Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

The Saturday of the Third Week of the Great Fast

Epistle

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Hebrews [§ 325]. Brethren:

10 ³²Remind yourselves of the former days in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great contest of sufferings: ³³partly, being made a show of both by reproaches and affliction; and partly, having become partners of those who conducted themselves thus. ³⁴For ye also sympathized with those in bonds and ye yourselves accepted the seizure of your possessions with joy, knowing in yourselves that ye have in the heavens a better and abiding possession. ³⁵Do not begin therefore to cast away your boldness which hath great recompense. ³⁶For ye have need of patience, that, after ye do the will of God, ye might receive for yourselves the promise. ³⁷“For yet a very little while, the One Who cometh will come, and will not delay [cf. Hab. 2:3]. ³⁸“Now the just shall live by faith; and if one should draw himself back, My soul hath no pleasure in him [cf. Hab. 2:4].”

Another Reading for Saturday of the Third Week of the Great Fast in Commemoration of the Departed

The Reading is from the First Epistle of Saint Paul to the Thessalonians [§ 270].

4 ¹³Brethren, we do not wish you to be ignorant concerning those who have fallen asleep, that ye may not be grieving, even as the rest who have no hope. ¹⁴For if we believe that Jesus died and is risen, so also those who fell asleep through Jesus will God bring with Him. ¹⁵For we say this to you by the word of the Lord, that we the living, the ones remaining over until the coming of the Lord, in no wise shall precede those who fell asleep. ¹⁶For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout of command, with a voice of an archangel, and with a trumpet of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first. ¹⁷Then we the living, the ones remaining over, shall be carried off together with them in clouds to a meeting of the Lord in the air, and so shall we always be with the Lord.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Mark [§ 8]. At that time:

2 ¹⁴As Jesus passed by, He saw Levi, the son of Alphæos, sitting at the custom-house, and saith to him, “Follow thou Me.” And he rose up and followed Him. ¹⁵And it came to pass, as He was reclining at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners also were reclining together at table with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many, and they followed Him. ¹⁶And after the scribes and the Pharisees saw Him eating with the tax collectors and sinners, they were saying to His disciples, “Why is it that He eateth and drinketh with the tax collectors and sinners?” ¹⁷And Jesus, having heard it, saith to them, “They who are strong have no need of a physician, but they who are ill; I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

Commemoration of the Departed

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint John [§ 16]. The Lord said to the Jews who had come to Him:

5 ²⁴“Verily, verily, I say to you, that the one who heareth My word and believeth the One Who sent Me hath everlasting life, and cometh not into judgment, but hath passed over out of death into life. ²⁵“Verily, verily, I say to you, that an hour cometh, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they who hear shall live. ²⁶“For even as the Father hath life in Himself, so He also gave to the Son to have life in Himself, ²⁷“and He also gave to Him authority to execute judgment. That He is Son of Man, ²⁸“cease marvelling at this; for an hour is coming in which all those in the graves shall hear His voice, ²⁹“and shall go forth—they who did good things to a resurrection of life, but they who practised bad things to a resurrection of condemnation. ³⁰“I am not able to do anything of Myself. Even as I hear, I judge; and My judgment is just, because I seek not Mine own will, but the will of the One Who sent Me, the Father.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of our holy father among the saints, Tarasios, Archbishop of Constantinople.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

March 10th – Civil Calendar: Non-Leap Year
March 9th – Civil Calendar: Leap Year
February 25th – Church Calendar

1. St. Tarasios, Patriarch of Constantinople.

His predecessor, Patriarch Paul, secretly left the patriarchal throne, retired to a monastery and received the Great Habit. This was during the reign of Irene and Constantine. By Paul’s advice, Tarasios, a senator and advisor to the emperor, was chosen as patriarch in 784. He quickly passed through all the stages of ordination and became patriarch. A man of great physical stature and great zeal for Orthodoxy, Tarasios accepted this undesired state in order to help in the struggle of Orthodoxy against heresy, especially that of Iconoclasm. He was responsible for the summoning of the Seventh Ecumenical Council in Nicaea in 787, where the iconoclasts were condemned and the veneration of the holy icons was restored and confirmed. Tarasios was very compassionate to the poor and indigent, building them shelters and feeding them, but he was decisive with those in power in the defense of faith and morals. When the Emperor Constantine VI divorced his lawful wife, Maria, and took a kinswoman to live with him, seeking the patriarch’s blessing to remarry, Tarasios not only withheld his blessing, but first counseled and then reproached him, and finally excommunicated him. As death approached, those round him saw him answering the demons: ‘I am not guilty of that sin, nor of that one,’ until he was incapable of speech. He then began defending himself with his arms, driving them away from him. As he breathed his last, his face shone as with the light of the sun. This truly great hierarch entered into rest in 806. He had governed the Church for 22 years and four months.

2. Our Holy Father Paphnutios of Kephala.

This saint was a contemporary of St. Anthony the Great. It is said of him that he wore the same habit for eighty years. St. Anthony valued him highly and said to all that he was a true ascetic, able to heal and to save souls.

FOR CONSIDERATION

A Christian is like a betrothed girl. As a betrothed girl thinks constantly of her betrothed, so the Christian thinks of Christ. And if the betrothed is far away from her sight, it doesn’t matter; the girl behaves as though he were always there with her. She thinks about him, sings about him, speaks of him, dreams about him, prepares gifts for him. And the same goes for a Christian’s behavior towards Christ. As a betrothed girl knows that she must first leave the house of her birth to meet with and be one with her betrothed, so the Christian knows that he cannot be completely one with Christ until death separates him from the body; that is, from the material home in which his soul dwelt and grew from his birth.

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.