Fathers of the 1st Six Ecumenical Councils; Unc. Rel. Ven. Seraphim of Sarov
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Saints commemorated
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St Macrina, sister of St Basil the Great and St Gregory of Nyssa (380)
Macrina (c. 327 – 19 July 379) was the eldest child of a Cappadocian household that gave the Church more saints than any other, and the hidden centre of it. Widowed of a betrothed husband before she was married, she refused a second engagement, kept her father's house, and then turned the family estate at Annisa on the river Iris in Pontus into an ascetic community in which mistress and maidservant lived as sisters. She formed her youngest brother Peter of Sebaste, steadied the house at the death of Naucratius, and — on her brother Gregory of Nyssa's testimony — turned Basil the Great from the vanity of rhetoric to the philosophic life. Gregory wrote her Life, and set down her deathbed conversation as the dialogue On the Soul and the Resurrection, in which she, not he, is "the Teacher." She is honoured as the model of the consecrated virgin and, with justice, as the fourth of the Cappadocians.
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Dios of Antioch
Dios (Δῖος, "of Zeus" by the accident of a pagan name) was an Antiochene ascetic of the later fourth century who carried the discipline of the Syrian fathers into the capital. Sent to Constantinople by a vision, he settled in a waste place outside the walls that the city shunned as demon-haunted, and made it a monastery: the Monastery of Dios, one of the earliest and longest-lived houses of the imperial city. The emperor Theodosius built it at his own charge and the patriarch Atticus ordained him priest and set him over it. He was famous for an abstinence that took food only at intervals of days, for a dry staff that struck root and grew into a great oak, for a spring opened by his prayer, and for raising a drowned man; and, having once been laid out for burial and revived, he lived fifteen years more and reposed in extreme old age about the year 430.
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Justa and Rufina of Seville
Justa and Rufina were two Christian sisters of Hispalis — Seville — in Roman Baetica, poor women who made and sold earthenware in the market, and who were put to death about the year 287. Their passion turns on an act of ordinary trading: asked to supply vessels for the procession of a pagan goddess, they refused, and when the devotees smashed their stock in reprisal the sisters threw down the idol. Justa died under torture in prison and her body was recovered from a well; Rufina, whom a lion in the amphitheatre would not touch, was strangled and her body burned. They are the patronesses of Seville and of potters, and are kept in East and West alike on July 19.
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Milica of Serbia
Milica (c. 1335 – 11 November 1405) was the wife of the great-martyr Lazar of Serbia, the mother of the despot Stefan Lazarević, and — for the sixteen years between the catastrophe of Kosovo and her death — the woman who governed what was left of the Serbian state and then, as a nun, prayed for it. Of the Nemanjić blood through her father Vratko, she held the regency after 1389, made the terrible peace with the sultan that preserved her people at the cost of her daughter, founded and built the monastery of Ljubostinja, took the veil there as the nun Eugenia and afterwards the great schema as Euphrosyne, and obtained from Bayezid the relics of Parasceva of the Balkans for Belgrade. Her relics at Ljubostinja were reported myrrh-streaming and healing.
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Paisius of the Far Caves
Paisius was a monk of the Kiev Caves monastery, of the fourteenth century by the usual reckoning, whose whole memory rests on a single fact of the sort the Caves Paterikon is best at preserving: he and Mercurius were inseparable. The two shared one cell through their lives, were laid in one grave at their deaths, and were venerated together; their relics were afterwards divided into separate reliquaries, in which they rest today in the Far (Theodosian) Caves. Nothing else of his life is transmitted — no origin, no office, no miracle-story — and the entry does not invent any. He is commemorated on July 19 and among the fathers of the Far Caves on August 28.
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Roman of Ryazan
Roman Olegovich, prince of Ryazan (c. 1237 – 19 July 1270), was the grandson of princes who died fighting Batu, and the last of his house to die at Tatar hands. Denounced to the khan Mengu-Timur by the baskaki, the tax-farmers of the Horde, on the charge of speaking against the khan and blaspheming the Tatar religion, he was summoned to the camp and offered the choice between apostasy and death. He answered by preaching Christ to his judges, and was put to death by a dismemberment carried out limb by limb while he was still able to speak, his tongue cut out, his eyes put out, and his head at last set on a spear. The Russian Church honours him as a martyr — not merely a passion-bearer — because the demand made of him was explicitly a demand to change his faith.
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Seraphim of Sarov
Seraphim of Sarov (1754–1833), born Prochorus Moshnin of Kursk, is among the most beloved saints of the modern Orthodox world — a hieromonk of the Sarov monastery who became the archetype of the Russian starets, the Spirit-bearing elder. After years as a hermit in the forest, in which the tradition sets his thousand nights of prayer upon a rock and his near-murder by robbers, whom he forgave and refused to prosecute, he passed through a long silence and reclusion into an eldership of overflowing joy: he greeted all who came, in every season, with "My joy! Christ is risen!" His conversation with Nicholas Motovilov on the acquisition of the Holy Spirit — and the counsel "Acquire the Spirit of Peace, and thousands around you will be saved" — distilled the whole of his teaching. He guided the women's community at Diveyevo, reposed on his knees before an icon of the Mother of God on January 2, 1833, and was glorified by the Russian Church in 1903.
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Stefan Lazarević
Stefan Lazarević (c. 1377 – 19 July 1427), called the Tall, was the son of the great-martyr Lazar of Serbia and of Milica, and the ruler who held what was left of Serbia together for a generation after Kosovo. A Turkish vassal in his youth and a fighter in the sultan's wars, he received from Constantinople in 1402 the title of despot, moved his capital to Belgrade and rebuilt it, legislated for the mines at Novo Brdo, endowed the monastery of Manasija (Resava) with its school of scribes, and was himself a writer — the Discourse on Love is his. He reposed suddenly while hunting on 19 July 1427 and was buried at Manasija. The Church honours him as a right-believing ruler: not a martyr, but a Christian prince who governed a subject people justly in an age that gave him no good choices.
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Theodore of Edessa
Theodore, called the Sabbaite from the Palestinian lavra in which he spent most of his life, was a native of Edessa in Mesopotamia who was orphaned as a boy, gave away his inheritance, and went to Jerusalem, where he was tonsured at the Great Lavra of Saint Sabbas. After decades of obedience and of enclosure he was drawn out of his solitude and made bishop of Edessa — a Melkite see of the Patriarchate of Antioch, then long under Muslim rule — where he contended with the Manichaeans, the Nestorians and the Monophysites and governed his diminished Chalcedonian flock. His Life makes him travel to Baghdad to lay the grievances of the Christians before the caliph, whom he heals and baptises under the name John, and who is afterwards killed for confessing Christ. Theodore returned to Saint Sabbas and died there in 848. Chapters of ascetic teaching under his name passed into the Philokalia, and his Life, translated early into Slavonic, became one of the favourite reading-books of medieval Rus.
Troparia & kontakia
Apolytikion
Most glorified art Thou, O Christ our God, who hast set our Fathers as beacons upon the earth, and by them hast guided us all into the true faith: O greatly merciful One, glory to Thee.
Apolytikion — Tone 8
With the streams of thy tears thou didst make the barren wilderness bear fruit, and by thy groanings from the depths thou didst make thy labours fruitful a hundredfold; and thou wast made a beacon for the whole world, shining with miracles, O Dios our father. Intercede with Christ God that our souls may be saved.
Apolytikion — Tone 4 (common of women martyrs)
Thy lambs Justa and Rufina cry aloud to thee, O Jesus: Thee do we long for, O Bridegroom, and contending we are crucified and buried with thee in thy baptism; we suffer for thy sake, that we may reign with thee, and we die for thee that we may live in thee. Receive us as spotless sacrifices offered to thee in love. By their prayers, O merciful one, save our souls.
Apolytikion — Tone 8
In thee, O Mother, was that which is according to the image kept whole and unhurt; for thou didst take up the Cross and follow after Christ, and by thy doing thou hast taught us to look past the flesh, since it passes away, and to attend upon the soul, which is a thing immortal. Wherefore, O venerable Macrina, thy spirit keeps festival with the angels.
Apolytikion — Tone 8
Widowed on the day of Kosovo, thou didst not lay down the burden of thy people, but didst govern them in wisdom and then lay down thy rank for the angelic habit, O venerable mother Euphrosyne; wherefore, having built a refuge for the widows of the slain, thou dost pour out healing from thy relics upon all who come to thee.
Apolytikion — Tone 4
Left fatherless upon the field of Kosovo, thou didst take up a broken inheritance and shepherd it in the fear of God, O right-believing Stefan; thou didst build cities and churches, gather the wise, and give just laws to thy people in the day of their servitude. Entreat Christ God that our souls may be saved.
Apolytikion — Tone 8 (common of a hierarch-ascetic)
In thee, O Father, was preserved unfailing that which is according to the image, for taking up the Cross thou didst follow after Christ, and by thy deeds thou didst teach us to overlook the flesh, which passes away, and to attend to the soul, which is a thing immortal; wherefore thy spirit, O holy Theodore, rejoices with the angels.
Kontakion
The preaching of the Apostles and the definitions of the Fathers have sealed the one faith of the Church; and she, wearing the garment of truth woven from the theology that comes from above, rightly divides and glorifies the great mystery of godliness.
Kontakion — Tone 2
Thou didst leave the city of Antioch at God's summons and take for thy dwelling the waste place that men feared; and there thy dry staff put forth leaves, and the dead was given back alive at thy word. Wherefore we cry to thee: cease not, O wonderworking Dios, to intercede for us all.
Kontakion — Tone 4
Ye would not sell your work to an idol, and for a broken image ye gave your bodies to the rack; the well and the fire could not hide you, O sisters, and the beast of the arena knew its master. Wherefore, O Justa and Rufina, entreat Christ God for us who honour you.
Kontakion — Tone 4
The radiance of righteousness shone out in thee, and thou wast shown to all a pattern of the godly life, teaching the virtues to those who cry to thee: Rejoice, O Macrina, boast of virginity.
Kontakion — Tone 2
Thou didst give thy daughter to the enemy that thy people might live, and thy own life to Christ that they might be saved; and the myrrh of thy relics answers for thee, O mother Euphrosyne. Cease not to intercede for the land thou didst not abandon.
Kontakion — Tone 2
Offered the choice of thy faith or thy life, thou didst count thy life the lesser thing, O right-believing Roman; and when they took away thy tongue thou didst confess with thy blood what thou couldst no longer speak. Wherefore, O martyr-prince, entreat Christ God for the land that bore thee.
Kontakion — Tone 2
Having forsaken the beauty of the world and the corruptible things that are in it, O venerable one, thou didst settle in the monastery of Sarov; and living there like an angel, thou wast a way of salvation to many. Therefore Christ also glorified thee, O father Seraphim, and enriched thee with the gift of healings and of wonders. Wherefore we cry to thee: Rejoice, O Seraphim our venerable father.
Kontakion — Tone 3
Thou wast a wall to the Serbian land when its walls were thrown down, and a father to those who had none; therefore the city thou didst raise up keeps thy memory, and we who honour thee cry: Rejoice, O Stefan, faithful steward of a people in bondage.
Kontakion — Tone 2
The bright lamp of the desert didst thou become, and afterwards a shepherd of the faithful in the land of thy fathers; forsaking the silence thou hadst loved, thou didst take up the labour of the word, O wise Theodore, and having finished thy course thou hast returned to thy cell, and to Christ, whom thou didst serve.
Magnification
We call thee blessed, O venerable father Seraphim, and we honour thy holy memory, O instructor of monks and companion of the angels.
Troparion — Tone 8 (common of a venerable father of the Caves)
Thou didst dwell in the caves as in the courts of heaven, and there in one cell with thy fellow didst wear out thy life in fasting and prayer, O venerable father Paisius; wherefore Christ has glorified thee with the choir of the fathers of the Caves. Intercede with him that our souls may be saved.
Troparion — Tone 4 (common of a martyr)
Thy martyr Roman, O Lord, in his contest received from Thee our God an incorruptible crown; for having Thy strength, he cast down the tyrants and shattered the feeble insolence of the demons. By his intercessions save our souls.
Troparion — Tone 4
From thy youth thou didst love Christ, O blessed one, and ardently longing to serve him alone, thou didst struggle in the wilderness with unceasing prayer and labour; and having gained the love of Christ with a compunctionate heart, thou wast shown to be the beloved chosen one of the Mother of God. Therefore we cry to thee: Save us by thy prayers, O Seraphim our venerable father.
Readings
Vespers
Genesis 14.14-20 (Fathers)
14And when Abram heard that his brother was taken captive, he armed his trained servants, born in his own house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them unto Dan. 15And he divided himself against them, he and his servants, by night, and smote them, and pursued them unto Hobah, which is on the left hand of Damascus. 16And he brought back all the goods, and also brought again his brother Lot, and his goods, and the women also, and the people. 17And the king of Sodom went out to meet him after his return from the slaughter of Chedorlaomer, and of the kings that were with him, at the valley of Shaveh, which is the king’s dale. 18And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God. 19And he blessed him, and said, Blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth: 20And blessed be the most high God, which hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand. And he gave him tithes of all.
Deuteronomy 1.8-11, 15-17 (Fathers)
8Behold, I have set the land before you: go in and possess the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them. 9And I spake unto you at that time, saying, I am not able to bear you myself alone: 10The LORD your God hath multiplied you, and, behold, ye are this day as the stars of heaven for multitude. 11(The LORD God of your fathers make you a thousand times so many more as ye are, and bless you, as he hath promised you!) 15So I took the chief of your tribes, wise men, and known, and made them heads over you, captains over thousands, and captains over hundreds, and captains over fifties, and captains over tens, and officers among your tribes. 16And I charged your judges at that time, saying, Hear the causes between your brethren, and judge righteously between every man and his brother, and the stranger that is with him. 17Ye shall not respect persons in judgment; but ye shall hear the small as well as the great; ye shall not be afraid of the face of man; for the judgment is God’s: and the cause that is too hard for you, bring it unto me, and I will hear it.
Deuteronomy 10.14-21 (Fathers)
14Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the LORD’s thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is. 15Only the LORD had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day. 16Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiffnecked. 17For the LORD your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty, and a terrible, which regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward: 18He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment. 19Love ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. 20Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name. 21He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes have seen.
Wisdom of Solomon 3.1-9
1But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and there shall no torment touch them. 2In the sight of the unwise they seemed to die: and their departure is taken for misery, 3And their going from us to be utter destruction: but they are in peace. 4For though they be punished in the sight of men, yet is their hope full of immortality. 5And having been a little chastised, they shall be greatly rewarded: for God proved them, and found them worthy for himself. 6As gold in the furnace hath he tried them, and received them as a burnt offering. 7And in the time of their visitation they shall shine, and run to and fro like sparks among the stubble. 8They shall judge the nations, and have dominion over the people, and their Lord shall reign for ever. 9They that put their trust in him shall understand the truth: and such as be faithful in love shall abide with him: for grace and mercy is to his saints, and he hath care for his elect.
Wisdom of Solomon 5.15-6.3
15But the righteous live for evermore; their reward also is with the Lord, and the care of them is with the most High. 16Therefore shall they receive a glorious kingdom, and a beautiful crown from the Lord’s hand: for with his right hand shall he cover them, and with his arm shall he protect them. 17He shall take to him his jealousy for complete armour, and make the creature his weapon for the revenge of his enemies. 18He shall put on righteousness as a breastplate, and true judgment instead of an helmet. 19He shall take holiness for an invincible shield. 20His severe wrath shall he sharpen for a sword, and the world shall fight with him against the unwise. 21Then shall the right aiming thunderbolts go abroad; and from the clouds, as from a well drawn bow, shall they fly to the mark. 22And hailstones full of wrath shall be cast as out of a stone bow, and the water of the sea shall rage against them, and the floods shall cruelly drown them. 23Yea, a mighty wind shall stand up against them, and like a storm shall blow them away: thus iniquity shall lay waste the whole earth, and ill dealing shall overthrow the thrones of the mighty. 1Hear therefore, O ye kings, and understand; learn, ye that be judges of the ends of the earth. 2Give ear, ye that rule the people, and glory in the multitude of nations. 3For power is given you of the Lord, and sovereignty from the Highest, who shall try your works, and search out your counsels.
Wisdom of Solomon 4.7-15
7But though the righteous be prevented with death, yet shall he be in rest. 8For honourable age is not that which standeth in length of time, nor that is measured by number of years. 9But wisdom is the gray hair unto men, and an unspotted life is old age. 10He pleased God, and was beloved of him: so that living among sinners he was translated. 11Yea speedily was he taken away, lest that wickedness should alter his understanding, or deceit beguile his soul. 12For the bewitching of naughtiness doth obscure things that are honest; and the wandering of concupiscence doth undermine the simple mind. 13He, being made perfect in a short time, fulfilled a long time: 14For his soul pleased the Lord: therefore hasted he to take him away from among the wicked. 15This the people saw, and understood it not, neither laid they up this in their minds, That his grace and mercy is with his saints, and that he hath respect unto his chosen.
7th Matins Gospel
John 20.1-10
1The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre. 2Then she runneth, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid him. 3Peter therefore went forth, and that other disciple, and came to the sepulchre. 4So they ran both together: and the other disciple did outrun Peter, and came first to the sepulchre. 5And he stooping down, and looking in, saw the linen clothes lying; yet went he not in. 6Then cometh Simon Peter following him, and went into the sepulchre, and seeth the linen clothes lie, 7And the napkin, that was about his head, not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself. 8Then went in also that other disciple, which came first to the sepulchre, and he saw, and believed. 9For as yet they knew not the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead. 10Then the disciples went away again unto their own home.
Epistle
Romans 15.1-7
1We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. 2Let every one of us please his neighbour for his good to edification. 3For even Christ pleased not himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me. 4For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. 5Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: 6That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. 7Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God.
Hebrews 13.7-16 (Fathers)
7Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation. 8Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever. 9Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines. For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein. 10We have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle. 11For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp. 12Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate. 13Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach. 14For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come. 15By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name. 16But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
Galatians 5.22-6.2 (St Seraphim)
22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 23Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. 24And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. 25If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. 26Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another. 1Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. 2Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.
Gospel
Matthew 9.27-35
27And when Jesus departed thence, two blind men followed him, crying, and saying, Thou Son of David, have mercy on us. 28And when he was come into the house, the blind men came to him: and Jesus saith unto them, Believe ye that I am able to do this? They said unto him, Yea, Lord. 29Then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith be it unto you. 30And their eyes were opened; and Jesus straitly charged them, saying, See that no man know it. 31But they, when they were departed, spread abroad his fame in all that country. 32As they went out, behold, they brought to him a dumb man possessed with a devil. 33And when the devil was cast out, the dumb spake: and the multitudes marvelled, saying, It was never so seen in Israel. 34But the Pharisees said, He casteth out devils through the prince of the devils. 35And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.
John 17.1-13 (Fathers)
1These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: 2As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. 3And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. 4I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. 5And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was. 6I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word. 7Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee. 8For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me. 9I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine. 10And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them. 11And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are. 12While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled. 13And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.
Luke 6.17-23 (St Seraphim)
17And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judæa and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases; 18And they that were vexed with unclean spirits: and they were healed. 19And the whole multitude sought to touch him: for there went virtue out of him, and healed them all. 20And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. 21Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. 22Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake. 23Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets.