2 Timothy 2.11-19 (Epistle)

11Istinita je rijeè: ako s njim umrijesmo, to æemo s njim i oživljeti. 12Ako trpimo, s njim æemo i carovati. Ako se odreèemo, i on æe se nas odreæi. 13Ako ne vjerujemo, on ostaje vjeran; jer se sam sebe ne može odreæi. 14Ovo napominji, i posvjedoèi pred Gospodom da se ne prepiru, koje ništa ne pomaže, nego smeta one koji slušaju. 15Postaraj se da se pokažeš pošten pred Bogom, kao radin koji se nema šta stidjeti, i pravo upravlja rijeèju istine. 16A poganijeh praznijeh razgovora kloni se; jer najviše pomažu u bezbožnosti, 17I rijeè njihova kao živina toèi: meðu kojima je Imenej i Filit, 18Koji u istini pogriješiše govoreæi da je vaskrsenije veæ bilo; i smetaju vjeru nekijeh. 19Tvrdo dakle stoji temelj Božij imajuæi ovaj peèat: pozna Gospod svoje; i: da otstupi od nepravde svaki koji spominje ime Gospodnje.

Luke 18.2-8 (Gospel)

2Govoreæi: u jednome gradu bijaše jedan sudija koji se Boga ne bojaše i ljudi ne stiðaše. 3A u onome gradu bijaše jedna udovica i dolažaše k njemu govoreæi: ne daj me mojemu suparniku. 4I ne šæadijaše zadugo. A najposlije reèe u sebi: ako se i ne bojim Boga i ljudi ne sramim, 5No buduæi da mi dosaðuje ova udovica, odbraniæu je, da mi jednako ne dolazi i ne dosaðuje. 6Tada reèe Gospod: èujte šta govori nepravedni sudija. 7Akamoli Bog neæe odbraniti izbranijeh svojijeh koji ga mole dan i noæ? 8Kažem vam da æe ih odbraniti brzo. Ali sin èovjeèij kad doðe hoæe li naæi vjeru na zemlji?

Our Holy Fathers Athanasius the Great (373) and Cyril (444), Patriarchs of Alexandria

Saint Athanasius, pillar of Orthodoxy and Father of the Church, was born in Alexandria in 275, to pious Christian parents. Even as a child, his piety and devotion to the Faith were so notable that Alexander, the Patriarch of the city, took Athanasius under his protection. As a student, he acquired a thorough education, but was more interested in the things of God than in secular learning, and withdrew for a time into the desert to sit at the feet of Saint Anthony (January 17), whose disciple he became and whose biography he later wrote. On returning to Alexandria, he was ordained to the diaconate and began his public labors for the Church. He wrote his treatise On the Incarnation, when he was only twenty. (It contains a phrase, still often quoted today, that express in a few words some of the depths of the Mystery of the Incarnation: God became man that man might become god.)

Just at this time Arius, a priest in Alexandria, was promoting his enticing view that the Son and Word of God is not of one essence with the Father, but a divine creation of the Father. This view, which (as Athanasius realized) strikes at the very possibility of mankind’s salvation, gained wide acceptance and seemed for a time to threaten the Christian Faith itself. In 325, the Emperor Constantine the Great convoked a Council of the Church at Nicaea to settle the turmoil that the Arian teaching had spread through the Church. Athanasius attended the Council, and defended the Orthodox view so powerfully that he won the admiration of the Orthodox and the undying enmity of the Arians. From that time forth his life was founded on the defense of the true consubstantiality (homoousia) of the Son with the Father.

In 326, not long before his death, Patriarch Alexander appointed Athanasius to be his successor, and Athanasius was duly elevated to the patriarchal throne. He was active in his pastoral role, traveling throughout Egypt, visiting churches and monasteries, and working tirelessly not only to put down the Arian heresy, but to resolve various schisms and moral declines that affected his territory.

Though the Arian heresy had apparently been condemned once and for all at Nicea, Arius had many powerful allies throughout the Empire, even in the Imperial court, and Athanasius was soon subjected to many kinds of persecution, some local, some coming from the Imperial throne itself. Though he was Patriarch of Alexandria for more than forty years, a large amount of that time was spent in hiding from powerful enemies who threatened him with imprisonment or death. Twice he fled to Rome for protection by the Pope, who in the early centuries of the Church was a consistent champion of Orthodoxy against its various enemies. From his various hiding places, Athanasius issued tracts, treatises and epistles which helped to rally the faithful throughout Christendom to the Orthodox cause.

In 366, the Emperor Valens, fearing a revolt of the Egyptians on behalf of their beloved Archbishop, officially restored Athanasius to favor, and he was able to spend the last seven years of his life in peace. Of his forty-seven years as Patriarch, about seventeen were spent in hiding or exile. He reposed in peace in 373, having given his entire adult life, at great suffering, to the defense of the Faith of Christ.

With St Athanasius, the Church commemorates St Cyril (Kyrillos), also Archbishop of Alexandria (412-44). His lot was to defend the Faith against the heretic Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, who denied that Christ in his Incarnation truly united the divine with the human nature. Cyril attempted in private correspondence to restore Nestorius to the Christian faith, and when this failed he, along with Pope Celestine of Rome, led the defense of Orthodoxy against Nestorius’ teaching. Saint Cyril presided at the Third Ecumenical Council in 431, at which the Nestorian error was officially overthrown. After guiding his flock for thirty-two years, he reposed in 444.