Ven. Paul of Thebes and John Calabytes

Thursday of the 32nd week after Pentecost

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No Fast Tone 6

Saints commemorated

Saint of the day Antiochian commemoration

Ven. Paul of Thebes and John Calabytes

Paul of Thebes (c. 227 – c. 341), called the First Hermit, is honoured by the Church as the father and archetype of Christian solitude. A wealthy and educated young Egyptian of the Thebaid, orphaned early and threatened with betrayal by a covetous brother-in-law during the persecution of the emperor Decius, he fled into the desert about the age of twenty-three and found a hidden cave beside a spring and a single palm tree. There he remained for some ninety years, clothed in woven palm-leaves and fed — the tradition holds — by a raven that brought him half a loaf of bread each day, unknown to the world and known only to God. Near the end of his life he was sought out and found by Anthony the Great, to whom God revealed that a monk more perfect than himself dwelt deeper in the wilderness; the two aged fathers conversed, and Anthony was present at Paul's death and buried him — the grave, the account says, dug by two lions that came from the desert. Paul reposed about the year 341, aged some one hundred and thirteen. He is kept on January 15.
Saint Ita of Kileedy, Ireland (570)
John Kalyvites

John Kalyvites — "the Hut-dweller" (c. 450) — was the only son of a wealthy senatorial family of Constantinople who, seized in boyhood by the longing for God, secretly left his parents' house to become a monk in the "Sleepless" (Akoimetoi) monastery. After years of ascetic struggle he returned, unrecognised, to his own family's gate, and lived there as a nameless beggar in a little hut, enduring the contempt of his parents' servants and the daily sight of the home and the mother he had renounced, keeping always with him a precious Gospel-book his parents had once given him. Only on his deathbed did he make himself known, sending word by that book, so that his mother and father knew at last that the beggar at their door was their lost son. He reposed about the year 450, still a young man, and a church was raised over the hut. He is kept on January 15, together with Paul of Thebes.
Pansophius of Alexandria

Pansophius (early 3rd century – c. 250) was a martyr of Alexandria, the son of a Roman proconsul, who was well educated in his youth and, coming to the faith of Christ, distributed his large inheritance to the poor and withdrew to live as an ascetic, spending some twenty-seven years in prayer, fasting, and the study of the Scriptures. During the persecution of the emperor Decius he was arrested and brought before the magistrate; confessing Christ and refusing to sacrifice to the idols, he was scourged so cruelly that he gave up his soul under the lash, receiving the crown of martyrdom about the year 250. He is commemorated on January 15.

British Isles and Ireland

St. Ita of Killeedy, nun (570)
St. Teath of Wales, daughter of King Brychan (6th C)
St. Lleudadd, abbot of Bardsey (6th C)
St. Sawl, father of St. Asaph (6th C)
St. Ceolwulf, King of Northumbria, monk (764)
Hieromartyr Blaithmaic, abbot of Iona (823)

Troparia & kontakia

Kontakion — Tone 2

Longing, O wise one, for a poverty in imitation of Christ, thou didst forsake the wealth of thy parents; and holding the Gospel in thy hands, thou didst follow after Christ our God, O John, interceding without ceasing for us all.

Kontakion — Tone 2

Sticheron

Having renounced the world and the things that are in the world, O righteous one, and having taken up the Gospel, thou didst follow after it in the manner of the Gospel; and dwelling in thy hut as mystically in Paradise, by the utmost hardness of thy flesh thou didst slay the man-slaying dragon. Therefore, making thy dwelling in the heavens, O blessed John, ask for us the great mercy.

Sticheron — Tone 2

A stranger's way of life upon the earth didst thou pursue, O Paul, and thou didst dwell together with the wild beasts, ministered to by a bird, O righteous one, at the biddings of God; and when the great Anthony beheld this, when he had found thee, he was filled with wonder at all these things, and ceaselessly magnified as God the Provider and Master of all.

Sticheron

Sticheron — Tone 2

Troparion — Tone 4

From infancy thou didst fervently long for the Lord, and thou didst forsake the world and the delights that are in the world, and thou didst struggle excellently; thou didst set up thy hut before the gates of thy parents, and thou didst shatter the snares of the demons, O all-blessed one. Wherefore, O John, Christ hath worthily glorified thee.

Troparion — Tone 4

Thy martyr, O Lord, in his contest received the crown of incorruption from thee our God; for possessed of thy strength, he set at nought the tyrants and shattered the feeble insolence of the demons. By his intercessions, O Christ God, save our souls.

Troparion — Tone 8

With the streams of thy tears thou didst cultivate the barrenness of the desert, and with sighs from the depths thou didst bear fruit a hundredfold in labours; and thou becamest a beacon to the whole world, shining forth with miracles, O Paul our righteous father. Intercede with Christ our God, that our souls may be saved.

Troparion — Tone 4

Troparion — Tone 8

Readings

Epistle

James 4.7-5.9

⁷Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded. ⁹Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. ¹⁰Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up. ¹¹Speak not evil one of another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge. ¹²There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another? ¹³Go to now, ye that say, To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain: ¹⁴Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. ¹⁵For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that. ¹⁶But now ye rejoice in your boastings: all such rejoicing is evil. ¹⁷Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin. ¹Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. ²Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. ³Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days. ⁴Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth. ⁵Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter. ⁶Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you. ⁷Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. ⁸Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. ⁹Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the judge standeth before the door.

Gospel

Mark 10.17-27

¹⁷And when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running, and kneeled to him, and asked him, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? ¹⁸And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God. ¹⁹Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Defraud not, Honour thy father and mother. ²⁰And he answered and said unto him, Master, all these have I observed from my youth. ²¹Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me. ²²And he was sad at that saying, and went away grieved: for he had great possessions. ²³And Jesus looked round about, and saith unto his disciples, How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God! ²⁴And the disciples were astonished at his words. But Jesus answereth again, and saith unto them, Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches to enter into the kingdom of God! ²⁵It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. ²⁶And they were astonished out of measure, saying among themselves, Who then can be saved? ²⁷And Jesus looking upon them saith, With men it is impossible, but not with God: for with God all things are possible.

Saints commemorated