Tuesday, 23 June 2026

Martyr Agrippina of Rome

Tuesday of the 4th week after Pentecost

72 days after Pascha · Tone 2 · Liturgy · Apostles Fast (Wine and Oil are Allowed)

Saints commemorated

Holy Martyr Eustochios the Presbyter and his companions

Saint Eustochios lived in the city of Ouasada during the reign of the Emperor Maximian at the beginning of the fourth century, when Agrippa was governor. He had been a priest of the idols, but seeing the unyielding courage of the Christian martyrs and the wonders worked through them he turned away from the worship of the demons and sought out Eudoxius, the Bishop of Antioch, who baptised him and afterwards ordained him to the priesthood. Returning to a village in Lycaonia called Lystra, he found his nephew Gaius and the three children Lollius, Probus and Urban, and instructed them in the faith, baptising them together with the rest of his kindred. When the persecution overtook them, all were brought before the court, tortured for their confession of Christ, and beheaded at Lystra. Their joint memorial honours a household drawn out of pagan priesthood into the company of the holy martyrs.

Holy Virgin Martyr Agrippina of Rome

Saint Agrippina was born and brought up in Rome, where from her earliest years she trained herself to live by the Gospel, expelling the passions from her heart through prayer, fasting and unwavering chastity. Betrothed in spirit to Christ alone, she suffered during the persecution of the Emperor Valerian in the middle of the third century. Brought before the tribunal, she boldly confessed her faith and was given over to torture; she was beaten with staves until her bones were broken, and an angel of the Lord appeared to comfort and strengthen her, until under fresh torments she gave up her soul to God around the year 275. Her companions Vassa, Paula and Agathonike took up her body and bore it secretly to Sicily, where they buried it; a church later raised over her relics became famous for healings and miracles, and her intercession was invoked against the raids of the Saracens. In the eleventh century her relics were translated to Constantinople, where her memory was kept with great solemnity.

Saint Etheldreda, Abbess of Ely

Saint Etheldreda, called Aethelthryth in the Old English, was the third and most renowned of the saintly daughters of King Anna of East Anglia, born in the 630s probably at Exning in Suffolk. About the year 652 she was given in marriage to Tondbert, prince of the South Gyrwe, on condition that her vow of perpetual virginity be honoured, and after his death three years later she withdrew to the Isle of Ely which had come to her as her dower. In 660 she was married for political reasons to the youthful Ecgfrith of Northumbria, but after twelve years of unbroken virginity, when the king pressed his rights as her husband, she fled with the consent of Saint Wilfrid of York to the monastery of Coldingham, where she received the veil from Abbess Ebba. In 673 she returned to Ely and there founded a great double monastery for monks and nuns, of which she was installed as abbess by Wilfrid. She lived in extreme austerity, wearing only woollen garments, eating once a day, and rising before matins to remain at prayer until daybreak. Toward the end of her life a tumour appeared on her neck, which she received with thanksgiving as a chastisement for the love of jewelled necklaces in her youth. She died of the plague on 23 June 679 after some six years as abbess. Sixteen years later her sister and successor Saint Seaxburh raised her body and found it incorrupt; she became one of the most loved saints of the English Church, and her shrine at Ely Cathedral remained a place of great pilgrimage until the Reformation.

Translation of the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God

On this day the Russian Church commemorates the deliverance of Moscow in 1480 from the invading hordes of Khan Akhmat of the Golden Horde, ascribing the salvation of the city to the intercession of the Most Holy Theotokos through her wonder-working Vladimir Icon. The icon, attributed by tradition to the Evangelist Luke and brought from Constantinople to Kiev in the early twelfth century, had been translated to Vladimir by the holy Prince Andrew Bogolyubsky and afterwards to Moscow, where it became the chief palladium of the Russian land. As Khan Akhmat advanced to the river Ugra and Grand Prince Ivan III drew up his forces opposite him, the people of Moscow gathered before the icon in continual prayer; for many weeks the two armies stood without battle, and at length, seized by inexplicable terror, the Tatars turned and fled. This bloodless victory, known as the Standing on the Ugra, ended more than two centuries of the Mongol yoke. The festal celebration of the icon is kept three times in the year, on 21 May, 23 June and 26 August, each marking a different deliverance granted to the Russian people through the prayers of the Mother of God.

Daily readings

Epistle

weekly cycle

Romans — Romans 10.11-11.2

¹¹For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. ¹²For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. ¹³For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. ¹⁴How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? ¹⁵And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things! ¹⁶But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report? ¹⁷So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. ¹⁸But I say, Have they not heard? Yes verily, their sound went into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world. ¹⁹But I say, Did not Israel know? First Moses saith, I will provoke you to jealousy by them that are no people, and by a foolish nation I will anger you. ²⁰But Esaias is very bold, and saith, I was found of them that sought me not; I was made manifest unto them that asked not after me. ²¹But to Israel he saith, All day long I have stretched forth my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people.

¹I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. ²God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew. Wot ye not what the scripture saith of Elias? how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying,

Gospel

weekly cycle

Matthew — Matthew 11.16-20

¹⁶But whereunto shall I liken this generation? It is like unto children sitting in the markets, and calling unto their fellows, ¹⁷And saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented. ¹⁸For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, He hath a devil. ¹⁹The Son of man came eating and drinking, and they say, Behold a man gluttonous, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners. But wisdom is justified of her children.

²⁰Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, because they repented not: