Lives of the Saints
1. HOLY MARTYRS GURIAS, SAMONAS, AND ABIBUS
Gurias and Samonas were distinguished citizens of Edessa. During a persecution of Christians they hid outside the city and lived in fasting and prayer, encouraging the faithful who came to them for counsel. But they were captured and brought before a judge. The judge threatened them with death if they did not submit to the imperial decree about worshiping idols. The holy martyrs of Christ answered him: "If we submit to the imperial decree, we shall perish, even if thou dost not kill us." After cruel tortures they were thrown into prison, where they remained from August 1 until November 10, enduring hunger, darkness, and distress. Then they were again brought out and tortured; and as they remained unshaken in the Christian Faith, they were condemned to death and beheaded by the sword in the year 322 under the wicked Emperor Licinius. Later Abibus, a deacon of Edessa, also received torments for Christ his Lord, and in the flames gave up his spirit to God. His mother extracted his body whole from the fire and buried it in the tomb together with Saints Gurias and Samonas. When the persecution ceased, Christians erected a church in honor of the three martyrs, Gurias, Samonas, and Abibus, and placed their wonderworking relics in one coffin. Among the numerous miracles of these wondrous saints of God, one is particularly notable. A certain widow in Edessa had a virgin daughter, whom a Gothic soldier from the Greek army married. And as the mother feared to give her daughter to a distant land, the Goth swore at the tomb of the three holy martyrs that he would do no evil to the virgin but would take her as his lawful wife, since, he said, he was unmarried. In fact he was married. And when he took the virgin to his homeland he kept her not as a wife but as a slave, until his lawful wife died. Then in agreement with his other relatives he buried his living slave woman together with his dead wife. The slave woman prayed with tears to the holy martyrs to save her. And they appeared to her in the tomb, took her, and instantly transported her from the Gothic land to Edessa, to their church. The next day, when they opened the church, they found the virgin by the tomb of God's saints, and learned of her miraculous deliverance.
2. HOLY MARTYRS ELPIDIUS, MARCELLUS, AND EUSTOCHIUS
These three martyrs suffered for Christ in the time of Julian the Apostate. Elpidius was a senator. Seeing the torments and miracles of Elpidius, six thousand pagans believed in Christ the Lord.
3. FEAST OF THE ICON OF THE HOLY THEOTOKOS OF KUPYATICHI
This icon first appeared to a certain girl named Anna in the village of Kupyatichi in the Minsk province in the year 1182. While guarding her flock, Anna saw a certain light in the forest. When she approached that light, she beheld on a tree a medium-sized cross with the image of the Most Holy Theotokos. Anna took that cross and carried it home, and then returned to her flock. But to her great wonder she again saw in the same place the same cross on the tree. She took it, placed it in her bosom, and carried it home. When she wished to show the cross to her father, she reached into her bosom, but the cross was not there. She told her father everything; and with her father she went, they saw the cross in the forest, and carried it home. The next day the cross again was not in the house. They alarmed the whole village, and all the villagers went and saw the cross and bowed down to it. Soon people built a church there. Numerous miracles were manifested from that miraculous cross with the image of the Mother of God. That icon is now located in the church of Saint Sophia in Kiev.
Hymn of Praise
O Most Holy Mother of God,
Bride of God,
To Christ God thou wast
A bodily throne;
Thou didst bear the King of glory
In thy body,
Thou didst give birth to the Life-giver
To a dead world.
By His Blood, His holy Blood,
He redeemed the world,
Thee, O Virgin, and Himself,
He gloriously glorified.
But thy true glory
Shines in heaven,
Where thou sittest at the right hand
Next to Christ Himself.
Yet the rays of thy glory
Descend to earth,
And shine upon the path for travelers
In the night.
Glory to thee, Mother of God,
Throughout all ages,
First temple, wondrous temple,
Of Christ's glory!
Reflection
God most often gives peacemakers victory in war. One example of this is the great Emperor Justinian, and another is holy King Stephen Dechanski. After the death of his father King Milutin, Stephen removed the bandage from his eyes and was joyfully proclaimed king by both the nobility and the people. But Constantine, Simonida's son and Stephen's younger brother by their father, raised an army against Stephen. Then Stephen wrote to him thus: "Thou hast heard what happened to me (that is, how I received my sight) by God's Providence, which orders all things for good. Pardoned by God, I have inherited the ancestral throne, to rule over people with the fear of God and with justice, according to the example of my forefathers. Desist from thy undertaking, come that we may see each other; accept the second place in the state as the second son, and rise not with foreigners against thy fatherland; our spacious land is sufficient both for me and for thee. I am not Cain the fratricide but a friend to the brother-loving Joseph. With the words of that latter I also speak to thee: I am God's; ye thought evil against me, but God arranged it for good." Thus the holy king wrote. But Constantine did not obey. And he was defeated in war by Stephen. Thus was also defeated Vladislav, the son of Dragutin, another pretender to the Serbian throne! And worst of all fared Michael Shishman, the Bulgarian emperor. To him Stephen wrote: "Understand the meaning of Christian love, calm thy wrath, allow love to be between us as it was also between our parents. Cease spilling Christian blood. Turn thy weapons against the enemies of Christ's name and not against Christians. Remind thyself how hard it will be to answer for innocent blood. Know also this, that he who seizes what belongs to another loses also his own." Michael mocked this letter of the holy king and was utterly defeated at Velbužd. "God is with the righteous and not with the mighty."
“God is with the righteous and not with the mighty.”
Contemplation
Contemplate the wondrous creation of the world (Gen. 1), namely:
1. How God said, Let there be a firmament between the waters;
2. How He divided the water under the firmament from the water above the firmament;
3. How He called the firmament heaven.
Homily
on the revelation of God's wisdom to the heavenly powers
That now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be made known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God (Eph. 3:10)
Are the angels, brethren, all-knowing? They are not; for if they were all-knowing, they would be gods. There is one God, brethren, and the angels are God's most beautiful servants. The mystery of the Incarnation was not known to the angels before it took place. And all the other mysteries connected with the mystery of the Incarnation were unknown to the angels until they saw them revealed in the Church. The Church is, therefore, a new revelation even for the holy angels themselves. The Church is on the one hand a new manifestation of God's wisdom, power, and love for mankind, and on the other hand a new manifestation of man's love for God and man's struggle. Not even the angels themselves knew beforehand how far God would humble Himself nor how high man would be exalted. This was shown in the Church and made known to the angels through the Church. Of this the apostle speaks to the Ephesians in the words cited. To the principalities and powers, that is, not even to the angelic heights was all known beforehand. The manifold wisdom of God, that is, wisdom not previously manifested and unknown to the angels, but now shown in the Church in countless forms and circumstances and occasions.
O my brethren, the two greatest works of God thus far revealed are the creation of the world and the creation of the Church. And in both the one and the other work, man is, brethren, the chief object of God's love. Let us be grateful, with every breath of ours grateful, most grateful to God. O good God, merciful God. To Thee be glory and praise forever. Amen.
“The two greatest works of God thus far revealed are the creation of the world and the creation of the Church.”