Our venerable father Auxentius on Mount Skopa in Bithynia, priest and archimandrite, who argued the Chalcedonian faith with a strong voice in a prominent place as if established in a place of authority.
The passing of our venerable father Constantine, whose monastic name was Cyril, the Apostle of the Slavs. This man from Thessalonica, along with his brother Methodius, was sent by Photius the bishop of Constantinople to Moravia, where he preached the Christian faith and devised an alphabet that they might translate the sacred books from Greek to the Slavic language. When they came to Rome, Cyril, who was previously known as Constantine, was afflicted by an illness. He was made a monk and the same day fell asleep in the Lord in 869.
You made the wilderness your dwelling, O Auxentius, the bearer of God. You became an angel in the flesh and a wonder-worker. Through prayers, fast, and vigils, you obtained from God special graces to heal the sick and to sanctify the souls of those who come to you with trust. Glory to the One who gave you strength! Glory to the One who crowned you! Glory to the One who through your intercession grants healing to all!
From your childhood you made wisdom your sister, and you took her to wife as a radiant virgin. You adorned your mind and soul with it like gold. You became a second great Cyril, O voice of God. You became a martyr by name and a blessed thinker.
You found your paradise in asceticism and mastered your body’s passions; you grew stronger in faith and blossomed as a flower in the midst of the Garden, O Auxentius.
Enlightening the world by your divinely inspired teachings, you have extended your sway like lightning over the world. You sow the brilliant Word of God everywhere you go; all the corners of the world shine with your miracles, the north, south, east and west, O blessed Cyril.
Genesis 1:24 – 2:3
Then God said: let the earth bring forth every kind of living creature: tame animals, crawling things, and every kind of wild animal. And so it happened: God made every kind if wild animal, every kind of tame animal, and every kind of thing that crawls on the ground. God saw that it was good. Then God said: Let us make human beings in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the tame animals, all the wild animals, and all the creatures that crawl on the earth.
God created mankind in his image;
In the image of God he created them;
Male and female he created them.
God blessed them and God said to them: Be fertile and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and all the living things that crawl on the earth. God also said: See, I give you every seed-bearing plant on all the earth and every tree that has seed-bearing fruit on it to be your food; and to all the wild animals, all the birds of the air, and all the living creatures that crawl on the earth, I give all the green plants for food. And so it happened. God looked at everything he had made, and found it very good. Evening came, and morning followed– the sixth day.
Thus the heavens and the earth and all their array were completed. On the seventh day God completed the work he had been doing; he rested on the seventh day from all the work he had undertaken. God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work he had done in creation.
Proverbs 2: 1-22
My son, if you receive my words and treasure my command,
Turning your ear to wisdom, inclining your heart to understanding;
Yes, if you call for intelligence, and to understanding raise your voice;
If you seek her like silver, and like hidden treasure search her out,
Then will you understand the fear of the Lord; the knowledge of God you will find;
For the Lord give wisdom, from his mouth comes knowledge and understanding;
He has success in store for the upright, in the shield of those who walk honestly,
Guarding the paths of justice, protecting the way of his faithful ones,
Then you will understand what is right and just, what is fair, every good path;
For wisdom will enter your heart, knowing will be at home in your soul,
Discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you;
Saving you from the way of the wicked, from those whose speech is perverse.
From those who have left the straight paths to walk in the ways of darkness,
Who delight in doing evil and celebrate perversity;
Whose ways are crooked whose paths are devious;
Saving you from a stranger, from a foreign woman with her smooth words,
One who forsakes the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant of her God;
For her path sinks down to death, and her footsteps lead to the shades.
None who enter there come back, or gain the paths of life.
Thus you may walk in the way of the good, and keep to the paths of the just.
For the upright will dwell in the land, people of integrity will remain in it;
But the wicked will be cut off from the land, the faithless will be rooted out of it.
Tuesday, February 13 –
