Translation of the relics of Apostle Bartholomew from Anastasiopolis to Lipari (580).
Holy Apostle Titus of the Seventy (1st c.).
St. Menas, patriarch of Constantinople (552). Sts. Barses (378) and Eulogius (ca. 386), bishops of Edessa, and St. Protogenes, bishop of Carrhae (ca. 387), confessors.
New Hieromartyr Moses (Kozhin), hieromonk of Solovki Monastery (1931).
Martyr Genesius of Arles (3rd c.). Sts. John the Cappadocian (520), and Epiphanius (535), patriarchs of Constantinople. St. Aredius of Limousin (Gaul) (591). St. Ebba the Elder, abbess, of Coldingham, Northumbria (683). St. John, bishop of Carpathos (7th c.). St. Gregory, abbot, of St. Martin Monastery in Utrecht (775). Translation of the relics of St. Hilda of Whitby (ca. 860). Synaxis of Hierarchs of Crete: Andrew, archbishop (740); Cyril (ca. 303) and Eumenius (7th c.), bishops of Gortyna.
Repose of Abbess Magdalene of Sevsk Convent (1848), Monk Benjamin of Valaam (1848), and Abbot Nikon (Vorobiev) of Gzhatsk (1963).
Wednesday. [II Cor. 6:11-16; Mark 1:23-28]
The demon praised the Saviour, but the
Saviour said to him: Hold thy peace, and come out of
him. Demons never say anything or do anything with a
good purpose—they always have something evil in
mind. So it was here. The Lord, not exposing their crafty
designs, decided it with a word: hold thy peace and come
out. He did not want to converse long with an evil spirit.
Here is a lesson for us. A person manages to do very
little of something good before a demon sits nearby and
begins to trumpet in his ears: “You are this and
that.” Do not listen and do not enter into
conversation with this flatterer, but immediately say
point blank: “Hold thy peace and come out,”
and erase his tracks with sighs and self-reproach, then
incense that place where he was with contrite prayer. He
wants to give rise to self-opinion and self esteem, and to
fan self-praise and vainglory from them—all of those
thoughts and feelings are the spiritual life the same as
thieves in everyday life. Like thieves that enter a house
to rob its goods, so these demons, taking root in a soul,
destroy all that is good in that soul and cast it away, so
that nothing remains for the Lord to praise later.