Getting to know the Saints: Tell us about your patron saint!

[Priest Siluan]

My Patron Saint is Siluan Afonsky (Silouan The Athonite). There are many things that to say on him. I prefer you see this.

http://www.orthodoxphotos.com/Holy_Fath ... ndex.shtml

[beewolf]

My patron saint will be (when I am baptised), St. Seraphim of Sarov. I have been a practitioner of contemplative prayer for a while now, although very much a beginner in the way. I was reading of St. Seraphim's instruction on prayer and listening to the Spirit, it made my heart burn within me with longing for God. In many ways he exemplifies the kind of life i aspire for, or a parallel of it in my own sphere at least.

Gospodi pomiluy

[spyridon]

Dear members,

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  Last time I visited the monastery, I was sharing stories about 

His Grace with another youth. He told me that before Bishop Karas
departed H.G. along with a group of visitors were walking in the
desert. While walking they spotted a snake. His Grace told the snake
to go back in his hole, and if he were to see him again he was going
to
kill him. The snake Obeyed, and left there presence. Now a short
while passed and the same snake re-emerged again. H.G. told the snake
that he had warned him, and that he is going to kill him. Bishop
Karas
did the sign of the cross over the snake and left. One man who did
not
want the Bishop's words to be in vain went back to kill the snake, he
found the snake already dead which a short while before had enough
strength to leave their presence. May the prayers of Bishop Karas be
with us, and glory be to God forever. Amen

[stmaterne]

[quote="Brigid of Keldare"]A Gift of Hospitality - Saint Brigid, Abbess of Kildare
....

http://www.roca.org/OA/107/107e.htm

.[/quote]

text now available in French too :

[url]http://stmaterne.blogspot.com/2007/02/s ... -gals.html[/url]

saint Brigit of Kildare, pray to God for us!

Jean-Michel, Belgium
[url]http://www.orthodoxes.net[/url]

[Hristofor]

I have a question, if anyone can help me with a reference:

i've read some time ago in the Life of Saints about the case of an heretic bishop who seemed gentle and was sent to be a bishop in a city, but the orthodox people from that city had chased him because of his heresy, disregarding all his apparent gentleness.
Does anyone remember in which saint's life we can find this case?

Thank you.

[CafeReader1]

When tonsured Monk Symeon I had taken on St Simeon of Syracuse (Sicily) as my monastic patron. Though I've shorted it to Symon (it's still the same name). For every ethnicity there are so many different spelling and pronunciation for Simon and variants.

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https://orthodoxwiki.org/Symeon_of_Trier

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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symeon_of_Trier

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https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2017/05/saint-symeon-of-trier-known-as-five.html?m=1

[Lazarún Zalónir]

My saint is Saint Timofey of Polotsk, also known in the Icelandic sagas as Thorvaldr Koðránsson the Far-Traveled, and here is a story about him.

Saint Timofey was born in Iceland sometime in the 10th century, in the harsh age of the Viking world, when the old pagan gods still held sway over the North Atlantic islands. His birth name was Thorvaldr Koðránsson, a name itself dedicated to Thor, the hammer-bearing god of the pagans. Yet the irony is beautiful: the man named for Thor would eventually become one of the earliest Orthodox Christian missionaries connected with Iceland and Rus’.

He was born into the rough and stormy world of Norse clan society. Iceland at the time was a frontier land of blood feuds, honor killings, harsh winters, and long memories. Men carried axes more easily than prayer ropes. The sagas describe Thorvaldr as energetic, bold, intelligent, and restless. Like many young Icelanders of his era, he entered military service and traveled abroad. According to later sources, he served among Scandinavian warriors during the wars surrounding the Danish prince Sweyn Forkbeard. But something in him recoiled from the brutality around him. The endless cycle of vengeance and killing began to disgust him.

During his travels he encountered Christianity in Saxony and through Christian Scandinavians. There he met the missionary bishop Friðrekr (Frederick), from whom he learned the Christian faith and eventually received Holy Baptism. The old warrior world began to crack apart inside him. Christ entered the volcanic Icelandic heart.

After his conversion, Thorvaldr returned to Iceland with Bishop Friðrekr to preach Christianity to his own people. This was not easy work. Iceland was fiercely pagan, suspicious of foreigners, and proud beyond measure. Yet Thorvaldr preached boldly because the bishop himself did not know the Icelandic tongue. The missionary work depended largely on him.

One of the most famous stories from the sagas concerns the conversion of his father, Koðrán. Koðrán still worshipped the old spirits and kept a sacred “guardian stone” connected with pagan belief. Thorvaldr and the bishop prayed, and according to the saga the stone split apart miraculously, helping lead his father to baptism.

But the mission soon met fierce resistance. Thorvaldr and Bishop Friðrekr were mocked publicly. Pagan poets composed obscene satirical verses against them, something considered deeply dishonorable in Norse culture. Eventually violence erupted. Thorvaldr killed two of the men who had slandered him. Even though the culture around him accepted blood vengeance, this became a tragic stain on his conscience and effectively ended his mission in Iceland.

Yet here is one of the most moving parts of his life: he did not return to paganism. He did not abandon Christ. Instead, he became a penitent wanderer.

Leaving Iceland forever, Thorvaldr traveled across Europe and the Christian East. The sagas and traditions place him in Germany, Jerusalem, Constantinople, and finally among the lands of Rus’. The Byzantine emperor and patriarch are even said to have received him and blessed his missionary labors among the northern peoples.

When he arrived in the lands of Rus’, he eventually journeyed northward to Polotsk, a city wounded by warfare and political violence after the campaigns of Prince Vladimir before his own conversion. Thorvaldr preached Christ there, not as a conqueror, but as a comforter. He spoke to grieving people about the Resurrection, Paradise, and the mercy of Christ toward the suffering. The people listened. Many accepted baptism.

There, in Polotsk, Thorvaldr became known by another name: Timofey, or Timothy. He is said to have founded a monastery dedicated to Saint John the Baptist. He spent the remainder of his life there in prayer and missionary work until his repose around the year 1002.

The old Icelandic warrior died not with a sword in his hand, but in the peace of Christ.

What makes Saint Timofey so remarkable to me is that his life feels like a bridge between worlds:

* pagan Scandinavia and Holy Rus’
* Viking saga and Orthodox hagiography
* violence and repentance
* wandering and finally peace

He was not born in a Christian empire. He did not grow up surrounded by monasteries and cathedrals. He came out of one of the hardest pagan cultures in Europe. And yet grace reached him across the frozen seas.

There is something deeply poetic in imagining this Icelandic missionary walking through Byzantium, praying in Jerusalem, and finally reposing in Polotsk while the northern lights still shone over the lands of his birth far away.

As the Apostle says:

“If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.” (2 Corinthians 5:17)

Saint Timofey’s entire life is proof of that transformation. A Viking became a pilgrim. A warrior became a preacher. A wanderer became a saint.