Acts 23.1-11 (Epistle)

1Paul, looking steadfastly at the council, said, “Brothers, I have lived before God in all good conscience until today.”

2The high priest, Ananias, commanded those who stood by him to strike him on the mouth.

3Then Paul said to him, “God will strike you, you whitewashed wall! Do you sit to judge me according to the law, and command me to be struck contrary to the law?”

4Those who stood by said, “Do you malign God’s high priest?”

5Paul said, “I didn’t know, brothers, that he was high priest. For it is written, ‘You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people.’”

6But when Paul perceived that the one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, “Men and brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees. Concerning the hope and resurrection of the dead I am being judged!”

7When he had said this, an argument arose between the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the crowd was divided. 8For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit; but the Pharisees confess all of these. 9A great clamor arose, and some of the scribes of the Pharisees’ part stood up, and contended, saying, “We find no evil in this man. But if a spirit or angel has spoken to him, let’s not fight against God!”

10When a great argument arose, the commanding officer, fearing that Paul would be torn in pieces by them, commanded the soldiers to go down and take him by force from among them and bring him into the barracks.

11The following night, the Lord stood by him and said, “Cheer up, Paul, for as you have testified about me at Jerusalem, so you must testify also at Rome.”

John 16.15-23 (Gospel)

15All things that the Father has are mine; therefore I said that he takes of mine and will declare it to you.

16“A little while, and you will not see me. Again a little while, and you will see me.”

17Some of his disciples therefore said to one another, “What is this that he says to us, ‘A little while, and you won’t see me, and again a little while, and you will see me;’ and, ‘Because I go to the Father’?” 18They said therefore, “What is this that he says, ‘A little while’? We don’t know what he is saying.”

19Therefore Jesus perceived that they wanted to ask him, and he said to them, “Do you inquire among yourselves concerning this, that I said, ‘A little while, and you won’t see me, and again a little while, and you will see me’? 20Most certainly I tell you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy. 21A woman, when she gives birth, has sorrow because her time has come. But when she has delivered the child, she doesn’t remember the anguish any more, for the joy that a human being is born into the world. 22Therefore you now have sorrow, but I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you.

23“In that day you will ask me no questions. Most certainly I tell you, whatever you may ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you.

Ven. Pachomius the Great

His name in his native Coptic, Pachom, means “eagle.” He was an Egyptian pagan who entered the Roman army at a young age. While quartered at Thebes, he was amazed at the kindness of the local Christians, who brought food and drink to the soldiers. Learning who they were, he believed in Christ and vowed, once released from the army, to serve him for the rest of his life. At the end of his military service, he was baptised and became the disciple of the hermit Palamon, with whom he lived for ten years.

At a place called Tabennisis an angel appeared to him dressed in the robes of a monk and gave him a tablet on which was written a rule for a cenobitic monastery — one in which the brethren live communally rather than as hermits, something that had not been seen before among Christians. The angel commanded him to found such a monastery. Pachomius set to work, building many cells though there was no one to live there but himself and his brother John. When John questioned the unnecessary building, Pachomius only said that he was following God’s command, without saying who would live there or when.

But soon men began to assemble there, and in time so many came to be his disciples that he eventually founded nine monasteries housing thousands of monks. The rule that he gave (or had been given) for these monasteries became the model for all communal Christian monasticism thereafter. St Pachomius reposed in 346, before his great Egyptian fellow-strugglers St Anthony the Great and St Athanasius the Great.

Entertaining angels unawares: Christian believers’ simple acts of kindness toward their pagan oppressors may have seemed foolish to many, but it was such acts that opened the eyes of Pachomius to the light of Christ, and which bore incalculably great fruit: the founding of the monastic life which is still the backbone of Christ’s Church.

Our Father among the Saints Achillius, Bishop of Larissa (330)

He was born in Cappadocia, and was one of the 318 God-bearing Fathers who attended the First Ecumenical Council. At the council, Achillius took up a stone and said to the Arians, ‘If Christ is a creature of God, as you say, tell oil to flow from this stone.’ When the heretics kept silent, Achilleus went on, ‘And if the Son of God is equal to the Father, as we believe, let oil flow from this stone,’ at which oil flowed out. Returning to Larissa, the holy bishop cast down many pagan temples, built many churches, cast out many demons, and reposed in peace.