The Morning Offering

The Monastery at Dusk

Sunday

March 13, 2011 / February 28, 2011

First Sunday of the Great Lent: Triumph of Orthodoxy. Tone one.
Great Lent. Food with Oil

"Cyprus" Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos from the village Staromniy, Moscow region (movable holiday on the 1st Sunday of the Great Lent).
Venerable Basil the Confessor (747), companion of St. Procopius at Decapolis.
St. Arsenius (Matsievich), metropolitan of Rostov, confessor (1772).
New Hieromartyr Sergius priest (1932).
Blessed Nicholas of Pskov, fool-for-Christ (1576).
Hieromartyr Proterius, patriarch of Alexandria, and six companions (457).
Hieromartyr Nestor, bishop of Magydos in Pamphylia (250).
Venerables Marana, Cyanna (Kyra), and Domnica (Domnina), nuns, of Syria (ca. 450).
Apostles Nymphas and Eubulus.
Venerable Romanus, desert-dweller of Condat in the Jura Mountains (460) (Gaul).
New Virgin-martyr Kyranna of Thessalonica (1751) (Greek).
Venerable Barsus of Damascus, bishop (Greek).
 

Quote for the Day:

"There is no prayer so quickly heard as the prayer whereby a man asks to be reconciled with those who are wroth with him. For when he charges himself with the offense, this prayer is immediately answered."

Saint Isaac the Syrian

Scripture Readings for the Day:
 
Hebrews 11:24-26

²⁴ By faith Moses, when he became of age, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, ²⁵ choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, ²⁶ esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt; for he looked to the reward.
 
Hebrews 11:32-12:2

³² And what more shall I say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah, also of David and Samuel and the prophets: ³³ who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, ³⁴ quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, became valiant in battle, turned to flight the armies of the aliens. ³⁵ Women received their dead raised to life again.
Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. ³⁶ Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. ³⁷ They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented— ³⁸ of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth.
³⁹ And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise, ⁴⁰ God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.

Hebrews 12

The Race of Faith

 ¹ Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, ² looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

John 1:43-51

Philip and Nathanael

⁴³ The following day Jesus wanted to go to Galilee, and He found Philip and said to him, “Follow Me.” ⁴⁴ Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. ⁴⁵ Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found Him of whom Moses in the law, and also the prophets, wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”
⁴⁶ And Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”
Philip said to him, “Come and see.”
⁴⁷ Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward Him, and said of him, “Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no deceit!”
⁴⁸ Nathanael said to Him, “How do You know me?”
Jesus answered and said to him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.”
⁴⁹ Nathanael answered and said to Him, “Rabbi, You are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!”
⁵⁰ Jesus answered and said to him, “Because I said to you, ‘I saw you under the fig tree,’ do you believe? You will see greater things than these.” ⁵¹ And He said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, hereafter you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”

According to Bishop Seraphim (Tsujie) of Sendai the Cathedral in Sendai, despite being in the most damaged part of the city, is unharmed. Please pray for the people of Japan.

Click on photo to enlarge.