SAINT GREGORY LIMNIOTES

August 24

From the Prologue

Gregory was a confessor and a great ascetic of Olympus. He died at the age of ninety-five at the time of the Iconoclasts, 716 A.D. *

* In the great Greek Synaxarion, St. Dionysius, the Archbishop of Aegina who died in 1624 A.D. is also mentioned and from whose relics numerous miracles were manifested.

HYMN OF PRAISE

THE HOLY FEMALE MARTYR SYRA

As young as the dew but, in wisdom, old

Rich in faith, hope and meekness,

Syra the Persian, a model Christian,

To God prayed, at night before dawn;

By prayers, Syra, her soul rejoiced,

By prayers she, her soul enriched,

At the father's hearth, in darkness and sorrow,

In grief and blood of a combatant field,

By prayers, Syra her heart rejoiced.

Of the peace of Christ, joyful and full.

Against Syra, kingdom and pagan priests were,

And for Syra, Christ and the honorably clergy.

In the dungeon dark, at prayer vigilant,

In a wondrous light, Syra glowed.

That is the light of Paradise, darkened by sin.

And returned to the faithful, by the Cross of Christ.

Whoever the Cross takes upon himself, that light receives,

From the light of the soul, the face also glows:

Syra, as a true star shown,

And through death, to the bosom of Christ hurried.