3 November 2024 (MIA)

Macedonian Orthodox Church Calendar

Saint Hilarion the Great

Saint Hilarion the Great was born in the year 291 in the Palestinian village of Tabatha. He was sent to Alexandria to study. There he became acquainted with Christianity and was baptized. After hearing an account of the angelic life of St. Anthony the Great, Hilarion went to meet him, desiring to study with him and learn what is pleasing to God. Hilarion soon returned to his native land to find that his parents had died. After distributing his family’s inheritance to the poor, Hilarion set out into the desert surrounding the city of Maium. In the desert, the monk struggled intensely with impure thoughts, vexations of the mind and the burning of the flesh, but he defeated them with heavy labor, fasting and fervent prayer. The devil sought to frighten the saint with phantoms and apparitions. During times of prayer St. Hilarion heard children crying, women wailing, the roaring of lions and other wild beasts. The monk perceived that it was the demons causing these terrors to drive him away from the wilderness. He overcame his fear with the help of fervent prayer. Once, robbers fell upon St. Hilarion, and by the power of his words, he persuaded them to forsake their life of crime. Soon all of Palestine learned about the holy ascetic. The Lord granted to St. Hilarion the power to cast out unclean spirits. With this gift of grace, he loosed the bonds of many of the afflicted. The sick came for healing, and the monk cured them free of charge, saying that the grace of God is not for sale. Such was the grace that he received from God that he could tell by the smell of someone’s body or clothing with which passion afflicted his soul. They came to St. Hilarion wanting to save their soul under his guidance. With the blessing of St. Hilarion, monasteries began to spring up throughout all of Palestine. Going from one monastery to another, he set up a strict ascetic manner of life. About seven years before his death (+ 371-372) St. Hilarion moved back to Cyprus, where the ascetic lived in a solitary place until the Lord summoned him to Himself.

Catholic calendar

St. Martin de Porres

St. Martin de Porres was born at Lima, Peru, in 1579. His father was a Spanish gentleman and his mother a colored freed-woman from Panama. At fifteen, he became a lay brother at the Dominican Friary at Lima and spent his whole life there-as a barber, farm laborer, almoner, and infirmarian among other things. Martin had a great desire to go off to some foreign mission and thus earn the palm of martyrdom. However, since this was not possible, he made a martyr out of his body, devoting himself to ceaseless and severe penances. In turn, God endowed him with many graces and wondrous gifts, such as aerial flights and bilocation. St. Martin’s love was all-embracing, shown equally to humans and animals, including vermin, and he maintained a cats and dogs hospital at his sister’s house. He also possessed spiritual wisdom, demonstrated in his solving his sister’s marriage problems, raising a dowry for his niece inside of three day’s time, and resolving theological problems for the learned of his Order and for bishops. A close friend of St. Rose of Lima, this saintly man died on November 3, 1639, and was canonised on May 6, 1962. His feast day is November 3.