Pre-Lenten Triodion, day 19 · 52 days until Pascha
Saints commemorated
-
Saint of the day
St Leo, Bishop of Catania
Leo the Wonderworker (c. 703 – c. 780) was bishop of Catania in Sicily, an island then still within the Byzantine Empire. Born at Ravenna of noble and pious parents and renowned from youth for his charity to the poor and to strangers, he was ordained at Ravenna, served as archdeacon at Reggio in Calabria, and was called to the see of Catania, which he governed with such gentleness and generosity that the whole island honoured him. The tradition remembers him above all as a wonderworker who healed the sick, and for his victory over the sorcerer Heliodorus — a baptized Catanian turned magician, whose public bewitchments had long defied and mocked the Church. When at last Heliodorus disrupted the very Liturgy, Leo bound him with his omophorion, led him into a great fire, and stood praying within the flames unharmed while the sorcerer was reduced to ashes, so that all glorified God. He reposed in peace on February 20 and was buried in a church he had built at Catania, where his relics gave healing. He is not to be confused with Leo the Great of Rome (February 18).
-
St Bessarion the Great, wonder-worker of Egypt (466)
Bessarion the Great (died c. 466) was one of the great desert fathers of fifth-century Egypt, a wonderworker of Scetis and disciple, the tradition holds, of Anthony the Great and of Macarius the Great. He is known above all from the Apophthegmata Patrum, the Sayings of the Desert Fathers, where a chapter of his sayings and a memoir by his disciple Doulas preserve both his teaching and his miracles: how on a waterless shore he prayed and the salt sea grew sweet to drink; how, to reach an elder before nightfall, he prayed and the sun stood still in its course; how he crossed a river dry-shod. He owned nothing and stayed nowhere, passing his life homeless "like a bird," sleeping in the open among the rocks and thorns, so poised in unceasing prayer and self-denial that his brethren likened him to the bodiless powers. He reposed in extreme old age. The day of his memory is not agreed: the Greek Menaion keeps him on February 20, the Slavonic books and the OCA on June 6, where he heads the day together with Hilarion the New of Dalmatia.
-
Thirty-four Holy Martyrs of the Monastery of Valaam (1578)
-
Agathon of Rome
Agathon (c. 577 – 681) was Pope of Rome from 678 to 681, under whom the Sixth Ecumenical Council — Constantinople III (680–681) — condemned the heresy of Monotheletism, the teaching of a single will in Christ. A Sicilian of Greek origin, born about Palermo, he gave away his inheritance to the poor, became a monk, and served long as treasurer of the Roman church before his election. When the Emperor Constantine IV summoned a council to end the long controversy over the wills of Christ, Agathon gathered the Western bishops in synod and sent to Constantinople a celebrated dogmatic letter confessing the two natural wills and two energies of the incarnate Word, which the Council received with acclamation as the voice of Peter, and upon which it framed its definition. Renowned besides for the multitude of his miracles — whence the Greeks style him Thaumaturgus, the Wonderworker — he reposed in 681. The East keeps his memory on February 20; the West on January 10, the day of his repose.
-
Cornelius of the Pskov Caves
Cornelius (1501–1570) was the great abbot of the Pskov Caves (Pskovo-Pechersky) Monastery, under whom that border-house rose to be one of the foremost monasteries of Russia. Born of a noble Pskov family and schooled at the Mirozh monastery, he became a monk at the Caves and was made abbot at twenty-eight; for forty years he built and adorned the monastery, ringed it with a stone fortress-wall, expanded the God-hewn caves and their church, gathered a great library, wrote and continued the Pskov chronicle, and carried the Gospel to the Estonian and Setu peoples of the borderland, founding churches among them. In 1570, during Ivan the Terrible's terror against Pskov and Novgorod, the Tsar, persuaded that Cornelius was a traitor, struck off his head at the monastery gate as the abbot came out to bless him — then, seized with remorse, took up the body in his own arms and bore it into the church, so that the way is called the Bloody Path to this day. Venerated at once as a martyr, Cornelius is commemorated on February 20.
-
Sadoth of Persia
Sadoth (Syriac Shahdost, "friend of the king"; Slavic Sadoc) was the second bishop of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, the royal city of Persia, succeeding Symeon Barsabae when that first great martyr of the Persian church was slain at the outbreak of Shapur II's persecution. Warned in a vision of a ladder — Symeon calling from its summit, "I climbed yesterday; do thou climb today" — he was arrested in the persecution's second year with his clergy, monks and consecrated virgins, held five months in chains, tortured, and commanded to worship the sun; refusing, he was taken to Beth Lapat and beheaded, about the year 342, and his company — 128 in the Slavic count, 120 in the Greek — died by the sword. He is commemorated on October 19 and again on February 20.
British Isles and Ireland
- St. Bolcan, bishop of Derkan (480)
- St. Colgan, abbot of Clonmacnoise (c.796)
Readings
Epistle
Jude 11-25
11Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core. 12These are spots in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear: clouds they are without water, carried about of winds; trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots; 13Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever. 14And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, 15To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him. 16These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts; and their mouth speaketh great swelling words, having men’s persons in admiration because of advantage. 17But, beloved, remember ye the words which were spoken before of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ; 18How that they told you there should be mockers in the last time, who should walk after their own ungodly lusts. 19These be they who separate themselves, sensual, having not the Spirit. 20But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, 21Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. 22And of some have compassion, making a difference: 23And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh. 24Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, 25To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.
Gospel
Luke 23.2-34, 44-56
2And they began to accuse him, saying, We found this fellow perverting the nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Cæsar, saying that he himself is Christ a King. 3And Pilate asked him, saying, Art thou the King of the Jews? And he answered him and said, Thou sayest it. 4Then said Pilate to the chief priests and to the people, I find no fault in this man. 5And they were the more fierce, saying, He stirreth up the people, teaching throughout all Jewry, beginning from Galilee to this place. 6When Pilate heard of Galilee, he asked whether the man were a Galilæan. 7And as soon as he knew that he belonged unto Herod’s jurisdiction, he sent him to Herod, who himself also was at Jerusalem at that time. 8And when Herod saw Jesus, he was exceeding glad: for he was desirous to see him of a long season, because he had heard many things of him; and he hoped to have seen some miracle done by him. 9Then he questioned with him in many words; but he answered him nothing. 10And the chief priests and scribes stood and vehemently accused him. 11And Herod with his men of war set him at nought, and mocked him, and arrayed him in a gorgeous robe, and sent him again to Pilate. 12And the same day Pilate and Herod were made friends together: for before they were at enmity between themselves. 13And Pilate, when he had called together the chief priests and the rulers and the people, 14Said unto them, Ye have brought this man unto me, as one that perverteth the people: and, behold, I, having examined him before you, have found no fault in this man touching those things whereof ye accuse him: 15No, nor yet Herod: for I sent you to him; and, lo, nothing worthy of death is done unto him. 16I will therefore chastise him, and release him. 17(For of necessity he must release one unto them at the feast.) 18And they cried out all at once, saying, Away with this man, and release unto us Barabbas: 19(Who for a certain sedition made in the city, and for murder, was cast into prison.) 20Pilate therefore, willing to release Jesus, spake again to them. 21But they cried, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. 22And he said unto them the third time, Why, what evil hath he done? I have found no cause of death in him: I will therefore chastise him, and let him go. 23And they were instant with loud voices, requiring that he might be crucified. And the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed. 24And Pilate gave sentence that it should be as they required. 25And he released unto them him that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired; but he delivered Jesus to their will. 26And as they led him away, they laid hold upon one Simon, a Cyrenian, coming out of the country, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus. 27And there followed him a great company of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented him. 28But Jesus turning unto them said, Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children. 29For, behold, the days are coming, in the which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck. 30Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us. 31For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry? 32And there were also two other, malefactors, led with him to be put to death. 33And when they were come to the place, which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the malefactors, one on the right hand, and the other on the left. 34Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. And they parted his raiment, and cast lots. 44And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. 45And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. 46And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost. 47Now when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous man. 48And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts, and returned. 49And all his acquaintance, and the women that followed him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things. 50And, behold, there was a man named Joseph, a counsellor; and he was a good man, and a just: 51(The same had not consented to the counsel and deed of them;) he was of Arimathæa, a city of the Jews: who also himself waited for the kingdom of God. 52This man went unto Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. 53And he took it down, and wrapped it in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in stone, wherein never man before was laid. 54And that day was the preparation, and the sabbath drew on. 55And the women also, which came with him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, and how his body was laid. 56And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment.
Troparia & kontakia
Kontakion — Tone 6
Him who from infancy was dedicated to the Lord, and from his swaddling-clothes received grace, let us all crown with hymns — Leo, the luminary and champion of the Church; for he is her firm support.
Kontakion — Tone 4
Eagerly and in his very likeness didst thou follow the word of the Master: as a good shepherd thou didst lay down thy life for the sheep of Christ, O hieromartyr Sadoth. We entreat thee, much-suffering one: pray to Christ, the Chief Shepherd, that we too be numbered among the sheep that stand at his right hand, that we may sing to thee: Rejoice, holy father Sadoth, who didst shed thy blood for Christ.
Troparion — Tone 4
The truth of thy deeds revealed thee to thy flock as a rule of faith, an image of meekness, and a teacher of temperance; therefore by humility thou hast gained the heights, and by poverty riches. O Father and Hierarch Agathon, intercede with Christ our God that our souls may be saved.
Troparion — Tone 8
In thee, O Father, that which is according to the image was preserved with exactness; for taking up thy cross thou didst follow Christ, and by thy deeds thou didst teach us to despise the flesh, for it passeth away, but to care for the soul, a thing immortal. Therefore doth thy spirit, O venerable Bessarion, rejoice together with the angels.
Troparion — Tone 4
The truth of thy deeds revealed thee to thy flock as a rule of faith, an image of meekness, and a teacher of temperance; therefore by humility thou hast gained the heights, and by poverty riches. O Father and Hierarch Leo, intercede with Christ our God that our souls may be saved.