Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Saturday of the Cheesefare

Epistle

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Romans [§ 115]. Brethren:

14 ¹⁹Let us then pursue the things of peace and the things of building up of one another. ²⁰On account of food, cease putting down the work of God. All things indeed are clean, but it is bad to the man who eateth so as to be a stumbling block. ²¹It is good not to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor to do anything in which thy brother stumbleth, or is scandalized, or is made weak. ²²Hast thou faith? Be having it with respect to thyself before God. Happy is the one who adjudgeth not himself in what he approveth. ²³But the one who doubteth is condemned if he should eat, because it is not of faith; and all which is not of faith is sin.

²⁴Now to Him Who is able to establish you according to my Gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to a revelation of the mystery which was kept in secret in times lasting for ages, ²⁵but now hath been made manifest, and by prophetic Scriptures, according to the commandment of the eternal God, was made known to all the nations to an obedience of faith— ²⁶to God, alone wise, to Whom be glory through Jesus Christ to the ages. Amen.

A Different Reading for the Commemoration of the Ascetics

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Galatians [§ 213]. Brethren:

5 ²²The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, ²³meekness, self-control; against such things there is no law. ²⁴But they who are of the Christ crucified the flesh with the passions and the lusts. ²⁵If we live by the Spirit, let us also be walking by the Spirit. ²⁶Let us not become vainglorious, provoking one another, envying one another.

6 ¹Brethren, even if a man should be overtaken in some transgression, ye, the spiritual ones, be restoring such a one in the spirit of meekness, looking out for thyself, lest thou also be tempted. ²Keep on bearing one another’s burdens, and thus fill up the law of the Christ.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew [§ 16]. The Lord said:

6 ¹“Be taking heed not to do your alms before men, in order to be seen by them; otherwise ye have no reward with your Father Who is in the heavens. ²“Therefore, whenever thou art doing alms, do not begin to sound a trumpet before thee, even as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, in order that they might be glorified by men. Verily I say to you, they have received their reward. ³“But when thou art doing alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand is doing, ⁴“so that thine alms might be in secret; and thy Father Who seeth in secret Himself shall render what is due to thee openly. ⁵“And whenever thou art praying, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites; for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, in order that they might be made manifest to men. Verily I say to you, they have received their reward. ⁶“But thou, whenever thou art praying, enter into thy chamber, and after thou shuttest thy door, pray to thy Father Who is in secret; and thy Father Who seeth in secret, shall render what is due to thee openly. ⁷“But when ye pray, do not begin to repeat the same vain words over and over again, even as the heathens; for they think that they shall be heard for their loquacity. ⁸“Do not therefore become like them; for your Father knoweth of what things ye have need before ye ask Him. ⁹“Be ye therefore praying thus:

‘Our Father Who art in the heavens, hallowed be Thy name;

¹⁰“‘let Thy kingdom come; let Thy will be done also on the earth, as in heaven;

¹¹“‘give us today our daily bread;

¹²“‘and forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors;

¹³“‘and let us not be brought into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory to the ages. Amen.’”

Commemoration of the Ascetics

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew [§ 43]. The Lord said to His disciples:

11 ²⁷“All things were delivered to Me by My Father. And no one doth fully know the Son, except the Father; nor doth anyone fully know the Father, except the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son is willing to reveal Him. ²⁸“Come to Me, all ye who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. ²⁹“Take up My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and humble in heart; and ye shall find rest to your souls. ³⁰“For My yoke is good and My burden is light.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of the holy Martyrs Pamphilos the presbyter, Valens the deacon, Paul, Selevkos, Porphyrios, Julian, Theodoulos, Elias, Jeremias, Esaias, Samuel, and Daniel, at Cæsarea in Palestine.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

March 1st – Civil Calendar: Non-Leap Year
February 29th – Civil Calendar: Leap Year
February 16th – Church Calendar

1. The Twelve Holy Martyrs who suffered in the reign of the Emperor Diocletian.

The first of these, Pamphilos, was priest in the church at Caesarea in Palestine; a learned and devout man, he corrected the mistakes of various copiers in the text of the New Testament. He himself copied this saving Book and gave it to any who desired it. The second was a deacon, Valens (Valentine), old in years and white with wisdom. He was a great expert in the holy Scriptures, knowing them by heart. The third was Paul, a respected and eminent man, who had on a previous occasion been cast into the fire for the sake of Christ. With them were five Egyptians, brothers both in blood and soul, who were returning to their native land from serving a sentence in the mines of Cilicia. As they reached the gate of the town of Caesarea they said that they were Christians, and were therefore brought to trial. When asked their names, they replied: ‘We have cast away the pagan names given us by our mother, and are called Elias, Isaias, Jeremias, Samuel and Daniel.’ When asked where they were from, they replied: ‘From Jerusalem that is above.’ They were all beheaded, and a young man called Porphyrios, who had searched for their bodies to give them burial, suffered soon afterwards. Him they burned. An officer, Seleucus, who had come up to the martyrs and embraced them before the sword descended on their heads, was also burned, and an old man, Theodulus, a servant of the Roman judge, who had embraced one of the martyrs while they were under escort. Lastly Julian, who had kissed the dead bodies of the martyrs and honored them, followed them in death. So they exchanged the small for the great, the tawdry for the precious and death for immortality, and went to the Lord in 308.

2. St. Maruthas.

Bishop of the town of Tagrith in Mesopotamia, he was famed for his faith and goodness. Maruthas calmed the wrath of the Persian King Yazdgird (Yezdegeherd) against the Christians, begged from him the relics of the 400 martyrs in Persia and founded a town, Martyropolis, where he placed these holy relics. He finished his earthly course in this town in 422 and went to the Lord.

3. St. Flavian.

He was Patriarch of Constantinople after St. Proklos, in 446, and was a contemporary of Pope Leo. He battled firmly against Eftyches and Dioscoros, but did not live to see the triumph of Orthodoxy at the Fourth Council, for, before that, he was so mercilessly thrashed and trampled on at a heretical council in Ephesus that he died there. He was a faithful soldier of Christ and a courageous defender and confessor of the Orthodox Faith. He entered into rest in 449.

4. Our Holy Father the Martyr Romanos.

Romanos was a simple and illiterate villager from Karpenesion. Learning of the heroism and the glory of the martyrs of Christ, the young Romanos yearned for martyrdom himself. He went to Thessalonica, where he began to extol the Christian Faith in the streets, and to call Mohammed a writer of fables. The Turks tortured him terribly, then handed him over to a galley-captain. Christians rescued him from the galley and sent him to the Holy Mountain, where Romanos became a monk under the famous Elder Akakios. But he still yearned for martyrdom for the sake of Christ. With the blessing of his elder, he went to Constantinople, pretended to be a fool and began to lead a dog about the streets. When asked why, Romanos replied that he fed that dog as Christians fed Turks. The Turks threw him into a dry well, where he lived without bread for forty days. They then took him out and executed him. Light streamed from his body for three days, after which an Englishman took it to England. But a monk soaked a towel in his blood, and that towel is kept to this day in the monastery of Docheiariou. This glorious soldier of Christ suffered in 1694.

FOR CONSIDERATION

Only with the greatest struggle and sacrifice is the chaff of heresy separated from the wheat of Orthodox truth. Heretics have always made use of the lowest means and the meanest people in the undermining of Orthodoxy. Archimandrite Eftyches of Constantinople and Patriarch Dioscoros of Alexandria, who held the heretical teaching that in Christ there are not two natures—a divine and a human—but one, had for their friend at the imperial court the base eunuch Chrysaphios. The Empress Evdokia was secretly allied with them. Patriarch Flavian fearlessly defended Orthodoxy like a lion, being helped in this by the emperor’s sister, St. Pulcheria. The eunuch produced the foulest slanders against Patriarch Flavian for the Emperor Theodosios, in order to make the emperor drive him from his throne and replace him with the heretic Eftyches. When neither he nor others succeeded, the heretics decided to kill Flavian. At a pirate council in Ephesus, they so beat and ill-treated him that on the third day St. Flavian gave his soul to God. And what happened in the end? At the Fourth Ecumenical Council, Eftyches and Dioscoros were anathematized. The eunuch, driven from court in shame, lost his life. The Empress Evdokia was exiled from Constantinople to Palestine. Flavian and Pulcheria were proclaimed saints and the Orthodox Faith was triumphantly confirmed.

Daily Scripture Readings taken from The Orthodox New Testament, translated and published by Holy Apostles Convent, Buena Vista, Colorado, copyright © 2000, used with permission, all rights reserved.

Daily Prologue Readings taken from The Prologue of Ochrid, by Bishop Nikolai Velimirovic, translated by Mother Maria, published by Lazarica Press, Birmingham, England, copyright © 1985, all rights reserved. Edited by Dormition Skete.