Glory be to God for all things!

St. Nectarios will be commemorated in the Orthodox Church on the 9th of November.  A loving saint that is remembered among many Orthodox Christians around the world.  As when anyone visits a Eastern Orthodox Church one finds a holy icon of St. Nectarios.  This beloved saint has help many suffering souls with cancer, leukemia, and for those recently discovered seeking a job. In the Greek Orthodox Church (as well as other Eastern Orthodox Churches) who has not experienced an intercession on behalf of the prayers of St. Nectarios?  These miracles are indeed countless!  We indeed give thanks unto our Lord God.

In April 1961 His Holiness Athenagoras, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, together with the Holy Synod, issued an encyclical proclaiming Nectarios (Nectarios) Kefalas, Metropolitan of Pentapolis (in Egypt) and founder of the Holy Trinity Convent on the Island of Aigina, (Greece) to be a saint of the Church.

St. Nectarios reposed in the Lord, or gave his loving soul to our Lord on November 9, 1920, and on the day of his repose a miracle took place, and ever after until these very days.

This beloved Orthodox saint not only lived a very pious and religious life, but also we have an enormous amount of material about his many writings from the testimony of his contemporaries. Just this past week my chanter brought to my attention that St. Nectarios as a Metropolitan wrote the following hymns for the Mother of God the Theotokos which is called "O Virgin Pure", as I often heard these Eastern Orthodox hymns, I must admit I did not know that St. Nectarios wrote these beautiful hymns until recently. I was spiritually overjoyed and uplifted!  I would like to humbly now share these hymns with you spiritually, and perhaps you too can pray these hymns in your home as well.  We certainly give thanks to God for indeed sending this man  and this most pious God loving Metropolitan who loved Him and His Church.
 

O Rejoice, Bride Unwedded.

O Ever Virgin Mary/ of all the world, the Lady
O bride all pure, immaculate/ O Lady Panagia
O Mary bride and queen of all/ our cause of jubilation
Majestic maiden, Queen of all/ O our most holy Mother
More hon'rable than Cherubim/ beyond compare more glorious
than immaterial Seraphim/ and greater than angelic thrones.

O Rejoice, Bride Unwedded.

Rejoice, O son of Cherubim/ Rejoice, O hymn of angels
Rejoice, O ode of Seraphim/ the joy of the archangels
Rejoice, O peace and happiness/ the harbor of salvation
O sacred chamber of the Word/ flower of incorruption
Rejoice, delightful paradise/ of blessed life eternal
Rejoice, O wood and tree of life/ the fount of immortality

O Rejoice, Bride Unwedded.

I supplicate you, Lady/ now do I call upon you
And I beseech you, Queen of all/ I beg of you your favor
Majestic maiden, spotless one/ O Lady Panagia
I call upon you fervently/  O sacred, hallowed temple
Assist me and deliver me/ protect me from the enemy
And make me an inheritor/ of blessed life eternal.

O Rejoice, Bride Unwedded.

(Source and translation from: Holy Nativity Convent, Saxonburg, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.)

God Love And Bless You!
Humbly With The Love Of Christ Our Lord,
+ Reverend Presbyter Demetrios Serfes
Who Prays For You And With You!
November 1999