paulinus of York (October 10) in evangelizing the north of England.

Following the death of Saint Edwin (October 12) in 633, the northern kingdom experienced many trials, including military defeats, famine, and plague. The year 633-634 was so fraught with misfortune that it became known as “The Hateful Year.” Saint Paulinus accompanied Saint Ethelburga (April 5) back to her native Kent after the death of her husband King Edwin, leaving Saint James behind to care for the new converts in northern England.

Saint James has been described as “faithful and undismayed,” even though the secular power which supported the Church had been overthrown. Even so, he would not abandon the people in his care, nor would he cease his missionary labors.

This faithful servant of the Lord established himself near the village of Catterick in Yorkshire, teaching, comforting, and encouraging his flock. Even in such difficult times, Saint James was able to win many converts to Christ. He had a talent for music, and was skilled in the Roman chants composed by Saint Gregory Dialogus (March 12) which were being used in Kent. James taught these chants to the Christians of the north. When peace returned and the churches reopened, their services were beautified with the chants which Saint James had given them.

We do not know exactly when Saint James died, but it is believed that he survived for at least thirty years after “The Hateful Year,” and participated in the Synod of Whitby in 664.

Saint James does not appear to have been ordained to the holy priesthood, but through his tireless labors he built up the Church in the north. Saint Bede (May 27) calls him “a man of great energy and repute in Christ’s Church” (History of the English Church and People, Book II, chapter 16).

Saint Peter was born in Njegushi, Montenegro on April 1, 1747. He was tonsured a monk and ordained to the diaconate when he was only seventeen. He accompanied his uncle Bishop Basil to Russia the following year in order to study there. His uncle died within a year after arriving in Russia, and so Peter was obliged to return to Montenegro.

The young deacon was ordained to the holy priesthood, and was later elevated to the rank of archimandrite. Saint Peter assisted Metropolitan Savva in the administration of the diocese until that hierarch died in 1781. Saint Peter seemed the logical choice to succeed him.

As Metropolitan of Montenegro, Saint Peter also became the secular leader (governor) of the Montenegran Serbs. For the rest of his life he devoted himself to promoting peace and unity among warring tribes and clans, and to helping his flock rise above petty quarrels and animosity at a difficult time in their history.

Saint Peter also defended his nation against the onslaught of enemies. He successfully opposed Napoleon’s army at Dalmatia, and took part in the first Serbian uprising against the Turks.

Although he enjoyed a certain prominence as the archpastor and governor of the Serbs, Saint Peter continued to live as a simple monk in a small cell where he lived in asceticism. He fasted, prayed, and read books in French, Italian and Russian in order to increase his knowledge of Orthodox doctrine and secular culture. While he was strict with himself, the holy bishop was merciful toward others.

Saint Peter contributed to the welfare of his country through his good works. As a bishop he promoted love and peace. As governor he never sentenced a criminal to death.

Saint Peter, the Metropolitan and governor of Cetinje and all Montenegro, fell asleep in the Lord on October 18, 1830. He was succeeded by his nephew Bishop Peter II (Njegos).

Saint Peter’s holy and grace-filled relics were uncovered in 1834. They were found incorrupt and streaming with myrrh, and still rest in the monastery at Cetinje. He is honored as a powerful intercessor for his people, and for the whole Church.

Saint David of Serpukhov, a disciple of Saint Paphnutius of Borov (May 1), lived as a hermit at the River Lopasna, 23 versts from Serpukhov. In 1515, on the right bank of the river, he built a church dedicated to the Ascension, and laid the foundations of the Davidov wilderness monastery.

The Machairotissa (Μαχαιριώτισσα) Icon is a wonderworking icon of the Mother of God in the Holy Machaira Monastery on Cyprus. This Icon is historically and spiritually linked to the Monastery, which owes its name to the history of the Icon.

This Icon is believed to be one of the 70 icons of the Theotokos painted by Saint Luke, and at the time it was located above the Holy Soros (a chest containing the Robe and the Sash of the Theotokos) in the church of the Mother of God at Blachernae (See July 2 and August 31). This is reinforced by the inscription "Hagiosoritissa" on the Icon, which was later changed to "Machairiotissa," from the Greek word for "knife" (μαχαίρι).

According to oral tradition, an ascetic brought the Hagiosoritissa Icon to Cyprus from Constantinople during the Iconoclastic period (716 – 843), and settled in a cave on the site where the monastery stands today. After the ascetic went to the Lord, the Icon was forgotten and the entrance of the cave was sealed until the XII century, when the Theotokos gave a knife to the Holy Ascetics Neophytos and Ignatius (December 13), so that they could cut the bushes away and find the Icon. When Saint Neophytos reposed, another old monk, Father Prokopios, joined Ignatius.

The brotherhood grew too large, and so these two Fathers decided to build a monastery which would be governed according to the cenobitic Rule followed by the great monastic centers of the time. The Holy, Royal and Stavropigial Monastery of Panagia Machairotissa, is located at the eastern end of the Troodos mountain range near the peak of Kionia, at an altitude of 870 meters. It is built on a beautiful mountainside overgrown with pine trees, ending in the Pediaios torrent. It is called a Basilica because it was built with royal assistance, and Stavropegial,¹ because the Patriarch had affixed a cross on the side of the building.

The Synaxis of the Machairotissa Icon is celebrated on October 18th, the Feast of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke who, according to Tradition, painted the Machairiotissa Icon. It is kept in the katholikon of the Machaira Monastery. The Icon is also commemorated on November 21, the Feast of the Entry of the Theotokos into the Temple.

¹omophorion of the primate of a Church rather than under the local diocesan bishop.

The Holy Prophet Hosea the first of the minor prophets, belonged to the tribe of Issachar. He lived during the ninth Century before Christ, in the kingdom of Israel. He was a contemporary of the holy Prophets Isaiah, Micah and Amos. During this time, many of his fellow Israelites had forgotten the true God, and worshipped idols. The holy Prophet Hosea attempted to turn them again to the faith of their Fathers by his wise counsels. Denouncing the iniquities of the people of Israel (i.e. the northern kingdom Israel), the prophet proclaimed to them great misfortunes from a foreign people and their removal into captivity by Assyria.

Almost a thousand years before the coming of the Savior, and through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the prophet foretold the end of sacrificial offerings and of the priesthood of Aaron (Hos. 3:4-5), and that the knowledge of the True God would spread through all the earth (Hos. 2:20-23). Hosea spoke also about Christ, how He would return from out of Egypt (Hos. 11:1; compare Mt. 2:15), that He would be resurrected on the third day (Hos. 6 and especially Hos.6:2; compare with 1 Cor.15:4), and that He would conquer death (Hos.13-14. Compare 1 Cor.15:54-55).

The prophesies of Saint Hosea are included in the book that bears his name. The prophetic service of Saint Hosea continued for more than sixty years. The God-inspired prophet died in deep old age, having devoted all his life to fulfilling the Will of God.

The Hieromartyr Andrew of Crete lived during the reign of the iconoclast emperor Constantine Kopronymos (741-775), who ordered Christians, under penalty of death, to remove the holy icons from their churches and homes. Believers, who fearlessly resisted the impious iconoclast, and held firmly to the traditions of the holy Fathers, were locked in prison. When the venerable Andrew heard that the emperor was throwing virtuous and pious Christians into prison instead of thieves and robbers, he went to the Church of the Great Martyr Mamas (September 2) in Constantinople and in front of everyone, denounced the heretic for persecuting the true Faith.

In an attempt to justify himself the emperor said that it was folly to bestow veneration on wood and paint. To this the monk replied that whoever suffers for holy icons suffers for Christ, but whoever reviles the icon upon which Christ is depicted, offers insult to Christ Himself. The enraged iconoclast gave orders to torture Saint Andrew without mercy.

As he was being dragged through the streets to the place of execution, someone cut off the saint’s feet. As a result, Saint Andrew was freed from his torments by death. A hundred years later a Canon was written to the saint by Saint Joseph the Hymnographer (April 4). The saint heals those afflicted with seizures.

Saint Anthony of Leokhnov, Novgorod, was from the Tver lineage of the Veniaminov nobles. The monk lived as a hermit not far from Novgorod, in the Rublev wilderness at the River Perekhoda. In about the year 1556 he resettled with the wilderness-dweller Tarasius, who lived beyond Lake Ilmen at Leokhnov, near Stara Rus, and received monastic tonsure from him. Thus began the wilderness monastery in honor of the Transfiguration of the Lord, afterwards called the Leokhnov or Ivetsk-Antoniev monastery. Saint Anthony lived to old age, having acquired the gift of clairvoyance.

In the year 1611, when the Swedes had laid waste the area around Novgorod, the monk on the invitation of Metropolitan Isidore moved to Novgorod. He died on September 14, 1611 at age 85 and was buried near the church of the holy Evangelist Luke, on the side towards the church of Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia). Before his death, and in the presence of many of the monks, he said that his body would rest in his wilderness-monastery. A disciple of the monk, named Gregory, returned to the site of the monastery that had been laid waste and burned by the Swedes, built a cell and a chapel, and remained there to live.

Saint Anthony appeared to him three times in a dream and said, “Brother Gregory, go to Novgorod, tell Metropolitan Cyprian and the elders of the city that they should put me in the place of my monastery.” After Gregory’s report, the Metropolitan led a church procession to the grave of Saint Anthony. The incorrupt relics were transferred to the Leokhnov monastery on July 13, 1620. At the uncovering of the relics, a blind man named Joseph gained his sight, and many other miracles occurred.

There is a special order of commemorations, celebrated by the churches in the name of Saint Anthony of Leokhnov, both in the village of Leokhnov and in the Rublev wilderness-monastery. On the second Friday after the Feast of the Foremost Apostles Peter and Paul (June 29), we celebrate the Uncovering and Transfer of the Relics of Saint Anthony from Novgorod to the Leokhnov monastery. On the Ascension of the Lord, the coming of Saint Anthony from the Rublev wilderness to Leokhnovo is remembered. On October 17 the Repose of the saint, who died on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, in the ninth hour of the evening, is commemorated. At the Rublev wilderness monastery the memory of the Consecration of the church in the name of the venerable Anthony on August 30 (1873) is also celebrated.

The Martyrs and Unmercenaries Cosmas and Damian in Cilicia (Arabia), and the Martyrs Leontius, Anthimus and Eutropius. The holy brothers Cosmas and Damian were physicians in Arabia, who believed in Christ. They traveled through the cities and the villages, preaching Christ and healing the sick. The saints would not take any sort of payment for the help they rendered. In Cilicia, pagans seized the holy physicians and led them before the governor, Lysias. Since they refused to renounce Christianity, the governor ordered the saints to be brutally beaten, and then cast into the sea.

An angel of God rescued them from the sea and brought them to shore. Then the pagans beheaded the saints and three other Christians: Leontius, Anthimus, and Eutropius.

The Unmercenary Saints Cosmas and Damian of Arabia should not be confused with the Unmercenary Saints Cosmas and Damian of Asia Minor (November 1), or the Unmercenary Saints Cosmas and Damian of Rome (July 1).

The Transfer of the relics of Righteous Lazarus of the Four Days, Bishop of Kiteia on Cyprus, took place in the ninth century. The Righteous Saint Lazarus, the brother of Martha and Mary, lived in the village of Bethany, not far from Jerusalem. During His earthly life the Lord Jesus Christ often visited the house of Lazarus, whom He much loved and called His friend (John 11:3,11), and when Lazarus had died and lain four days already in the grave, the Lord raised him from the dead (John 11:1-44). (The Church remembers Saint Lazarus on the Saturday of the Sixth Week of Great Lent, “Lazarus Saturday.”)

Many of the Jews, when they heard about this, came to Bethany. Being persuaded of the reality of this most remarkable wonder, they became followers of Christ. Because of this the High Priests also wanted to kill Lazarus. Righteous Lazarus is mentioned in the Holy Gospel once more: when the Lord had come again to Bethany six days before the Passover, Lazarus was also there (John 12:1-2, 12:9-11). After his raising, Saint Lazarus lived another thirty years as a bishop on the island of Cyprus, where he spread Christianity and peacefully fell asleep in the Lord.

The holy relics of Saint Lazarus were discovered in Kiteia. They were within a marble coffin, upon which was inscribed: “Lazarus of the Four-Days, the friend of Christ.” The Byzantine emperor Leo the Wise (886-911) gave orders to transfer the relics of Saint Lazarus to Constantinople in the year 898 and place them within the church of the Righteous Lazarus.

The Icon of the Mother of God “In Giving Birth, You Preserved Your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before Birth and After Birth”) was transferred to the Nikolaev Peshkov monastery of Moscow diocese by the Moscow merchant Alexis Grigorievich Mokeev. Around the year 1780 Alexis joined the brethren of the monastery. He had given all of his wealth to the igumen of the monastery, Archimandrite Macarius, and the holy icon remained in his cell.

After Alexis’s death, the icon was brought to the archimandrite, who observed that the icon was painted in oil on canvas and not according to the prescribed rules of iconography (using egg tempera on wood), and he installed it over the exit door of the chapel of Saint Methodius, which was on a street not far from the monastery.

The glorification of the holy icon began in 1827, when Captain Platon Osipovich Shabashev, going past the chapel at night, saw an extraordinary light coming from the icon of the Most Holy Theotokos. Another time he had a vision of the icon at a time when he found himself in difficult circumstances. In a dream, Platon beheld the radiant icon of the Mother of God in the clouds above the chapel of Saint Methodius and heard a voice say, “If you wish to be delivered from temptation, pray before this icon.” Platon obeyed the guidance of the Mother of God, and the sorrow passed him by.

The pious Platon told the Superior of the monastery about the miracles. He then transfered the holy image into the monastery. When they went to put the icon in a ornamental case, the image of the Most Holy Virgin, painted on canvas, stiffened taut upon a board, on which was concealed a depiction of the Mother of God of finest quality. Numerous miracles are recorded to have taken place from this icon in 1848 during an outbreak of cholera, when many praying before it were healed.

This icon of the Mother of God is of the Hodēgḗtria type.

At the beginning of the XIX century the remarkable ascetic Constantine Theodoulos was a monk on Mount Athos. This Elder had a wonderworking Icon of the Theotokos, which had been painted about 150 years before. After this ascetic's repose, the Icon was passed on to Constantine's disciple, Schema-monk Martinian, who arrived on Mount Athos from Greece in 1821.

Early in 1841 Father Martinian left the Holy Mountain and went to the town of Mavrovonē in the diocese of Sparta, where many miracles were about to take place.

The residents of that place were afflicted by a terrible disaster: their fields, forests and almost all the vegetation was devastated by locusts. Moving forward in a solid mass, they destroyed everything in their path. Their flight took them right to the city of Marathon. The local authorities drove the residents out of their homes into the fields, forcing them to collect the destructive insects, dump them into pits, and then burn them, but all these measures were ineffective. It seemed that the more locusts they killed, the more their numbers increased.

People lost all hope for human assistance, so they chanted a Moleben, but the disaster did not end. Terrified, the villagers turned to Father Alexis, a man of God, who lived in a monastery near that unfortunate district. Taking some holy relics, this God-pleaser advised them to have a Moleben with a Cross Procession to their fields. The locusts, as if irritated by such actions, focused their attention on the worshippers. Countless insects attacked people, especially in their eyes. Both the residents and priests fled to their homes in horror.

Elder Martinian also learned about this disaster. After serving a Moleben, he spoke to the villagers: "Is our faith so weak that we cannot ask the Lord to help us? Let us intensify our prayers; at least let us gather the old men, and we will resort to the powerful intercession of the Queen of Heaven and Earth. Let us take her holy Icon and pray together, trusting in the Lord. He will not reject our humble prayer to Him, and, through the intercessions of His Mother, He will save this district from a great calamity."

The inhabitants followed the pious Elder's suggestion, with confidence in the merciful intercession of the Mother of God, they gathered not only old men, but also husbands, wives and even children. There were also four priests. The Cross Procession followed the Elder, who carried the holy Icon, and went into the field. There Father Martinian placed the Icon on the ground, and all the villagers bowed before it in supplication. The Sovereign Lady did not reject the prayers of the faithful servants of her Son and our God. She drove the locusts away. Suddenly, a great flock of birds appeared, rushing swiftly at the insects. The locusts rose from the fields and flew in such a thick mass that they obscured the sunlight.

Later, in the village of Mavrovonē there was a boy who was very sick, and his illness was getting worse. His parents asked the priest to bring him Communion. For some reason, however, the visiting priest did not hurry, and he did not arrive for a long time. He took the Holy Gifts and went to the boy's house. He had invited Elder Martinian to come with him. When they arrived at the house, they were shocked by the news that boy was already dead. The priest was filled with deep remorse, since his procrastination had deprived the child of his final spiritual consolation. The only hope left to them was to trust in God's mercy.

The priest asked Father Martinian to bring his Icon so they could pray to the Queen of Heaven for the boy. The Elder, seeing the deep faith of the priest and the devastated parents, took out the holy Icon which he always kept with him and placed it over the child's bed. Confident that nothing is impossible for the Sovereign Lady, the Elder, the priest, and parents bowed before the Icon, begging her to restore the child to life. After praying for a time, the Elder touched the dying boy three times with the Icon, and suddenly the child opened his eyes. At Father Martinian's request, the boy was given Holy Communion, and then got up perfectly well. The next day he went to school, where he had been sent shortly before this for his primary education. Later, the boy who returned to life was tonsured in a foreign country with the name Alexis, and for a long time he lived an ascetical life on Mount Athos.

News of this glorious miracle spread far through the neighborhood. Many people who suffered from physical and spiritual infirmities flocked to the Icon of the Mother of God with faith. The Elder's tiny home was always crowded with people and he decided to hide from them, but they found him again.

Father Martinian would not have minded visiting the sick with the Icon if their reverence for the Mother of God had not been mixed with a desire to glorify the Elder as well. He thought he should retire to a place where no one would find him. Therefore, he went by the sea shore and soon, above the ocean, he found a sheer rock with a cave, which was quite suitable for his ascetical struggles. Father Martinian thought he was completely secluded there. However, the good will of the Most Pure Virgin had arranged things otherwise.

One night the ascetic was praying in the cave. Suddenly, he heard a voice ordering him not to hide the Icon, but to minister to the needs of others. He tried to protest his unworthiness, and his infirmity, but the voice told him even more insistently to be obedient, saying that all this was for the glory of the Mother of God. When the Elder had finished his prayer, he decided to rest for a short time. Suddenly, at that moment, the cave was illumined with an extraordinary light. Surprised, the Elder came out onto the rock, desiring to know the source of such extraordinary radiance. The ascetic beheld a wondrous sight. He saw a pillar of light stretching from the sky to the ground, and in doing so, he heard again the same voice commanding him to leave his solitude and to go serve his neighbors. Thus, the ascetic opened his door to the residents of that vicinity.

There was a possessed woman named Elena, who used to shout all the time that she knew where the Elder was hiding. At the same time, she declared that only his Icon could heal her. The demon who possessed the woman was very fierce. He exposed the secret sins of all those who came to see Elena. One devout priest decided to read the prayers of exorcism over her no matter what happened. For that reason he went to Elena's house. Immediately, the woman attacked the priest and began to vilify the one who served at the altar, saying: "Aha! So you want to expel me? Are you thinking of casting me out? No, you cannot expel me, you will never drive me out. Look to yourself!"

Despite all the demon's words the priest continued to read the prayers, and asked the demon possessing the woman to reveal who could banish him. Against his will, the impure spirit spoke of a solitary Elder with an Icon, calling the ascetic a ragamuffin, an evil monk, and so on. Then the priest asked the demon where he might find this Elder. Then the demon, forced by the priest's prayers and by the power of God, revealed where Father Martinian was hiding.

The morning after the vision the Elder heard the sound of a large crowd of people gathered before the rock and begging him to come down to them to help the suffering. Seeing God's will in all this, the Elder obeyed and went to the homes of the villagers. First of all, he went to see Elena. As he approached her dwelling, she fell down unconscious and began to scream. When the Elder entered the house, he put down the Icon of the Mother of God and bowed before the Icon. At once, the demon came out of the woman with great moaning. She returned to her senses and fervently thanked the Theotokos. After this she felt quite well. Many other demoniacs were also healed by praying before her Icon.

Because of all the miracles taking place before the Icon, people were always in Father Martinian's home. The Elder finally decided to return to his monastery. When the people learned of his departure, they followed him for some distance. With a great cry they parted from the Elder as he walked away from them, carrying the Icon of the Mother of God, who had poured forth so much grace on their district.

In 1884, soon after he arrived on the Holy Mountain and entered the monastery of the Great Martyr Panteleimon, Father Martinian went to the Lord. Then the holy Icon of the Mother of God became the monastery's precious heritage. The revered Icon remained there until July 20, 1889, when Archimandrite Makarios, the Superior of Saint Panteleimon's Monastery, gave the Deliverer Icon as a blessing to the newly-built New Athos Monastery of Saint Simon the Canaanite in the Caucasus The Icon has been there from 1889 until the present day.

The first celebration of the transfer of the Icon to New Athos Monastery took place on October 17, 1889. That is why the Feast Day in honor of this Icon was established on this day. About that time a storm cast more than a ton of fish ashore at the monastery.

In this Icon the Most Holy Theotokos holds the Divine Child on her right arm, and He blesses with His right hand.

The Deliverer Icon of the Mother of God is commemorated on October 17, and on April 4.

Saint Joseph (Jandierishvili) received his spiritual education at David-Gareji Monastery. He was endowed by the Lord with the gift of wonderworking. His prayers healed the terminally ill and demon-possessed. For his wisdom and virtue, he was consecrated bishop of Rustavi, and in 1755 enthroned as Catholicos-Patriarch. Saint Joseph remained a monk-ascetic in spite of his hierarchical rank.

In 1764 Holy Catholicos Joseph, like Saint Gregory the Theologian, humbly stepped down from the archpastor’s throne and withdrew to Akhmeta in northeastern Georgia. With his own hands he cultivated a vineyard and distributed his harvest to the poor. The climate in that region was capricious—droughts were frequent, and hail would devastate the fragile crops, laying waste to the farmers’ labors. But while Saint Joseph was laboring there, the region suffered neither drought nor hail.

Through Saint Joseph’s prayers, the sick were healed and the blind received sight. Those who dwelt near him loved him deeply and put their hope in him. Saint Gabriel the Lesser remarked joyfully in one of his writings: “Once I saw and two times I kissed the hand of this holy man.”

Having lived in godliness to a ripe old age, Catholicos Joseph reposed peacefully in the year 1770.

The Life of Saint Kozman has not been preserved. In the commemorations for this day it is mentioned only that he died a martyr’s death in the region of Kartli.

Here it is fitting to note that, due to its geopolitical circumstances, Georgia has throughout history been a constant victim of foreign aggression. To give one’s life for his motherland and Faith became so customary for the Georgian people that the Georgian Church is unable to commemorate all of its martyrs by name. Unfortunately, errors of faith and time have erased from the pages of history the lives and virtues of many of the elect. Today, the Church calendar and the prayers with which the faithful honor the martyrs remain the sole means for the Church to acknowledge the lives of these holy men and women.

Saint Shushanik (Susanna) was the wife of the Georgian prince Varsken, the ruler of Hereti (a province of southeastern Georgia). Hereti was under Persian control at that time; Varsken was essentially the viceroy for the Persians. Having been raised in a pious Christian family, she was deeply penetrated with love and the fear of God.

At that time Kartli was under heavy political pressure from Persia, and Prince Varsken visited the Persian king Peroz in hopes of encouraging more friendly relations between the two countries. He willingly denied the true Faith, converted to the worship of fire, and promised the king to convert his wife and children upon his return to Hereti.

Having approached the border of Hereti, Varsken sent messengers to Tsurtavi, the city in which he ruled, to ensure that his subjects met him with due respect. The blessed Shushanik, having learned of her husband’s betrayal, fell to the ground and wept over him with bitter tears. Then she took her four children, deserted the palace, and sought refuge in a nearby church.

That evening Shushanik was visited by her spiritual father, the elder Jacob, who predicted, “Varsken’s cruelty and mercilessness are unmistakable. Know that terrible trials await you. Will you be firm and unbending in your position?”

“I would rather die than unite with him and destroy my soul!” she answered.

Three days later the prince arrived in Tsurtavi. As promised, he tried to persuade his wife to convert, but Saint Shushanik firmly answered, “As you have renounced your Creator, so I am renouncing you. I will no longer take part in your affairs, no matter what suffering I must endure!”

The next time, Varsken sent his younger brother Jojik and Bishop Apots to convince Shushanik to return to the palace. Shushanik refused for some time, but in the end she yielded to their persuasion. She set off for the palace with the Holy Gospel and the Lives of the holy martyrs, and when she arrived she locked herself in a squalid cell. Two days later Varsken returned to the palace and invited Shushanik, his brother Jojik, and his sister-in-law for supper. The queen, however, could not bring herself to share a meal with one who had betrayed Christ: she pushed away the cup that Jojik’s wife had offered her, thus further angering her husband.

The furious Varsken beat his wife mercilessly, fettered her in irons, locked her in prison, and forbade the guards to let anyone in to see her.

Saint Shushanik spent six years in captivity. While she was serving her sentence, she helped the poor that came to her. Through her prayers the sick were healed and children were born to the childless. Before her death, Holy Martyr Shushanik blessed those around her and requested that she be buried at the place from which her unbelieving husband had dragged her out of the palace.

This happened in the year 475. The clergy and people alike wept bitterly over Shushanik’s tragic fate. Her holy relics were buried in accordance with her will.

In 578, with the blessing of Catholicos Kirion I, Saint Shushanik’s holy relics were translated to Tbilisi, where they remain today, in the Metekhi Church of the Most Holy Theotokos.

Saint Susanna of Georgia is also commemorated on August 28.

The Holy Martyr Longinus the Centurion, a Roman soldier, served in Judea under the command of the Governor, Pontius Pilate. When our Savior Jesus Christ was crucified, it was the detachment of soldiers under the command of Longinus which stood watch on Golgotha, at the very foot of the holy Cross. Longinus and his soldiers were eyewitnesses of the final moments of the earthly life of the Lord, and of the great and awesome portents that appeared at His death. These events shook the centurion’s soul. Longinus believed in Christ and confessed before everyone, “Truly this was the Son of God” (Mt. 27:54).

According to Church Tradition, Longinus was the soldier who pierced the side of the Crucified Savior with a spear, and received healing from an eye affliction when blood and water poured forth from the wound.

After the Crucifixion and Burial of the Savior, Longinus stood watch with his company at the Sepulchre of the Lord. These soldiers were present at the All-Radiant Resurrection of Christ. The Jews bribed them to lie and say that His disciples had stolen away the Body of Christ, but Longinus and two of his comrades refused to be seduced by the Jewish gold. They also refused to remain silent about the miracle of the Resurrection.

Having come to believe in the Savior, the soldiers received Baptism from the apostles and decided to leave military service. Saint Longinus left Judea to preach about Jesus Christ the Son of God in his native land (Cappadocia), and his two comrades followed him.

The fiery words of those who had actually participated in the great events in Judea swayed the hearts and minds of the Cappadocians; Christianity began quickly to spread throughout the city and the surrounding villages. When they learned of this, the Jewish elders persuaded Pilate to send a company of soldiers to Cappadocia to kill Longinus and his comrades. When the soldiers arrived at Longinus’s village, the former centurion himself came out to meet the soldiers and took them to his home. After a meal, the soldiers revealed the purpose of their visit, not knowing that the master of the house was the very man whom they were seeking. Then Longinus and his friends identified themselves and told the startled soldiers to carry out their duty.

The soldiers wanted to let the saints go and advised them to flee, but they refused to do this, showing their firm intention to suffer for Christ. The holy martyrs were beheaded, and their bodies were buried at the place where the saints were martyred. The head of Saint Longinus, however, was sent to Pilate.

Pilate gave orders to cast the martyr’s head on a trash-heap outside the city walls. After a while a certain blind widow from Cappadocia arrived in Jerusalem with her son to pray at the holy places, and to ask that her sight be restored. After becoming blind, she had sought the help of physicians to cure her, but all their efforts were in vain.

The woman’s son became ill shortly after reaching Jerusalem, and he died a few days later. The widow grieved for the loss of her son, who had served as her guide.

Saint Longinus appeared to her in a dream and comforted her. He told her that she would see her son in heavenly glory, and also receive her sight. He told her to go outside the city walls and there she would find his head in a great pile of refuse. Guides led the blind woman to the rubbish heap, and she began to dig with her hands. As soon as she touched the martyr’s head, the woman received her sight, and she glorified God and Saint Longinus.

Taking up the head, she brought it to the place she was staying and washed it. The next night, Saint Longinus appeared to her again, this time with her son. They were surrounded by a bright light, and Saint Longinus said, “Woman, behold the son for whom you grieve. See what glory and honor are his now, and be consoled. God has numbered him with those in His heavenly Kingdom. Now take my head and your son’s body, and bury them in the same casket. Do not weep for your son, for he will rejoice forever in great glory and happiness.”

The woman carried out the saint’s instructions and returned to her home in Cappadocia. There she buried her son and the head of Saint Longinus. Once, she had been overcome by grief for her son, but her weeping was transformed into joy when she saw him with Saint Longinus. She had sought healing for her eyes, and also received healing of her soul.

Saint Longinus, the Gate-Keeper of the Kiev Caves, Far Caves, made his monastic obedience at the Kiev Caves monastery. His prayerful fervor and humble love for work were rewarded by the Lord. The venerable gatesman was granted the gift of discernment. He encouraged the people who came to the Lavra with good intent, but he denounced those inclined to wickedness and urged them to repentance. He was buried in the Far Caves.

St Longinus is also commemorated on August 28 and on the second Sunday of Great Lent.

Saint Longinus, the wonderworker of Yarenga, is also commemorated on July 3.

No information available at this time.

Saint Eupraxia, Princess of Pskov (Euphrosynē in the world), was the daughter of Prince Rogvol'd Borisovich of Polotsk, and the aunt of the holy Prince Dovmont-Timothy (May 20). She was also the wife of Prince Yaroslav Vladimirovich of Pskov. Prince Yaroslav fled from Pskov to Livonia, and there he married a German woman. Together with the Teutonic knights he made several incursions into the Russian lands, and in 1231 he captured Izborsk. After her husband's departure, Euphrosynē devoted herself to works of piety. In the year 1243, she built a monastery on the banks of the Velika River and dedicated it to Saint John the Forerunner. It is believed that she became its Superior.

Invited to Livonia to meet with her former husband in the city of Odenpa (Bear’s Head), Saint Eupraxίa was murdered (May 8, 1243) by a stepson, more accurately, Yaroslav's son by his German wife. She was buried in the church of the monastery that she founded.

Ten days after Saint Eupraxia's martyrdom, a miracle occurred over her grave, when myrrh issued from an icon of the Savior. The icon was called “The myrrh-streaming Savior."¹ Saint Eupraxίa appears on two icons. In one, she is depicted at prayer with Saint John the Forerunner and the Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called. The other icon is beside the wonderworking icon of the Savior.

Saint Eupraxίa is commemorated on October 16, the day of martyrdom, and on the Third Sunday after Pentecost (Synaxis of the Pskov Saints).

¹ "Спаситель Мироточивый."

The holy fool Saint Domna (Karpovna) was born into a noble family in the central Ukraine around the beginning of the nineteenth century. Orphaned at an early age, Saint Domna grew up in her aunt’s house. She received an excellent education, and was able to speak several languages. She was a beautiful girl, and therefore she had many suitors who hoped to marry her. The righteous one, however, desired to preserve her virginity for the Lord’s sake. When she discovered that her relatives wished to force her to be married, she left the house in secret, dressed in plain clothing, and she went on pilgrimage to the holy places. Since she had no documents to prove her identity, she was arrested and exiled to Siberia, where she settled in the city of Tomsk. There she undertook the exploit of foolishness for the sake of Christ.

Saint Domna had no permanent home, and she often spent her days and nights in the open air. Her clothes consisted of various items in different sizes, which hung from her almost naked body. Bags of all sorts hung from her body, filled with bits of glass, incense, bread, sugar, shoes, ropes, stones, and other things. Saint Domna often counted them instead of the knots on a prayer rope, thereby concealing her unceasing prayer from human sight. When compassionate people gave her coats during the severe winters, she accepted them with gratitude, but a few hours later she would give them to some other beggar, while she continued to suffer from the cold. Knowing about the difficult stay of the prisoners in the Tomsk police station, Domna began to walk among them and sing spiritual songs, for which she herself was detained. Upon learning of this, the Tomsk merchants, who revered Domna, carried her loads of cakes, bliny, tea and sugar, which she meted out to the distressed prisoners.

Remembering the words of Holy Scripture: “A righteous man pities the lives of his animals” (Proverbs 12:10, Septuagint), the saint also took care of stray animals and watchdogs. She often fed them, and she was fond of the dogs, about whom the owners did not care, turning them loose at will. Animals also loved the righteous one and by night a multitude of them surrounded her. But even among dumb animals Domna Karpovna did not forget about God. The residents of Tomsk, amid the howling of dogs, often heard her prayer in the darkness: “Most Holy Theotokos, save us!”

The blessed one prayed intensely and fervently in the temple, but only when there were just a few people present. One eyewitness described her prayer: “Once I glanced into the side chapel of the church, and there I saw Domna Karpovna, kneeling, and praying. Oh, how she prayed! And the tears, the tears! They flowed from her eyes in two streams.” But as soon as she noticed someone was looking at her, she began to behave like a fool again, moving from place to place, talking, and extinguishing candles.

Through her exploit of foolishness Saint Domna preserved her virginity, voluntarily enduring poverty, suffering from the heat and cold, and putting the sinful passions to death. At the end of her life she received the gift of clairvoyance from the Lord, which served for the spiritual benefit of others. She surrendered her soul to God on October 16, 1872, and she was buried in the convent of Saint John the Baptist in Tomsk.

The Church of Russia glorified Saint Domna in 1984. She is also commemorated on June 10, the Synaxis of All Saints of Siberia. Some sources give December 16 as the day of her repose. Today, not far from Saint Domna’s burial place, a chapel was built and dedicated to her.