Saint Nilus the Elder, also known as Nilus of Sinai, Nilus of Ancyra, Neilos, Nil Postnik (“the Faster”), was a hermit and a great friend, disciple, and supporter of St John Chrysostom. Born in 4th century Constantinople, he was a Byzantine imperial official and may even have been a Praetorian Prefect. Due to the influence of St John Chrysostom, when his children were grown, Nilus and his wife agreed to lead separate lives devoted to God. He became a monk on Mount Sinai with his son Theodulus. His wife and daughter went to a women’s monastery in Egypt.
After a few years on the Mount, Arab raiders abducted Theodulus. Nilus went in search of him and found him in Eleusa in Palestine where the bishop had ransomed him out of slavery and made him the door-keeper of his church. The bishop ordained them both, and the returned to Sinai. For forty years a cave served as their home.
He was a noted author on theological matters. He was known as a theologian, Biblical scholar and ascetic writer, and people of all kinds, from the emperor down, sought his counsel. He warned and threatened people in high places, abbots and bishops, governors and princes, even the emperor himself, without fear.
Nilus died at Ancyra, Galatia in the year 430. His remains were brought to Constantinople in the reign of Justin the Younger, and deposited in the church of the apostles there.
Blessed Gomidas Keumurjian, also known as Gomida Keumurgian, Cosma de Carboniano, was a martyr. Originally a priest in the Armenian church, in 1696 he and his family made complete submission to the authority of Rome. His preaching attracted large audiences of not only Armenians, but also Ottoman Greeks and so many Muslims that he had to regularly preach sermons in Turkish. This angered the Armenian officials. Some of them falsely accused Gomidas of being a spy for Rome, which led to his arrest and execution by Turkish authorities.
At the insistence of the Armenian Apostolic Patriarch of Constantinople, Gomidas was tried before an Islamic court and sentenced to death by the Qadi for treason against the Ottoman Sultan and for secretly baptizing Muslims. Gomidas, however, was offered a full pardon and his immediate release in return for his conversion to Islam. The other eight priests with him immediately accepted the offer of pardon in exchange for conversion to Islam, and only Gomidas refused, saying, “I will not exchange my gold for your copper.”
Accompanied by his wife and children and a crowd of three thousand witnesses, Gomidas was led out of prison on 5 November 1707 to the Samatya quarter of Istanbul. Like the many other martyred priests under the Caesars, he was followed to the place of execution by his wife and children. His wife encouraged him to remain firm, while his sister, Irena, begged him not to bereave his family. Irena urged her brother to instead pretend to convert to Islam, while remaining a crypto-Christian. Unmoved, he continued until he reached the crossroads called Parmak Kapu, where he was ordered to kneel. Gomidas did so, facing Jerusalem, much to the dismay of the crowd, who repeatedly called in vain for him to turn and face Mecca instead. When the executioner approached with a drawn sword and also urged him to save his life through conversion to Islam, he replied, “No, do your work”, and began reciting the Nicene Creed in the Classical Armenian liturgical language. His prayer only ceased when he was beheaded.
Saint Ignatius of Constantinople, also known as Ignatios and Nicetas, was a monk, priest, abbot and Patriarch of Constantinople born in 799 in Constantinople. Born the son the Byzantine emperor Michael I, he was thrust into tumultuous times. Iconoclasm was raging, and when he was fourteen, Emperor Leo V the Armenian had him forcibly castrated, which made him ineligible to become emperor, and imprisoned him in a monastery after his father’s deposition in 813. As a monk, he took the name Ignatius and eventually became abbot. He also founded three monasteries on the Princes’ Islands, a favorite place for exiling tonsured members of the imperial house.
Ignatius of Constantinople, Hagia Sophia
Empress Theodora appointed Ignatius as Patriarch on 4 July 847 in part because he supported venerating icons. As patriarch, Ignatius became an important ally for Theodora in the midst of the Iconoclast Controversy. Ignatius served as Patriarch of Constantinople from 4 July 847 to 23 October 858 and from 23 November 867 to his death on 23 October 877.
The imperial court’s resentment of Ignatius began when he refused communion to and excommunicated a high ranking imperial court member, Bardas, for incest. Bardas exiled Empress Theodora, attempting to gain more power, but Ignatius refused to approve of this. Emperor Michael III, influenced by Bardas, removed Ignatius as patriarch and exiled him in 857. A synod was convened which deposed Ignatius on the basis of a canon which prohibited a bishop being appointed by a secular power. Photius, an associate of Bardas (and the one who plunged his church and billions of people into a millennia long schism and hell by condemning the Filioque),was made patriarch on Christmas Day of 858.
A schism resulted from Photius I’s election because many bishops saw Ignatius’s exit as illegitimate. Ignatius had only a few supporters once Photius I became patriarch. Most agreed that Ignatius had legitimately resigned, but some of his supporters appealed to Rome for him. A synod of 170 bishops deposed and anathematised Ignatius, but the schism escalated when Pope Nicholas I stepped in. Pope Nicholas I questioned Photius I’s legitimate status as patriarch. Papal legates retried Ignatius in a synod in 861, which said that Photius I was the legitimate patriarch, but Nicholas I rejected that synod and held his own synod which condemned Photius I and declared Ignatius the legitimate patriarch. He excommunicated Photius I and declared all his ordinations invalid.
In 867, Emperor Michael III was murdered and replaced by Basil I, his co-emperor. Basil I exiled Photius I and restored Ignatius as patriarch. Basil I effectively undid the last nine years of church history, restoring the Ignatian bishops and nullifying everything Photius I did.
Ignatius died on the 23 October 877 of natural causes, and his relics lie in the church of Saint Michael, Constantinople.
Ignatius is appointed patriarch by Empress Theodora
Our Lady of the Founders – The Relic of the Girdle of Our Lady, Constantinople (5th Century) – 31 August:
St Aidan of Lindisfarne (Died 651) Apostle of Northumbria, Bishop, Monk, Missionary, Abbot, Ascetic.
St Raymond Nonnatus O.deM. (1204-1240) Religious Priest, Confessor, Cardinal, Friar of the Mercedarian Order. Beatified on 5 November 1625 by Pope Urban VIII and Canonised in 1657 by Pope Alexander VII. Raymond was delivered by Caesarean operation when his mother died during childbirth – hence the name: non natus = not born.
St Ammi of Caesarea St Aristides the Philosopher St Barbolenus of Bobbio St Bonajuncia OSM Confessor St Caesidius St Cuthburga of Wimborne St Cwenburgh of Wimborne
St George Limniotes, a martyr and hermit. Born in 635, he pursued the life of a hermit on Mount Olympus, near Constantinople. Like all hermits, he prayed, fasted, and practiced contemplation, his sanctity gaining him the love of the locals, who sought his counsel and prayers. During his life the heresy of Iconoclasm raged, and he fiercely defended icons and demolished the arguments of the Iconoclasts. For this, in the year 730, at age ninety-five, he was martyred. His murderers mutilated his face, cutting off his nose before they burnt him to death.
Manifestly he was assuredly saved who had been glorified in such a spectacle.
St Crispus of Rome St Daig Maccairaill Bl Domenico de Molinar St Eonus of Arles St Ernan St Evan of Ayrshire St Firminus of Metz St Florus of Illyria Bl Francus of Francavilla Bl Gaspar di Salamanca St Hermas of Rome St John of Rome St Juliana of Myra St Juliana of Stobylum St Laurus of Illyria St Leo of Myra Bl Leonard of Cava St Maximus of Illyria Bl Milo of Fontenelle St Polyaenus of Rome St Proculus of Illyria
Blessed Rinaldo of Concorezzo (c 1245 – 1321) Bishop of Vicenza from 1296 until his 1303 appointment as the Archbishop of Ravenna-Cervia holding that until his death, Doctor of Canon Law, Papal envoy, Arbitrator and Peace-maker. Archbishop Rinaldo was also a close friend of Dante Alighieri.
St Ronan of Iona St Serapion of Rome
Massa Candida: Also known as Martyrs of Utica and the White Company: Three hundred 3rd century Christians at Carthage, who were ordered to burn incense to Jupiter or face death by fire. Martyrs. Saint Augustine of Hippo and the poet Prudentius wrote about them. They were forced to cast themselves into a pit of burning lime c 253 at Carthage, North Africa.
Happy, indeed, is she to whom it is given to share this sacred banquet, to cling with all her heart to Him whose beauty all the heavenly hosts admire unceasingly, whose love inflames our love, whose contemplation is our refreshment, whose graciousness is our joy, whose gentleness fills us to overflowing, whose remembrance brings a gentle light, whose fragrance will revive the dead, whose glorious vision will be the happiness of all the citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem
Saint Anthusa of Mantinea or the Confessor. She is easily confused with Saint Anthusa the daughter of the iconoclast emperor Constantine V, but it was Saint Anthusa of Mantinea whom he summoned to ask for prayers for the labouring mother of Saint Anthusa of Constantinople, the infant daughter who was subsequently named after her.
She was an anchoress and abbess in Constantinople during the 8th century.
After the death of her parents while still very young, the saint distributed her inheritance, left her family home, and withdrew to a cave. Ninety virgins gathered around her, entrusted themselves to her guidance, and followed her example. She founded two monasteries, one for men and the other for women, and became abbess of the monastery for nuns, who “were known for their obedience to their abbess and for their spiritual discipline”.
She openly defied Emperor Constantine V’s iconoclastic prohibitions, so she, her nuns, and her nephew, who was abbot of the second monastery, were arrested and tortured. When Anthusa correctly prophesied that the emperor’s wife, who was close to death from childbirth, would safely deliver twins, a boy and a girl, the empress intervened. Anthusa’s life was spared, and the empress donated several estates to her. The empress’ daughter was named after Anthusa, educated by her, and also became a saint, founding the first orphanage in the Christian world.
Saint Anthusa of Constantinople, daughter of the emperor
Anthusa returned to her monastery, where she lived to old age. She died in 759 and was buried in her cell.
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