Our holy Mother Makrina, the abbess of a monastery in central Greece, is venerated for her personal holiness of life and has been called “The Grandmother of the revival of Orthodox Monastic Life in America”.

Mother Makrina was born in 1921 with the name Maria Vassopoulou and from a young age was attracted to the things of God. When she was seven she declared to her parents that she wanted to become a nun. Her father asked “Have you ever seen a nun?” Maria replied, “No, but I believe this will help me to reach God”.

At the age of ten tragedy struck Maria’s family when both of her parents fell asleep in the Lord within a year of each other, leaving her younger brother George and herself orphans. With no one to care for them, Maria went in search of a job to support the two of them: first, working in factory that processed nuts and then in a cigarette factory.

Andrei Vakarov was born in 1899 in the village of Gorinchovo in Maramaroš County which today is part of Transcarpathia, Ukraine

Physical therapist, chiropodist, nun, servant of the poor, spiritual guide. Mother Gabriela, also known as Gavrilia was canonized by the Ecumenical

Vojislav Nastic was born on January 31, 1914 in Gary, Indiana to Atanasije and Zorka Nastic. He was baptized at the St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Church in Gary (now located in Merrillville) where he served as an altar boy and attended the Froebel Elementary School. In 1923 when Vojislav was 9, his parents returned to their homeland where he continued his education, graduating from the high school in Sarajevo in 1933. It seems that Vojislav’s father knew the famed Bishop Nicholas Velimirovich

Alaska is one of the best places in the United States to view a spectacular, dazzling natural phenomenon known as the northern lights or aurora borealis. For Orthodox Christians, Alaska has produced spectacular spiritual lights of our Faith including St. Herman of Alaska, St. Innocent, St. Jacob Netsevetov, St. Peter the Aleut and St. Juvenaly. A new light has shone forth from the remote villages of Alaska, a native Alaskan and the wife of a priest: Olga Arrsamquq. Although not yet canonized by her Orthodox Church, she is widely venerated as Blessed Olga of Alaska, icons of her have been painted and people have reported seeing her in dreams or visions.

From the land of Georgia, an independent nation that was once a republic of the Soviet Union, a new light shines for Orthodox Christians around the world. Georgia, the first nation to adopt Christianity as the national religion in the 4th century, has produced a host of holy women and men and the most recent, St. Gabriel Urgebadze. St. Gabriel has become one of the most popular Orthodox saints in Georgia and icons and photographs of him are found everywhere: in churches, schools, cars, public transportation. He has become known throughout the Orthodox world and is honored with the titles “Confessor of the Faith”: one who suffered for Christ and also with the unusual title “Fool for Christ”.

In Sofia, the capital city of Bulgaria, stands one of the largest Orthodox Churches in the world – St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral.  It is not only the cathedral church of the Patriarch of Bulgaria but a national shrine, symbol of the Bulgarian nation and a main tourist attraction.  If you visited the cathedral between the approximate years of 2000 – 2018 you would have been greeted by a poorly dressed, elderly man, holding a plastic cup who seemed to be just another homeless beggar.  This man was Dobri Dobrev, sometimes called “Elder Dobri” or “Grandpa Dobri”.  This simple man walked 12 miles each day from the village of Bailovo to the cathedral to beg money. 

Eugene Rose was born in San Diego, California in 1934 in a typical WASP family:  white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant.  He was baptized in the Methodist faith of his family and lived the life of a typical American boy:  school, sports, music.  He was a brilliant student, known by the nickname “Eugenius” and graduated as the valedictorian of his class.  Eugene continued to excel academically in college, majoring in Oriental studies but began to question his earlier Protestant Christian beliefs.  As his niece Cathy Scott recorded:  “It was evident to most everyone who spent any time around Eugene – his classmates, friends, instructors, and family – the he was truly searching for something he could latch onto.”  He rejected the Protestant Christianity of his family and declared himself an atheist.  As he searched for meaning in life, he explored Chinese philosophy, especially in its Buddhist approach and learned ancient Chinese in order to read the Eastern texts in their original language. 

A Serbian bishop, who served for a time as a bishop of the Orthodox Church in Carpatho-Russia, was canonized as a saint by the Orthodox Church of Serbia on October 2, 2022.  The future saint was born as Ivan Chiric  in a family of priests in Sremski Karlovce, Serbia on May 1, 1884.  He was educated in his hometown and also in the city of Novi Sad.  Ivan graduated from the Moscow Theological Academy in 1906 and defended his doctoral thesis in Vienna in 1908.  Later that year he was tonsured a monk with the name Irenaeus and ordained deacon and then priest.  With his advanced education, Father Irenaeus became the head librarian of the Patriarchal Library and also taught at the Karlovac Seminary in the area of theology and liturgics. 

On Saturday, February 8, 2020 in the Orthodox Cathedral in Prague, the Orthodox Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia canonized as martyr-saints several clergy and lay people who were martyred by the Nazis during World War II.  The new saints include the priests Father Vladimir Petrek, Father Vaclav Cikl and the laymen Jan Sonnevend, Vaclav Ornest, Karel Louda and their families.  All these Orthodox Christians suffered for Christ with their Bishop Gorazd Pavlik who had been previously canonized as a martyr-saint in 1987.  (see acrod.org;  Orthodox Reading Room,  Lives of the Saints). 

The story of the new martyrs begins September, 1941 when Reinhard Heydrich was appointed as the Nazi Deputy Reich-Protector (Governor) of Bohemia and Moravia.  Heydrich had a reputation as a violent, heartless Nazi.  Adolph Hitler called  him “The man with the iron heart” and others referred to him as “The Butcher”.  Within five days of his arrival in Prague, 142 people were executed and it was Heydrich who was the architect and key organizer of the Holocaust which led to the extermination of over six million Jews and others.  Today, as we look at the historical photos of piles of emaciated bodies in Nazi concentration camps, we ask:   “Did anyone care?  Why didn’t someone stop this evil?   Why didn’t someone do something?

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On a recent pilgrimage to the ancient monasteries of Mount Athos, Greece, His Holiness Patriarch Bartholomew made the surprise and joyous announcement of the canonization of five holy elders who labored and ministered on the Holy Mount.  The new saints include: Elder Daniel of Katounakia (+1929) Elder Ieronymos of Simonopetra Monastery (+1957), Elder Joseph the Hesychast (+1959), Elder Sophrony of Essex, England (+1993) and Elder Ephraim of Katounakia (+1998).

These new saints spent most of their lives inhabiting the ancient monasteries of Mount Athos. Mount Athos is a peninsula in northeastern Greece that has been solely devoted to the monastic life for over 1,000 years. There are 20 major monasteries and numerous small sketes and hermitages scattered up and down the peninsula. In the very tip of the peninsula is the deserted region of Katounakia, site of steep cliffs where some monks live as hermits in caves and shacks clinging to the rocky terrain.

A beloved saint of Carpatho-Russians, Ukrainians, Byelorussians and Russians is the Venerable Job, Abbot and Wonderworker of Pochaev.  St. Job is remembered as a defender of the Orthodox Faith, an ascetic and spiritual father, miracle worker, and abbot of the great monastery of Pochaev located today in western Ukraine. 

St. Job was born in 1551 with the name Ivan Zhelezo (which means “iron”) to a family of pious Orthodox Christians.  At the tender age of ten, he left his parents and asked to be received into the monastery of the Transfiguration in the village of Pidhora, in the Carpathian Mountains.   Two years later, at the age of 12 he was tonsured as a monk and given the name “Job”.  The monk Job proved himself worthy of the monastic tonsure by his exemplary way of life and when he reached the age of 31 he was ordained as a priest. 

Metropolitan Vladimir of Kiev led out of his monastery and shot.  Before his execution he prayed for God to forgive his murderers.  When his body was discovered, his fingers were frozen in the manner a bishop would give a blessing. 

Abbess Elizabeth (Grand Duchess) and her companion Nun Barbara thrown alive down a mine shaft slowly dying from their wounds and starvation. 

Bishop Germogen, with a rock tied to his hands, thrown alive into the Tura River. 

Archbishop Joachim of Nizhni Novgorod hung upside down from  the icon screen  above the Royal Doors. 

Father Alexander Hotovitsky, former priest in New York City, executed by firing squad. Father John Kochurov, former priest in Chicago, shot by a mob of Bolshevik soldiers  in front of his teenage son. 

Father Simeon Subbotin sentenced to ten years in a prison camp where he died; one of thousands of other Orthodox clergy and lay people who perished in the camps. 

Elder Joseph the Cave Dweller, also known as Elder Joseph the Hesychast sometimes lived in a cave, sleeping on boards, died over 60 years ago yet the message of his life continues to touch Orthodox Christians around the world.  He lived in a remote, desolate spot on Mount Athos in Greece but he has had a continuing impact on the spiritual renewal of the Orthodox Churches of America.  His influence can be seen today here in America from the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania to the desert of Arizona.  He has yet to be formally canonized a saint by the Ecumenical Patriarch but among his thousands of disciples he is honored as a grace-filled, miracle- working saint of our times.

Elder Joseph was born on the Greek island of Paros with the name Francis and lived with his pious parents and six siblings in a two- room home.  When he was in the fourth grade his father died forcing him to quit school to support his mother and family.  He found work in Athens first as a cook, then on a trolley car and at the age of 18 enlisted in the Greek Navy, completing his compulsory military service.  He became somewhat successful running a small business with a bright future ahead of him until one night he had a vivid dream. 

In every generation and in every culture God raises up men and women as examples for us as we struggle to live the Gospel of Christ.  They are like lighthouses that were once used to guide sailors to safe harbor – the light of their lives leads us to Christ who said “I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life”.  (John 8:12)  Such a lighthouse shone in the city of St. Petersburg, Russia in the 18th century and still shines throughout the world today. 

Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God; consider the outcome of their life, and imitate their faith. (Hebrews 13:7)

The Holy Synod of Bishops of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, meeting on August 29, 2018, added to the calendar of saints: Elder Amphilochios (Makris) of the island of Patmos. This island is famed as the place where the Apostle John the Theologian, after undergoing persecution, was sent into exile and had visions which led to writing of the Book of Revelation (Apocalypse): I John, your brother, who share with you in Jesus the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet saying, “Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches…” (Revelation 1:9-11)

The future Saint Amphilochios was born on the island of Patmos in 1889. He was named Athanasios in baptism and was raised in large family of pious, country people. Even as a small child he was known to be devout and would strictly observe the church fasts.

“There is no one like God”—in this is expressed all of the great Archangel’s knowledge of his God. He doesn’t describe Him, nor does he explain—he stands and witnesses. In this is his inclusion in the radiance of the Divinity, and in this is the measure by which he manifests this radiance and opens for us the way to the Lord’s mystery by his word, and by those names that express all his unfathomable experience of the unfathomable God.

There is a place in the book of Revelations where the seer of mysteries, St. John, tells us that when the time comes and we will all be in the Kingdom of God, then each will receive a mystical name by which only God Who gives it knows and recognizes the one who receives it. This name as if contains in itself the whole mystery of the person; by this name is everything said about him; no one can know this name other than God and the one who receives it, because it determines the unique, inimitable relationship that exists between God and His creature—each and every one, and for Him one and only.

We bear the name of the saints who lived out their calling on the earth; we have been consecrated to them, like churches are consecrated to one or another saint, and we must contemplate both the meaning of the name and the personality of the saint as far as we can ascertain it from his or her life. After all, he or she is not only our intercessor in prayer and protector, but to some extent also the image of what we could be. No one’s life can be duplicated, but it is possible to learn from the life of one or another person, saint, or even sinner how to live more worthy of ourselves and of God.

Our Holy Father Moses of the Carpathians, also known as St. Moses the Hungarian or St. Moses Uhrin was a native of the Carpathian Mountain region of Eastern Europe in the 9th century A.D. He was the brother of St. Ephraim of New Torzhok and St. George and together they were in the service of the Holy Prince Boris, a son of the Holy Prince Vladimir. Prince Boris, knowing that his brother Sviatopolk was seeking to kill him in order to gain power, refused to bring violence against his own brother and was brutally murdered while was chanting Psalms. St. Boris, with his brother St. Gleb, were the first saints canonized by the Orthodox Church of Russia. After Boris’ murder, Moses fled and hid in Kiev with Predislava, sister of Prince Yaroslav. In 1018, the Polish king Boleslav conquered Kiev and St. Moses and his companions were taken away to Poland in chains.

St. Moses was said to be tall, muscular and handsome and he attracted the attention and lustful desire of a certain wealthy Polish widow. She bought Moses from Boleslav and took him to her estate with the intention of seducing him and marrying him.

At this first visit of mine to you, beloved brethren, the words come to my mind said by the Lord at one time through the Prophet Hosea, ‘I will say to them who were not my people, Thou art my people’…… I left the beloved motherland, my elderly mother, people familiar and close to me, those who are dear to my heart, and departed to a faraway land—to you, people not familiar to me so that from now on you become my people and my beloved ones.

With these words one of the youngest bishops of the Orthodox Church of Russia greeted his new flock in America. Consecrated bishop at the young age of 32, he was assigned to the Russian Orthodox missionary diocese of America in 1898. Bishop Tikhon, later Patriarch Tikhon of Russia, one of the most important Orthodox leaders of the 20th century

Many modern advertisers promote their products by showing a before/after picture of a person who used their cleaning product, diet pills, etc. The point of the commercial or ad is to show results, that is, proof that the product “works”. The two Sundays after Pentecost are a meditation and a celebration of the impact of the presence of the Holy Spirit in the lives of men and women throughout history. It is in the lives of holy men and women – the Saints – that we see the fruit of the descent of the Holy Spirit and the reason why He was sent: for the sanctification and enlightenment of the faithful.

The first Sunday after Pentecost is known as the Sunday of All Saints in which we honor all the known and unknown holy men and women throughout history who were sanctified by the descent Holy Spirit. The second Sunday after Pentecost is another Sunday of All Saints but more focused: it honors the holy men and women of a certain nation or region such as All Saints of Russia, All Saints of Mount Athos. In 2005, His Eminence Metropolitan Nicholas of blessed memory established within our Diocese the commemoration of All Saints of Carpatho-Rus on the second Sunday after Pentecost.

It is not uncommon as we rub shoulders at work and school with people of different faiths that we are challenged to explain what we believe and why we believe it. I once worked with a nurse who was very proud that her Church was “just Christian without any of those ‘add ons’. One of the “ad ons” that she was referring to and a part of our Faith that is often challenged is our devotion and veneration of the Saints. Some Christians, such as my nurse-friend have the uninformed notion that such devotion crept into the Church at some late century, say the Middle Ages, and that pure, apostolic Christianity had no such practice as the honoring of Saints.

In the New Testament, St. Paul referred to all baptized Christians as saints. For example, in his epistle to the Ephesians he addresses all the saints who live in Ephesus.

St. Nicholas of Myra…..St. Gregory of Nyssa…..St. John of Damascus….We have longed become used to the idea that the great saints of the Church were from far away lands in times long past. Yet there lived among us here in America a modern miracle worker, man of prayer, spiritual father, and bishop. Archbishop John Maximovitch of San Francisco was widely regarded as a miracle-working living saint and perhaps the holiest man of the 20th century even before his death on July 2, 1966.

On the surface, St. John’s life is not all that remarkable: he was born in Russia in 1896 where he attended law school, graduating in 1918. With the outbreak of the Russian Revolution he and his family were evacuated to Serbia where he entered the seminary, was tonsured a monk and ordained a priest. Even at this young age, the bishop there – St. Nicholas Velimirovich, often said: “If you wish to see a living saint, go to Father John”.

On Monday, November 27, 2017, the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, along with the Holy Synod of Bishops added to the calendar of saints, the Elder Iakovos Tsalikis who fell asleep in the Lord in 1991. His feastday has been set for November 22 (Gregorian Calendar) December 5 (Julian).

The Holy Elder Iakovos (James) was born in 1920 in Asia Minor (present day Turkey) into a pious Greek Orthodox family. He grew up in a world in which the Orthodox people lived under the oppression of the Turkish government. When Iakovos was only two years old, his father was taken away by Turkish authorities and his mother Theodora and family forced to leave their native village never to return. The family emigrated to the Greek island of Evia where by the grace of God they were eventually reunited with Iakovos’ father Stavros. From a young age, Iakovos’ life was centered on his village church. It was said that by the time he was seven years old he knew the Divine Liturgy from memory. At the age of 13 he completed elementary school but due to the family’s poverty he was unable to continue his studies and joined his father at work. He lost his mother in 1942 and was drafted into the army in 1947. Upon his return from the army in 1949 his father died leaving him to care for his sister Anastasia until her marriage in 1952.

There is a fascinating event from the life of the Holy Prophet Elias recorded in the Bible. Because of his faithfulness to the one true God, Elias was on a run for his life, pursued by the evil Queen Jezebel who was intent on killing him. Elias fled into the wilderness and there the Lord spoke to him and said “Go out tomorrow and stand on the mountain before the Lord; and behold, the Lord will pass by….” Elias is given a promise that he will meet the Lord on that mountain. So the next day there is a great and powerful wind on the mountain…but the Lord was not in the wind….then an earthquake and a fire….but the Lord was not in either of them.

It was June 10, 1900, dozens of Chinese Orthodox Christians had fled for their lives and hid in the home of their priest, Father Mitrophan Tsi-Chung. (who was ordained by St. Nicholas of Japan) A rebellion had broken out in China known as the Boxer Rebellion, an uprising against foreign influence which targeted all foreigners and Chinese converts to Christianity. Armed bands roamed the streets searching for foreigners to kill with the tacit approval of the imperial government. The group surrounded the home of Father Mitrophan and while some Orthodox Christians managed to escape, most of them, including the priest, were stabbed or burned alive. His body was found in his yard under a date tree. Father Mitrophan’s family shared in his witness for Christ: his son Isaiah was beheaded, his wife Matushka Tatiana initially managed to escape but was captured and beheaded on June 12 along with nineteen other Christians. The priest’s eight year old son John was brutally mutilated: his ears, nose and toes were cut off but he survived this ghastly attack. He was seen the next day begging for water. Passersby mocked him and called him a follower of devils. When asked if he was in pain he replied “It does not hurt to suffer for Christ”. The Boxers returned for him and finished him off.

An Orthodox Christian woman named Ia Wang, the head teacher at the Orthodox Mission School, was also taken prisoner on June 10 and was stabbed, beaten and buried alive. A sympathetic neighbor picked up her tortured body and took her to his home where he nursed her back to health.

The Holy Bible commands us to remember those who went before us preaching the word of God: Remember your leaders, those who spoke the word of God to you; consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith. (Hebrews 13:7) They are to be our examples and models of faith, piety, and devotion to Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. One such recent example of faith lived and struggled for the Faith in the mountains and villages of many of our ancestors. Our Holy Father Alexis Kabaluk was born with the name Alexander in 1877 in the Rusyn village of Yasinie to a pious Greek Catholic family. As a youth he was drawn to God and frequently visited Orthodox and Greek Catholic monasteries. After completing his military service he visited the Monastery of Biskad, now in Romania, to seek the counsel of the Elder Arcadius who blessed him to become a monk. Unable to accept the false union with Rome, Alexander entered the Orthodox Church in 1908 while on pilgrimage to the Holy Mountain – Mount Athos in Greece.

St. Maxim was born in 1886 in Zdynia in the Lemko region of Carpatho-Rus which was then a part of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy in present day Poland. His father, Tymofej, was the cantor of Zydnia’s Greek Catholic church. After completing his education in the nearby town of Jaslo and Nowy Sacz, he entered the Greek Catholic Basilian monastery in Krakow. Dissatisfied with the attempts to Latinize the Eastern rite to make it more acceptable to the Roman Catholic majority and also attempts to denationalize the Rusyns, he crossed the border into the Russian empire and entered the famed Orthodox monastery at Pochaev. It was while at the monastery that his outstanding potential attracted the attention of the illustrious Bishop Anthony (Khrapovitsky) who entrolled him in the Orthodox seminary in Zhitomir.

Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God, consider the outcome of their lives and imitate their faith…. (Hebrews 13:7)

One of the greatest preachers and teachers of the Scripture is widely regarded to be St. John Chrysostom who lived and died over 1,600 years ago. We in America especially honor the memory of a man who lived and walked among us who has been called “The New Chrysostom” or “The Serbian Chrysostom” for his gift of preaching and teaching. St. Nicholas Velimirovich was born in 1880 in the small Serbian village of Lelich to pious Serbian Orthodox parents. He grew up in a home imbued with the life of the Orthodox Faith. His parents often interrupted their farm work for daily prayer and observed and celebrated all of the fasts and feastdays of the Church. His mother was often seen taking her little Nikola by the hand and walking three miles to the Chelije Monastery for prayer, Confession and Holy Communion.

Tomorrow is Monday. Not just any Monday, but Clean Monday, the first day of Clean Week, the beginning of Great Lent, a time of particular prayer and fasting. Great Lent will take us on a journey through forty days, or six weeks, to Lazarus Saturday, Palm Sunday and then Holy Week. At the end of that Week, God willing, we will celebrate the Resurrection of Christ on Easter Night. For we are now fifty days exactly from Easter Day.

This Sunday is known as Forgiveness Sunday, and also Cheesfare Sunday for it is the last day on which we may eat dairy produce. On it we remember the Fall of Adam and Eve and how they lost Paradise by eating 'the forbidden fruit', which is why we fast, eating only 'the permitted fruit'. How exactly did that Fall happen?

This great ascetic and staretz (elder) is the most beloved and popular of the Orthodox Saints of Russia. His icon is found in every Russian Church and many homes. Devotion to his memory has extended beyond Russia to Greece, the Middle East and even many Roman Catholics know and love this great saint.

St. Seraphim was born with the name Prochorus Moshnin in the city of Kursk, Russia to pious parents. From an early age he loved to attend the divine services, to pray, to read the Holy Scriptures and Lives of the Saints. At the age of ten he became seriously ill but in a dream he saw the Mother of God who promised to visit and heal him. Shortly after, a procession with the miraculous Kursk Root Icon of the Theotokos (now located in New York), passed the Moshnin home.

The third Sunday of the pre-Lenten season in the Orthodox Church—which would be the second Sunday before the beginning of Great Lent—is called the Sunday of the Last Judgment. At this Sunday, at the Sunday service, the Divine Liturgy, the very well-known parable of Christ in Matthew 25 is the reading, the parable of the Last Judgment. And on this Sunday, of course, as usual, all of the hymns for the day—vespers, matins, there’s a canon at matins—[are] all dedicated to a reflection and meditation on the final judgment.

In this parable, Jesus says that when the Son of Man comes in his glory with all of his angels and sits upon his glorious throne, that he will gather before him all the nations, and this tells us that all the nations and all the peoples of the earth and every individual person will give an account of his or her life at the end of the ages.

Jesus Christ shared the parable of the Publican and the Pharisee with us to warn us of the great spiritual danger of arrogant self-confidence in our own righteousness, coupled with contempt for those whom we consider to be beneath us. In this way Jesus sought to protect us from the terrible spiritual sickness of Pharissee-ism.

This disease of the soul first manifests itself as absolute confidence and trust in the rightness of our own point of view and judgement; it presupposes our personal superiority over others. And this twisted expression of self confidence quickly degenerates into uncritical self-satisfaction and self righteousness, into a kind of mindless self-admiration. It takes endless endless pleasure in the self, and in all that it does.

Several years ago one of our teenagers challenged me with this question: Why should I go to church on Sunday? What difference will it make in my life if I light a candle, stand up, sit down and sing some hymns? A good question! An honest question from a young woman trying to understand her Orthodox Faith. The life of this new saint of our church illustrates the tremendous spiritual power and great grace available through the Divine Liturgy of our church.

The future saint was born on the Greek island of Naxos in 1851, his parents were somewhat wealthy but also pious Orthodox Christians having a chapel on their property in honor of St. Nicholas of Myra. As a young boy he often played church while wearing a bed sheet and served as an altar boy for his grandfather, Father George Melissourgos.

"Do you have monks and nuns in your church? I don’t believe in that, they’re wasting their life doing nothing… …..unless they’re out helping people like Jesus did."

I had this conversation recently with a man named Jim who is a member of another Christian denomination. The topic of monasticism was started by the news of the canonization of the nun Mother Theresa of Calcutta by the Roman Catholic Church. In Jim’s view, she is an example of a good nun, that is, one who went out and helped people rather than living behind the walls of a monastery.

Monasticism: the way of life of monks and nuns, is at the very heart of our Orthodox Faith and is the foundation of spirituality for all Orthodox Christians: priests, monastics and lay people. In fact, the very spiritual center of Orthodox Christianity is Mount Athos: a remote peninsula which is an autonomous part of Greece. It is the home to 20 ancient monasteries, many over 1,000 years old and numerous smaller sketes and hermitages.

St Elizabeth the New Martyr (1864-1918) was the Princess Diana of her day: fabulously wealthy, a royal princess, highly educated, intelligent and stunningly attractive. And yet unlike Princess Diana, her life of privilege and wealth, parties and the high society of Europe underwent a dramatic change in February, 1905.

The Second Sunday After Pentecost has been designated in our diocese as the Sunday of All Saints of Carpatho-Rus. We invite you to read about the lives of a brief selection of Saints who lived or were intimately involved in the lands of Carpathian Rus. Nearly twelve centuries have passed since the two brothers from Thessalonica, Saints Cyril and Methodius, arrived in the lands of our people bringing them the world of God.

On December 2, 1998 the remarkable earthly life of one of the most outstanding Orthodox spiritual elders of the 20th century: Elder Cleopa of Romania ended. While over 10,000 people gathered for his funeral at the Sihastria Monastery in the Carpathian Mountains of northeastern Romania, the news of his death traveled around the world. Even such secular outlets as The New York Times carried a notice of his death and the even the local newspaper in far-away Salinas, Kansas carried the story: Romanian Holy Man Dies.

Father Cleopa was born Constantine Ilie and from a very young age was uninterested in matters of this world but those of heaven.

St. Steven Serbian Orthodox Cathedral in Alhambra, California was the setting on September 5-6, 2015 for the canonization of Father Sebastian Dabovich as the newest Orthodox saint of America. His Holiness, Patriarch Irinej of Serbia led the liturgical celebration with the participation of His Eminence, Archbishop Demetrios of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese and hundreds of bishops, priests, and faithful from around the world. St. Sebastian was honored as the “Serbian Orthodox Apostle to America” for his imitation of the Apostles in his missionary labors among Serbian and other immigrants across the United States.

From the very beginning of the Church, Christians have honored their holy martyrs – those brave men and women who accepted death rather than deny their Lord Jesus. One of the earliest examples of this veneration of martyrs is an ancient Christian document known as The Martyrdom of Polycarp which tells the story of a Christian bishop who was a direct disciple of the Apostle John the Evangelist and who was martyred in the year 165 A.D. But for us in 21st century America martyrs are often distant figures from another generation and another place. We honor the memory of St. George and St. Demetrios but they lived long ago and far away. However our land of America has been blessed by several holy men who accepted martyrdom for their faith in Jesus Christ: some who met death on our shores and some who ministered here and then met martyrdom when they returned to their native lands. Others are honored as confessors: that is those who suffered for their faith in Christ but had peaceful deaths.

I am not a fan of horror movies. I don’t enjoy feeling frightened by suspense and terror as a means of entertainment. But back in February I forced myself to watch a video that was about as horrifying as anything I have ever seen. It was so awful that I could not bear to watch it to the end. What made it especially horrifying was that it did not feature actors following a script but was a real-life documentary. The video was titled: “A Message Signed in Blood to the Nation of the Cross”. It was the gruesome video of 21 Orthodox Christians of Egypt beheaded by Islamic terrorists on a beach in Libya. The video was designed to send a message filled with fear and terror to the world, especially Christians “the Nation of the Cross”. The terrorists who murdered these men message did send a message to the world

In my years of working with terminally ill patients as a hospice chaplain, the saddest situations I sometimes face is individuals who had laid out a vision for their lives: a retirement of traveling, leisure, a boat and house in Florida only to have these visions dashed by the scourge of a devastating illness. These people often scrimped and saved and endured difficult jobs for years in order to reach

In 1823, the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church of Russia sent out a request for a priest to volunteer for service to the remote Russian colony of Alaska. Not surprisingly, there was no response from any of the clergy who were reluctant to leave their comfortable lives for the remote wilderness

Our American nation was founded on the equality of all people and a firm rejection of kings, emperors, and royalty of any kind. But yet we are fascinated with the lives of kings, emperors and royal families, especially the British royal family. The 1981 wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana was a media event with some 750 million

The province of Crimea dominated the news back in March as the nations of Ukraine and Russia were locked in a struggle to determine the future of this region. Whatever one’s political leanings – toward Ukraine or Russia, Orthodox Christians know that the land of Crimea is blessed by the presence of a modern day saint and miracle worker: St. Luke the Surgeon, bishop of Simferopol and Crimea. The future St. Luke was born on April 27, 1877 with the name Valentin Felixovich Voino-Yasenetsky in the eastern area of Crimea. His parents were not active in the practice of their Faith as he noted in his memoirs

On December 1, 2013, the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Patriarchate of Constantinople glorified as a saint, the Elder Porphyrios of Mount Athos, Greece. St. Porphrios is one of a number of contemporary holy men who sought God on the Holy Mount of Mount Athos and wer filled with the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Mount Athos is a peninsula in northeastern Greece that is called “The Garden of the Theotokos”. This sacred ground has been reserved for the practice of the monastic life for over 1,000 years and is the home of 20 major monasteries and numerous small sketes and hermitages. This new saint of our Orthodox Church was born on February 7, 1906 in Greece and was baptized with the name of Evangelos. His parents were poor but pious farmers, his father serving as the village cantor who at times chanted the services with St. Nectarios. Due to their poverty, the Elder’s father was forced to emigrate to America to work on the construction of the Panama Canal.

Several weeks ago, I was preparing my Sunday bulletin and was searching on the internet for an icon of the Saints commemorated on that day – October 20 – the Holy Martyrs Sergius and Bacchus of Syria. I was shocked to discover that some elements in our society have proclaimed them Patron Saints of Same Sex Marriage and that icons of these holy martyrs have been distributed at Gay Pride events. Something I was told at Camp Nazareth last summer made sense…. During one of the clergy discussions with the teenagers, a young woman shared that someone in her family “had an icon of two gay saints”.

As a parish priest, I find tremendous inspiration in reading the Lives of Saints who were priests, especially those who were married, parish pastors such as St. John of Kronstadt or St. Dmitri Klepinin. (see our Diocesan website: acrod.org Orthodox Reading Room: Lives of the Saints) Glorified as a saint of our Church in the year 2000 was St. Alexis Mechev a parish priest in Moscow who is an example of faithfulness in pastoral work and holiness for all priests today.

Today, more than ever, people need less preaching of the Gospel of Jesus and more examples of how it can be lived. More powerful than any sermon is the witness of a person who lived their Faith. This is the reason Orthodox Christians honor their Saints and study their lives. This is the command of Holy Scripture: Remember your leaders, those who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their lives and imitate their faith. (Hebrews 13:7)

When each of the bishops of our Diocese were consecrated to the episcopacy, they received the honorary title of an ancient Christian city. When Metropolitan Orestes was consecrated in 1938, he received the honorary title of Bishop of Agathonikeia. Bishop John received the title Bishop of Nyssa; Metropolitan Nicholas – Bishop of Amissos. When His Grace, Bishop Gregory was recently consecrated as our new bishop, he received the same honorary title as Bishop John: Bishop of Nyssa.

During the reign of the Emperor Alexius Comnenus (1081-1118), a controversy arose in Constantinople among men learned in Faith and zealous for virtue about the three holy Hierarchs and Fathers of the Church, Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian and John Chrysostom. Some argued for Saint Basil above the other two because he was able, as none other, to explain the mysteries of the Faith, and rose to angelic rank by his virtues. Organizer of monastic life, leader of the entire Church in the struggle with

February 3, 2012 marked the centennial of the death of Archbishop Nicholas (Kasatkin) of Tokyo who is venerated around the world as the Enlightener of Japan and Equal-to-the-Apostles. By the time of his death in 1912 St. Nicholas left behind a church that grew from one man with one convert to over 35,000 Orthodox Christians, 32 priests, 96 churches, and 265 chapels.St. Nicholas was born with the name Ivan Kasatkin in the Smolensk province of Russia. His mother died when he was age five leaving his father, the parish deacon, to raise him alone.

He lived for a time in a cave; later a hut in the woods. His clothes were old, full of patches and always the same. He wore a 16-pound cross and chains. He slept on a wooden bench covered by a deerskin. He was in trouble with the government and accused of treason. While this description might sound like a homeless person in one of our nation's cities, this was the life of the first Orthodox saint of America: St. Herman of Alaska.

Well-documented and well-known among Orthodox Christians in America are the stories of the countless bishops, priest and lay people martyred by Communists throughout the countries of Eastern Europe. Less known are the lives of the thousands of Serbian Orthodox Christians, estimated at nearly one million, martyred for their Faith during World War II.

When we contemplate the lives of the saints, we are sometimes inclined to ask, what sustained them amidst the distractions of their lives? How could these men and women remain in a state of communion of with God? How could they continually center their thoughts, prayers and contemplations on Jesus Christ? We could read about them and say that many of the saints over the past 20 centuries lived monastic lives and were without the distractions that most of us face on a daily basis.

On October 4, 2011, our Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, with the Holy Synod of Bishops officially numbered among the saints the Eldress Sophia, Ascetic of Kleisoura, Greece. St. Sophia was born as Sophia Saoulidi in 1883 in the village of Trebizond in present-day Turkey. In 1907 she married Jordan Hortokoridou but in 1914 he disappeared (likely against his will) leaving her as the single mother of a new born son.

On February 4 – 5, 2012 the Diocese of Berlin and Germany of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia canonized as a saint, the New Martyr Alexander Schmorell. St. Alexander was a member of an underground Nazi resistance group known as the White Rose which used passive, nonviolent resistance to Adolph Hitler and his Nazi party against their violence and extermination of Jews and other minorities. The group was discovered and all were executed by beheading, including St. Alexander at the age of 25 on July 13, 1943

One of the most loved saints of our Metropolitan Nicholas of blessed memory was St. Nectarios of Aegina. It was our beloved Metropolitan who made him known to our Diocesan faithful. It was our beloved Metropolitan who brought holy oil from his tomb through which several miraculous cures have been reported among our people. St. Nectarios was born in 1846 in Greece with the name Anastasios Cephalas. When he was fourteen years old his parents sent him to find work in Constantinople since the family was very poor.

If you were to enter the Orthodox cathedral located on Geary Boulevard in San Francisco, you would notice people lighting candles before a small pavilion-like shrine on the right side of the church. On closer inspection, you would see people bending to kiss the glass covering the coffin of the archbishop of the cathedral who died in 1966. They are venerating the holy relics of St. John the Wonderworker, archbishop of San Francisco. Why this veneration of a dead body?

On September 18, 2008, Metropolitan Vladimir of Kiev along with scores of priests and thousands of faithful gathered in the remote Carpatho-Russian village of Malaya Ugolka near Chust to celebrate the glorification of the newest saint of the Carpathians, St. Job (Kundria) of Ugolka. Our Holy Father Job Kundria was born Ivan Kundria on May 18, 1902 in the village of Iza, a village forever held in honor by Orthodox Carpatho-Russians. It was the village of Iza that was the center of a movement away from

On the Feast of St. Elias the Prophet, we read these words from the 5th chapter of the Universal Epistle of St. James the Apostle: The fervent prayer of a holy man is powerful indeed (James 5:16). The reason these words are read on the Feast Day of St. Elias is because the holy man St. James spoke about who prayed fervently, with great zeal and intense feeling, was St. Elias the Prophet. St. James then proceeds to tell just how powerful the prayers of the holy St. Elias were. Elias prayed with deep faith, zeal and intense feeling to God for a drought in order to punish King Ahab,

On July 12, 1994 one of the greatest Orthodox spiritual elders of our day fell asleep in the Lord after a lifetime of prayer, fasting, and spiritual warfare. Though he was not a priest but a simple monk, he was sought out by priests and even bishops for his spiritual counsel. Being blessed with the grace of the Holy Spirit he was known as a miracle worker and clairvoyant who could read the hearts and thoughts of people. Father Paisios was born in Greece in 1924 and was baptized with the name of Arsenius by St. Arsenius of Cappadocia (1840-1924),

O Lord, make this man also, who has been proclaimed a steward of the episcopal grace, to be an imitator of You, the true Shepherd, who laid down Your life for Your sheep… (Prayer of Consecration of a Bishop) On September 25, 1921, these words were prayed over Father Gorazd Pavlik as he was consecrated the Bishop of Moravia and Silesia. It is doubtful that anyone in attendance that day, including the new bishop, expected that he would be called upon to live that prayer in a literal way.

    Does the Orthodox Church “make Saints”?  How does it go about the process of declaring who is a saint

The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects.     (James 5:16) She was blind from birth, but from a very young

On April 29, 2010 the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church of Serbia proclaimed the glorification as a saint of the Church, Father Justin Popovich, considered by many as one of the greatest Orthodox theologians of the 20th century but who combined his intellectual ability with a life of asceticism, spiritual warfare and prayer.

1854-1909 Submitting my soul to the mercy of God, and asking everybody’s forgiveness and forgiving everybody, and remaining faithful to the Orthodox Catholic doctrines up to my last minute, believing and professing myself, and submitting myself to the prayers of all…. With these words, our Holy Father Alexis Toth composed his last will and testament shortly before his death in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania in 1909.

August 9/22 Of the Holy Apostles chosen by Christ, one seems always to be overlooked. Of course, he was not amongst the original Twelve, but replaced Judas, as the twelfth apostle. His name is the Holy Apostle Matthias. St. Matthias replaced Judas and took his rightful position among the eleven others. I write this article primarily because he is so overlooked and unknown, and also in a personal way, because he is the apostle whose name I took as a monastic.

On January 16, 2004, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople decreed the official glorification of Mother Maria (Skobstova), her son George (Yuri), and her assistants, Father Dimitri Klepinine and Elia Fondaminskii. The life of Mother Maria is one of great contradictions and yet great inspiration. She was once a socialist revolutionary and mayor of her Russian town, the first Russian woman to enroll in a theological seminary, married twice, divorced twice, mother of three, Orthodox nun, servant of the poor, the sick and the homeless of Paris, protector of Jews from the Nazis and finally, a martyr at Ravensbruck concentration camp.

As we reflect on the Lives of the Saints and seek to imitate their faith, one of the challenges, especially for we priests, is that the vast majority of Orthodox saints were either martyrs who suffered and died for Christ or were monks and nuns. Very few of our canonized Saints were married men and women who raised families,