Thursday, 11 June 2026

Holy Apostles Bartholomew and Barnabas

Thursday of the 2nd week after Pentecost

60 days after Pascha · Tone 8 · Red cross (polyeleos typikon symbol) · Apostles Fast (Wine and Oil are Allowed)

Saints commemorated

★ Holy Apostles Bartholomew and Barnabas

Saint Bartholomew was one of the Twelve Apostles, a Galilean; the Gospel accounts say little more about him. It is said that, after receiving the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, he traveled in the service of the Gospel to Arabia and Persia, and brought to India a translation of the Gospel according to Matthew. Eusebius writes that one hundred years later Pantaenus, an illustrious Alexandrian scholar, found this gospel when he traveled in India. By most accounts Bartholomew ended his life in Armenia, where he met his martyrdom by crucifixion. According to many, he and Nathaniel are the same person: the Gospel accounts that speak of Bartholomew do not mention Nathaniel; and St John’s Gospel,which mentions Nathanael as one of the Twelve, does not mention Bartholomew. But according to the Greek Synaxarion, Bartholomew and Simon the Zealot are one and the same. Saint Barnabas was one of the Seventy, from Cyprus, a Levite and at one time a fellow-student with St Paul under Gamaliel. After Christ’s Ascension, he led the Seventy until the Apostle Paul’s conversion. He is mentioned often in the Acts of the Apostles, which describes some of his travels as a companion of St Paul. By all accounts, he was the first to preach the Gospel of Christ in Rome and in Milan. His wonder-working relics were discovered on the island of Cyprus in the time of the Emperor Zeno; on this basis the Church of Cyprus was established as an independent Church, since it had an apostolic foundation.

Holy Apostle Barnabas of the Seventy

478

Barnabas, born Joseph, was a Levite of the island of Cyprus and the cousin of Saint Mark the Evangelist. He had been sent to Jerusalem to study the Law under the celebrated rabbi Gamaliel, and there became a fellow disciple of the future Apostle Paul. He was numbered among the Seventy whom the Lord chose and sent forth, and after Pentecost he sold a field that he possessed and laid the price at the feet of the Apostles, as is recorded in the Acts. Because of the encouragement he gave to the brethren, the Apostles called him Barnabas, "son of consolation." When Saul of Tarsus came to Jerusalem after his conversion, the disciples feared him; Barnabas brought him to the Apostles and bore witness to the genuineness of his calling. He was sent by the church of Jerusalem to confirm the new community of believers at Antioch, where for the first time the disciples were called Christians, and there he sought out Paul to share the work. Together they were set apart by the Holy Spirit for the first apostolic journey through Cyprus, Pamphylia, Pisidia and Lycaonia, and Barnabas was named with Paul as an apostle in chapter fourteen of the Acts. After parting from Paul over the question of John Mark, Barnabas returned with Mark to Cyprus to preach the Gospel. He is honoured as the founder of the Church of Cyprus and was stoned to death at Salamis by the unbelieving Jews. Mark buried him in a cave with a copy of Saint Matthew's Gospel laid upon his breast, by which his tomb was identified in the year 478 in the reign of the emperor Zeno, securing for the Church of Cyprus its autocephaly.

Holy Apostle Bartholomew

Bartholomew, identified by ancient tradition with the Nathaniel of Saint John's Gospel, was one of the Twelve Apostles, born at Cana of Galilee. Saint Philip brought him to Jesus, who saluted him with the words, "Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile." After Pentecost the lot of his apostolic mission fell upon distant lands. The fathers record that he preached the Gospel in India, in Mesopotamia and Persia, in Lycaonia and along the shores of the Black Sea, and that he carried with him a Hebrew copy of the Gospel of Saint Matthew, which Pantaenus of Alexandria found still being read among Indian Christians a century later. With the Apostle Philip he laboured at Hierapolis in Phrygia, where Philip was martyred, and Bartholomew himself was crucified head downwards but taken alive from the cross at the prayers of the Christian community. Released from Hierapolis, Bartholomew journeyed to Greater Armenia, where he converted the king Polymius and many of his court. The royal brother Astyages, stirred up by the priests of the idols, seized the apostle at Albanopolis, sometimes identified with the city of Albanus near the Caspian Sea, and after grievous tortures had him flayed and beheaded about the year 71. The faithful gathered his relics and laid them in a stone coffin in the city. The translation of his relics, kept on this day in some calendars, recalls how during the persecution of the Christians under the Persians the chest containing his body was cast into the sea and miraculously borne by the waves to the island of Lipari, west of Italy, and afterwards carried to Beneventum, where he is venerated to this day. The Eastern Church keeps his memory together with that of the Apostle Barnabas on 11 June.

Saint Luke the Confessor, Archbishop of Simferopol and Crimea

Saint Luke was born Valentin Felixovich Voyno-Yasenetsky on 27 April 1877 at Kerch in the Crimea, of an old Polish Catholic family long settled in Russia. After studying art he turned to medicine out of love for the poor, took his degree at Kiev, and during the Russo-Japanese war served as a frontline surgeon. His pioneering work on local anaesthesia and on the surgery of suppurative wounds, set out in a treatise of 1934 which was crowned by the Stalin Prize, made him one of the foremost surgeons of the Russian-speaking world. The death of his wife in 1919 deepened the faith he had received from his mother, and in 1921 he was ordained priest at Tashkent while continuing to teach and operate. In 1923 he received monastic tonsure and was consecrated bishop of Tashkent under the name of Luke. From that moment until the end of his life, Saint Luke combined the labours of an active diocesan bishop, a confessor of the faith and a working surgeon. He spent eleven years in three exiles to Siberia and the far north, in prisons, in transit camps and in the icy Yenisei region, refusing every demand to lay aside his rank or his cassock. During the Second World War he served in the military hospitals of Krasnoyarsk and was named Archbishop of Krasnoyarsk, then of Tambov, and from 1946 of Simferopol and the Crimea. Though almost blind in his last years, he continued to preach, to write, to receive the sick and to reconcile penitents, leaving behind volumes of sermons and the work "Spirit, Soul and Body." He fell asleep in the Lord on 11 June 1961 at Simferopol and was glorified as a Confessor by the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church in 2000.

Commemoration of the appearance of the Archangel Gabriel to a monk on Mt Athos, and the revelation of the hymn "It is Truly Meet" (Axion Estin

980

A monk on the Holy Mountain was chanting the ancient hymn to the Most Holy Theotokos, “More honorable than the Cherubim…” (composed by St Cosmas the Hymnographer) in his cell, when the Archangel Gabriel appeared to him, disguised as a monk. The angel chanted the same hymn, but began it differently: “It is truly meet to call thee blessed, the Theotokos, the ever-blessed and most pure and Mother of our God. More honorable than the Cherubim…” Amazed at the hymn’s beauty, the monk asked the stranger to write it down for him: the Angel inscribed it on a stone tablet with his finger, then vanished from sight. The tablet was brought to Constantinople and shown to the Emperor and the Patriarch as proof of the miracle. From that time, this version of the hymn began to be sung in the Divine Liturgy, as it is to this day.

Daily readings

Epistle

weekly cycle

Romans — Romans 5.10-16

¹⁰For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. ¹¹And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.

¹²Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned: ¹³(For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law. ¹⁴Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. ¹⁵But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. ¹⁶And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification.

Gospel

weekly cycle

Matthew — Matthew 8.23-27

²³And when he was entered into a ship, his disciples followed him. ²⁴And, behold, there arose a great tempest in the sea, insomuch that the ship was covered with the waves: but he was asleep. ²⁵And his disciples came to him, and awoke him, saying, Lord, save us: we perish. ²⁶And he saith unto them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm. ²⁷But the men marvelled, saying, What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him!

Vespers

1 Peter — 1 Peter 1.3-9

³Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, ⁴To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, ⁵Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. ⁶Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: ⁷That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: ⁸Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: ⁹Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.

Vespers

1 Peter — 1 Peter 1.13-19

¹³Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; ¹⁴As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance: ¹⁵But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; ¹⁶Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy. ¹⁷And if ye call on the Father, who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man’s work, pass the time of your sojourning here in fear: ¹⁸Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; ¹⁹But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot:

Vespers

1 Peter — 1 Peter 2.11-24

¹¹Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; ¹²Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles: that, whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation.

¹³Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; ¹⁴Or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well. ¹⁵For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men: ¹⁶As free, and not using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness, but as the servants of God. ¹⁷Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king. ¹⁸Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward. ¹⁹For this is thankworthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully. ²⁰For what glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently? but if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God. ²¹For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: ²²Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: ²³Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously: ²⁴Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.

Matins Gospel

John — John 21.15-25

¹⁵So when they had dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my lambs. ¹⁶He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my sheep. ¹⁷He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep. ¹⁸Verily, verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest: but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not. ¹⁹This spake he, signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when he had spoken this, he saith unto him, Follow me. ²⁰Then Peter, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved following; which also leaned on his breast at supper, and said, Lord, which is he that betrayeth thee? ²¹Peter seeing him saith to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this man do? ²²Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? follow thou me. ²³Then went this saying abroad among the brethren, that that disciple should not die: yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not die; but, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? ²⁴This is the disciple which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things: and we know that his testimony is true. ²⁵And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen.

Epistle

— Apostles

Acts — Acts 11.19-26, 29-30

¹⁹Now they which were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen travelled as far as Phenice, and Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching the word to none but unto the Jews only. ²⁰And some of them were men of Cyprus and Cyrene, which, when they were come to Antioch, spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus. ²¹And the hand of the Lord was with them: and a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord.

²²Then tidings of these things came unto the ears of the church which was in Jerusalem: and they sent forth Barnabas, that he should go as far as Antioch. ²³Who, when he came, and had seen the grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord. ²⁴For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith: and much people was added unto the Lord. ²⁵Then departed Barnabas to Tarsus, for to seek Saul: ²⁶And when he had found him, he brought him unto Antioch. And it came to pass, that a whole year they assembled themselves with the church, and taught much people. And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch. ²⁹Then the disciples, every man according to his ability, determined to send relief unto the brethren which dwelt in Judæa: ³⁰Which also they did, and sent it to the elders by the hands of Barnabas and Saul.

Gospel

— Apostles

Luke — Luke 10.16-21

¹⁶He that heareth you heareth me; and he that despiseth you despiseth me; and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me.

¹⁷And the seventy returned again with joy, saying, Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name. ¹⁸And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. ¹⁹Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you. ²⁰Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.

²¹In that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight.