The Lives of the Saints
1. VENERABLE PROCOPIUS THE DECAPOLITE
This saint was from the Decapolis, the region of ten cities around the Sea of Galilee, on account of which he was called the Decapolite. In his youth he gave himself to the ascetic life and passed through all the prescribed labors by which the heart is cleansed and the spirit raised up toward God. But when the persecution of icons began under the wicked Emperor Leo the Isaurian, Procopius arose in defense of the icons, demonstrating that the veneration of icons is not idolatry, for Christians know that in bowing before icons they are not bowing to dead matter but to the living saints who are depicted upon the icons. For this Procopius was savagely tortured, imprisoned, beaten, and scraped with iron. When the wicked Emperor Leo was slain in body, having perished in soul earlier, the icons were restored to the churches and Procopius returned to his monastery, where he spent his remaining days in peace. In old age he departed to the Kingdom of God, where with joy he beholds the living angels and saints whose likenesses on icons he had venerated on earth. He reposed peacefully in the ninth century.
2. VENERABLE THALALEÜS, SYRIAN ASCETIC
He was first in the monastery of Saint Sabas the Sanctified, but afterward settled in a certain pagan cemetery, notorious for manifestations of evil spirits and for terrors. In order to overcome fear within himself through faith in God, Thalaleüs settled in that cemetery, where he spent many years, enduring much from the attacks of spirits both by day and by night. On account of his great faith and love toward God, God granted him the gift of wonderworking, and he did great good for the sick and suffering. He reposed around the year 460.
3. VENERABLE TITUS OF THE CAVES
Titus was a presbyter and had a sincere love for the deacon Evagrius, as a brother for a brother. But as great as their initial love had been, so great afterward became the mutual enmity and hatred sown by the devil between them. They came to loathe each other so that when one was censing in the church, the other would turn away and go outside. Titus attempted many times to be reconciled with his adversary, but in vain. Titus fell ill, and everyone thought he would die. He begged that Evagrius be brought to him so that they might ask each other's forgiveness. Evagrius was brought by force to the bedside of Titus, but Evagrius wrenched himself free and fled, saying that he would not forgive Titus in this world or the next. No sooner had he said this than he fell to the ground and breathed his last. And Titus rose from his bed in health and recounted how demons had been circling around him until he forgave Evagrius, and when he forgave him the demons fled and attacked Evagrius, while angels of God surrounded him. He reposed in the year 1190.
4. VENERABLE STEPHEN
He was first a court official under Emperor Maurice. He then left court service and, moved by love of Christ, built a house of mercy for the elderly in Constantinople. He reposed peacefully in the year 614.
5. HOLY MARTYR JULIAN THE GOUT-SUFFERER
He suffered from gout and could neither stand nor walk. He was brought on a stretcher before the tribunal for his confession of the Christian faith. He was burned alive on a pyre, together with his disciple Cronion, in the time of Emperor Decius in Alexandria.
Hymn of Praise
ON FORGIVENESS
Let us forgive men, that God may forgive us,
We are all on earth but transient guests.
Neither prayer nor lengthy fasting avails
Without true mercy and without forgiveness.
Sins are leprosy, and God is the true Physician,
Whom God cleanses, Him He also glorifies.
Every mercy shown to men God repays with mercy —
Without mercy he perishes who returns sin with sin.
Pus is not cleansed from festering wounds by pus,
Nor is darkness driven from a dungeon by darkness,
But a pure balm heals the festering wound,
And light disperses the darkness of the dungeon.
Mercy is like a balm to the gravely wounded,
All rejoice in it as in a lamp.
"I need no mercy!" so the fool declares,
And cries out for mercy when sorrow strikes him down!
In the mercy of God men bask as in sunshine,
For God's mercy awakens us into life!
Let us forgive men, that God may forgive us,
We are all on earth but transient guests.
“Pus is not cleansed from festering wounds by pus, nor is darkness driven from a dungeon by darkness.”
Reflection
Whenever we are outside the grace of God, we are also outside ourselves, and compared to our grace-endowed nature we are in no better a state than a madman compared to a so-called healthy person. Only the grace-filled man is a natural man — that is, a man of higher, uncorrupted nature, in which the grace of God reigns and governs.
Saint Symeon the New Theologian says: "A lamp, though filled with oil and having a wick, remains entirely dark if it is not lit with fire. So also the soul, adorned in appearance with all the virtues, if it lacks the light and grace of the Holy Spirit, is quenched and dark" (Homily 59). As the great apostle also says: "By the grace of God I am what I am" (I Cor. 15:10). To be without grace means to be removed from God, and thus removed from the reality of one's own very being. Our being, our person, establishes its reality and receives its fullness only in closeness to God and through God.
Therefore sinners are to be regarded as the sick, as powerless shadows, without reality and without mind.
“Only the grace-filled man is a natural man — that is, a man of higher, uncorrupted nature, in which the grace of God reigns and governs.”
Contemplation
Contemplate the Lord Jesus as the vine (John 15:1), namely:
1. As the vine from which countless fruitful branches have sprung forth in the persons of the saints;
2. As the vine which with its sap, with its own blood, sustains and nourishes all the branches upon itself;
3. As the vine from which the divine Church has branched out on earth and in heaven;
4. As the vine from which I too must not sever the branch of my own life.
Homily
on the power of the Resurrector of the body
Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up (John 2:19)
The Lord speaks this of the temple of His own body. Destroy this Body and I will raise it up in three days! So speaks He who knows His own power, and who by His power has fulfilled His own words. For His body was destroyed, broken, pierced, buried, and covered with darkness for three days. And on the third day He raised it up — raised it not merely from the grave to earth, but exalted it to the heavens. And so He spoke the word, and His word was fulfilled.
The Lord gave a sign to the Jews, for they sought a sign from Him. And when He gave them a sign such as no one before Him had ever been able to give, they did not believe Him. Instead, confused and frightened, they bribed the guards at Golgotha to lie — to proclaim a falsehood, that this wondrous sign had not occurred, but that the disciples had stolen Him from the tomb!
No sign avails those who will not believe. The Jews saw with their own eyes many miracles of Christ, and yet refused to believe, saying instead, as a justification for their unbelief, that He performed those miracles by the power of the prince of devils! He who will not believe in good is not aided by all the signs that heaven can give. A heart filled with malice is harder than granite. A mind darkened by sin cannot be illumined by all the light of heaven, greater than a thousand suns.
But when a man drives out malice from his heart and saves his mind from the darkness of sin, then he sees the countless signs that God gives to those who will to believe — they see and they believe.
O my brethren, let us not sin against the mercy of God, and let us not yield to the malice of unbelief. O my brethren, all the signs have already been given, and all shine like stars across the heavenly vault to every man who has a good heart and a right-thinking mind.
O Lord Wonderworker, to Thee be glory and praise forever. Amen.
“A heart filled with malice is harder than granite. A mind darkened by sin cannot be illumined by all the light of heaven.”