October 12
Sunday of the 7th Ecumenical Council
On the Sunday that falls on or immediately after the eleventh of this month, we chant the Service to the 350 holy Fathers of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, which gathered in Nicaea in 787 under the holy Patriarch Tarasius and during the reign of the Empress Irene and her son, Constantine Porphyrogenitus, to refute the Iconoclast heresy, which had received imperial support beginning with the Edict issued in 726 by Emperor Leo the Isaurian. Many of the holy Fathers who condemned Iconoclasm at this holy Council later died as Confessors and Martyrs for the holy Icons during the second assult of Iconoclasm in the ninth century, especially during the reigns of Leo the Armenian and Theophilus.

October 12
Symeon the New Theologian
Saint Symeon became a monk of the Studite Monastery as a young man, under the guidance of the elder Symeon the Pious. Afterwards he struggled at the Monastery of Saint Mamas in Constantinople, of which he became abbot. After enduring many trials and afflictions in his life of piety, he reposed in 1022. Marvelling at the heights of prayer and holiness to which he attained, and the loftiness of the teachings of his life and writings, the church calls him "the New Theologian." Only to two others, John the Evangelist and Gregory, Patriarch of Constantinople, has the church given the name "Theologian." Saint Symeon reposed on March 12, but since this always falls in the Great Fast, his feast is kept today.

October 12
Probus, Andronicus, & Tarachus, Martyrs of Tarsus
The holy Martyrs contested for Christ during the reign of Diocletian, in the year 296 or 304. Tarachus was advanced in years, of Roman birth, and had been a soldier; Probus was from Side in Pamphylia, and Andronicus from Ephesus. They were taken together in Cilicia and subjected to manifold exceedingly cruel tenures. Tarachus was beaten on his cheeks and neck with stones, his hands were burned, he was hanged on a post and smoke was put underneath him to choke him; vinegar was forced down his nostrils; after enduring further tortures, he was carved to pieces. Probus was thrashed with whips, his feet were burned with red hot irons, his back and sides were pierced with heated spits; finally he also was cut up with knives, and received the crown of martyrdom. Andronicus suffered similar tortures, and also finished his course being cut to pieces, commending his soul into the hands of God.

"When you see life's pleasures, beware that they might not distract you, for they conceal death's snares. Likewise a fisherman casts not his hook to no purpose. As bait for his hook, the enemy uses the delusion of sensuality to arouse desire, that he might thereby catch men's souls and subject them to himself. A soul which has been caught to serve the enemy's will then serves as a snare for other souls, for it conceals the grief of sin with its apparent delight." -- St. Ephraim the Syrian, A Spiritual Psalter no 43, pg. 74, 4th century

"Since there are certain people who find great fault with us for adoring and honoring both the image of the Savior and that of our Lady, as well as those of the rest of the saints and servants of Christ, let them hear how from the beginning God made man to His own image. For what reason, then, do we adore one another, except because we have been made to the image of God? As the inspired Basil, who is deeply learned in theology, says: "the honor paid to the image conveys to the original.," and the original is the thing imaged from which the copy is made." -- St. John of Damascus, The Orthodox Faith, 4.16. Catholic University of America Press in Washington D.C. Translated by Frederic H. Chase, Jr. volume 37, page 370., 8th Century