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“Your birth, Oh Theotokos, brought joy to the whole world, for from you dawned the sun of righteousness, Christ our God. Freeing us from the curse, He gave us His blessings. Abolishing death, He granted us eternal life.” Apolytikion (the Dismissal hymn) of the Nativity of the Theotokos
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On the 3rd of September, in the Church that was built 5 years ago in honor of the Holy Icon of Our Most Holy Lady of Pisidia in Alanya of Antalya, the annual feast was celebrated by the faithful of the region. His Grace Ambrosios of Evdokias the auxiliary bishop to H. Eminence Metropolitan Sotirios of Pisidia, Exarch of Side and Antalya, presided over the Divine Liturgy which was concelebrated by Economos of the Ecumenical Throne Fr. Konstantin Shevchenko, the Dean of the Church; Hieromonk Vladimir Rusanov, the priest of the church of St. Alypios the Stylite; and Deacon Sergei Palatnikau.
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Today, on this 3rd of September, our Church commemorates the Miracle Working Icon of the Most Holy Lady of Pisidia. A great miracle associated with the Holy Mother of God occurred on this date, and it is for this reason that this celebration was established on the ecclesiastical calendar. More recently, on this day in 2014, another miracle of this icon took place, which brought about not only a revival of the feast, but a Church was also built in its honor. There are written testimonies of the existence of this icon and the miracles that Our Most Holy Lady worked through it, starting in the 6th century. She is called Pisidiotissa (of Pisidia) because she resided in the Church of the Most Holy Lady in the Byzantine city of Sozopol, located in the province of Pisidia of Asia Minor (the city is today called Uluborlu).
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Prot. No.529
+ B A R T H O L O M E W
BY GOD’S MERCY ARCHBISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE-NEW ROME
AND ECUMENICAL PATRIARCH
TO ALL THE PLENITUDE OF THE CHURCH GRACE, PEACE AND MERCY
FROM THE MAKER OF ALL CREATION
OUR LORD, GOD AND SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST
***
Dearest brother Hierarchs and beloved children in the Lord,
It is a shared conviction that, in our time, the natural environment is threatened like never before in the history of humankind. The magnitude of this threat becomes manifest in the fact that what is at stake is not anymore the quality, but the preservation of life on our planet. For the first time in history, man is capable of destroying the conditions of life on earth. Nuclear weapons are the symbol of man’s Promethean titanism, the tangible expression of the “complex of omnipotence” of the contemporary “man-god.”
In using the power that stems from science and technology, what is revealed today is the ambivalence of man’s freedom. Science serves life; it contributes to progress, to confronting illnesses and many conditions that were hitherto considered “fateful”; it creates new positive perspectives for the future. However, at the same time, it provides man with all-powerful means, whose misuse can be turned destructive. We are experiencing the unfolding destruction of the natural environment, of biodiversity, of flora and fauna, of the pollution of aquatic resources and the atmosphere, the progressing collapse of climate balance, as well as other excesses of boundaries and measures in many dimensions of life. The Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church (Crete, 2016) rightly and splendidly decreed that “scientific knowledge does not mobilize the moral will of man, who knows the dangers but continues to act as if he did not know.” (Encyclical, § 11)
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Among the Holy Fathers of our Church, the great figure of St. Alexander is prominent. Born in the year 239 AD to Christian parents, he had the distinction of serving as the first Archbishop of Constantinople. He lived during the great persecutions against Christians ordered by the Roman emperors Decius, Diocletian, Galerius, and Licinius. During those difficult years, St. Alexander tried to protect Christians who were being terrorized, and provide proper burial to the holy relics of the martyrs, with honor and respect. Despite the danger to himself, he continued in this work and the Lord protected him.