On the12th of December, the Feast-Day of Our Father among the Saints SPYRIDON the Wonderworker, Bishop of Trimythus

My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Only True Lord, God and Savior,

CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.

On the 12th of December, the Feast-Day of Our Father among the Saints
SPYRIDON the Wonderworker, Bishop of Trimythus.

Apolytikion (Dismissal) Hymn of the Hierarch. First Tone

THOU was shown forth as a champion of the First Council and a
Wonderworker, O Spyridon, our God-bearing Father. Wherefore,
thou didst speak unto one dead in the grave, and didst change a
serpent to gold. And while chanting thy holy prayers, thou hadst
Angels serving with thee, O most sacred one. Glory to Him that
hath glorified thee. Glory to Him that hath crowned thee.
Glory to Him that worketh healings for all through thee.

Kontakion Hymn of the Hierarch. Second Tone

PIERCED through with the love of Christ, O sacred Spyridon, thou
gavest thy mind divine wings with the Spirit’s light; in the active
vision of God were all thy labours, O inspired of God, whereby thou
becamest the Lord’s divine altar, asking divine light for all.

Saint Spyridon, the God-bearing Father of the Church, the great defender of Corfu and the boast of all the Orthodox, had Cyprus as his homeland. He was simple in manner and humble of heart, and was a shepherd of sheep. When he was joined to a wife, he begat of her a daughter, whom they named Irene. After his wife’s departure from this life, he was appointed Bishop of Trimithus, and thus he also became a shepherd of rational sheep. Even as a Bishop did not change his simple style of life, taking charge of his cattle himself and tilling the soil with his own hands. He consumed very little of his own produce, giving the great part to the poor. He performed great miracles byGod’s power, making it rain fall in a drought, stopping the course of the river, raising several of the dead, healing the Emperor Constans of a grave sickness, seeing and hearing Angels, foreseeing future events and penetrating the secrets of the human heart. He dressed so simply that once when he was invited by the Emperor to the Imperial Court a soldier took him for a beggar and struck him a blow. The meek and guileless Spyridon turned him the other cheek. When the First Ecumenical Synod (Council) was assembled in Nicaea, he also was present, and by means of his most simple words stopped the mouth of the heretic Arians who were blaspheming against our Lord Jesus Christ by declaring that Jesus is NOT TRUE GOD BUT A CREATURE (KTISMA).

In the midst of the Synod and the company of luminaries and illustrious personalities was the humble mind Spyridon, whose indwelling of the Holy Spirit and virtue empowered him to surpass the worldly philosophers who were given permission to attend the Council. The Saint asked to speak. Saint Spyridon took up a tile in his hands and went on speaking: "One is God Who made heaven and the earth, the Creator of all things. The same one created the heavenly powers and fashioned man, so that ‘all things came into being through Him, and without Him, not even one thing came into being that hath come to be. And ‘by the Logos/Word of the Lord were the heaven established, and all the might of them by the Spirit of His mouth’ (Psalm 32:6). "Again, we know Hm to be coessential with the Father, coequal in dignity, honor, and glory. The Holy Trinity, though One, in essence, is tri-hypostatic, Three Persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit…attend to this small and common roof-tile…I shall demonstrate before your very eyes the truth with this here clay tile which is compounded of three elements though it is one in essence and nature.

After the Saint, inflamed with love for the Holy Trinity, made the sign of the Honorable Cross with his right hand, while holding the tile in his left hand, he pronounced: ‘In the name of the Father,’ and instantly — lo, thy Wonders, O Christ our King! — the fire which has baked the tile flared upward. Then he said, ‘and of the Son,’ and at once, the water wherewith it had been mixed ran down. Immediately following, he said, ‘and of the Holy Spirit,’ and he opened his hand in which only the clay from which it was made remained. Thus the Saint put to shame the heretics and philosophers.

By the Divine grace which dwelt in him, he wrought such great Wonders that he received the surname "Wonderworker." So it is that, having tended his flock piously and in a manner pleasing to God, he reposed in the Lord about the year A.D. 350, leaving to his country his sacred relics as a consolation and source of healing for the faithful. The miracles of Saint Spyridon are numerous, both while he was living and after, through his holy relics which bring healing of various diseases to those who believe.

Saint Spyridon blessed my family with a tremendous miracle when I was still a child of five years old in the town of Zaharo, Elias where we lived. It was during the 1946-1948 civil war in Greece. The patron Saint of Zaharo is Saint Spyridon and all the people there loved the Saint and sought his protection and guidance. A battle ensued and the communist troops had surrounded the town with all the townspeople trapped in their homes. The battle with the communist guerrillas was about to fall into the hands of the enemy. My family of seven members was also caught in this very frightful situation. My parents, concerned about any of us being injured or killed by a stray bullet, gathered a few pieces of furniture and made a kind of shelter for all of us to go under. The shelter was situated under the icon corner of the house and where the vigil light was and where we said our prayers. One of the holy icons was of our Patron Saint, St. Spyridon. We all prayed to our Lord, our Theotokos, and to Saint Spyridon to protect us during the fierce battle. The battle was raging all night and, early in the morning, we heard the sound of planes and the explosion of the bombs raining on the town. Soon, both the sounds of the planes and the bombs came closer and closer. Then, one of the bombs fell and exploded in the backyard, while a second one was a direct hit on our house with us in it. Finally, the battle was over by morning, the guerrillas were all killed, but our entire family was buried under a pile of debris and dirt. Relatives and friends thought that the entire family was killed. Oh! The Wonder! All of us were alive and uninjured. Our Lord, the Theotokos, and Saint Spyridon protected us and we all survived. That eventually led us to Athens, and from Athens to Chicago, Illinois in the U.S.A. Thanks be to God! to our Theotokos, and to our Patron Saint Spyridon.

About the middle of the 7th Century, because of the incursions made by the barbarians at that time, his holy relics were taken to Constantinople, where they remained, being honored by the Emperors themselves. But before the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks, which took place on May 29, 1453, a certain priest named George Kalokhairetes, the parish priest of the church where the Saints holy relics, as well as those of Saint Theodora the Empress, were kept, took them away on account of the impending peril. Travelling by way of Serbia, he ame as far as Arta in Epirus, a region in Western Greece opposite to the isle of Corfu or Kerkyra. From there, while the misfortunes of the Orthodox Christians were increasing with every day, he passed over to Corfu about the year 1460. His holy relics are now housed in the church of Saint Spyridon in Corfu, Greece, where they are a major pilgrimage site for Orthodox Christians worldwide.

_____________
"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
– Saint John Chrysostomos
+ + +

With sincere agape in His Divine and Glorious Diakonia (Ministry),
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+ Father George