18Let no one deceive himself. If anyone thinks that he is wise among you in this world, let him become a fool that he may become wise.
19For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, “He has taken the wise in their craftiness.”
20And again, “The Lord knows the reasoning of the wise, that it is worthless.”
21Therefore let no one boast in men. For all things are yours,
22whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come. All are yours,
23and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.
Matthew 13.36-43
(Gospel)
36Then Jesus sent the multitudes away, and went into the house. His disciples came to him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the darnel weeds of the field.”
37He answered them, “He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man,
38the field is the world, the good seeds are the children of the Kingdom, and the darnel weeds are the children of the evil one.
39The enemy who sowed them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels.
40As therefore the darnel weeds are gathered up and burned with fire; so will it be at the end of this age.
41The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will gather out of his Kingdom all things that cause stumbling and those who do iniquity,
42and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
43Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the Kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.
Commemorations
Virgin Martyr Febronia
Though the daughter of a Roman senator and a great beauty, she fled the world and entered a monastery in Mesopotamia. (So great was her beauty that the abbess had her stand behind a screen while reading to her monastic sisters.) At that time the Emperor Diocletian sent a certain Selenus, along with his nephew Lysimachus, on a mission to find and destroy Christians in the East. Though Selenus was a fierce persecutor of the Christians, Lysimachus felt sympathy for them and secretly protected them whenever he could. Selenus and his party came to Nisibis, where Febronia’s virtue and holiness had already become well-known, though she was still only twenty years old. Selenus summoned her and made every effort to convince her to renounce her faith. When she stood firm, she was first viciously dismembered then beheaded. Lysimachus gathered her relics and took them to the monastery for burial. At the monastery he, together with many soldiers, were baptized. The holy Febronia’s relics worked many healings, and she herself appeared to the other nuns on the anniversary of her repose, standing in her usual place among her sisters. Her relics were translated to Constantinople in 363.
Our Holy Father Dionysios, founder of the Monastery of St John the Forerunner on Mt Athos (1380)
He was born in Koritza in Albania. His elder brother Theodosius went to the Holy Mountain and in time became abbot of the monastery of Philotheou. A few years later Dionysios followed his brother and became a monk under him at Philotheou. A heavenly light began to appear to Dionysios every night at the same place, some distance from his monastery. Believing that the light was a divine sign that he was to build a monastery, Dionysios left the Holy Mountain to seek the help of his brother (now Metropolitan of Trebizond) and the Emperor Alexios Comnenis. From the Emperor he received both money and a Royal Charter, which is still kept at the Monastery of St John the Forerunner, which Dionysios founded in 1380, and which is often referred to as the Dionysiou Monastery. Later, pirates plundered the monastery, and Dionysius went to Trebizond, where he reposed at the age of seventy-two.