From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   The Holy Spirit   
      
       The coming of the Spirit is gentle, his presence fragrant, his   
   weight very light. Rays of light and knowledge stream before him as he   
   approaches. The Spirit comes with the tenderness of a true friend and   
   protector to save, to heal, to teach, to counsel, to strengthen, to   
   console. The Spirit comes to enlighten the mind first of the one who   
   receives him, and then through that person the minds of others as   
   well. As light strikes the eye of those who come out of darkness into   
   sunshine and enables them to see clearly things they could not discern   
   before, so does light flood the souls of those counted worthy of   
   receiving the Holy Spirit and enable them to see things beyond the   
   range of human vision of which they had previously been ignorant.   
   --St. Cyril of Jerusalem:   
      
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   December 27th - Saints Theodore and Theophanes   
      
   Two brothers who endured persecution because of their resistance to   
   the Iconoclasts of the Byzantine Empire. Both were monks in the   
   monastery of St. Sabas in Jerusalem at the time when Byzantine   
   officials demanded that the icons be destroyed. When the brothers   
   opposed the action, they were beaten and had their faces cruelly   
   disfigured by having verses carved into them.   
      
   Theodore died in prison. Theophanes may have survived him long enough   
   to become bishop of Nicaea.   
      
   Saint Theodore the Confessor, and his brother Theophanes (October 11)   
   were born in Jerusalem of Christian parents. From early childhood   
   Theodore shunned childish amusements and loved to attend church   
   services. With his younger brother Theophanes, he was sent to the   
   Laura of St. Sava to be educated by a pious priest. Both brothers   
   became monks, and St. Theodore was ordained to the holy priesthood.   
      
   The iconoclast emperor Leo V the Armenian (813-820) expelled and   
   replaced the pious ruler Michael I Rhangabe (811-813). In the   
   beginning, Leo concealed his heretical views, but later declared   
   himself an iconoclast. The Patriarch of Jerusalem sent the two   
   brothers to Constantinople to defend the holy icons. Theodore refuted   
   Leo's arguments, proving the falseness of his beliefs. Leo ordered   
   that both brothers be beaten mercilessly, and then had them sent into   
   exile, forbidding anyone to help them in any way.   
      
   Under the subsequent emperors, Michael II (820-829), and particularly   
   under the iconoclast Theophilus (829-842), both brothers returned from   
   exile. Again they were urged to accept iconoclasm, but they bravely   
   endured all the tortures. They were sent into exile once more, but   
   later returned. This time they were subjected to fierce torture, and   
   finally, their faces were branded with the verses of a poem which   
   mocked the holy confessors. Therefore, the brothers were called "the   
   Branded."   
      
   The city prefect asked St. Theodore to take communion with the   
   iconoclasts just once, promising him freedom if he did. But the holy   
   martyr replied, "Your proposal is the same as saying: 'Let me cut off   
   your head once, and then you may go wherever you wish.'"   
      
   After torture the holy brothers were banished to Apamea in Bithynia,   
   where St. Theodore died around the year 840. St. Theophanes survived   
   until the end of the iconoclast heresy, and died as Bishop of Nicea.   
   St. Theophanes was author of many writings in defense of Orthodoxy.   
   The relics of St. Theodore were transferred to Chalcedon, where they   
   worked many healings.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   "One of the most excellent allotments of the gift of faith, is for a   
   man to be certain of the petition of his prayer through his trust in   
   God. Certainty of faith in God is not the soundness of a man's   
   confession (although this is the mother of faith), but a soul that   
   beholds the truth of God by the power of her disciplines."   
   --St. Isaac the Syrian   
      
      
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   27  The Holy Mother   
      
   By the side of the manger where the Infant lies. His Mother is   
   watching. Who is she?   
      
   A poor and humble maiden, but nevertheless the Mother of God, The   
   Mother of God! How can this be? How can the Eternal, Infinite God have   
   a human Mother? Yet so it is; Mary has a privilege which raises her   
   immeasurably above the highest of the Seraphim. It makes her more   
   perfect in her likeness to God than is possible to any other creature.   
   If, then, we honor the Saints and Angels, how much more should we   
   honor God's own Mother!   
      
   Yet Mary has a still greater claim to our homage, a more fruitful   
   source of blessedness even than the Divine Maternity. Her unswerving   
   obedience to the inspirations of God is declared by our Lord Himself   
   to be a still higher privilege --"Yea, rather, blessed are they who   
   hear the Word of God and keep it." If only we realized the blessedness   
   of unswerving obedience, how different our lots would be!   
      
   What are Mary's thoughts, as she sits watching there? She has no   
   thought save of God. She is absorbed in Him. The hours pass like   
   minutes, they are a sort of anticipation of Paradise. She sees her God   
   face to face, and though His glory is veiled under the robe of flesh,   
   yet Mary can pierce through it as none else ever could, and can bask   
   in the Divine which it conceals. O God, help me to realize now Thy   
   presence, when Thou art veiled under the Sacramental species.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)