All the Churches Should Ring Their Bells on the Feast of Saint Mark of Ephesus

 By Dr. Nikolaos Baldimtsis

In Arta I served as an agricultural doctor for about two years, from 1979 to 1981. There I met spiritual people whose words and especially their lives were for me a teaching of faith.

In Arta I had as a spiritual father the archimandrite and preacher Fr. Iakovos Pachys, who was later chosen by God to be the Metropolitan of Argolis. This ascetic man lived in a simple room of the old boarding school in Arta. When I went and met him, we would sit in the yard under the trees, and in a happy mood he would tell me various incidents of his life and discreetly catechize me on serious matters of the spiritual life, as he experienced them.

Prayer of Saint Mark of Ephesus Before Departing for Italy to Attend the Synod of Ferrara-Florence

 

Prayer of Saint Mark the Eugenikos, 

Metropolitan of Ephesus

 

(Offered Before His Departure For Italy)

 

I who, in the pursuit of virtue, am idle and tormented by thoughts derived from the passions, what can I do, long-suffering Lord? Lest I fall and lose Your great gifts, and to me lest the mystery of Your goodness and good-pleasure become inactive? Don't let that happen to me, O God, You who love compassion and who loves my soul. Let me not be abandoned by You, let me not find myself on the side of the evil one that leads to deprivation, but You who receive the persistent pleas of Your saints and accepts the intercessions of Your sacred angels, especially of our most-superior Lady the Theotokos, give me the strength to follow Your path, demanding from me not the worthy fruit of repentance, but that which is in accordance with my powers. Put in my hard heart Your fear and through it completely cleanse it and soften it in Your immovable love. And when I depart from my body grant me rest in the place inhabited by Your saints, and grant me to be satisfied with the vision of Your eternal glory, for You are blessed unto the ages of ages. Amen.

Source: From Codex 226 of Dionysiou Monastery on the Holy Mountain. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.   

 

 

Contemporary Miracles and Apparitions of Saint Mark of Ephesus in Athens

The following miracles and apparitions were recorded from personal testimonies by the parish priest of the Church of Saint Mark the Eugenikos, Father Demetrios Aggelakis, in the neighborhood of Patisia in central Athens.

The Saint Takes Care of the Building of his Church

As the construction of the holy temple had progressed and the whole process was in a critical phase, there was a lack of money with the risk of further work being stopped and the whole venture stagnating. The agony of the priest was great and he called upon St. Mark's to help him, for which he received assurance from the Saint that the next day a gentleman would come and bring him a considerable sum to continue the work (he also mentioned the amount). Indeed, the next day, a gentleman from Vouliagmeni came to the temple asking if it was the temple of St. Mark, and asked to speak to the priest. He replied that he already knew what he wanted. And then the unknown gentleman revealed that the previous night there came to him in a dream a monk, who was introduced to him as Mark Eugenikos, and ordered him to help financially build his home in Kato Patisia. The gentleman obeyed the Saint and offered a donation exactly the same amount the Saint had mentioned to the priest the previous night. Thus, the erection of the church resumed.

Life of Saint Mark the Eugenikos of Ephesus

Saint Mark, was born with the name Emmanuel, in 1392 in the queen of cities, Constantinople. He came from pious parents, his father was called George and was a chief justice, a sakellarios, and a deacon of the Great Church, and his mother was Maria, the daughter of the pious physician Luke.

Both parents tried and succeeded in raising little Emmanuel in the teachings and admonition of the Lord. But the death of his father left him and his younger brother John orphans at a tender age.

The Saint learned his first letters from his father George, who had a famous private school. After the death of his father, his mother sent him to continue his studies with the most famous teachers of the time, John Chortasmenos (later Metropolitan Ignatios of Selymbria) and the mathematician and philosopher George Gemiston Plethon. Among his classmates was his later sworn enemy Bessarion the Cardinal.

Saint Mark of Ephesus Resource Page

St. Mark the Eugenikos (Feast Day - January 19)

Verses

Mythically Atlas bore the heavens on his shoulders,

Truly Mark bore Orthodoxy. 

 

Synaxarion of Saint Mark the Eugenikos of Ephesus

 

Life of Saint Mark the Eugenikos of Ephesus

 

Saint Mark the Eugenikos - the Star of Ephesus

 

Saint Mark of Ephesus as a Model for our Lives

 

Mark the Eugenikos, the Champion of Orthodoxy (Photios Kontoglou)

 

Today, More Than Ever, Saint Mark of Ephesus Is Relevant 

 

Prayer of Saint Mark of Ephesus Before Departing for Italy to Attend the Synod of Ferrara-Florence

 

How Saint Mark of Ephesus Behaved in the Dialogue With the Latins 

 

Church and Churches in Relation to the Holy and Great Synod (4 of 4) 

 

Saint Mark of Ephesus on the Latin Church 

 

Excerpts From the Letters of Saint Mark of Ephesus 

 

Patriarch Bartholomew On Dialogue With the Non-Orthodox 

 

Contemporary Miracles and Apparitions of Saint Mark of Ephesus in Athens

 

All the Churches Should Ring Their Bells on the Feast of Saint Mark of Ephesus

Church and Churches in Relation to the Holy and Great Synod (4 of 4)

...continued from part three.

Church and Churches?

Reactionaries refer to and invoke the Symbol of Faith and claim that the phrase "In One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church" means solely the Orthodox Church.

What response to this is given once again by the Professor of Dogmatics John Karmires. Interpreting this phrase in the Symbol of Faith, he says the following: "Thus all Christians consider themselves to belong to the vast meaning of the Church, perceiving to belong to the body of Christ, which is one, since the Church is one, as defined in the sacred Symbol of Faith of Nicaea-Constantinople. It appears ... to be obvious that the heteredox belong to their substantial one united Church, by which they are perhaps capable of salvation."[40]

Saint Mark the Eugenikos - the Star of Ephesus

St Mark, whose name in the world was Manuel, was born of pious parents in 1392 in the queen of cities, Constantinople. His father was called George and was the Sakellarios and Deacon of the Great Church of Hagia Sophia, and his mother was Maria who was the daughter of the pious physician Luke.

Both parents tried and succeeded in raising Manuel in the education and admonition of the Lord. But the death of his father left him and his younger brother John orphans at a tender age.

His first letters, the Saint learnt from his father George, who had a famous private school. After the death of his father, his mother sent him to continue his studies to the then most famous teachers, John Cartasmeno (later Metropolitan Ignatius of Selmyria) and the mathematician and philosopher George Gemistus Plethon. Among his classmates was the later sworn enemy Cardinal Bessarion.

How Saint Mark of Ephesus Behaved in the Dialogue With the Latins

By John Kardasis

The Synod of Ferrara-Florence took place 385 years after the Schism between Rome and Constantinople, and the heretical positions of the Latins was well known to Saint Mark. Nonetheless the Saint made a great effort to persuade the Latins, sometimes by overstepping the sacred Canons, which exclude any contact with heretics. He did this with the hope of their return (not for union). Thus:

Saint Mark of Ephesus on the Latin Church

By His Eminence Metropolitan Hierotheos

of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou

Saint Mark the Eugenikos, Metropolitan of Ephesus, was a fearless confessor of the faith at the Synod of Ferrara-Florence, since he did not succumb to papal pressure and blackmail and remained until the end a confessor of the faith. Not only did he demonstrate the fallacies of the Latins at this Synod, but he simultaneously proved that the Latins made fraudulent interpolations into the texts of the Church Fathers.

Saint Mark of Ephesus as a Model for our Lives

St. Mark the Eugenikos (Feast Day - January 19)

By Protopresbyter Fr. George Papavarnavas

Saint Mark the Eugenikos and Bishop of Ephesus is known and loved in the Orthodox world for his zeal and struggles for the Orthodox faith. In the Robber Pseudo-Synod of Ferrara-Florence, where the Orthodox were dragged against their will as we will analyze below, he wrestled with all his strength alone against all, not only by the Latins, but also by the Latin-minded. The latter, instead of standing by his side as Orthodox and supporting him, rather they pressed him with various plausible arguments to withdraw. But he stood steadfast as a rock due to his faith, so that the Pope was forced to confess, when he was informed that Mark had not signed the union document: "Then we accomplished nothing."

The Bishop of Ephesus was not fanatical and stubborn, as the Latins and Latin-minded say, but he had the experience of God and knew very well the true faith as it was revealed and handed down from Christ and His Holy Apostles and as interpreted by the deified Saints "in the Church", and he could not tolerate its counterfeit or alteration by the Franks. Moreover, for the first eight centuries after the birth of Christ, in the western part of Romiosini, or the so-called Byzantine Empire, the faith of the Orthodox was genuine, just like in the eastern part, which is why we have in the List of Saints of the Orthodox Church even Orthodox Popes. But after the occupation of the western part of the Empire by the Franks, they expelled the Orthodox clergy, they replaced them with their own, and worst of all they adulterated the Orthodox faith with various alterations and additions. They altered the Symbol of Faith (the Creed) which was drafted by the First and Second Ecumenical Synods and confirmed by the Third, which anathematized all those who would attempt to alter it by either removing or adding something to it. The Franks, however, despite the explicit and strict prohibition, added to the Creed the "Filioque", which means "and from the Son". That is, that the Holy Spirit does not only proceed from the Father, but also from the Son, despite the fact that in the New Testament Christ says clearly that the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father". This addition creates huge problems, as it introduces a diarchy in the Divinity and underestimates the Holy Spirit who is equal to the Father and the Son. Unfortunately, narrowness of space does not allow for more detail on this. It also introduced the "primacy" of the Pope, the teaching regarding "purgatorial fire", etc. The Orthodox, as is natural, reacted in the early eleventh century and we arrived at a definitive schism.

In the fifteenth century, shortly before the fall of Constantinople, the Romans requested the help of the Franks in order to face the Turks. They thought they were given the chance they always sought, which was to subjugate Orthodoxy. So to offer their assistance it was conditional on the two Churches uniting. Thus the Orthodox came into a dialogue and an unequal struggle, since the Franks were pressuring them to accept their innovations in every which way. They would keep them hungry, they forbade them to leave and go back to their homeland and flock, and the Clergy that were able to escape they defrocked and tortured. In the writing of Hieromonk Athanasios of Paros (18th cent.) titled Antipope, which would be desirable for all Orthodox to study, he refers to the shocking facts about this Pseudo-Synod and the superhuman struggles of Saint Mark, whom he names the "Atlas of Orthodoxy". Among other things he writes: "To all the Orthodox faithful systems I present today the most-holy Mark of Ephesus. I call Mark he who arose in the East, but shuddered the West. Mark, that luminary of the Eastern Church and the lightning of the imperious West. Mark, he who is the mouth of theologians, the glory of Orthodoxy, the most wondrous athlete, the only unconquerable and unbreakable man."

Dialogue with the Latins, as with other Christian denominations, can bear fruit, if it takes place, of course, in a climate of love and freedom, but especially by persons integrated in the climate of Orthodox Tradition. By true theologians who experience God and follow the teaching of the God-seeing Holy Fathers, who know very well the truths of the Gospel as it has been interpreted and experienced in the Orthodox Church. Fanaticism is foreign to the spirit of the Gospel, as is the relinquishment of the true faith for the sake of some false love. Authentic love cannot exist outside of the true faith. The return to the "One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church", which belongs to the Orthodox faith, is the true way of union "in love and truth".

Source: Ekklesiastiki Paremvasi, "Ο ΑΤΛΑΣ ΤΗΣ ΟΡΘΟΔΟΞΙΑΣ: ΑΓΙΟΣ ΜΑΡΚΟΣ Ο ΕΥΓΕΝΙΚΟΣ" ("The Atlas of Orthodoxy: Saint Mark the Eugenikos"), January 1998. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.

Excerpts From the Letters of Saint Mark of Ephesus

On Those Who Accepted the Florentine Union

"These people admit with the Latins that the Holy Spirit proceeds and derives His existence from the Son. Yet, with us, they say the Spirit proceeds from the Father. The Latins imagine that this addition to the Creed is lawful and just, but we will not so much as pronounce it. They state that unleavened bread is the body of Christ, but we dare not communicate it. Is this not sufficient to exhibit that they came to the Latin council not to investigate the truth, which they once possessed and then betrayed, but simply to earn some gold and attain a false union? Behold, they read two Creeds as they did before. They perform two different liturgies - one on leavened and the other on unleavened bread. They perform two baptisms - one by triple immersion and the other by aspersion; one with Holy Chrism and the other without it. All our Orthodox customs are different from those of the Latins, including our fasts, Church rites, icons, and many other things. What sort of union is this then, when it has no external sign? How could they come together, each retaining his own?"

On Communion With the Latin Church

"Flee brethren! Flee communion with the incommunicable and the commemoration of the uncommemorative. Behold, I, Mark, the sinner, tell you that whoever commemorates the Pope as an Orthodox prelate is guilty. Moreover, one who minds the dogmas of the Latins will be judged with the Latins, and will be deemed a betrayer of the Faith."

On Latin Theology

"They desire also to preserve their own...and at the same time do not follow the traditions of the Fathers."

"If the Latins have not departed from the correct Faith, then we have cut them off unjustly. However, if they have departed from the Faith, regarding the theology of the Holy Spirit, to Whom to blaspheme is the greatest of all perils, clearly, they are heretics, and we have cut them off as heretics."

On Accepting Latin Converts to Orthodoxy

"We must not sanctify one of the Latin race through the divine and most pure gifts given by priestly hands, unless that one shall first resolve to depart from Latin dogmas and customs and shall be catechized and joined to the Orthodox."

On Essence and Energies of God in the Fathers

"We must not be surprised if we do not find among the ancients any clear and defined distinction between the essence of God and His energies. If, in our time, after the solemn confirmation of this truth, the partisans of profane wisdom have created so much trouble in the Church over this question - and have accused Her of polytheism - what mischief would not have been perpetrated in earlier times against this truth by those puffed up with vain learning. This is why our theologians always insisted in the simplicity of God more than the distinctions which exist in Him. It would have been inopportune to exhibit the teaching concerning the essence and energies before those who had enough trouble admitting the distinction of hypostases. Thus, by a wise economy this sacred teaching has become clarified in the course of time, God using for this purpose the foolish attacks of heretics."

On the Pope

"For us, the Pope is as one of the Patriarchs - and only if he is Orthodox; whereas, they proclaim him Vicar of Christ, Father and Teacher of all Christians. Flee from them, O brethren, and from communion with them. 'For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. Therefore, it is no great thing if even his ministers transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works'" (2 Cor. 11:13-15).

Source: P.G. 160 and translated by Holy Apostles Convent in The Lives of the Pillars of Orthodoxy.

Synaxarion of Saint Mark the Eugenikos of Ephesus

St. Mark the Eugenikos of Ephesus (Feast Day - January 19)

Verses

Mythically Atlas bore the heavens on his shoulders,

Truly Mark bore Orthodoxy.

The great teacher and invincible defender of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, Saint Mark, was the offspring and scion of the imperial city, Constantinople. Reared by most pious parents, and instructed in secular and spiritual wisdom, he became preeminent in both. Saint Mark lived as an ascetic on the Prince's Islands and later in the Monastery of Saint George Mangana in Constantinople. He passed through all the degrees of the priesthood, and was finally advanced to the dignity of Archbishop and the lofty throne of the Metropolis of Ephesus. At the insistence of Emperor John Palaiologos, the Saint was sent to the council of the Latins in Florence, to unite the churches that had been divided for so many years. He astounded the papal teachers with the divine wisdom of his words, and was the only one who did not sign the blasphemous decree of that false council. Because of this, the Holy Church of Christ has ever honored this great man as a benefactor, teacher, sole defender, and invincible champion of the Apostolic Confession. He reposed in 1443.

From The Horologion.

A Miracle

An honorable and wealthy man named Demetrios Zourbaios had a sister who had succumbed to a grave illness. At great cost, he summoned all the physicians of Mesolongion to treat her. However, his sister found no relief, and her condition even worsened. For three days, she was insensible, losing her speech and movement. The physicians diagnosed her as terminal, with death soon approaching. Her relatives began to prepare for her funeral. As this was taking place, unexpectedly, they heard her voice and a heavy sigh. She then turned, saying, "Why do you not change my dress which is drenched with water?" Upon hearing her speak, her brother was filled with unexpected joy. He then hastened to her, asking, "What is the matter and why are you soaked?" She answered, "A certain hierarch took me by my hand and led me to a spring. He placed me in a cistern and doused me, saying, 'Go now, you are no longer ill.'" The woman's brother then asked her, "Why did you not ask the name of him who healed you?" She then answered, "I did inquire the identity of his holiness. He told me that he was the Metropolitan of Ephesus, Mark Eugenikos."

Then - O the wonder! - she arose from her sick bed. All present beheld her soaked garments. Moreover, her bed, bed covers and blankets were saturated. Upon arising, she bore no trace of her former illness. The woman then commissioned an icon of St. Mark be made in commemoration of the miracle. This pious woman lived for another fifteen years and was translated to the Lord.

From The Great Synaxarion of the Orthodox Church (January).

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
By your profession of faith, O all-praised Mark the Church has found you to be a zealot for truth. You fought for the teaching of the Fathers; you cast down the darkness of boastful pride. Intercede with Christ God to grant forgiveness to those who honor you!

Kontakion in the Third Tone
Clad, O godly-minded one, with an invincible armor, thou didst dash to pieces the pride of the Western rebellion; thou wast brought forth as the champion of Orthodoxy, as the Comforter's own instrument and pure vessel. For this cause, to thee we cry out: Rejoice, O Mark, thou boast of the Orthodox flock.