Martyrs Acepsimus, Joseph, Aithalas

Saints commemorated

Saint of the day

Martyrs Acepsimus, Joseph, Aithalas

Akepsimas, Joseph and Aithalas were leaders of the Church in Persia — a bishop, a priest, and a deacon — martyred under the Sassanid king Shapur II around the year 378, near the end of the forty-year persecution he waged against the Christians of his realm. Akepsimas, bishop of the city of Naeson, was arrested an old man of eighty and held three years in prison with the seventy-year-old priest Joseph and the deacon Aithalas; when all three refused to worship the sun and fire, the bishop was beheaded and the priest and deacon stoned to death. They are commemorated together on November 3.
Holy Virgin Martyr Winefride of Treffynnon (Holywell), Wales (7th c.)
George the Great Martyr

George the Trophy-bearer (†303) is the most universally venerated of the martyrs of the East, honoured from Ethiopia to England as Μεγαλομάρτυς and Τροπαιοφόρος — "great-martyr" and "trophy-bearer," the soldier who carried off the prize. Born in Cappadocia of a martyred father and a Palestinian mother from Lydda, he rose young to the rank of comes in the guard of Diocletian, and when the persecuting edict was published at Nicomedia in 303 he gave away his goods, freed his slaves, and denounced the emperor's decree to his face before the council. There followed the long cycle of tortures for which his passion is famous — the spiked wheel, the pit of quicklime, the red-hot iron shoes, the poison of the magician Athanasius — through which the martyr was preserved, so that the sorcerer himself, and the Empress Alexandra, and many of the court confessed Christ. He was beheaded on 23 April 303 and buried at Lydda (Diospolis) in Palestine, where his shrine became one of the great pilgrimage places of Christendom. To him the later tradition attached the celebrated miracle of the dragon, and he is the patron of Georgia, England, Greece, Ethiopia, Portugal and Catalonia, of the city of Beirut and of Christian soldiers everywhere.

British Isles and Ireland

St. Winifred of Treffynon (Holywell) (7th C)
St. Elerius, abbot (6th C)
St. Clodock, hermit (6th C)
St. Wulgan of Canterbury, confessor (8th C)
St. Romwold of Northumbria, confessor (7th C)
St. Cristiolus (7th C) brother of St. Sulian and founder of churches
St. Englatius of Tarves, Aberdeenshire (966)
St. Vulganius hermit in Arras (c.704)

Troparia & kontakia

Apolytikion — Tone 4

As the deliverer of captives and defender of the poor, physician of the sick and champion of kings, O Trophy-bearer and Great-martyr George, intercede with Christ God that our souls may be saved.

Kontakion — Tone 2

Wisely and blamelessly didst thou minister the divine Mysteries, and thou wast shown to be a sacrifice acceptable to God, O God-blessed one; for gloriously thou didst drink the cup of Christ, O holy Akepsimas, together with thy fellow-sufferers, praying without ceasing for us all.

Kontakion — Tone 4

Tilled by God, thou wast shown forth as the most honoured husbandman of true religion, gathering for thyself the sheaves of the virtues; for having sown in tears, thou reapest with rejoicing, and having contended even unto blood, thou hast won Christ. By thine intercessions, O holy one, thou grantest to all forgiveness of their offences.

Troparion

As the deliverer of captives and defender of the poor, physician of the sick and champion of kings, O victorious Great-Martyr George, intercede with Christ our God that our souls may be saved.

Troparion — Tone 4 (from the common of martyrs)

Thy martyrs, O Lord, in their contest received incorruptible crowns from Thee, our God; for possessing Thy strength they cast down the tyrants and shattered the feeble insolence of the demons. By their intercessions save our souls.

Readings

Epistle

Colossians 2.13-20

¹³And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; ¹⁴Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; ¹⁵And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it. ¹⁶Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: ¹⁷Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ. ¹⁸Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, ¹⁹And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God. ²⁰Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances,

Gospel

Luke 11.29-33

²⁹And when the people were gathered thick together, he began to say, This is an evil generation: they seek a sign; and there shall no sign be given it, but the sign of Jonas the prophet. ³⁰For as Jonas was a sign unto the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of man be to this generation. ³¹The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with the men of this generation, and condemn them: for she came from the utmost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here. ³²The men of Nineve shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here. ³³No man, when he hath lighted a candle, putteth it in a secret place, neither under a bushel, but on a candlestick, that they which come in may see the light.

Saints commemorated