Orthodox Calendar, August 3
Venerable Isaac
Celebrated on May 30 and August 3, he was a soldier before he became a monk. After he was tonsured, he attained such a degree of spiritual perfection that he was accounted worthy of beholding divine visions.
When Saint Isaac heard about how the Emperor Valens had fallen into the Arian heresy and was persecuting the Orthodox Christians, he left his monastery and traveled to Constantinople to confront the emperor. At that time Valens was planning a campaign against the Goths. Saint Isaac tried to change the emperor’s mind several times, but was unable to convince him. He prophesied that Valens would die in flames because of his actions.
The emperor ordered that Saint Isaac be thrown into prison, and promised to deal with him when he returned from his expedition. On August 9, 378 Valens was defeated at Adrianople and died in a fire after hiding in a barn, just as the saint had predicted.
Emperor Theodosius the Great, who had a great love for the saint, released him from prison and banned Arianism. Saint Isaac attended the Second Ecumenical Council (381), where he defended the Orthodox Faith against the Arian heresy.
Saint Isaac hoped to return to his monastic life in the wilderness, but a wealthy man built a monastery for him at Constantinople, and he became its first igumen. The monastery was later named for his disciple Dalmatus.
When Saint Isaac was approaching the end of his earthly life, he named Saint Dalmatus to succeed him as igumen. He lived to a ripe old age and reposed in the year 383.
Troparion — Tone 4
O God of our Fathers, / always always act with kindness towards us; / take not Your mercy from us, / but guide our lives in peace / through the prayers of Venerable Isaac, Dalmatus, and Faustus.
Saint Dalmatus
He served in the army of the holy emperor Theodosius the Great (379-395) and attracted his notice. Then the saint was filled with the desire to dedicate himself to his Lord and Creator. Therefore, sometime between the years 381-383, he left the service of an earthly ruler in order to serve the King of Heaven.
He went with his son Faustus to Saint Isaac’s monastery near Constantinople in order to speak with him. Saint Isaac (May 30) tonsured both father and son into monasticism, and they both began to lead a strict ascetic life.
Saint Dalmatus excelled all the other monks in virtue. Once, during Great Lent, Saint Dalmatus did not eat any food for the forty days. Later he regained his strength and was found worthy of a divine vision.
The holy ascetic was chosen to be the igumen after the death of the most devout Isaac. In fact, at the Third Ecumenical Council which met in Ephesus in 431 A. D. which condemned the heresy of Nestorius, Saint Dalmatus was honored for his defense of the Orthodox Faith.
After the Council the holy Fathers elevated Saint Dalmatus to be the archimandrite of his monastery, where he died peacefully at the age of ninety (after 446). He was succeeded by his son Faustus, who proved to be a worthy successor of his father.
Saint Faustus
He and his father Dalmatus received the monastic tonsure from Saint Isaac (May 30) at his monastery near Constantinople.
Saint Faustus, like his father, had attained the heights of monasticism, and excelled at fasting. Following the death of his father, he succeeded him as igumen of the monastery. The details of his ascetical life are not known.
Troparion — Tone 4
O God of our Fathers, / always always act with kindness towards us; / take not Your mercy from us, / but guide our lives in peace / through the prayers of Venerable Isaac, Dalmatus, and Faustus.
Holy Myrrhbearer Salome
She was the wife of Zebedee and mother of two Holy Apostles: James and John the Evangelist. She went to our Saviour Jesus Christ with the request that He may grant her sons the honour to sit on His right and on His left in Kingdom Come (Matthew 20 : 20-22). She believed His Kingdom was of this world. Only later she understood when Christ rose from death.
She was imprisoned together with other Christian believers and left with them on a boat drifting on the sea. The boat reached today’s Provence region, in France, where they took the Word of God. Holy Myrrhbearers Salome and Mary the wife of Cleophas, lived on the Island at the mouth of River Rhône.
Venerable Theodora of Thessalonika
She was born on the island of Aegina in 812. Her father Anthony was a priest and her mother’s name was Chrisanty. Her baptism name was Agapi. The family left the island and moved to the city of Thessalonika for fear of the Saracen pirates.
She married Theodorinos and gave birth to three children of which just the elder survived, a girl whom the parents dedicated to a monastery in the hope they would get more children. The daughter was given the name Theopisti by Katherine, Abbes of St Luke Monastery.
Agapi became a widow when she was 25, so she joined her daughter in the monastery. As a nun, she lived a life pleasing to God and started to perform miracles after her death. The abbess died long after Theodora did, and when they opened the tomb, Venerable Theodora moved to make room for the abbess’s body.
Then her myrrh-bearing relics cast away demons gave eyesight to the blind and made many other miracles.
Troparion — Tone 8
By a flood of tears you made the desert fertile, / and your longing for God brought forth fruits in abundance. / By the radiance of miracles you illumined the whole universe! / O our holy mothers Theodora and Theopiste, pray to Christ our God to save our souls!
Saint Heraclius the Confessor of Bessarabia
Saint Heraclius the Confessor of Bessarabia was born in Pojorâta, Câmpulung Moldovenesc County, on May 11, 1893, receiving the name Ioan at baptism. His parents, Ignat and Elisabeta Flocea, hardworking peasants, provided him with a fine education, raising him in love and devotion to God alongside his seven younger siblings.
From childhood, he felt the call to monastic life. Once, he ran away from home to the nearest monastery, intending to stay there forever. Seeing his purity and sincerity, the abbot comforted him and sent him back to his parents, but this thought never left him. Ioan had a burning thirst for knowledge and an enlightened mind from a young age. He was drawn to spiritual life and wished to perfect himself.
In the summer of 1914, during World War I, Ioan was drafted into the army and sent to fight at the front. On the battlefield, he was severely wounded in the left hand, but God protected him, and he survived the rain of bullets that mowed down everything in its path. Ioan underwent surgery, and his hand was miraculously healed by God’s mercy.
Returning to the trenches, he was also wounded in the leg by shrapnel but survived, once again thanking God for protection. At the front, he found an icon of Saint Nicholas and a candle burning in front of it, at which moment he promised God that if he survived the war, he would embrace monastic life. Thus, in 1917, after returning home to Bukovina, he went to Bessarabia and entered Harbovăț Monastery in Călărași district.
After a period of testing, his abbot, seeing his zeal for holy things, tonsured him a monk in 1920, giving him the name Heraclius. In 1926, he was ordained a hierodeacon and two years later a hieromonk, serving with much zeal and due reverence throughout his life.
His oratorical skills, thorough theological training, and pure life led to his being appointed in 1935 to lead the processions in parishes, carrying the wonder-working Icon of the Mother of God from Harbovăț to conduct the spiritual ploughing of autumn and spring. At these services, Saint Heraclius delivered sermons for the spiritual benefit of the faithful.
His contemporaries honoured him, recognizing him as a great orator, a skilled spiritual father, and a good servant. He was merciful and hospitable, entirely dedicated to his priestly mission. He knew the Holy Scriptures well and spoke several foreign languages: Russian, Gagauz, and German. Thus, he translated spiritually beneficial texts, which he published for the spiritual edification of many.
Saint Heraclius was an excellent mentor to the young people who attended the Choir School in Chișinău, which had been transferred to Harbovăț, where he served as spiritual leader and deputy director.
Due to his skill and steadfastness, he was appointed diocese vicar in 1940. With his discernment, he maintained balance at Harbovăț Monastery during a turbulent time, the war, until its dissolution by the Soviets.
He was then transferred as a serving priest to the parish of Nisporeni. Seeing the Soviets’ persecution of priests and monks, he sent aid to the monks of the Noul Neamț and Hâncu Monasteries from his parish’s modest means. He gave them money and food, showing love and compassion to his brothers in suffering.
While serving as exarch of the monasteries in the Archdiocese of Chișinău between 1941 and 1944, he instilled Christian virtues in the hearts of the brothers and monks, urging them to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth, speaking to them about the temporality of life and the joy of eternal communion with Christ.
In 1944, Bessarabia was reoccupied by Soviet troops. The godless soldiers arrested, tortured, and killed many clerics and believers who confessed faith in Jesus Christ. Saint Heraclius also bore this heavy cross of confession. On September 3, 1945, he was arrested by unbelievers. He was unjustly sentenced to eight years of imprisonment in labour camps in the Soviet Union.
Like the other clerics, he continued to help and encourage the prisoners in prison, hearing confessions and keeping the flame of faith alive, being a faithful servant of Christ. He did not renounce the Bridegroom of the Church nor yield to his tormentors, remaining steadfast in faith until the end of his life.
In 1953, he returned to Bessarabia, “still as humble and diligent a preacher of the Word of God.” Between 1953 and 1959, Saint Heraclius lived at the Țigănești Monastery near Chișinău. After its closure in 1959, he went to the Noul Neamț Monastery, where he lived until its closure in 1962. He spent his last years in the house of a spiritual son in the village of Chițcani, near the Noul Neamț Monastery, in humility and prayer, spiritually guiding his disciples who visited him.
Shining in virtue, love, and humility, he became a vessel receptive to divine gifts and a wise guide for souls on the path of salvation. Pleasing God and people through his holy life, he ended this life on August 16/3, 1964, surrounded by his disciples. He was buried in the village cemetery under the careful surveillance of the communists.
After the year 2000, through God’s providential work and the care of his relatives from Pojorâta, the grave of the great Saint was discovered with much effort. On this occasion, his holy relics were taken and placed in the cemetery of the New Neamț Monastery. Then, the family, having great reverence for their spiritual ancestor, took a fragment of the holy relics for blessing.
On his commemoration day in 2022, myrrh flowed from the venerable one’s relics. Saint Heraclius’s family, witnessing this miracle, glorified God and recounted the wonderful event to His Grace Bishop Veniamin of Southern Bessarabia. Learning of this and his holy life, pleasing to God, together with the family and a group of priests, he went to the Saint’s grave and, on November 22, 2022, found his revered relics beautiful to behold and fragrant.
He was canonised by the Holy Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church in July 2024.
Through his holy prayers, Lord Jesus Christ, our God, have mercy on us and save us. Amen.
Tr by oca.org
