Saturday, 11 October 2025

Saturday of the 18th week after Pentecost

174 days after Pascha · Tone 8 · Liturgy · No Fast

Saints commemorated

★ Synaxis of the Holy Startsi of Optina Monastery

Commemorated today are our holy fathers Moses, Antony, Leonid(Lev), Macarius, Hilarion, Ambrose, Anatolius I, Isaac I, Joseph, Barsanuphius, Anatolius the Younger, Nectarius, Nikon the Confessor, and Hieromartyr Isaac the Younger. Hieromartyr Isaac was shot by the Bolsheviks on December 26 1937. This feast commemorates a few of the holy Fathers who made the Optina Hermitage (Pustyn) a focus for the powerful renewal movement that spread through the Church in Russia beginning early in the nineteenth century, and continuing up to (and even into) the atheist persecutions of the twentieth century. Saint Paisius Velichkovsky (November 15) was powerfully influential in bringing the almost-lost hesychastic tradition of Orthodox spirituality to Russia in the eighteenth century, and his labors found in Optina Monastery a ‘headquarters’ from which they spread throughout the Russian land. The monastery itself had been in existence since at least the sixteenth century, but had fallen into decay through the anti-monastic policies of Catherine II and other modernizing rulers. Around 1790, Metropolitan Platon of Moscow undertook a mission to restore and revive the monastery in the tradition set forth by St Paisius. By the early 1800s the monastery (located about 80 miles from Moscow) had become a beacon of Orthodox spirituality, partly through their publication of Orthodox spiritual texts, but more importantly through the lineage of divinely-enlightened spiritual fathers (startsi, plural of starets) who served as guides to those, noble and peasant, who flocked to the monastery for their holy counsel. The fathers aroused some controversy in their own day; a few critics (some of them from other monasteries) disapproved of their allowing the Jesus Prayer to become widely-known among the people, fearing that it would give rise to spiritual delusion (prelest). For a wonderful depiction of the deep influence of the Jesus Prayer on Russian life during this period, read the anonymously-writtenWay of a Pilgrim. With the coming of the Russian Revolution in 1917, the monastery was of course officially shut down, but some of the Fathers were able to keep it running for a time as an ‘agricultural legion’. Over the years, most of the Fathers were dispersed, to die in exile, in prison camps, or by the firing squad. Many of them are known to have continued to function as startsi to their spiritual children, despite great danger and hardship, for the remainder of their time on earth. Commemoration of the Optina startsi was approved by the Synod of the Russian Church Abroad in 1990, and by the Moscow Patriarchate in 1996. The Optina Monastery itself was officially re-established in 1987.

Holy Apostle Philip the Deacon, one of the Seven

Saint Philip was a native of Caesarea in Palestine, married, and the father of four daughters whom the Acts of the Apostles describes as virgins endowed with the gift of prophecy. After the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, when the Twelve had need of helpers in the ministry of tables, Philip was chosen with Stephen the Protomartyr and five others, men full of the Spirit and of wisdom, to be ordained the first deacons of the Church of Jerusalem.

Following the martyrdom of Stephen and the persecution that arose, the disciples were scattered, and Philip went down to a city of Samaria, where he preached Christ with such power that the city received the word with joy. Through his hands many were healed, evil spirits were cast out, and a great multitude were baptised. The Apostles Peter and John afterwards came down to lay their hands upon those whom Philip had baptised, that they might receive the Holy Spirit.

By the command of an angel, Philip was sent to the road that runs from Jerusalem to Gaza, where he met an Ethiopian eunuch, the treasurer of Queen Candace, reading the prophecy of Isaiah. He opened the Scriptures to him, baptised him in a wayside spring, and was then caught up by the Spirit and found at Azotus, preaching the gospel through every city until he came to Caesarea.

In Caesarea he kept his house, where Saint Paul would later lodge with him on his last journey to Jerusalem. He was afterwards consecrated bishop by the Apostles and sent to Tralles in Asia Minor, where he gathered a great church, worked many miracles, and converted many to Christ. There, in great old age, he reposed in peace.

Holy Mothers Zenaida and Philonilla, kinswomen of the Apostle Paul

Saints Zenaida and Philonilla were sisters of the first century, born into a learned Jewish family in Tarsus in Cilicia. They were kinswomen of the holy Apostle Paul, and were instructed in the Christian faith and baptised by their brother Saint Jason, who became the first bishop of Tarsus and is commemorated on 28 April. From their youth the sisters were noted for their love of learning and their compassion for the sick. Forsaking the world, they withdrew from the city to a cave near a mineral spring, where they set up a small chapel and a cell. Skilled in medicine and trained in the arts, they offered their healing without payment to all who came to them, becoming the first of those whom the Church calls unmercenaries, taking after the Apostle Luke the physician. They cured many illnesses by the use of the healing waters near their cave, by herbs, and above all by the power of prayer and the name of Christ. The sisters lived a life of strict ascetic discipline, fasting and prayer, while their door stood open to all in need. Many of those whom they healed were brought to faith in Christ, and the sisters were known throughout the region as friends of peace and of the poor. The pagan inhabitants of Tarsus, alarmed by the spread of the gospel through their work, fell upon the cave at night and stoned the holy women to death. They received the crown of martyrdom together about the year 100. Their relics later became sources of healing, and the cave with its spring was venerated as a holy place. The Church honours them as virgin martyrs, unmercenary physicians, and faithful kinswomen of the Apostle of the Gentiles.

Venerable Theophanes the Branded, Bishop of Nicaea

Saint Theophanes was the younger brother of Saint Theodore the Branded, who is commemorated on 27 December. They were the sons of pious parents in Palestine, raised in the ways of the Church, and tonsured monks together at the great Lavra of Saint Sabbas the Sanctified in the Judean wilderness. From their youth they distinguished themselves by their love of the Scriptures and the holy fathers, and were ordained to the priesthood by the patriarch of Jerusalem. The brothers were sent by their patriarch on a mission to Constantinople in the time of the iconoclast emperor Leo the Armenian, to plead the cause of the holy icons. They withstood the emperor in his palace, and for their boldness were imprisoned and exiled. Under the next iconoclast emperors, Michael the Stammerer and Theophilus, they were brought again to Constantinople and again refused to renounce the veneration of icons, though they were stripped, scourged, and reviled in the public squares. The emperor Theophilus, exasperated by their constancy, gave order that twelve lines of mocking iambic verse should be cut into their faces with red-hot needles. From this dreadful inscription they took the name by which the Church remembers them, the Branded. The brothers bore their disfigurement with joy and were exiled to a remote fortress, where Saint Theodore reposed. When the holy Empress Theodora restored the veneration of the icons in 843, Theophanes was returned from exile and consecrated Bishop of Nicaea. There he served the Church in great holiness and devoted himself to the writing of sacred hymns, composing nearly one hundred and fifty canons, including a beautiful canon in defence of the holy icons. He reposed in peace about the year 845 and is venerated as confessor and hymnographer.

Saint Theophanes the Hymnographer

847

He was born in Arabia to wealthy Christian parents. He and his brother Theodore (December 27) became monks in the monastery of St Sabbas the Sanctified. During the iconoclast persecutions, they were sent by Patriarch Thomas of Jerusalem to the Emperor Leo the Armenian, to defend the veneration of icons. The Emperor had the two brothers tortured and imprisoned; then, as a final insult, he had a condemnation branded (or, by another account, tattooed) on their faces in twelve lines of iambic verse. When the iconoclast persecution ended, Theophanes was freed and was soon made a bishop. In all, he suffered for the holy icons for twenty-five years. Both he and his brother Theodore composed many Canons and hymns, which are still used in the Church’s services. He reposed in peace.

Our Holy Father Philotheos Kokkinos,Patriarch of Constantinople

1379

He was born in Thessalonika around 1300; his mother was a convert from Judaism. He entered monastic life, first at Mt Sinai, then at the Great Lavra on Mt Athos. The so-called “Hesychast controversy” was then raging, and St Philotheos became one of the firmest and most effective supporters of St Gregory Palamas (November 14) in his defense of Orthodoxy against western-inspired attacks on the doctrines of uncreated Grace and the possibility of true union with God. It was St Philotheos who drafted the Hagiorite Tome, the manifesto of the monks of Mt Athos setting forth how the Saints partake of the Divine and uncreated Light which the Apostles beheld at Christ’s Transfiguration. In 1351, he took part in the “Hesychast Council” in Constantinople, and wrote its Acts. In 1354 he was made Patriarch of Constantinople; he stepped down after one year, but was recalled to the Patriarchal throne in 1364. He continued to be a zealous champion of undiluted Orthodoxy, writing treatises setting forth the theology of the Uncreated Energies of God and refuting the scholastic philosophy that was then infecting the Western church. Despite (or because of?) his uncompromising Orthodoxy, he always sought a true, rather than political, reconciliation with the West, and even worked to convene an Ecumenical Council to resolve the differences between the churches. This holy Patriarch was deposed in 1376 when the Emperor Andronicus IV came to the throne; he died in exile in 1379. St Philotheos composed the Church’s services to St Gregory Palamas. He is not listed in the Synaxaria, but is venerated as a Saint in the Greek church.

Daily readings

Epistle

weekly cycle

1 Corinthians — 1 Corinthians 15.39-45

³⁹All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one flesh of men, and another flesh of beasts, and another flesh of birds, and another of fishes. ³⁹All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds. ⁴⁰There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. ⁴⁰There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. ⁴¹There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for one star differeth from another star in glory. ⁴¹There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory. ⁴²So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: ⁴²So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: ⁴³it is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: ⁴³It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: ⁴⁴it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. ⁴⁴It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. ⁴⁵So also it is written, The first man Adam became a living soul. The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. ⁴⁵And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

Gospel

weekly cycle

Luke — Luke 5.27-32

²⁷And after these things he went forth, and beheld a publican, named Levi, sitting at the place of toll, and said unto him, Follow me.

²⁷And after these things he went forth, and saw a publican, named Levi, sitting at the receipt of custom: and he said unto him, Follow me. ²⁸And he left all, rose up, and followed him. ²⁸And he forsook all, and rose up and followed him. ²⁹And Levi made him a great feast in his own house: and there was a great company of publicans and of others that sat down with them.

²⁹And Levi made him a great feast in his house: and there was a great multitude of publicans and of others that were sitting at meat with them. ³⁰And the Pharisees and their scribes murmured against his disciples, saying, Why do ye eat and drink with the publicans and sinners? ³⁰But their scribes and Pharisees murmured against his disciples, saying, Why do ye eat and drink with publicans and sinners? ³¹And Jesus answering said unto them, They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick. ³¹And Jesus answering said unto them, They that are in health have no need of a physician; but they that are sick. ³²I am not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. ³²I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.