Congratulating readers on the new time of blessings from God, a regular author of Russian Mind magazine, the rector of St. Nicholas Church in the French city of Toulouse, Father Augustin Sokolovski, shares with readers his thoughts on the saints whose memory is celebrated at the beginning of autumn
The first of September is the beginning of the school year. At the same time, even among church people, few remember that in the Church, and not only in Orthodoxy, but also among Roman Catholics, September 1 is the beginning of a new church year. This is the beginning of a new church year, which in Orthodox worship is called the “Summer of the Lord.”
Martyr Andrew Stratelates
In 1591, on the outskirts of Moscow, the Russian army successfully repelled the last invasion of the Crimean Khanate on the capital in history. The troops were located opposite each other, and the centre of the battle took place on the site where, in gratitude, a monastery in honor of St. Andrew Stratilates was soon erected on Sparrow Hills. The victory was won on his feast day. Currently, the St. Andrew’s Monastery houses important dicasteries of the Russian Church, the Synodal Library, and the main Orthodox radio station, Radio Vera.
On the first day of autumn, the Orthodox Church celebrates the memory of the martyr Andrew Stratilates. The exact time of Andrei Stratilate’s life is unknown. It is assumed that he suffered for his faith during the time of the Roman Emperor Maximian (284–305). The Greek word «stratilate» is translated as «army commander». The life says that Andrew was a pagan, but as was often the case in the Roman army, he trusted Jesus extremely. In a moment of danger, when he and the detachment under his command were ordered to pursue some «Persians» in order to engage them in battle, he called on the soldiers to hope in Christ. Victory was won. But along with the honours, the soldiers were denounced for confessing the Crucified.
So, Andrew deployed his small army towards Tarsus of Cilicia, the birthplace of the Apostle Paul, because this region was already Christianized, and there was hope of meeting a priest or bishop there to be baptized. After his baptism, Andrew and his detachment laid down their arms so as not to engage in battle with their brothers in arms who had been sent by the pagan command to deal with them. If Andrew truly lived under Maximian, he was a contemporary of the patron saint of the French, Swiss, and other ancient Christian armies, the martyr Maurice. Like Andrew the Stratelates, who, out of brotherly love, laid down his arms with his legion to refuse to fight against his brothers, Maurice was killed for his faith in Helvetia, the future Switzerland. A remarkable example of the Communion of Saints who did not know each other personally, by the grace of the Holy Spirit.
The early Church glorified its saints not for heroism, but for holiness. Saint Augustine makes a detailed distinction between these two characteristics in his work On the City of God. Thus, according to the Father of the Church, the ancient Romans were heroes, but they were also very wicked. Andrew Stratelates was glorified by the Church not for his military valor, but for his preaching of the Gospel among his fellow soldiers and his willingness to suffer for the faith. Thus, the Gospel commandment was fulfilled: «Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends» (John 15:13).
The martyr Andrew Stratelates was the patron saint of the Russian writer Andrei Platonov (1899-1951), whose poems and prose about autumn are characterized by a special melancholy. “There is much gloomy anxiety in life, // The days bring many troubles. // Autumn roads in the rain, // It is hard to walk along them,” he wrote in his poem Ivan da Marya.
Like all Russians before the Revolution of 1917, Platonov was a baptized child. But even in his youth he «believed» in Bolshevism, and in his works, he claimed that Jesus Himself was a Bolshevik, and under no circumstances should He be handed over to the «churchmen.» Only at the end of his short but sorrowful life did the writer begin to return to the Church and asked his loved ones to pray for him. The writer looked after his son, who had tuberculosis. Platonov became infected himself and died. Converted to the modern calendar, he was born on August 28, that is, on the Assumption, and died on January 5, before Christmas Eve, as if for poets the history of salvation lived in reverse order.
«But in the deep, dying autumn // One can mournfully and forever fall in love: // After all, the pines turn green in winter – // One must live all year round,» Platonov wrote in the same poem. The memory of the holy martyr Andrew is also a duty to offer a prayer for the eternal memory of the writer.
The holiness of the third September
On 3 September, the Church celebrates the memory of Saint Vassa of Edessa. Saint Vassa suffered for Christ during the reign of Emperor Galerius at the turn of the third and fourth centuries.
The Greek city of Edessa, from which Vassa came, should be distinguished from the famous Syrian metropolis, the ancient capital of the Holy Image of the Savior. It is interesting to note that on the same day as the memory of Saint Vassa, the Church celebrates the memory of the Apostle Thaddeus of 70, whose name, according to ancient tradition, connects the history of the Holy Image and the preaching of the Gospel in Syrian Edessa. It is possible that this is not a coincidence, but a consequence of the fact that the editors of the ancient liturgical calendars mistakenly identified two different Edessas and synchronized the memory of the Apostle with that of Vassa of Edessa, as if they were both from the same city. This is indirectly attested by the liturgical office of the Apostle Thaddeus and the martyr Vassa, which is common for these two saints in the liturgical Menaion.
Along with Saint Vassa, her sons Theognius, Agapius, and Pistus suffered. The memory of the holy martyrs, a mother and her sons, is an example of early Christian family holiness, and, sadly, an example of human betrayal. Vassa was the wife of a pagan priest named Valerius, who gave her and his own sons over to the pagans.
The saints were arrested, subjected to persuasion, torture, and torment. Hoping that Vassa would give in to the suffering of her own children, the pagans first dealt with the three sons. Their torments were severe and varied. In the end, all three were beheaded. As if wishing to avenge every child raised by her in the Christian faith, the pagans subjected Saint Vassa to a bloody triad of tortures: she was burned with fire, she was thrown to the wild beasts and then thrown into the sea.
A passing ship saved her. Perhaps this was an «ordinary» human rescue, perhaps a supernatural phenomenon. Hagiographers believed that those who saved the saint were Angels, and St Nicodemus of the Holy Mountain believed that they were her sons. In the apotheosis of their heavenly glory, they appeared to their mother as a sign of gratitude and strengthening.
At the moment of her interrogation, the saint toppled the pagan idol of Zeus, but the real apogee of her suffering was her “return from the dead”. Like the Lord Jesus in the Gospel, who did not try to escape the torment of the Cross, which He proclaimed at the Last Supper in establishing the Sacrament of the Eucharist as a seal and sign of the voluntariness of His Passion and our salvation, Saint Vassa returned to her executioners. Eight days later, when the pagans finally considered her lost in the depths of the sea, she again appeared before the court. In divine providence, this was a chance for repentance, correction and conversion. But, unlike the Apostle Thomas, who on the eighth day believed in Christ through touching His wounds, in the future proof that the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist serve as the source of faith, the Greek pagans considered Saint Vassa a ghost. They beat the defenceless woman with sticks for a long time. As if convinced, in their pagan frenzy, that she was not spirit, but flesh, they then beheaded her.
«You were a mother of fair children, O trophy-bearer Vassa. You did bring to the Trinity the fruits of your womb. At you word Theognios, Pistos, and Agapios bravely contested and with you partake of glory. Save those who cry to you: Glory to Him Who has crowned you; glory to Him Who has glorified you; glory to Him Who through you works healings for all,” says the troparion to the martyrs.
The modern Russian Menaion contains a service to the holy martyrs, but, unfortunately, there is no troparion, which is indirect evidence of the modesty of the celebration. On September 30 the Church celebrates the memory of the holy martyrs Faith, Hope and Love, and their mother Sophia. Saint Sophia and her three daughters are much more famous than Vassa and her three sons. The memory of the martyr Vassa and her sons was greatly celebrated on the Greek islands of the Sea of Marmara, where, according to legend, they suffered. After the Asia Minor catastrophe of 1922 and the expulsion of the Greek population from the former Byzantine territories in Asia, there is no longer a Christian presence there. As our contemporary Bishop Vasily Krivoshein wrote, citing a Greek proverb, «a poor saint has no doxology.»
Holy bishop Athanasius and martyr Anthousa
«To all perfection I see a limit, but your commands are boundless,” says the longest of the psalms in the Septuagint translation (118:96). The Fathers of the Church saw in these words an indication of the possibility of astonishing diversity in the correct fulfilment of the same commandment. Saint Athanasius of Tarsus fulfilled Christ’s commandment to «lay down one’s life for one’s friends» (John 15:11) «peaceably,» through the preaching of the Gospel.
The name «Athanasius» means immortal. It is therefore not surprising that it was very popular among Christians, who not only believed in the eternity of the soul, as pagans also believed, but also expected a general «resurrection of the flesh,» as the Apostles’ Creed so realistically states. One of the ancient saints named with such a hope of immortality was the martyr Athanasius of Tarsus. The Church celebrates his memory on September 4. This saint was bishop of the city of Tarsus and suffered for Christ under Emperor Aurelian (270–275). The martyrdom of Saint Athanasius was prompted by the baptism of Anthousa, a young virgin of very wealthy origin from Seleucia.
Anthousa was a pagan, but she saw in a vision a man of God whom she was destined to meet. Later, her parents spoke among themselves of a Christian preacher who had converted many people to Christ and, above all, supported his preaching with numerous miracles and healings. Struck by this coincidence of vision and gossip, of the supernatural and of the everyday, Anthouse set out in search of the evangelist. Having found him, she asked him for guidance in the faith. Saint Athanasius baptized her and the bodyguards who accompanied her, named Neophytos and Charisimos.
The brief description of the life of Saint Athanasius, of which we know nothing beyond this episode, is an example of the fulfilment of Jesus’ commandment in the Gospel: «Greater love has no one than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends» (John 15:11). He could have preached among the people for a long time. The pagan police knew that the corporation of pagan priests and the ignorance of the masses would sooner or later turn against Christian preachers, and therefore often did not intervene in their activities. But the baptism of a nobleman in this case meant the inevitable death of the Christian bishop. The pagan authorities then reacted quickly and aggressively. They saw the conversion of noble and famous people to Christianity as a major challenge. The testimony of these converts was considerable. It is no coincidence that the Church called martyrs of royal and very noble origin «great martyrs.» Athanasius made his choice.
Almost simultaneously with Saint Anthousa, and apparently in the same region, another saint of the same name, Anthousa, suffered for Christ. Hiding her noble origins, she dressed in coarse and shabby clothes, thus creating one of the prototypes of Christ’s future madness, which, this sacred prophetic madness, would become the asceticism of many saints in the future Church. Tortured along with her twelve servants, she was placed in a well where she died. Tradition calls her Anthousa the Younger, or the New. She is commemorated on September 9. Precisely in relation to her, Saint Anthousa, baptized by Athanasius, is called » Anthousa the Great,» or Anthousa of Seleucia. The Greek name «Anthousa» translates as «flowery» and, in the modern transcription, Anfisa, was very popular in the last century in Russia and the Soviet Union.
Athanasius was subjected to the most brutal tortures, with rods and a rack, and then beheaded. А brief history of his long suffering has been preserved in the life of Saint Anthousa. As if in gratitude for her conversion and baptism, the saint bestowed upon Athanasius, immortal in name and martyrdom, the «literary» immortality of hagiography and ecclesiastical veneration. However, Anthousa’s life is so similar to that of another famous saint of the time, the martyr Pelagia, that it is difficult to know which of the two could have served as a model for the other.
The mother of the great Church Father, John Chrysostom, venerated as a saint in modern Orthodox piety, was named in honour of Saint Anthousa. One image depicts the mother of Basil of Caesarea Emmelia, the mother of Gregory the Theologian Nonna, the mother of Saint Augustine Monica, and the mother of John Chrysostom Anthousa in the same icon. The memory of Saint Athanasius of Tarsus, of Anthousa of Seleucia and of the martyrs Charissimos and Neophytos is celebrated together on the same day. These are examples of the communion of saints in life and in death, in the memory of the Church and beyond history.
Elder Aristocles of Moscow
Elder Aristocles of Moscow was born in 1846 and went to the Lord in 1918. He was a family man but became a widower and went to Greece to become a monk. Born in Orenburg, Aristocles spent most of his ascetic life on Mount Athos. Yet it was in Moscow where, according to an unfathomable plan of grace, he was destined to bring the greatest benefit to people through his ministry. The recollections of his contemporaries testify to the saint’s gift of spiritual counsel and prophecy, as well as to the power of his prayer, which once restored sight to a blind man. It was as if the elder overlooked other righteous men of that time in time and space. Ambrose of Optina and John of Kronstadt were older than him, and Patriarch Tikhon and even Silouan of Athos were younger.
The Lord evidently protected Saint Aristocles throughout his life. At the end of the 19th century, he was prior of the Moscow Metochion of the Russian Athos Monastery but was later recalled. The First Russian Revolution of 1905 therefore did not affect him – he remained on Mount Athos. Shortly before the outbreak of conflict over the veneration of the name of Jesus on the Holy Mountain, Aristocles was brought back to Moscow. Thus, he escaped the dramatic events just before the First World War, which led to the mass expulsion of Russian monks from Mount Athos.
Shortly after the Bolsheviks seized power in Russia, God called Aristocles to Himself. On the eve of the monastery’s destruction in 1923, the believers prophetically insisted on his reburial at the Danilov Cemetery. Thus, his relics were preserved for future veneration. On September 6, 2004, the anniversary of his death, he was beatified. The Lord miraculously and carefully preserved His saint so that he could preserve and protect others. Saint Aristocles is a living example of the charitable gift of spiritual guidance and of creating good in humble silence, despite the winds of all kinds of change in troubled times.
The Synaxis of Moscow Saints
On the Sunday before September 11, the Russian Church celebrates the Synaxis of Moscow Saints. This holiday often coincides with City Day. The first canonized Moscow saint is considered to be Metropolitan Peter of the Russian Church. He was born in 1260 and was elected metropolitan in 1308. In 1325, by an amazing coincidence, exactly one thousand years after the First Ecumenical Council in Nicaea, he chose Moscow as his place of residence. The future capital was then the only large city in Rus’ that did not have its own bishop. According to the canons of the Ancient Church, there should not be two bishops in one city. This was an absolutely prophetic decision, which, without exaggeration, not only determined the rise of Moscow, but also predetermined the course of subsequent Russian history. Just a year later, Peter departed to the Lord and was buried in the wall of the original Dormition Cathedral. August 6th marks the transfer of the relics of Saint Peter to the newly built Dormition Cathedral, which took place in 1479. Many centuries later, it was on this autumn day of Saint Peter’s remembrance that the elder Aristocles departed to the Lord. Therefore, the days of remembrance of Peter and Aristocles coincide. If Peter became the first Moscow saint in time, then Aristocles was one of the last.
