St. Theodore the Studite
St. Theodore (759-826) was born in Constantinople, entered monastic life under his uncle St. Platon at Sakkoudion, and around 796 became abbot of the Studion monastery, which he revived from a dozen monks to nearly a thousand and governed by his famous Studite Rule.
A fearless confessor, he was exiled three times: first for rebuking the unlawful marriage of Emperor Constantine VI, again under Emperor Nikephoros I, and finally under the iconoclast Leo the Armenian, enduring imprisonment and torture for the veneration of the holy icons. His catecheses to his monks, hundreds of letters, hymns, and treatises On the Holy Icons survive as pillars of Orthodox monastic and iconodule teaching; he reposed in Bithynia in 826, and his relics were returned to the Studion in 845.
How precious the gift of the cross, how splendid to contemplate! In the cross there is no mingling of good and evil, as in the tree of paradise: it is wholly beautiful to behold and good to taste. The fruit of this tree is not death but life, not darkness but light. A tree once caused our death, but now a tree brings life.
The cross is the glory of all the apostles, the crown of the martyrs, the sanctification of the saints.
If merely mental contemplation were sufficient, it would have been sufficient for Him to come to us in a merely mental way.
Troparion · Tone 8
Guide of Orthodoxy, teacher of piety and purity, luminary of the world, God-inspired adornment of monastics, O most wise Theodore, you have enlightened everyone with your teachings, O harp of the Spirit; pray to Christ God for the salvation of our souls.
Kontakion · Tone 2
Your truly ascetical life equalled that of the Angels, you were made radiant by contesting with your foes, and you were seen to dwell with the Angels, O Theodore blessed by God, pray unceasingly with them to Christ God for all of us.
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