Our Holy Father, the Martyr Damascene
Commemorated November 13
Born in Galata in Constantinople, he was first named Diamantis. He led a dissolute life in his youth, even embracing Islam. Then a bitter repentance grew in him, and he went to the Holy Mountain where, as a monk, he lived for twelve years in strict asceticism in the Lavra of St Athanasius. Desiring martyrdom, to cleanse him from his sin, he travelled to Constantinople and went into the mosques, making the sign of the Cross and calling out to the Turks that their faith was false, and that Jesus Christ is God and Lord. He was beheaded before the gateway of the Phanar on November 13th, 1681. His relics are preserved on Halki, in the monastery of the Holy Trinity.
Troparion
In thee, O father, was manifestly preserved what is in the image of God, for having taken up the cross, thou didst follow Christ and by thine own example hast taught that the flesh is to be despised as transient, but that particular care should be bestowed on the soul as a thing immortal; wherefore together with the angels rejoiceth also thine, O ascetic Damascene, spirit.
Kontakion
As a keeper of fasts pious and skilled, as an honoured voluntary martyr and one that in the desert led the life of a hermit, — let us worthily extol in hymns Damascene, the ever to be praised; for he hath trodden the serpent under his feet.
Source: Crkveni Kalendar
