Christ the Savior-Holy Spirit Orthodox Church
Archpriest Steven C. Kostoff
4285 Ashland Ave, Cincinnati OH 45212 - (513) 351-0907
Great Saints of the Church, Select Articles and Videos

Icon of All Saints
Icon of All Saints
Icon of All Saints
Updated for 2023!

This special section
features significant articles and resources concerning the saints, and their importance for us who are struggling to live an authentic Christian life amidst the challenges of the modern world. We trust you will be greatly edified by the lives and teachings of the saints of every age!
 
These first four saints have separate resource pages; see the summaries below or click the links to skip directly to each saint's page:
 

 

Scroll down or use these links for resources on the following:

 

St Nektarios the Wonderworker Resource Page

NEW FOR 2022!

 

St. Nektarios the Wonderworker, of Aegina

Widespread interest in the film, MAN OF GOD, has prompted us to create a new page:

St Nektarios the Wonderworker Resource Page,

  • featuring his Life, plus links to extensive additional resources on his ministry, writings, miracles, and more,
  • plus an outstanding Orthodox documentary on St Nektarios, 'A Wellspring of Humility', by Trisagion Films,
  • PLUS our special features on the film, MAN OF GOD, including movie trailer, film info, interviews, soundtrack, and much more, here.

Excerpt from Fr Steven's review of the film:

Everything about the film was of the highest quality - the script, the acting, the recreation of late 19th - early 20th c. Egypt and Greece, the musical score, and a fine eye from the director for the larger narrative and those details that leave a lasting impression. The director, by the way, is Yelena Popovich, a Serbian-American, who is an Orthodox believer. She has made a film unapologetically focusing on a "holy man" (the actual meaning of the word "saint") of deep faith and piety - St. Nektarios of Aegina (+1920) The Orthodox scholar, Constantine Cavarnos has described St. Nektarios in the following manner: "Metropolitan of Pentapolis, great Theologian, Philosopher, Moralist, Educator, Ascetic, Mystic, Miracle-Worker and Healer." His written legacy is quite prolific . . .

 

Proceed to our special page for St Nektarios and the film, 'MAN OF GOD' . . .

 

St. Nicholas the Wonderworker

St Nicholas, Protector of Mariners and Travelers!
St Nicholas, Protector of Mariners and Travelers!
NEW FOR 2021!

 

Announcing a long-overdue addition to our special resources on Great Saints of the Church:

 

St Nicholas the Wonderworker!

 

Commemorated on December 6 (repose) and May 9 (translation of his relics).

 

Every year we have considered creating a special page for this most beloved saint, yet for various reasons had not yet done so, preferring to link to his extended Life instead.

 

That changed this year (December 2021) when our dear friend and former parishioner Mother Paula of Transfiguration Monastery in Ellwood City, Pennsylvania, sent Fr Steven a link to a new documentary film which brings together the historical records on St Nicholas, who was actually "demoted" recently by the Roman Catholic confession as being merely a "legendary" figure. As this excellent new documentary reveals, nothing could be further from the truth: St Nicholas is vividly attested to by the historical record.

 

There is a real Bishop Nicholas at the heart of our veneration of this beloved saint: a Confessor of Christ who survived persecution under the Romans, who aided the poor and needy, who defended the True Faith at the First Ecumenical Council in Nicaea in 325, who protects travelers & mariners, and who inspires us by his Life in Christ and intercedes for us to this day.

 

With this new documentary as our anchor, we added other edifying videos from Orthodox sources, select children's books, numerous icons and paintings, plus other traditional hagiographies (including the extended 'Life' by St Dmitri of Rostov, and the Prologue of Ohrid entry by St Nikolai Velimirovich), as well as links to the massive collection of articles at the Mystagogy Resource Center (John Sanidopoulos), as well as other resources of interest.

 

We hope you enjoy this new section, and come to know better our beloved St Nicholas who always intercedes for us, and who provides for us a loving and trustworthy "rule of faith," as his troparion proclaims.

 

Continue to our new St Nicholas page!

 

St. Paisios the Athonite - a modern saint

Commemorated July 12

 

NEW RESOURCE PAGE ON ST PAISIOS LAUNCHED FOR 2020

 

There are few saints that we can call 'modern' but Elder Paisios (1924-1994) is one of them.  While living a very holy life and undertaking the struggle which characterize holy monks, he was also a 'man in the world' who was a carpenter and later a radio operator in WWII before going to Mt. Athos at the age of twenty six.  His teachings were well documented and published by a variety of sources and most often  address 'practical' subjects that men, women and chldren face in everyday secular life.

 

St Paision reposed in 1994, and was glorified and entered into the calendar of saints recently, in 2015. He continues to have an enormous impact on the Orthodox faithful throughout the world through his emphasis on humility and prayer offered in suffering of heart (philotimo).

 

Explore our special page on St Paisios with a brief life, hymns and readings, video, and links to books, icons, and additional resources.

 

 

St Silouan the Athonite

St Silouan the Athonite (Sept 24)
St Silouan the Athonite (Sept 24)

 

The Way of St. Silouan

 

"There once lived a person of great spiritual strength whose name was Siluan. He prayed long with tearful cries of "Lord have mercy on me," but God would not hear him. Many months went by in such prayer, and the strength of his soul was dissipated; he lost heart and cried, "You are unresponsive to prayer!" And suddenly, with these words on his lips and his soul drained of strength, for a moment he saw the Living Christ. His heart and entire body were filled with such flame that had the apparition continued another second, he would have died.

 

"Later he was unable to forget the inexpressibly meek, limitlessly loving, joyful and peaceful look of Christ; from that point forward he witnessed untiringly that God is love, love without measure or frontiers..."

 

Learn about St. Silouan and his lessons for us on our special resource page...

New for 2022 - Saints of the Orthodox Church (Videos)












Martyr-Saint Maria Skobtsova of Paris & Ravensbruck

Updated for 2023 with new Life, Icon

 

From Fr Steven's meditation on Mother Maria:

Pioneer of a Self-Sacrificing, 'Engaged Monasticism'

Saint Maria, commonly known as Mother Maria, is commemorated on July 20. Together with the Venerable Martyr the Grand Duchess Elizabeth (July 18th), we encounter in these holy martyrs two of the most extraordinary women of the twentieth century.  Both bore witness to Christ under truly horrific conditions, the Grand Duchess Elizabeth dying at the bottom of a mine shaft into which she was flung by Bolshevik thugs in 1918; and Mother Maria dying in a gas chamber at one of the notorious Nazi concentration camps, that at Ravensbruck, in 1945.  (From the beginning, Mother Maria understood the Nazi threat, referring to it as a "new paganism")...  Continue reading...

 

Articles:

Life of Righteous Martyr Maria (OCA website) - New for 2023

Articles and Resources from In Communion

 

Suggested Books:

Pearl of Great Price: The Life of Mother Maria Skobtsova, 1891-1945, by Sergei Hackel.

Mother Maria Skobstova, Essential Writings

 

Children's Book on Mother Maria:

Silent As A Stone: Mother Maria of Paris and the Trash Can Rescue


Numerous icon images here:

http://incommunion.org/2004/10/18/icons/


Insightful articles on Mother Maria's Monastic Way:

Engaged Monasticism: Mother Maria Skobtsova and Twenty-First Century American Orthodox Monasticism

Non-Fundamentalist Monastic Spirituality of Mother Maria Skobtsova

New Martyr-Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna


 
Honoring a 20th century New-Martyr

 

The Grand Duchess Elizabeth was a truly remarkable woman who sealed her life of service and ministry to others with the crown of martyrdom under the godless Bolsheviks. 
 
Unlike her sister, the Tsarina (Empress) Alexandra, she is not a controversial figure based upon a questionable role in the leading political events of early 20th c. Russia.  The Grand Duchess became a nun and the abbess of the Mary-Martha convent in Moscow, and was tirelessly concerned with offering assistance to the poor and downtrodden.  She was eventually killed in a most brutal fashion by the Bolsheviks on July 18, 1918.  Her sacred relics now reside in Jerusalem.  Please read more about her fascinating and inspiring life at OrthodoxWiki.org.  In addition to the links below, there are many sites dedicated to the Grand Duchess that can be “googled.”



External Links:

See Fr. Steven's 2015 Meditation on Grand Duchess & New-Martyr Elizabeth
Akathist to Holy Martyred Nun Elizabeth and Those with Her
Canon to the Holy Righteous Nun-Martyrs, Elizabeth and Barbara
Life of the Holy Royal Martyr Grand Duchess Elizabeth 
Holy New Martyr Elizabeth, Grand Duchess of Russia, Children's Book
Grand Duchess Elizabeth of Russia, biography by Lubov Millar

 

The Lives of Saints — Experiential Theology

St Justin Popovich
St Justin Popovich
June 10, 2012

 

The Place of Lives of Saints in the Spiritual Life

A Summary of the Teaching of St Justin Popovich

In order to begin to understand the importance of the Lives of the Saints for our spiritual lives, I believe we can turn to no better or more thorough source than St. Justin Popovich's Introduction to his own compilation of the Lives of the Saints. A theologian, St. Justin saw no dichotomy between the Lives of the Saints and the theological writings of the Church. For him, as for the Church, theology and the Lives of the Saints form one whole. He called the Lives of the Saints "experiential theology" or "applied dogmatic theology," and he viewed them and wrote about them in a theological manner. Likewise, he viewed theological writings as an expression of the experience of the life of Grace in the Church, and not just an intellectual, abstract or polemical exercise.

How does St. Justin view the Lives of the Saints theologically? At the center of all of St. Justin's thought is the Theanthropic vision: the fact that God became man in Jesus Christ, uniting human nature with Divine Nature. The fact of the God-man, the Theanthropos, is the axis of the universe: it is the reality according to which everything else must be viewed, whether it be the nature of the Church or the problems and issues of everyday life.

Thus, when St. Justin looks at the Lives of the Saints, he does so in the light of the God-man. Real and true life—eternal life in God—became possible only with the Incarnation, death and Resurrection of the Saviour, and this life is the Life of the Saints. St. Justin saw the Lives of the Saints as bearing witness to one life: the Life in Christ.

St. Justin wrote: "What are Christians? Christians are Christ-bearers, and, by virtue of this, they are bearers and possessors of eternal life.... The Saints are the most perfect Christians, for they have been sanctified to the highest degree with the podvigs of holy faith in the risen and eternally living Christ, and no death has power over them. Their life is entirely Christ's life; and their thought is entirely Christ's thought; and their perception is Christ's perception. All that they have is first Christ's and then theirs.... In them is nothing of themselves but rather wholly and in everything the Lord Christ."[1]

The Saints live in Christ, but Christ also lives in them through His Divine Energies, His Grace. And where Christ is, there is the Father and the Holy Spirit also. Christ says, Abide in Me, and I in you; and elsewhere He says, If a man love Me, he will keep My words: and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him (John 15:4; 14:23).

Thus, St. Justin makes bold to say that the Lives of the Saints not only bear witness to the Life in Christ: they may even be said to be the continuation of the Life of Christ on earth. "The Lives of the Saints," says St. Justin, "are nothing else but the life of the Lord Christ, repeated in every Saint to a greater or lesser degree in this or that form. More precisely, it is the life of the Lord Christ continued through the Saints, the life of the incarnate God the Logos, the God-man Jesus Christ Who became man."[2]

This is an amazing thing that St. Justin is saying: when we read the Lives of the Saints, we are reading the Life of our Lord Jesus Christ. This in itself should be enough to convince us of the importance of filling our souls with the Lives of the Saints.

St. Justin also says that the Lives of the Saints are a continuation of the Acts of the Apostles. "What are the 'Acts of the Apostles'?" he asks. "They are the acts of Christ, which the Holy Apostles do by the power of Christ, or better still: they do them by Christ Who is in them and acts through them. "And what are the 'Lives of the Saints'? They are nothing else but a certain kind of continuation of the 'Acts of the Apostles.' In them is found the same Gospel, the same life, the same truth, the same righteousness, the same love, the same faith, the same eternity, the same 'power from on high,' the same God and Lord. For the Lord Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever (Heb. 13:8): the same for all peoples of all times, distributing the same gifts and the same Divine Energies to all who believe in Him."[3]

With these words of St. Justin before us, we might well ask ourselves if Orthodox spiritual life is even possible without the testimony of the Lives of the Saints. The answer to this, I believe, must be "no." True spiritual life begins when we live in Christ and Christ lives in us, right here on this earth. And the Lives of the Saints bear witness to us that the Life of Christ on earth did not end with His Ascension into Heaven, nor with the martyrdom of His Apostles. His Life continues to this day in His Church, and is seen most brilliantly in His Saints. And we, too, in our own spiritual lives, are to enter into that continuing, never-ending Life.

I spoke recently to an Orthodox priest who had converted to Orthodoxy from Protestantism. He told me that, when he was received into the Church, the officiating priest told him: "You will never be truly Orthodox without reading the Lives of the Saints." Later, when he himself became a priest, he found that the most pious people in the churches are those who read the Lives of the Saints, and that those who make the most progress in the spiritual life are those who read the Saints' Lives.


Read the Full Article, on Pravoslavie.ru


Spiritual Lessons from the Three Hierarchs

Updated February 1, 2022

 

Roads to Damascus - Crisis, Conversion and Community in the Lives of the Three Hierarchs

 

by Monk Maximos of Simonopetra Monastery, Mount Athos


On the Holy Mountain, we are taught that everything in a saint’s life is worthy of admiration, but not everything in a saint’s life is worthy of imitation. This is certainly true, yet to this rule the lives of the Three Hierarchs are an exception: everything about them is both admirable and worthy of imitation.

 

Tonight I want to look at the Three Hierarchs in light of the remarkable experiences that changed the course of their lives and transformed them into great teachers, fathers, and saints. As we shall see, each of the three underwent a crisis, a decisive turning point, that led to spiritual transformation. As I hope to show, these critical experiences, which were essentially conversion experiences, are the key to understanding who they were and what their lives can mean for us today...


Continue reading on MYSTAGOGY Blog . . .

 

Aloso, read Fr Steven's classic meditation on the Three Holy Hierarchs...


 

The Remarkable Mothers of the Three Holy Hierarchs

 

Yesterday, January 30, we commemorated the Three Hierarchs and Universal Teachers: St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory the Theologian, and St; John Chrysostom. They were the focus of the homily, and of my Monday Morning Meditation posted earlier today.

 

However, a good part of the homily was focused on three female saints whose lives are intimately connected to that of the three holy bishops - their mothers: St. Aemelia (St. Basil); St. Nonna (St. Gregory); St. Anthousa (St. John). 

 

These are three remarkable women who profoundly shaped the lives of their illustrious sons. They are all saints with their own days of commemoration. I am providing a link to a wonderful webpage presentation of the three mothers. This parish is in Australia. I would urge you to read about these women and view the many remarkable icons of them and their sons. You will notice further links embedded there that will take you to a Life of each woman.


https://www.stparaskevi.org.au/saint-anthousa-mother-of-saint-john-chrysostom/