The Holy and Righteous Forebears of God Joachim and Anna; The Holy Martyr Severian.

Troparia and Kontakia

Troparion, Tone 4: Your nativity, O Virgin Mother of God,* has made joy known to all the world,* for from you dawned the Sun of Righteousness, Christ our God.* He abolished the curse and gave the blessing;* and by making death of no effect He bestowed on us eternal life.

Troparion, Tone 1: The just couple who lived in a state of grace,* Joachim and Anne, gave birth to this holy child for us.* The holy Church solemnly honours this feast in glory* and celebrates your precious memory today.* She glorifies God Who has lifted up our horn of salvation in the house of David.

Troparion, Tone 4: Your martyr, Severian, O Lord,* by his passion acquired the crown of incorruptibility from You, our God.* For possessing Your power he overcame the torturers* and shattered the feeble insolence of demons.* By his supplications, save our souls.

Kontakion, Tone 2: As a bright and unerring star you appeared to the world* proclaiming with your rays the Sun, that is, Christ, O martyr, Severian,* and you have extinguished all error.* But to us you give light, praying without ceasing for all of us.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.

Kontakion, Tone 3: The chains of sterility are broken and Anne rejoices.* She nurses the most pure Lady and invites us to sing with her* to the virgin Mother who is born for all people.

Now and for ever and ever. Amen.

Kontakion, Tone 4: By your birth, O immaculate one,* Joachim and Anna were freed from the reproach of childlessness,* and Adam and Eve* from the corruption of death.* And your people, redeemed from the guilt of their sins,* celebrate as they cry out to you:* “The barren one gives birth to the Mother of God* and nourisher of our life.”

Prokeimenon, Tone 3

My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Saviour. (Luke 1:46-47)

verse: Because he has regarded the humility of His handmaid; for behold, all generations shall call me blessed. (Luke 1:48)

Prokeimenon, Tone 4

God is wonderful in His saints,* the God of Israel. (Psalm 67:36)

Epistle

Galatians 6:2-10

Brothers and Sisters, bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. For if those who are nothing think they are something, they deceive themselves. All must test their own work; then that work, rather than their neighbor’s work, will become a cause for pride. For all must carry their own loads.

Those who are taught the word must share in all good things with their teacher.

Do not be deceived; God is not mocked, for you reap whatever you sow. If you sow to your own flesh, you will reap corruption from the flesh; but if you sow to the Spirit, you will reap eternal life from the Spirit. So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up. So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us work for the good of all, and especially for those of the family of faith.

Alleluia, Tone 1

verse: The salvation of the just comes from the Lord, their stronghold in time of distress. (Psalm 36:39)

verse: The Lord helps them and delivers them and saves them: for their refuge is in him. (Psalm 36:40)

Gospel

Mark 7:14-24

At that time, Jesus called the crowd again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.”

When he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable. He said to them, “Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) And he said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice.

Hymn to the Theotokos

O my soul, magnify the Virgin Mary, born from a barren womb.

And the Irmos, Tone 8: Virginity is alien to mothers* and childbearing is foreign to virgins;* yet in you, O Mother of God, both of them came together.* Therefore we and all the nations of the earth* without ceasing magnify you.

Communion Hymn

Rejoice in the Lord, O you just;* praise befits the righteous. (Psalm 32:1)