April 9, 2016

Saints Raphael, Nicholas and Irene Resource Page

Sts. Raphael, Nicholas and Irene (Feast Days - April 9 and Bright Tuesday)

On 9 April 1463, in the village of Thermi on the Greek island of Lesvos, a priest named Raphael, his deacon Nicholas, and Irene the 12-year-old daughter of the mayor of Thermi, suffered horrible martyrdoms at the hands of Turkish invaders. Their memory over time had become forgotten, until nearly 500 years later, in 1959, when all three Saints began to appear in the dreams and visions of the villagers, revealing to them the details of their lives and fate, leading them to the excavation of their graves, and inspiring them to build a beautiful monastery in their honor, which is until today a source of continuous healings of various illnesses and diseases by the grace they received from God.