12 June 2025 (MIA)

Macedonian Orthodox Church Calendar

Our Holy Father Isaac the Confessor

In the time of the Emperor Valens, the Arians persecuted Orthodoxy fiercely with the Emperor’s encouragement. Isaac, a hermit somewhere in the East, heard of the persecution, left his desert and went to Constantinople to encourage the faithful and denounce the heretics. Valens arrived in the north at that very time with his army, to meet the Goths who had come down from the Danube into Thrace. Isaac spoke out before the Emperor on the next day also, repeating his warning and the Emperor almost hearkened to him, but one of his advisors, a follower of the Arian heresy, thwarted him. Isaac spoke before the Emperor again on the third day, seizing the Emperor’s horse by the reins and pleading with him to grant freedom to the Church of God and to escape divine punishment by acceding to his request. The enraged Emperor ordered that the elder be thrown into a waste place full of thorns and mud, but three angels appeared and pulled him out of the swamp. St Isaac appeared before the Emperor on the fourth day, and foretold a terrible death if he did not give the Orthodox freedom. And so it all came to pass. The barbarians mowed the Greek force down like grass, and the Emperor fled with his Arian counsellor, and hid in a hamper. The barbarians arrived at the spot and realised where the Emperor was hiding. They surrounded the hamper and set fire to it, burning both the Emperor and his counsellor. The Emperor Theodosius the Great then came to the throne. He heard of Isaac and of the prophecy that had been fulfilled, and, sending for him prostrated himself before him. The elder Isaac, who had found such favour with God, entered into eternity in the year 383, to rejoice forever in the vision of the face of God.

Catholic Calendar

John of Sahagun

Also known as John of Saint Facundo; John of Saint Fagondez; John Gonzales de Castrillo; John of Saint Facun. Son of John Gonzalez de Castrillo and Sancia Martinez, the oldest of seven children, their first after sixteen years of sterility and frustration; raised in a pious and well-to-do family. Educated by Benedictines at Fagondez abbey at Sahagun. Ordained in 1445. Held several benefices in the diocese of Burgos, his father obtaining them for him like investments, but John surrendered all but one. Unlike many of his class who took their vocation as a profession, John felt a true call to service and a holy life, and he gave most of the proceeds from his benefices to the poor. Major-domo in the residence of his bishop. He was born in 1419 at Sahagun (Saint Fagondez), Léon, Spain as John Gonzales de Castrillo and died on 11 June 1479 at Salamanca, Spain; may have been poisoned by a woman whose lover, a nobleman, broke off their relationship after hearing John preach, and for this reason he is sometimes listed as a martyr; relics in Spain, Belgium and Peru.