The Lives of the Saints
1. SAINTS CYRIL AND METHODIUS, EQUAL TO THE APOSTLES
Brothers by birth, from Thessalonica, born of distinguished and wealthy parents, Leo and Maria. The elder brother Methodius served as an officer for ten years among the Slavs (Macedonian) and thus learned the Slavonic language. Afterward Methodius withdrew to Mount Olympus and gave himself to monastic struggle. There he was later joined by Cyril (Constantine). But when the Khazar King, the Khagan, sought from Emperor Michael preachers of the faith of Christ, then by the emperor's command these two brothers were found and sent among the Khazars. Having convinced the Khagan of the faith of Christ, they baptized him together with a great number of his chieftains and an even greater number of the people. After some time they returned to Constantinople, where they composed a Slavonic alphabet of thirty-eight letters and began to translate Church books from Greek into Slavonic. At the invitation of Prince Rastislav they went to Moravia, where they spread and strengthened the pious faith, multiplied books, and gave them to the priests to teach the youth. At the invitation of the Pope they went to Rome, where Cyril fell ill and died on February 14, 869. Then Methodius returned to Moravia and labored until his death in the strengthening of the faith of Christ among the Slavs. After his death — for he reposed in the Lord on April 6, 885 — his disciples, the Five Disciples, with Saint Clement as bishop at their head, crossed the Danube and descended southward into Macedonia, where from Ohrid they continued among the Slavs the work begun by Cyril and Methodius in the north.
2. THE PRIEST-MARTYR MOCIUS
A Roman by birth, and a priest in Amphipolis, a Macedonian city. He suffered in the time of Diocletian. By prayer he destroyed the statue of the god Dionysus, by which he embittered some of the pagans against himself but brought others to the faith. He was beheaded for Christ in the year 295.
3. SAINT NICODEMUS, ARCHBISHOP OF PEC
This great hierarch was a Serb by birth. He struggled ascetically on the Holy Mountain and was Abbot of Hilandar. After the death of Sava III he was elected Archbishop "of all the Serbian and coastal lands" in the year 1317. He crowned King Milutin in 1321. He translated the Jerusalem Typikon into Serbian. In the preface to this book he says: "Almighty God, Who knows our weakness, will grant us spiritual power, but only if we first show effort." He sincerely loved the ascetical life and labored at the eradication of the Bogomil heresy and the strengthening of the Orthodox faith. He reposed in the Lord in 1325. His wonderworking relics rest in the monastery in Pec.
Hymn of Praise
The Muslim leaders asked Cyril:
What manner of thing are three Persons in God?
If God is one, whence come three Persons?
Our God is one alone; yours are three!
Cyril answered: It is not so, it is not.
But as the radiant sun at noonday shines
And has its light, its warmth, and its sphere,
So is this a pale image of the divine Triad.
Three divine Persons yet one essence —
Through Christ this truth has been revealed.
Never can the conceited man grasp this.
God Himself revealed it; the Church teaches it.
“Never can the conceited man grasp this. God Himself revealed it; the Church teaches it.”
Reflection
In the Saracen camp Saint Cyril was asked: "How can Christians wage war and yet keep the commandment of Christ concerning prayer to God for their enemies?" To this Saint Cyril answered: "If in one law two commandments are written and given to men for fulfillment, which man will be the better fulfiller of the law: he who fulfills one commandment, or he who fulfills both?" To this the Saracens replied: "Undoubtedly, he who fulfills both commandments." Saint Cyril continued: "Christ our God commands us to pray to God for those who persecute us, and to do good even to them; but the same Lord also said to us: Greater love hath no man in this life than to lay down his soul for his friends. And therefore we endure the insults that our enemies inflict upon us individually and we pray to God for them; but as a community we stand up for one another and lay down our lives, lest you, by taking our brethren captive, capture together with their bodies their souls also, and destroy them both in body and in soul."
“As a community we stand up for one another and lay down our lives, lest you, by taking our brethren captive, capture together with their bodies their souls also.”
Contemplation
Contemplate the action of God the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles, namely:
1. How He makes the simple wise,
2. How He makes the inarticulate eloquent.
Homily
On the Irresistibility of the Will of God
**Then I said, I will not make mention of Him, nor speak any more in His name. But His word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay** (Jer. 20:9)
If anyone still doubts that God spoke through the prophets, let him read this confession of the great Prophet Jeremiah, and let him doubt no more. The prophet confesses that he had resolved to speak no more in the name of the Lord. Why? Because scarcely anyone paid heed to his word, and if anyone did pay heed, the prophet suffered reproach and derision daily for it. And when he resolved to be silent, did he truly fall silent? No, he could not: I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay! With irresistible force the Spirit of God pressed upon him to speak, and he had to speak. It is not, therefore, the prophet's affair whether he will speak or what he will say: this is the affair of the Almighty Spirit of God. And the prophet is merely the chosen instrument of the Almighty Spirit of God. Thus was all of Holy Scripture written — not according to the will of man but according to the will of God, and not according to the mind of man but according to the mind of God.
How the word of God feels when it enters a prophet from the Spirit of God, the great Jeremiah explains from his own personal experience: His word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones. This is what inspiration from the Almighty Spirit of God means. Under such irresistible inner pressure — as under the pressure of a fire shut up in the bones — did the holy men of God write. And many of them cried out: I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay! Who can resist the Spirit of God without punishment and perdition? Who can withstand Him when He wills to say or do something?
O my brethren, irresistible is the action of God the Holy Spirit!
O Almighty Spirit of God, guide us irresistibly upon the path of salvation. To Thee be glory and praise forever. Amen.
“With irresistible force the Spirit of God pressed upon him to speak, and he had to speak. The prophet is merely the chosen instrument of the Almighty Spirit of God.”