Monday 14 February 2033
7 Amshir 1749
Readings for Monday of The Fast of Ninevah
Prophecy
From the Book of Jonah , may his holy blessings be with us all. Amen
Jonah 1 : 1 - 17
| 1 | Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, |
| 2 | "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before Me." |
| 3 | But Jonah arose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid the fare, and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD. |
| 4 | But the LORD sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship was about to be broken up. |
| 5 | Then the mariners were afraid; and every man cried out to his god, and threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea, to lighten the load. But Jonah had gone down into the lowest parts of the ship, had lain down, and was fast asleep. |
| 6 | So the captain came to him, and said to him, "What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your God; perhaps your God will consider us, so that we may not perish." |
| 7 | And they said to one another, "Come, let us cast lots, that we may know for whose cause this trouble has come upon us." So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. |
| 8 | Then they said to him, "Please tell us! For whose cause is this trouble upon us? What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?" |
| 9 | So he said to them, "I am a Hebrew; and I fear the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land." |
| 10 | Then the men were exceedingly afraid, and said to him, "Why have you done this?" For the men knew that he fled from the presence of the LORD, because he had told them. |
| 11 | Then they said to him, "What shall we do to you that the sea may be calm for us?"--for the sea was growing more tempestuous. |
| 12 | And he said to them, "Pick me up and throw me into the sea; then the sea will become calm for you. For I know that this great tempest is because of me." |
| 13 | Nevertheless the men rowed hard to return to land, but they could not, for the sea continued to grow more tempestuous against them. |
| 14 | Therefore they cried out to the LORD and said, "We pray, O LORD, please do not let us perish for this man's life, and do not charge us with innocent blood; for You, O LORD, have done as it pleased You." |
| 15 | So they picked up Jonah and threw him into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging. |
| 16 | Then the men feared the LORD exceedingly, and offered a sacrifice to the LORD and took vows. |
| 17 | Now the LORD had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. |
Glory be to the Holy Trinity, our God, forever and unto the ages of all ages. Amen.
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Vespers Psalm & Gospel
From the Psalms of our father David the prophet and the king, may his blessings be with us all. Amen.
Psalms 95 : 1 - 2
| 1 | Oh come, let us sing to the LORD! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. |
| 2 | Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms. |
Blessed is he who comes in the Name of the Lord. Our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, unto Him be the glory forever, Amen.
Stand in the fear of God and listen to the Holy Gospel. A reading from the Holy Gospel according to our teacher Saint Luke the Evangelist. May His Blessings be with us all. Amen.
Luke 13 : 1 - 5
| 1 | There were present at that season some who told Him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. |
| 2 | And Jesus answered and said to them, "Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans, because they suffered such things? |
| 3 | I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish. |
| 4 | Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, do you think that they were worse sinners than all other men who dwelt in Jerusalem? |
| 5 | I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish." |
Glory be to God forever.
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Matins Psalm & Gospel
From the Psalms of our father David the prophet and the king, may his blessings be with us all. Amen.
Psalms 103 : 1,8
| 1 | Bless the LORD, O my soul; And all that is within me, bless His holy name! |
| 8 | The LORD is merciful and gracious, Slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. |
Blessed is he who comes in the Name of the Lord. Our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, unto Him be the glory forever, Amen.
Stand in the fear of God and listen to the Holy Gospel. A reading from the Holy Gospel according to our teacher Saint Matthew the Evangelist. May His Blessings be with us all. Amen.
Matthew 7 : 6 - 12
| 6 | "Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces. |
| 7 | "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. |
| 8 | For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. |
| 9 | Or what man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? |
| 10 | Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent? |
| 11 | If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him! |
| 12 | Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. |
Glory be to God forever.
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Divine Liturgy
Pauline Epistle
Paul, the servant of our Lord Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, appointed to the Gospel of God. A reading from the Epistle of our teacher Paul to the Romans.
May his blessings be with us. Amen.
Romans 6 : 17 - 23
| 17 | But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. |
| 18 | And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. |
| 19 | I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness. |
| 20 | For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. |
| 21 | What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. |
| 22 | But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life. |
| 23 | For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. |
The grace of God the Father be with you all. Amen.
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Catholic Epistle
A Reading from Epistle of St. Jude . May his blessings be upon us. Amen.
Jude 1 : 1 - 13
| 1 | Jude, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, To those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ: |
| 2 | Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you. |
| 3 | Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. |
| 4 | For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. |
| 5 | But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. |
| 6 | And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day; |
| 7 | as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. |
| 8 | Likewise also these dreamers defile the flesh, reject authority, and speak evil of dignitaries. |
| 9 | Yet Michael the archangel, in contending with the devil, when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, "The Lord rebuke you!" |
| 10 | But these speak evil of whatever they do not know; and whatever they know naturally, like brute beasts, in these things they corrupt themselves. |
| 11 | Woe to them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished in the rebellion of Korah. |
| 12 | These are spots in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves. They are clouds without water, carried about by the winds; late autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots; |
| 13 | raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame; wandering stars for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. |
Do not love the world or the things in the world. The world passes away, and its desires; but he who does the will of God abides forever. Amen.
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Acts of the Apostles
The Acts of our fathers the apostles, may their blessings be with us. Amen.
Acts 2 : 38 - 47
| 38 | Then Peter said to them, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. |
| 39 | For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call." |
| 40 | And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, "Be saved from this perverse generation." |
| 41 | Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them. |
| 42 | And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. |
| 43 | Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. |
| 44 | Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, |
| 45 | and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. |
| 46 | So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, |
| 47 | praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved. |
The word of the Lord shall grow, multiply, be mighty, and be confirmed, in the holy Church of God. Amen.
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Synaxarium
Day 7 of the Blessed Coptic Month of Amshir.
May God make it always received, year after year, with reassurance and tranquility, while our sins are forgiven by the tender mercies of our God my fathers and brothers. Amen.
The Seventh Day of the Blessed Month of Amshir
Departure of St.Alexandros the Second,
the Forty-Third Pope of Alexandria
On this day of the year 715 A.D., the
Holy Father Abba Alexandros the Second, the Forty-Third Pope of Alexandria,
departed. He was from the City of Bana. He became a monk in the monastery
of Pateron (Barbarun) or the monastery of the fathers, which was also known
as El-Zugag monastery, which was west of Alexandria. Because of his righteousness
and his knowledge, he was chosen to the throne of St. Mark. During his
papacy, he suffered many hardships. He was contemporary to the Caliph El-Walid
Ibn Abd-Elmalek. When the latter took the caliphate, he appointed his brother
Abdallah a governor of Egypt in the year 698 A.D. He mistreated the Christians
of Egypt, and confiscated the monasteries of the wilderness of Shiheet
(Scetis). His evil nature went to the extreme. One day he entered
a monastery in Upper Egypt, and saw an icon of the Virgin Mary, the Mother
of God, and inquired about it. He was told that it was the Virgin Mary,
the Mother of Christ, the Savior of the world, he spat on the icon and
said, "If I live, I shall destroy all the Christians." He then blasphemed
against the Lord Christ also. At night, he saw a vision during his sleep
which disturbed him, and filled his heart with fear. He wrote to his brother
saying, "that he suffered the day before as he saw a Man sitting on a great
throne, and His face shone more than the sun, and around Him were thousands
carrying arms. We were bound behind Him. When I asked who He was, I was
told that He was Christ Jesus, the King of the Christians, Whom I mocked
and despised the day before. One of the armed men came and pierced my side
with a spear."
His brother was extremely sad when he
heard about the vision. The same night, that man, Abdallah, caught a severe
fever and died. Forty days later, his brother El-Walid died also. In 701
A.D. another Governor replaced Abdallah, and he followed his predecessor's
policy. He mistreated the Christians, and arrested St.Alexandros and tortured
him until the believers collected for him three thousand Dinari. God perished
this Governor soon after that. The following Governor, was even more wicked
than the one before him. He ordered the arrest of the Pope, and asked him
for three thousand Dinari. The Pope excused himself saying that part of
the money that he paid to his predecessor was collected from some of the
believers and the rest was borrowed. The Governor did not accept his words,
and finally the Pope asked him for a grace period. The Pope went to Upper
Egypt to collect the money from the believers. During his travel, an ascetic
monk asked two of his disciples to dig out a cave. While they were digging,
they found five copper jars filled with gold. They kept one of them and
gave the rest to the hermit, which he sent to the Pope. The two disciples
took the gold and left the desert. They went out into the world, married,
and owned cattle, slaves and maidenservants. The Governor was informed
about these two men, and he called them to him. He threatened them if they
did not tell him the truth about their sudden wealth. They told him about
the five jars of gold, and that four jars were given to the Pope. He rushed
to the patriarchate and plundered all the church vessels. He seized the
Pope, insulted him and put him in prison. He demanded from the Pope the
jars and the three thousand Dinari. He did not release him until the Pope
gave it all to him.
Shortly after that, this Governor died,
and another even more evil came after him. He ordered the Christians to
tattoo on their wrists, instead of the sign of the honorable Cross, the
name of the "beast" that St. John the Theologian had prophesied about in
all the land. He also commanded the Pope to tattoo the sign of the beast
on his wrist, but the Pope refused. As the Governor insisted, the Pope
asked him for three days. The Pope went to his cell and prayed to the Lord
Jesus Christ not to forsake him so that he would not fail in this test.
The Lord answered his prayer, so he fell with a brief sickness. He went
to the Governor and asked his permission to go to Alexandria. The Governor
refused, thinking that the Pope was pretending to be sick just to escape
the tattooing. Afterwards, the Lord inspired him that he would depart from
this world after four days. He told this to his disciples, and asked them
to prepare a carriage to carry his body and to bury him beside the holy
fathers. He departed in peace, and was carried for his burial as he requested.
During the papacy of Abba Alexandros, the Melkites had a Patriarch in Egypt
by the name of Anastasius, who was hated by his own people because he loved
the Orthodox Copts and was peaceful with them. He left his own congregation
and went to Pope Alexandros, and confessed the Orthodox faith before him.
The Pope treated the Patriarch well, honored him and wanted to hand him
the affairs of the patriarchate so he could go and worship in seclusion
in one of the monasteries. Father Anastasius refused and said to him, "If
I had desired the patriarchal seat, I could have remained there, for I
was a patriarch, but now I want to be your disciple." He finally accepted,
however, to become a bishop in one of the bishoprics, and he shepherded
the flock entrusted to him well. Abba Alexandros remained on the seat of
St. Mark for 24 years and 9 months.
May His prayers be with us all. Amen.
Departure of St.Theodorus (Theodor),
the Forty-Fifth Pope of Alexandria
On this day also, of the
year 728 A.D., St. Theodorus (Theodore), 45th Pope of Alexandria, departed.
He was a monk in a monastery near Mariut, which was known as the monastery
of Tanboura, under the guidance of a virtuous elder called Yoannis (John).
Abba Yoannis was inspired by the Holy Spirit that his disciple Tadros one
day would become a Pope. He told those who were in authority. Tadros struggled
in his worship, and was perfect in his humility and meekness. He was chosen
by the will of God to become the Pope of Alexandria. He shepherd the flock
of the Lord Christ well. He continued to read and to preach to his people,
especially on Sundays and on feast days. He completed 12 years on the seat
of St. Mark and departed in peace.
May His prayers be with us, and Glory be to our God forever. Amen.
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Divine Liturgy Psalm & Gospel
From the Psalms of our father David the prophet and the king, may his blessings be with us all. Amen.
Psalms 130 : 3 - 4
| 3 | If You, LORD, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? |
| 4 | But there is forgiveness with You, That You may be feared. |
Blessed is he who comes in the Name of the Lord. Our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, unto Him be the glory forever, Amen.
Stand in the fear of God and listen to the Holy Gospel. A reading from the Holy Gospel according to our teacher Saint Matthew the Evangelist. May His Blessings be with us all. Amen.
Matthew 12 : 35 - 45
| 35 | A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth evil things. |
| 36 | But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. |
| 37 | For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." |
| 38 | Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, "Teacher, we want to see a sign from You." |
| 39 | But He answered and said to them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. |
| 40 | For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. |
| 41 | The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here. |
| 42 | The queen of the South will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed a greater than Solomon is here. |
| 43 | "When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. |
| 44 | Then he says, "I will return to my house from which I came.' And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. |
| 45 | Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation." |
Glory be to God forever.
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