In the town of Catania below the volcanic Mount Ezra, lived our venerable father Leo, a good shepherd and compassionate teacher of the people. He had great concern for the sick and the poor. His zeal for the Faith was as great as his charity toward the less fortunate. A magician named Heliodorus appeared in Catania and deluded the people with various illusions, greatly demoralizing the youth of the town. At one time during divine services, Heliodorus entered the church of God and began his obscenities. St. Leo approached him, tied him to one end of his pallium, and led him to the marketplace. Here Leo ordered that a large fire be built. When it was raging, Leo stood in the middle of the blaze and pulled Heliodorus into the fire. Heliodorus was completely consumed, but Leo remained alive and unscathed. All who had been bewitched by Heliodorus and who had looked upon him as someone divine, were ashamed. The compassionate and zealous Leo was proclaimed throughout the entire kingdom as a great miracle-worker, who helped men by his shining miracles. St. Leo fell asleep in the Lord around the year 787, and from his relics flowed a healing myrrh.
Troparion
The sincerity of your deeds has revealed you to your people, as a teacher of moderation, a model of faith, and an example of virtue. Therefore, you attend greatness through humility, and wealth through poverty. O father and bishop Leo, ask Christ our God to save our souls.
Kontakion
The Church sees you as a brilliant light in the heavens, shining more radiantly than the sun. Preserve her unconquered and indestructible to heresy, and keep her ever spotless, O blessed saint, for we honor your memory at all times.
Readings for the day
Genesis 4: 8-15
Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let us go out in the field.” When they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him. The Lord asked Cain, Where is your brother Abel? He answered, “I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?” God then said: What have you done? Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground! Now you are banned from the ground that opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. If you till the ground, it shall no longer give you its produce. You shall become a constant wanderer on the earth. Cain said to the Lord: “My punishment is too great to bear. Look, you have now banished me from the ground. I must avoid you and be a constant wanderer on the earth. Anyone may kill me at sight.” Not so! The Lord said to him. If anyone kills Cain, Cain shall be avenged seven times. So the Lord put a mark on Cain, so that no one would kill him at sight. Cain then left the Lord’s presence and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.
Proverbs 5: 1-15
My son, to my wisdom be attentive, to understanding incline your ear,
That you may act discreetly, and your lips guard what you know.
Indeed, the lips of the stranger drip honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil;
But in the end she is as bitter as wormwood, as sharp as a two-edged sword.
Her feet go down to death, her steps reach Sheol;
Her paths ramble, you know not where, lest you see before you the road to life.
So now, children, listen to me, do not stray from the words of my mouth.
Keep your way far from her, do not go near the door of her house,
Lest you give your honor to others, and your years to a merciless one;
Lest outsiders take their fill of your wealth, and your hard-won earnings go to another’s house;
And you groan in the end, when your flesh and your body are consumed;
And you say, “Oh, why did I hate instruction, and my heart spurn reproof!
Why did I not listen to the voice of my teachers, incline my ear to my instructors!
I am all but ruined, in the midst of the public assembly!”
Drink water from your own cistern, running water from your own well.
Icon courtesy of Jack Figel, Eastern Christian Publications – ecpubs.com
Monday, February 19 –
