Tuesday, 25 August 2026

Relics of Apostle Bartholomew

Tuesday of the 13th week after Pentecost

135 days after Pascha · Tone 3 · Black squigg (6-stich typikon symbol) · No Fast

Saints commemorated

Holy Apostle Titus of the Seventy, Bishop of Crete

Saint Titus is numbered among the seventy apostles of the Lord. Born in Crete to a noble pagan family and well learned in Hellenic philosophy, he was drawn to faith in the one true God after reading the Hebrew Scriptures, and was sent by the proconsul of Crete to Jerusalem to inquire concerning the wonders being told of Christ. There he beheld the Saviour, heard his teaching, and after the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost was baptised by the Apostle Paul, becoming his beloved fellow worker and companion in many of his journeys. Saint Paul addressed to him one of his pastoral epistles, instructing him in the ordering of the Cretan Church, of which he had been consecrated the first bishop. There Saint Titus preached the gospel, ordained priests in every city, and laboured to root out the remnants of pagan worship, falling asleep in peace at a great age. The Church keeps this day in honour of the translation of his holy relics; his principal feast is on 25 August together with another commemoration on 4 January with the seventy apostles.

Saint Epiphanius, Patriarch of Constantinople

Saint Epiphanius was Patriarch of Constantinople from 520 to 535 during the reign of the Emperor Justin I and the early years of his nephew Justinian. A presbyter of the Great Church renowned for his learning, his almsgiving and his ascetic life, he was raised to the patriarchal throne after the repose of Saint John of Cappadocia. Saint Epiphanius worked to restore communion between the see of Constantinople and the see of Rome after the Acacian schism, and confirmed the Orthodox faith in the canons proclaimed in his time. After ruling the Church of Constantinople for fifteen years he reposed in the Lord in 535. He is commemorated together with the other holy patriarchs of Constantinople honoured on this day.

Saint Menas, Patriarch of Constantinople

552

Saint Menas, surnamed the Wonderworker, served as Patriarch of Constantinople from 536 to 552 during the reign of the Emperor Justinian the Great. Before his elevation he was the priest in charge of the church and hospice of the holy Martyr Sampson the Hospitable. As patriarch he consecrated the new church of the Holy Wisdom of God, the great Hagia Sophia, on Christmas Day 537, and laboured zealously to uphold the Orthodox faith in the troubled period of the Three Chapters controversy. He fell asleep in the Lord in the year 552 and is honoured by the Church for his pastoral wisdom, his almsgiving and his many miracles.

Translation of the Relics of the Holy Apostle Bartholomew

The Holy Apostle Bartholomew, one of the Twelve, suffered for Christ at Albanopolis in Armenia in the year 71. The faithful gathered up his body and laid it in a stone reliquary in the city of Albanopolis, and many were healed at his tomb. Under the Emperor Anastasius (491-518) the relics were translated to the newly built city of Anastasiopolis, also called Dura, in Mesopotamia. When that city fell to the Persian king Chosroes at the close of the sixth century, Christians took up the chest containing the relics and bore it away to the shores of the Black Sea; pursued by pagan priests, they were forced to commit the chest to the waves. By the providence of God it crossed the seas and came to land at the island of Lipari near Sicily, where Bishop Agatho received it after a vision. The relics were enshrined in the cathedral of Lipari, and from there in the ninth century they were translated again to Beneventum and afterwards to Rome. The Orthodox Church keeps this day in commemoration of the translation of his holy relics.

Also commemorated: Relics of Apostle Bartholomew

Daily readings

Epistle

weekly cycle

2 Corinthians — 2 Corinthians 8.16-9.5

¹⁶But thanks be to God, which put the same earnest care into the heart of Titus for you. ¹⁷For indeed he accepted the exhortation; but being more forward, of his own accord he went unto you. ¹⁸And we have sent with him the brother, whose praise is in the gospel throughout all the churches; ¹⁹And not that only, but who was also chosen of the churches to travel with us with this grace, which is administered by us to the glory of the same Lord, and declaration of your ready mind: ²⁰Avoiding this, that no man should blame us in this abundance which is administered by us: ²¹Providing for honest things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men. ²²And we have sent with them our brother, whom we have oftentimes proved diligent in many things, but now much more diligent, upon the great confidence which I have in you. ²³Whether any do enquire of Titus, he is my partner and fellowhelper concerning you: or our brethren be enquired of, they are the messengers of the churches, and the glory of Christ. ²⁴Wherefore shew ye to them, and before the churches, the proof of your love, and of our boasting on your behalf.

¹For as touching the ministering to the saints, it is superfluous for me to write to you: ²For I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia, that Achaia was ready a year ago; and your zeal hath provoked very many. ³Yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain in this behalf; that, as I said, ye may be ready: ⁴Lest haply if they of Macedonia come with me, and find you unprepared, we (that we say not, ye) should be ashamed in this same confident boasting. ⁵Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren, that they would go before unto you, and make up beforehand your bounty, whereof ye had notice before, that the same might be ready, as a matter of bounty, and not as of covetousness.

Gospel

weekly cycle

Mark — Mark 3.13-19

¹³And he goeth up into a mountain, and calleth unto him whom he would: and they came unto him. ¹⁴And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach, ¹⁵And to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils: ¹⁶And Simon he surnamed Peter; ¹⁷And James the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James; and he surnamed them Boanerges, which is, The sons of thunder: ¹⁸And Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Canaanite, ¹⁹And Judas Iscariot, which also betrayed him: and they went into an house.