Monday, 17 November 2025

Monday of the 24th week after Pentecost

211 days after Pascha · Tone 6 · Red squigg (doxology typikon symbol) · Nativity Fast

Saints commemorated

Saint Genadius, Patriarch of Constantinople

Saint Genadius was patriarch of Constantinople from the year 458 to 471 and is remembered as one of the wisest and most pious occupants of that throne in the difficult years following the Council of Chalcedon. Trained from his youth in the Scriptures and the writings of the Fathers, he composed many commentaries on the prophets and the apostle Paul, of which fragments survive, and was held in such reverence by his contemporaries that he was numbered among the great teachers of the eastern church. He was zealous in upholding the Orthodox faith against the surviving Nestorians and the rising Monophysites, ordained none to the priesthood who had not first learned the Psalter by heart, and reformed the manner of life of the clergy of the imperial city. He convened a synod at Constantinople in 459 against the buying and selling of holy orders, and his synodical letter on this matter has been preserved by Justinian among the laws of the Church. After thirteen years of fruitful pastorship he reposed in peace, leaving behind a memory cherished by the Greek Church, which numbers him among the saintly bishops of the see of Saint Andrew the First-Called.

Saint Gregory the Wonderworker, Bishop of Neocaesarea

Saint Gregory, surnamed Thaumaturgus or Wonderworker on account of the multitude of his miracles, was born about the year 213 at Neocaesarea in Pontus of distinguished pagan parents and originally bore the name Theodore. After studying rhetoric and law at home, he and his brother Athenodorus journeyed to Caesarea in Palestine where, intending to proceed to the schools of Berytus, they fell in with the great teacher Origen and were so seized by his exposition of the Christian philosophy that they remained with him for some five years, becoming Christians and being trained in all the divine and human sciences. Returning to Pontus he was, against his will, consecrated bishop of his native city by Phaedimus of Amasea, although at that time he had only seventeen Christians under his care. By the time of his repose about the year 270 it is said that there were only seventeen pagans left, so great was the conversion wrought by his teaching, his austere life and the wonders that God worked through him. He moved mountains by prayer, dried up a marsh that was a cause of strife between two brothers, drove a demon from a pagan temple and obliged it to return at his command, foretold things to come, and received in a vision from the Theotokos and Saint John the Theologian a confession of the Holy Trinity that became the foundation of his teaching against the heresies. He took part in the council that condemned Paul of Samosata and gave to the Church a celebrated Canonical Epistle on the discipline to be observed after the incursions of the Goths.

Saint Hilda, Abbess of Whitby

614

A noble kinswoman of St Edwin, king of Northumbria (commemorated October 12), Hilda was baptized at a young age through the preaching of St Paulinus, one of the first missionaries sent from Rome to British Isles. At the age of thirty-three she renounced the world and entered monastic life. At first, she sought to enter a monastery near Paris in Gaul, but she was called back to her homeland by St Aidan, Bishop of Lindisfarne (August 31), who, discerning her already-apparent spiritual gifts, set her as Abbess of a small monastery. As her gifts of discernment and spiritual guidance became more widely-known, she led larger monasteries, finally establishing the Monastery of Whitby in 657. The Saint spent the next thirty-three years directing the Monastery, which became a beacon of Christian life throughout the British Isles and beyond. The Monastery was unusual by modern standards in that it comprised both a women’s and a men’s monastic house, with Mother Hilda as spiritual head of both. The community became a training-ground for priests and bishops who went on to spread the Gospel of Christ throughout Britain.

Commoners, kings and Bishop Aidan himself came regularly to her for spiritual counsel, and she was in her own lifetime regarded as the Mother of her country. For the last six years of her life she was afflicted with an unremitting burning fever, but she continued her holy work undeterred until her repose in 680. At the moment of her death, Saint Begu, in a different monastery, was awakened by a vision of Hilda’s soul being borne up to heaven by a company of angels.

The Synaxarion concludes, “Saint Hilda, like her contemporaries Saint Etheldreda (23 June) and Saint Ebba (25 Aug.), belongs to that monastic company of women of royal birth who exercised a formative influence in the English Church of the seventh century, but she is also a rare example of a spiritual Mother, who received from God the gift of directing not only nuns but monks and bishops as well; for in the Lord Jesus there is neither male nor female, but a new creation (Gal. 3:28).”

Saint Justus, Archbishop of Rochester

Saint Justus was one of the second band of Roman missionaries sent by Pope Gregory the Great to assist Saint Augustine in the conversion of the English, arriving in Kent about the year 601 in the company of the abbot Mellitus and Paulinus. In 604, when Augustine had divided the kingdom into two sees, Justus was consecrated the first bishop of Rochester, where King Ethelbert built for him the church of Saint Andrew. After the death of Ethelbert and the apostasy of his son Eadbald, Justus and Mellitus withdrew for a time to Gaul, returning when Eadbald himself was converted and renewed the work of the mission. On the death of Archbishop Mellitus in 624 Justus was raised to the metropolitan see of Canterbury, from which he sent Paulinus to preach to the Northumbrians and received from Pope Boniface V the pallium and a letter of encouragement preserved by the Venerable Bede. Reposing in peace on 10 November about the year 627 and buried in the church of Saint Augustine at Canterbury, his memory has been honoured among the apostles of the English nation, and is kept on this day in some Orthodox calendars together with the other early bishops of the British Isles.

Saint Lazarus the Iconographer of Constantinople

Saint Lazarus lived at Constantinople in the ninth century and was a monk and priest renowned for the great skill with which he painted the holy icons of Christ, the Theotokos and the saints. During the second iconoclast persecution under the emperor Theophilus he refused to give up the painting of icons or to set his hand to any image other than the holy ones, and for this confession he was tortured by the imperial command, his hands being burned with red-hot iron plates that he might no more practise his sacred art. By the prayers of the Theotokos his hands were healed, and as soon as he was released he resumed the painting of icons, restoring those that had been destroyed in the imperial city. After the death of Theophilus and the restoration of the icons by the empress Theodora and the patriarch Methodius in 843, the empress Theodora sent him on a mission to Pope Benedict III at Rome, but on the return journey he reposed in peace about the year 857, and his relics were brought back to Constantinople and laid in the Church of Saint Eudoxia.

Venerable Nikon, Abbot of Radonezh

He was born in 1350 in the town of Yuriev-in-the-fields, between Rostov and Radonezh. At a very young age he sought out St Sergius of Radonezh, seeking to be his disciple; but the Saint placed him in another monastery, where he soon became known as the ‘lover of obedience’ for his humility and selflessness. At last, when he was about thirty and had been ordained to the priesthood, he was able to go to Radonezh, where St Sergius, discerning his advanced spiritual state, made Nikon his cell-attendant. At the death of St Sergius, the brethren unanimously elected Nikon as their Abbot. In 1408, St Nikon was warned in an apparition that the monastery would be sacked by Tatars, so he and his monks fled with the monastery’s books and sacred vessels. When they returned they found that the monastery had been burned to the ground. Setting to work immediately, they built a new monastery over the next few years. In 1422 the relics of St Sergius, which had been miraculously preserved in the Tatar attack, were installed in the new monastery church.

The Synaxarion concludes: “Full of years and already transported in spirit to the Kingdom of Heaven, Saint Nikon said to his disciples, ‘Take me from here to the bright church prepared for me by the prayers of my spiritual father. I do not want to stay any longer here below!’ When he had communicated in the holy Mysteries and blessed his brethren one by one, he cried out, ‘O my soul, draw near with joy to the place that has been prepared for thy rest. Draw near with joy because Christ is calling thee!’ Then he fell asleep in peace. He was laid to rest opposite the tomb of Saint Sergius. Since then he has often appeared with Saint Sergius in order to heal the sick or to protect the Holy Trinity Lavra in times of danger.”

Our Holy Father Longinus

“Our holy Father Longinus lived in the Egyptian deserts during the fourth or fifth century. Among other sayings of his, are the following: A dead man judges no one, and it is just the same with the man who is humble. To someone who wanted to go to live in exile, he replied: Unless you guard your tongue, you will not be able to live in exile wherever you go. To someone else who wanted to live in solitude, he said: If you do not exercise the virtues in the midst of men, still less will you be able to do so in solitude. By his life and his words he taught love of humility as superior to all the works of ascesis, saying: Fasting humbles the body, vigil purifies the intellect and stillness leads to the affliction that baptizes man anew and cleanses him of all sin. We also owe to him the famous saying: Shed your blood and receive the Spirit.” (Synaxarion)

Daily readings

Epistle

weekly cycle

1 Thessalonians — 1 Thessalonians 2.20-3.8

²⁰For ye are our glory and our joy. ²⁰For ye are our glory and joy.

¹Wherefore when we could no longer forbear, we thought it good to be left behind at Athens alone;

¹Wherefore when we could no longer forbear, we thought it good to be left at Athens alone; ²and sent Timothy, our brother and God’s minister in the gospel of Christ, to establish you, and to comfort you concerning your faith; ²And sent Timotheus, our brother, and minister of God, and our fellowlabourer in the gospel of Christ, to establish you, and to comfort you concerning your faith: ³that no man be moved by these afflictions; for yourselves know that hereunto we are appointed. ³That no man should be moved by these afflictions: for yourselves know that we are appointed thereunto. ⁴For verily, when we were with you, we told you beforehand that we are to suffer affliction; even as it came to pass, and ye know. ⁴For verily, when we were with you, we told you before that we should suffer tribulation; even as it came to pass, and ye know. ⁵For this cause, when I could no longer forbear, I sent to know your faith, lest by some means the tempter have tempted you, and our labour be in vain. ⁵For this cause I also, when I could no longer forbear, sent that I might know your faith, lest by any means the tempter had tempted you, and our labor should be in vain. ⁶But now when Timotheus came from you unto us, and brought us good tidings of your faith and charity, and that ye have good remembrance of us always, desiring greatly to see us, as we also to see you: ⁶But when Timothy came even now unto us from you, and brought us glad tidings of your faith and love, and that ye have good remembrance of us always, longing to see us, even as we also to see you; ⁷for this cause, brethren, we were comforted over you in all our distress and affliction through your faith: ⁷Therefore, brethren, we were comforted over you in all our affliction and distress by your faith: ⁸for now we live, if ye stand fast in the Lord. ⁸For now we live, if ye stand fast in the Lord.

Gospel

weekly cycle

Luke — Luke 14.12-15

¹²Then said he also to him that bade him, When thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbours; lest they also bid thee again, and a recompence be made thee.

¹²And he said to him also that had bidden him, When thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, nor thy kinsmen, nor rich neighbors; lest haply they also bid thee again, and a recompense be made thee. ¹³But when thou makest a feast, bid the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind: ¹³But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind: ¹⁴And thou shalt be blessed; for they cannot recompense thee: for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just. ¹⁴and thou shalt be blessed; because they have not wherewith to recompense thee: for thou shalt be recompensed in the resurrection of the just.

¹⁵And when one of them that sat at meat with him heard these things, he said unto him, Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God.

¹⁵And when one of them that sat at meat with him heard these things, he said unto him, Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God.