Saturday after Theophany

Saints commemorated

• Ven. George the Chozebite

  George the Chozebite (mid-sixth century – c. 625) was one of the great ascetics of the Judean desert, abbot of the Monastery of Choziba in the gorge of the Wadi Qelt between Jerusalem and Jericho. Born on Cyprus and orphaned young, he followed his elder brother Heraclides into the monasteries of Palestine, passing from the lavra of Calamon by the Jordan to the coenobium of Choziba, where he spent the rest of his long life in humility, obedience, and unsparing labour, and where he became the community's revered elder and head. He lived through the catastrophe of the Persian invasion of 614, when Jerusalem fell and the desert monasteries were sacked, surviving to gather again the scattered brethren and to die in peace amid the ruins. His life is known in unusual detail because his own disciple, Antony of Choziba, wrote it down soon after his repose — a first-hand portrait of Palestinian monasticism in its last age before the Arab conquest. He is commemorated on January 8, within the afterfeast of the Theophany.

• Our Venerable Mother Domnica (Domnina) (ca. 474)

  Domnica of Constantinople (fourth century – c. 474) was a venerable amma of the imperial city, remembered as a foundress of monastic life for women and a saint of extraordinary spiritual gifts. According to the tradition she came from Carthage in Roman Africa to Constantinople in the reign of Theodosius the Great, was baptised by the Patriarch Nectarius, and gave herself wholly to the ascetic life, gathering a community of women and reaching a rare height of prayer. The synaxaria credit her with healings, with power over the elements — stilling fires and storms that threatened the capital — and with foreknowledge of things to come, gifts by which she turned the citizens of Constantinople toward the care of their souls. She lived to a very great age and reposed a virgin about the year 474. She is commemorated on January 8, within the afterfeast of the Theophany.

• Saint Atticus, Patriarch of Constantinople (425)

• Saint Severinus (482)

• Abo of Tiflis

  Abo of Tiflis (c. 756 – 786) was an Arab perfumer of Baghdad who embraced the Christian faith in Georgia and died a martyr for it — the patron saint of Tbilisi and one of the most beloved saints of the Georgian Church. Brought to Kartli in the household of the Georgian prince Nerse, Abo was drawn to the piety of the Georgian people, learned their language and worship, and was baptised. Returning to Tiflis (Tbilisi), then under Muslim rule, he openly confessed Christ and preached him, refusing every inducement to return to Islam; he was imprisoned and, in January 786, beheaded. His body was burned and his ashes cast into the Kura (Mtkvari) River beside the Metekhi cliff, over which a shining light was seen. His Passion, written soon after by Ioane Sabanisdze, is a monument of early Georgian literature. He is commemorated on January 8.

• Elias the Hermit of Egypt

  Elias the Hermit was an Egyptian ascetic of the fourth century who spent seventy-five years in solitary struggle in a cave on a desolate mountain, and reposed in extreme old age at about a hundred and ten years. He belongs to the company of the great anchorites of the Egyptian desert, and is commemorated on January 8, within the afterfeast of the Theophany.

• Emilian of Cyzicus

  Emilian the Confessor (died c. 820) was bishop of Cyzicus, on the Sea of Marmara, and a bold defender of the holy icons in the second iconoclast persecution under the emperor Leo V the Armenian. Summoned with the other bishops before the emperor when Leo moved to revive iconoclasm, Emilian refused to yield the veneration of the images and answered the emperor to his face, for which he was deposed, ill-treated, and sent into exile, where he died a confessor of the faith. He is numbered among the company of confessor-hierarchs who suffered in those years for the images of Christ and the saints. His principal feast is August 8; he is commemorated again on January 8, within the afterfeast of the Theophany.

• Gregory of Ohrid

  Gregory of Ohrid was a saint of the church of Ohrid (Achris), in the region of the ancient archbishopric, remembered as a faithful teacher and shepherd of Christ's flock. An inscription in the cathedral church of the Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia) of Ohrid names him "Gregory the Wise." Beyond this the record is very thin; he is commemorated on January 8, within the afterfeast of the Theophany.

• Julian and Basilissa

  Julian and Basilissa were a married couple of Antinoë in Egypt who, by mutual consent, lived together in perpetual virginity and, on the death of their parents, gave their wealth to found two monasteries — one for men under Julian, one for women under Basilissa. Basilissa reposed in peace after guiding her sisters; Julian remained, and in the persecution of the early fourth century he was arrested, tortured, and beheaded, together with a company won to Christ through his constancy: the youth Celsus (son of his persecutor), Marcionilla the boy's mother, the priest Anthony, a converted pagan baptised Anastasius, seven young brothers, and twenty soldiers. They are commemorated together on January 8, within the afterfeast of the Theophany.

• Paisius of Uglich

  Paisius of Uglich (c. 1397 – 1504) was the founder and first abbot of the Protection (Pokrov) Monastery near Uglich on the Volga, and a wonderworker of the Russian north. Orphaned as a boy, he entered the monastery of his uncle, Saint Macarius of Kalyazin, at the age of eleven, and was formed there in obedience, fasting, and prayer, labouring at the copying of sacred books. At the wish of the Prince of Uglich, Andrew, he founded in 1464 the cenobitic Protection Monastery a few versts from the city, and served as its abbot; he founded a second monastery in 1489. He lived to a great age and reposed on June 6, 1504; his relics, glorified by miracles, rest in the monastery he built. He is commemorated on January 8, within the afterfeast of the Theophany, and on June 6, the day of his repose.

British Isles and Ireland

• St. Ergnad of Ulster (5th C)
• St. Albert of Cashel (7th C)
• St. Pega, anchoress in Northamptonshire (c.719)
• St. Athelhelm, 20th archbishop of Canterbury (923)
• St. Wulsin, bishop of Sherborne (1002)

Troparia & kontakia

Readings