Science of the Saints, 17-IX-2018 (4 Sep.), Hieromartyr Babylas, Bishop Of Antioch

The Hieromartyr Babylas, and with him the three young men Urban, Prilidian, Eppolonias, and their mother Christodoula died as martyrs under the emperor Decius (249-251). 

During a time of his stay at their city of Antioch, the emperor arranged for a large festival in honour of the pagan gods. During this same time the holy and God-fearing bishop of Antioch, Babylas, was making Divine Liturgy in church; he prayed for his flock and taught it bravely to undergo all the tribulations for the faith in Christ. After his abomination of idol-worship, Decius, wanting to behold the making of the Divine Mysteries, decided to enter the church and by his visit to defile the Sanctuary of the Lord. News of this reached the bishop, and he, not wanting to permit impiety in the temple of God, went out to meet him and block the path to the church. 

When the emperor tried to get closer to the church doors, Saint Babylas shoved him away with his hands, such that the emperor had to forego his intent. He wanted to take his revenge on the saint right away, but seeing the large throng of Christians, he feared having them riot.

The next day the angry emperor gave orders to set fire to the Christian temple, and to bring Bishop Babylas before him. To the question about why he should insult the imperial dignity, and not allow the emperor into the church nor render him due respect of position, the holy bishop answered, "Anyone that would rise up against God and want to desecrate His sanctuary, such a one not only is not worthy of respect, but is become the enemy of the Lord."

The emperor demanded that the holy bishop worship the idols and in such manner redeem his offence against the emperor, or else face execution. But having convinced himself that the martyr would remain steadfast in his faith, he commanded the military commander Victorinus to put him in heavy chains and lead him through the city in disgrace. To this the holy martyr replied, "Emperor, for me these chains be as venerable as for thee is thine imperial crown, and the suffering for Christ for me is as acceptable as is the imperial power for thee; death for the Immortal King for me is as desirable as thine life be for thee." 

At the trial with Bishop Babylas were three young brothers who did not forsake him even in this most difficult moment. Seeing them, the emperor asked, "Who are these children?" "These are my spiritual children," answered the saint, "and I have raised them in piety, I have nourished them with an education, cultivated them with guidance, and here in a small body before thee are these great young men and perfect Christians. Test and see."

The emperor tried in all sorts of ways to entice the youths and their mother Christodoula into a renunciation of Christ, but in vain. Then in a rage he gave orders to whip each of them in a number equivalent to their years of age. The first they whipped with twelve blows, the second ten, and the third seven. Having dismissed the mother and children, the torturer again summoned the bishop, telling him that the children had renounced Christ. But the lie quickly unraveled and brought no success. Then in a rage he commanded all the martyrs be tied on a tree and burnt at with fire. But seeing the stoic bravery of the saints, the emperor finally condemned them to the death of martyrdom by beheading with the sword (+c.251).

Science of the Saints, 16-IX-2018 (3 Sep.), Holy Hieromartyr Anthimus, Bishop Of Nicomedia

The Hieromartyr Anthimus, Bishop of Nicomedia, and the Martyrs with him suffered during the time of the persecution against Christians under the emperors Diocletian (284-305) and Maximian (284-305). 

The persecution of Christians became particularly intense after the occurrence of a conflagration at the imperial court at Nicomedia. The pagans accused the Christians of setting the fire and reacted against them with terrible ferocity. Thus, in Nicomedia alone, on the day of the Nativity of Christ, at a church as many as twenty thousand Christians were burned. But this monstrous inhumanity did not frighten off the Christians: they firmly confessed their faith and accepted a martyr's death for Christ. And thus during this period of sufferings died Saints Dorotheus, Mardonius, Migdonius, Peter, Indysus and Gorgonius. One of them was beheaded by the sword, others perished by burning, or being covered over in the ground, or by drowning in the sea. 

Zinon, a soldier, for his bold denunciation of the emperor Maximian was stoned, and then beheaded. Then also perished at the hands of the pagans the holy Virgin-Martyr Domna, a former pagan-priestess, and also Saint Euthymius, because of their concern that the bodies of the holy martyrs should be buried. 

Bishop Anthimus, who headed the Church of Nicomedia, at the request of his flock concealed himself in a village not far from the city. From there he sent missives to the Christians, urging them to cleave firmly to the holy faith and not to fear tortures. One of his letters, dispatched with the Deacon Theophilus, was intercepted and given over to the emperor Maximian. Theophilus was subjected to interrogation and died under torture, without revealing to his torturers the whereabouts of Bishop Anthimus. 

But after a certain while Maximian managed to learn where Saint Anthimus was situated, and he sent a detachment of soldiers after him. The bishop himself met up with them along the way. The soldiers did not recognise the identity of the saint. He invited them to join him and provided them a meal, after which he revealed that he was the one that they were searching for. The soldiers did not know what to do in this instance; indeed, they wanted to leave him be and tell the emperor that they had not found him. Bishop Anthimus was not one to tolerate a lie, and so he would not consent to this. The soldiers themselves came to believe in Christ and accepted holy Baptism. But amidst all this, the saint nonetheless demanded them to carry out the orders of the emperor. 

When Bishop Anthimus was brought before the emperor, the emperor gave orders that the instruments of execution be brought out and placed before him. "Dost thou think, emperor, to frighten me with these tolls of execution?"asked the saint. "No indeed, thou canst not frighten one that doth wish to die for Christ! Execution is frightening only for the cowardly of soul, for whom the present life is most precious." 

The emperor then directed that the saint be fiercely tortured and beheaded by the sword. Bishop Anthimus to his last gasp with joy glorified God, for Whom he had been vouchsafed to suffer (+302).

Legends & Lore of Southern Illinois: Sassafras Tea & Sallet

Good health was vital to the pioneer, and he went to extreme lengths to keep himself fit. When measured by present-day standards, he was not a healthy man, and he had a very limited knowledge of better health practices. However, he did have strange beliefs, antidotes, a considerable stock of remedies, and even health superstitions. Since these were all he had to guide him in the matter of health, he followed them.

As spring came each year, the pioneer began to look about for a spring tonic. This might vary from a mixture of sulphur and sorghum molasses to sassafras tea and sallet. He believed that his blood had become thick during the winter and needed to be thinned, and that his system needed cleaning out.

There were accepted ways in which these objectives could be accomplished. He could take sulphur and molasses, though this popular remedy seemed to have been reserved mostly for youngsters. Another common and less objectionable remedy was sassafras tea, which people drank in copious amounts each spring. They thought sassafras tea was an eflfective blood-thinner particularly so when made from the roots of red sassafras.

Naturally, a sufficient quantity of roots should be used to give the brew strength and color. The amount needed to produce a half-gallon of tea would be represented by ten or twelve pieces about the size and length of a finger. These were allowed to simmer long enough to bring out the best flavor. The tea was then given a minute or so to settle. Sweetened to taste, it was an agreeable drink for most persons, and also was an agreeable way to "thin the blood."

To assure the best tea, the roots were dug in early spring while the trees were dormant; that is, before the sap had begun to rise. Some insisted that roots should be taken only from the north side of the tree. Some even held that those dug during the dark of the moon were more flavorful. All alike agreed that roots from more mature trees, three inches or more in diameter, were more aromatic. Digging sassafras in early spring became almost ritualistic. Only the rough outer bark of the roots was removed. Larger roots were split rail fashion, and diggers generally discarded the central portion of larger sections. When properly gathered and stored, roots retained their flavor for weeks. Properly brewed and allowed to settle, the tea had a most attractive rosy tint. The scent of brewing tea filled the house with a delightful odor.

A similar drink was made from the broken twigs of the spicewood bush. The writer once drank some of this tea in a home that rated it above the sassafras drink. The lingering memories of this one experience, however, are dim among the more vivid ones of sassafras brew.

Each spring now one finds small bundles of sassafras root in rubber bands on sale at grocery stores, even in nationally known chain stores and supermarkets, but something seems to be lacking. It may be that those gathering the roots do not select a sufficiently mature tree. Perhaps they are collecting white sassafras, or possibly they forget to dig only those roots north of the tree. However it may be, today's tea hardly measures up to those memories of yesteryear. Perhaps an explanation may lie in a friend's remark, "That boyish appetite is gone."

Sulphur and molasses and teas from sassafras and spicewood hardly were sufficient to fully thin the blood and clean the system. A supplement of wild greens, or sallet, was necessary. This yearning of the pioneer for green food is not difficult to understand. There were no frozen foods and no fresh vegetables from the South. The first green vegetables that the pioneer could have were those that grew on the farmstead, in the fence rows, and about old fields, where the housewife went to gather sour dock, pokeberry, lamb's quarter (generally pronounced lam-squarter), dandelion, narrowed leaf plantain, wild beets, wild lettuce, young sprouts of elderberry, wild onion, and perhaps other plants not presently popular.

Each family burned an early lettuce bed and often set out stalks of the cabbage that had been holed up in earthen mounds the previous autumn. They gathered the shoots from such sprouting stocks as well as the tops of any turnips that had survived the winter. There also would be an early planting of mustard. If newly planted beets were thinned, their tops were used. Greens thus became plentiful, but no later varieties could replace the first wild ones which were gathered as early as they appeared and cooked with a slab of fat bacon or hog jaw. Memories of these greens, supplemented with crackling bread may cause some oldsters to indulge in a bit of reverie. Some may recall the refrain of a song: "Corn bread, buttermilk, and good old greasy greens."

"Legends & Lore of Southern Illinois" - John W. Allen

Science of the Saints, 15-IX-2018 (2 Sep.), Holy Martyr Mamas

The Holy Martyr Mamas was born in Paphlagonia of pious and illustrious parents, the Christians Theodotos and Ruphina. For their open confession of their faith, the parents of the saint were arrested by the pagans and locked up in prison in Caesarea Cappadocia. Knowing his own bodily weaknesses, Theodotos prayed, that the Lord would take him before being martyred. The Lord heard his prayer and he died in prison. Saint Ruphina died also after him, having given birth to a premature son, whom she prayerfully entrusted to God, beseeching that He be the Protector and Defender of the orphaned infant. God hearkened to the death-bed prayer of Saint Ruphina: a rich Christian widow named Ammea reverently buried the bodies of Saints Theodotos and Ruphina, and she took the boy into her own home and surrounded him with motherly care. 

Saint Mamas grew up in the Christian faith. His foster mother concerned herself with the developing of his natural abilities and early on she sent him off to study his grammar. The boy learned easily and willingly. He was not of an age of mature judgment but distinguished himself by maturity of mind and of heart. By means of prudent conversations and personal example young Mamas converted many of his own peers to Christianity. There was a denunciation about this to the governor, named Democritus, and the youth was arrested and brought to trial. 

In deference to his illustrious parentage Democritus decided not to subject him to torture, but instead sent him off to the emperor Aurelian (270-275). The emperor tried at first kindly, but then with threats to turn Saint Mamas back to the pagan faith, but all in vain: the saint bravely confessed himself a Christian and pointed out the madness of the pagans in their worship of mindless idols. Infuriated, the emperor subjected the youth to cruel tortures. They eventually wanted to drown the saint, but an Angel of the Lord saved Saint Mamas and bid him live on an high mountain in the wilderness, located not far from Caesarea. Bowing to the will of God, the saint built there a small church and began to lead a life of strict temperance, in exploits of fasting and prayer.

Soon he received a remarkable power over the forces of nature: wild beasts inhabiting the surrounding wilderness gathered at his abode and listened to the reading of the Holy Gospel. Saint Mamas nourished himself on the milk of wild goats and deer. 

The saint did not ignore the needs of his neighbours: preparing cheese from this milk, he gave it away freely to the poor. Soon the fame of Saint Mamas' life spread throughout all of Caesarea. 

The governor in concern sent a detachment of soldiers to arrest him. Coming across Saint Mamas on the mountain, the soldiers did not recognise him, and mistook him for a simple shepherd. The saint then invited them to his dwelling, gave them a drink of milk and then told them his name, knowing that a suffering death for Christ awaited him. In surrendering himself over into the hands of the torturers, Saint Mamas was brought to trial under a deputy governor named Alexander, who subjected him to intensive and prolonged tortures. But they did not break the Christian will of the saint. He was strengthened by the words addressed to him from above: "Be strong and take courage, Mamas." 

When they gave Saint Mamas over for devouring by wild beasts, these creatures would not touch him. Finally, one of the pagan priests struck at him with a trident-spear. Mortally wounded, Saint Mamas went out beyond the city limits. There, in a small stone cave, he offered up his spirit to God, Who in the hearing of all summoned the holy Martyr Mamas into the habitation on high (+275). He was buried by believers at the place of his death.

Christians soon began to receive from him blessings of help in their afflictions and sorrows. Saint Basil the Great speaks thus about the holy Martyr Mamas in a sermon to the people: "Commemorate ye the holy martyr: those, who saw him in a vision, who from amongst the living here have him as an helper, those whom in calling on his name he hath helped in some matter, those whom he hath guided out of a prodigal life, those whom he hath healed of infirmity, those whose children already dead he hath restored to life, those whose life he hath prolonged - all of ye, gathered as one, praise ye the martyr".

Science of the Saints, 14-IX-2018 (1 Sep.), St Simeon the Stylite

The Monk Simeon the Stylite was born in the Cappadocian village of Sisan in the Christian family of Susotian and Martha. At 13 years of age he began to tend his father's flock of sheep. To this his first obedience he concerned himself attentively and with love. One time, having heard in church the Gospel commands of the Beatitudes, he was struck by their profundity. Not trusting to his own immature judgement, he turned therefore with his questions to an experienced elder. The elder readily explained to the lad the meaning of what he had heard and it strengthened in him finally the resolve to follow the Gospel path. Instead of heading homewards, Simeon set off to the nearest monastery and, after tears of entreaty, he was accepted after a week into the number of the brethren. 

When Simeon became age 18, he took monastic vows and devoted himself to feats of the strictest abstinence and of unceasing prayer. His zeal - beyond strength for the other monastic brethren - so alarmed the hegumen that he suggested to the monk that he either moderate his ascetic deeds or leave the monastery. The Monk Simeon thereupon withdrew from the monastery and settled himself by day upon a very high column, where he was able to carry out his austere vows unhindered. 

After some time, Angels appeared in a dream vision to the hegumen, which commanded him to bring back Simeon to the monastery. The monk however did not long remain at the monastery. After a short while he settled into a stony cave, situated not far from the village of Galanissa, and he dwelt there for three years, all the while perfecting himself in monastic feats. One time, he decided to spent the entire forty-day Great Lent without food and drink. With the help of God, the monk endured this strict fast. From that time he always completely refrained during the entire period of the Great Lent even from bread and water - twenty days he prayed while standing, and twenty days while sitting - so as not to permit the corporeal powers to relax. 

A whole crowd of people began to throng to the place of his efforts, wanting to receive healing from sickness and to hear a word of Christian edification. Shunning worldly glory and striving again to find his lost solitude, the monk chose a yet unknown mode of asceticism. He went up a pillar 4 meters in height and settled upon it in a little cell, devoting himself to intense prayer and fasting. 

Reports about the Monk Simeon reached the highest church hierarchy and the imperial court. The Antiochian Patriarch Domninos II (441-448) visited the monk, made Divine Liturgy at the pillar and communed the ascetic with the Holy Mysteries. 

Fathers pursuing asceticism in the wilderness all heard about the Monk Simeon, who had chosen such a difficult form of ascetic striving. Wanting to test the new ascetic and determine whether his extreme ascetic feats were pleasing to God, they dispatched messengers to him, who in the name of these desert fathers were to bid the Monk Simeon to come down from the pillar. In the case of disobedience they were to forcibly drag him to the ground. But if he offered obedience, they were entrusted in the name of the desert fathers to bless his continued ascetic deeds. The monk displayed complete obedience and deep Christian humility.

The Monk Simeon was brought to endure many temptations, and he invariably gained the victory over them - relying not on his own weak powers, but on the Lord Himself, Who always came to him in help. The monk gradually increased the height of the pillar on which he stood. His final pillar was 40 cubits in height. Around him was raised a double wall, which hindered the unruly crowd of people from coming too close and disturbing his prayerful concentration. Women in general were not permitted beyond the fence. In this the monk did not make an exception even for his own mother, who after long and unsuccessful searchings finally succeeded in finding her lost son. Not having gained a farewell, she thus died, nestled up to the fence encircling the pillar. The monk thereupon asked that her coffin be brought to him; he reverently bid farewell to his dead mother - and her dead face then brightened up with a blissful smile.

The Monk Simeon spent 80 years in arduous monastic feats - 47 years of which he stood upon the pillar. God granted him to accomplish in such unusual conditions an apostolic service indeed - many pagans accepted Baptism, struck by the moral staunchness and bodily toughness which the Lord bestowed upon His servant. 

The first one to learn of the end of the monk was his close pupil Anthony. Concerned that his teacher had not appeared to the people over the course of 3 days, he went up upon the pillar and found the dead body stooped over at prayer (+ 459). The Antiochian Patriarch Martyrios performed the funeral of the monk before an huge throng of clergy and people. They buried him not far from the pillar. At the place of his ascetic deeds, Anthony established a monastery, upon which rested a special blessing of the Monk Simeon.

Science of the Saints, 13-IX-2018 (31 Aug.), Deposition of the Cincture of the Mother of God

The Placing of the Venerable Cincture of the Most Holy Mother of God in the Constantinople Blachernae Church was during the reign of the emperor Arcadius (395‑408). Before this the holy relic, entrusted to the Apostle Thomas by the Mother of God Herself, was after Her Dormition thereafter kept at Jerusalem by pious Christians. After many years, during the reign of emperor Leo the Wise (886-911), from the Cincture of the Mother of God was accomplished a miraculous healing of his spouse Zoa, suffering from an unclean spirit.

The empress had a vision, that she would be healed of her infirmity when the Cincture of the Mother of God would be placed upon her. The emperor turned with his petition to the Patriarch. The Patriarch removed the seal and opened the vessel in which the relic was kept: the Cincture of the Mother of God appeared completely whole and undamaged by time. The Patriarch placed the Cincture on the sick empress, and she immediately was freed from her infirmity. They served a solemn thanksgiving molieben to the Most Holy Mother of God, and the venerable Cincture they placed back into the vessel and resealed the seal.

In commemoration of the miraculous occurrence and the twofold Placing of the venerable Cincture, the feast of the Placing of the Venerable Cincture of the Most Holy Mother of God was established. 

Science of the Saints, 12-IX-2018 (30 Aug.), Saints Alexander, John, and Paul, Patriarchs of Constantinople

Saints Alexander, John, and Paul, Patriarchs of Constantinople, lived at different times, but each of them happened to clash with the activities of heretics who sought to distort the teachings of the Church. 

Saint Alexander (325-340) was a chorbishop during the period of the first patriarch of Constantinople, Sainted Mitrophanes (315-325), and because of the patriarch's extreme age substituted for him at the First Ecumenical Council at Nicea against the Arians (325). Upon his death, Saint Mitrophanes had instructed in his will to elect his vicar to the Constantinople throne. During these times Patriarch Alexander had to contend with the Arians and with pagans. Once in a dispute with a pagan philosopher the saint said to him: "In the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ I command thee to be quiet!" and the pagan suddenly became voiceless. When he gestured with signs of acknowledgement of his errors and affirmation of the correctness of the Christian teaching, then his speech returned to him and he believed in Christ together with many other pagan philosophers. 

The heretic Arius was punished through the prayer of Saint Alexander. The heretic deceitfully agreed to enter into communion with the orthodox, and the emperor Saint Constantine set a day for receiving Arius. All night long Saint Alexander prayed, imploring the Lord not to permit the heretic to be received into communion with the Church. In the morning, when Arius triumphantly went to the church, surrounded by imperial counselors and soldiers, he was stricken with illness on the Constantine Square - his belly exploded and the innards fell out. 

Patriarch Alexander, having toiled much, died in the year 340 at the age of 98. Sainted Gregory the Theologian (or Nazianzen, Comm. 25 January) made mention about him afterwards in words of praise to the people of Constantinople. 

Sainted John the Faster (582-595) Patriarch of Constantinople (582-595), is famed as the compiler of a Penitential nomocanon, which has come down to us in several distinct versions. But their foundation is one and the same. This is an instruction for priests, how to hear a confession of secret sins, whether a sin already committed in act or merely a sin of intent. Ancient church rules address the manner and duration of public penances, established for obvious and evident sinners. But it was necessary to effectively adapt these rules for the private confession of undetected things being repented of. Because of this, Saint John the Faster issued his Penitential nomocanon, so that the good-intentioned confession of one's private sins, unknown to the world, already testifies to the disposition of the sinner and his conscience in being reconciled to God, and therefore the saint shortened the penances by the ancient fathers by half or more. Yet on the other hand, he set more exactly the character of the penances: severe fasting, daily performing of an established number of prayerful prostrations to the ground, the distribution of alms. The length of penance is determined by the priest. The main purpose of the nomocanon, compiled by the holy Patriarch, consists in establishing penances not simply by the measure of sins, but by the measure of admitting the confessed, and through the appraisal of penitence not by continual punishment, but through the extent of the experience to be confessed, one's spiritual state.

Sainted Paul, by birth a Cypriot, became Patriarch of Constantinople (780-784) during the reign of the Iconoclast emperor Leo IV the Khazar (775-780), and was a virtuous and pious but timid man. Viewing the martyrdom which the orthodox endured for holy icons, the saint concealed his orthodoxy and associated with the iconoclasts. After the death of the emperor Leo, he wanted to restore icon-veneration but was not able to accomplish this, since the iconoclasts were still quite powerful. The saint realised that it was not in his powers to guide the flock, and so he left the patriarchal throne and went secretly to the monastery of Saint Florus, where he took the schema. He repented his silence and association with the iconoclasts and talked of the necessity for convening the Eighth Ecumenical Council to condemn the Iconoclast heresy. Upon his advice, there was chosen to the patriarchal throne Saint Tarasios (784-806), at that time a prominent imperial counselor. The saint died a schema-monk in the year 804.