On this, the 1st Sunday after Pentecost, we commemorate the Hieromartyr Eusebius, Bishop of Samosata (380), Martyrs Zeno and his servant Zenas of Philadelphia (304), the Martyrs Galcteon, Juliana and Saturninus of Constan-tinople, St. Alban, the First Martyr of Britain (ca. 287), Hieromartyr Nicetas of Remesiana (414-420), and the Martyr Nicetas the Dacian (370-372).
A touchstone of true Orthodoxy is love for Christ's saints. From the earliest Christian centuries the Church has celebrated her Saints - first the Apostles and Martyrs who died for Christ, then desert-dwellers who crucified themselves for the love of Christ, and the hierarchs and shepherds who gave their lies for the salvation of their flocks. From the beginning the Church has treasured the written lives of these her Saints and has celebrated their memory in divine services. These two sources - the lives and the services - are extremely important to us today for the preservation of the authentic Orthodox tradition of faith and piety. The false "enlightenment" of our modern age is so all-pervasive that it draws many Orthodox Christians into its puffed up wisdom and without their even knowing it they are taken away from the true spirit of Orthodoxy and left only with the shell of Orthodox rites, formulas and customs.
- Fr. Seraphim Rose (+1983)
We are sometimes tempted to ask, if the Orthodox Church is the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ, why is it that so few belong to it? Visibly, if not numerically, Orthodoxy is such a minority religion in this country that it is easy to become discouraged. Unless we belong to a large parish we do not enjoy the support of "fellowship groups" as do so many Protestants. In this sense Orthodoxy can be a "lonely religion," especially for children and teenagers who find comfort in numbers and what's popular.
Partly to blame here is our weak sense of history. Our world-view tends to be horizontal - which is the way most Protestants view the Church. If, however, we adopt a vertical, i.e., historical perspective, we find that Orthodoxy is THE dominant Christian faith for all times. Here, too, we discover one of Orthodoxy's greatest treasures, the fellowship with the saints, holy men and women who, in every century, every decade, every year, have testified to the true Faith with their lives.
It is not enough to content ourselves with this knowledge. We must become personally acquainted with the saints. History is helpful, but it speaks primarily to the mind, whereas the Lives of saints speak more directly to the heart (such knowledge is more secure than that which enters the intellect and can be more easily dislodged by rational argument). Saints are living icons which offer us a glimpse of a transfigured world, a return to paradise, the very purpose of man's life.
Man has always learned most readily by example, and from the very beginning, the Church has recognized the benefit of preserving the memory of her heroes and their exploits. And so we have the Acts of the Apostles, and the early martyrologies; we have the Lausaic History from the fourth century, a compilation of the lives of the desert-dwellers, those men and women who "wished to lay hold upon their souls and to bind upon their heads the crown of holiness;" we have St. Gregory of Tours' Lives of the Fathers of Gaul ("Vita Patrum"), and St. Gregory the Dialogist's Lives of the Italian Saints. In the eighth century Venerable Bede recorded the Lives of the early British saints, and in the seventeenth century , in Russia, St. Dmitri of Rostov began compiling lives of saints which ran to twelve thick volumes, one for each month. Today we have available to us in English a rich store of hagiographical material, and we should make proper use of it. The purpose of the Lives of the saints is not to give abstract knowledge, but to edify and inspire to imitation.
St. Paul told his spiritual children, "Be ye followers of me . . ." (I Cor. 4:16). Indeed, what can speed our ascent on the ladder of virtue more than being able to follow in the footsteps of someone who has successfully gone before us? We read in the Life of St. Anthony the Great that visiting various desert ascetics, he learned from the strengths of each of them, "like a wise bee which hovers and rests over plants of every kind which are filled with honey that it may fill its habitation with the goodness of the earth." Likewise, St. John of Kronstadt counsels:
"At the end of your morning and evening prayers call upon the saints, so that seeing every virtue realized in them, you may yourself imitate every virtue. Learn from the patriarchs childlike faith and obedience to the Lord, from the apostles and prophets zeal to preach the word of God and the salvation of men, and from the martyrs and confessors firmness before the infidel and godless, from the ascetics to crucify your own flesh and its lusts, and from the unmercenary ones not to love profit and freely to help the needy."
In our daily struggle against sin, it is encouraging to know that the saints were men and women of flesh and blood who were beset by many of the same temptations. They can help us not only as inspiring examples of those who have overcome, but also as heavenly intercessors standing before the throne of God. In becoming closely acquainted with them, through learning about their lives and also through praying to them, we become more aware of the reality and the proximity of the other world. "God's saints," writes St. John of Kronstadt, "as our brethren - but perfect - live and are near us, ever ready to help us, by the grace of God. We live together with them, in the home of our Heavenly Father, only in different parts of it. We live in the earthly, they in the heavenly half; but we can converse with them and they with us."
The poverty of today's world is reflected in its lack of real heroes, men and women who can offer positive values. We in the Orthodox Church are fortunate to have the company of saints.
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith."
+ Sacred Tradition is the very Church; without the Sacred Tradition the Church does not exist. Those who deny Sacred Tradition deny the Church and the preaching of the Apostles.
-St. Nectarios of Aegina (+1920)
+ Just as streams of fresh water that feed the earth and satisfy those thirsting for refreshment are not diminished, so also the healings from the relics of the saints are limitless when the faith of those who run to them does not fail. Physicians, having used all their medicines, sometimes request others; but not so the saints whose faith alone, without which all the rest is vain, according to the word of the Gospel: "Thy faith hath saved thee," and "According to thy faith be it done unto thee" (Matt. (:22, 29).
- from the life of St. Cyril of White Lake
+ God's Saints are so beautiful, incorruptible, fragrant flowers. Do not touch these flowers with lips defiled by sin - that is, pray to them with a pure heart and pure lips, not carelessly, not with distracted thoughts, but with reverence, and without haste. They are speaking heavens; they led a heavenly, wonderful life on earth, doing great deeds, they lived in great love, in deep humility, gentleness, patience, self-denial, loving God above all things.
- St. John of Kronstadt (+1907)
Fr. Jerome served the Divine Liturgy daily, yet serving so frequently did not make the manner in which he served any less contrite. He was a worthy celebrant of the Most High. Often during the Liturgy, we heard pure children who were participating in the divine worship exclaim, "Look, the elder is not walking on the ground." Indeed, he had been granted divine gifts, and with the pure eyes of their souls they saw him elevated in the air about one or two spans above the ground. He celebrated his divine work as an immaterial liturgist and an angel of the Lord.
Elder Jerome especially loved to speak about the saint of the day. He would say, "What saint are we celebrating? Bring the book so that we can see what this saint did for Christ. And I - what do I do for Him?" After he would speak a bit about the saint - he knew all the lives of the saints by heart - he would open the book. And although he knew the accounts well, he read as enthusiastically as if it were the first time. His relationship with the saints was fervent and vivid, similar to a relationship with an intimate friend, who pays close attention to you when you speak. His love for the saints was amazing. It was as if he himself lived through their martyrdoms, as if he himself participated in their pains.
While reading, his eyes filled with tears. Because he could not restrain himself and hide his tears, he would say that he was elderly and tired and would give the book to another to continue. Often at the beginning of the reading, he would hand the book to the sacred chanter or to a priest, because he knew that again his pure tears would betray him.
A man who worked near the church had tattered pants. He asked Fr. Jerome whether he had any old ones to give him. "Of course, of course," he said, "wait a moment." The Elder went into the next room and took off his own pants, because he did not have any others. Covered with his cassock, he returned and gave them to the man.