Eastern Rite - Feasts of 12 February AM 7531

Today is the Sunday of the Prodigal Son and the Feast of Our Holy Father Meletios, Archbishop of Antioch.

✠✠✠✠✠

The Sunday after the Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee is the Sunday of the Prodigal Son. This parable of God’s forgiveness calls us to “come to ourselves” as did the prodigal son, to see ourselves as being “in a far country” far from the Father’s house, and to make the journey of return to God. We are given every assurance by the Master that our heavenly Father will receive us with joy and gladness. We must only “arise and go,” confessing our self-inflicted and sinful separation from that “home” where we truly belong (Luke 15:11-24).

After the Polyeleion at Matins, we first hear the Lenten hymn “By the Waters of Babylon.” It will be sung for the next two Sundays before Lent begins, and it serves to reinforce the theme of exile in today’s Gospel.

Starting tomorrow, the weekday readings summarize the events of Holy Week. On Monday we read Saint Mark's account of the Entry into Jerusalem. On Tuesday we read how Judas went to the chief priests and offered to betray the Lord. On the night before His death Christ tells His disciples that one of them will betray Him. He also predicts that they will desert Him and that Peter will deny Him three times. On Wednesday the Gospel describes how Judas betrayed the Savior with a kiss. Thursday's Gospel tells how Jesus was questioned by Pilate. On Friday we read the narrative of Christ's crucifixion and death.

Kontakion — Tone 3

I have recklessly forgotten Your glory, O Father; / and among sinners I have scattered the riches which You had given me. / Therefore, I cry to You like the Prodigal: / “I have sinned before You, O compassionate Father; / receive me a penitent and make me as one of Your hired servants.”

✠✠✠✠✠

Saint Meletios, Archbishop of Antioch, was Bishop of Sebaste in Armenia (ca. 357), and afterwards, he was summoned to Antioch by the emperor Constantius to help combat the Arian heresy and was appointed to that See.

Saint Meletios struggled zealously against the Arian error, but through the intrigues of the heretics, he was thrice deposed from his cathedra by the Emperor Constantius who had become surrounded by the Arians and had accepted their position. In all this Saint Meletios was distinguished by an extraordinary gentleness, and he constantly led his flock by the example of his own virtue and kindly disposition, supposing that the seeds of the true teaching sprout more readily on such soil.

Saint Meletios was the one who ordained the future hierarch Saint Basil the Great as a deacon. Saint Meletios also baptized and encouraged another of the greatest luminaries of the Catholic Faith Saint John Chrysostom, who later eulogized his former archpastor.

After Constantius, the throne was occupied by Julian the Apostate, and the saint again was expelled, having to hide in secret places for his safety. Returning under the emperor Jovian in the year 363, Saint Meletios wrote his theological treatise, “Exposition of the Faith,” which facilitated the conversion of many of the Arians to Catholicism.

In the year 381, under the emperor Theodosius the Great (379-395), the Second Ecumenical Council was convened. In the year 380, the saint had set off on his way to the Second Ecumenical Council at Constantinople and came to preside over it.

Before the start of the Council, Saint Meletios raised his hand displaying three fingers, and then withdrawing two fingers and leaving one extended he blessed the people, proclaiming: “We understand three hypostases, and we speak about a single nature.” With this declaration, a fire surrounded the saint like lightning. During the Council, Saint Meletios fell asleep in the Lord. Saint Gregory of Nyssa honoured the memory of the deceased with a eulogy.

Saint Meletios has left treatises on the consubstantiality of the Son of God with the Father, and a letter to the emperor Jovian concerning the Holy Trinity. The relics of Saint Meletios were transferred from Constantinople to Antioch.

Troparion — Tone 4

You appeared to your flock as a rule of faith, / an image of humility and a teacher of abstinence. / Because of your lowliness, Heaven was opened to you. / Because of your poverty, riches were granted to you. / O holy Bishop Meletios, pray to Christ our God to save our souls.

Kontakion — Tone 6

Fearing your spiritual boldness, the apostate Makedonios fled, / and we your servants, celebrating your service with love, flee to you as an intercessor, O Meletios, / converser with Angels, and the fiery sword of Christ our God, smiting all the godless; / and we sing to you, as a lamp which enlightens all.