Saint John the Great Forerunner and Baptist of the Lord, was the son of the High Priest Zachariah and Elizabeth. On August 29th we remember the severing of his precious head, for which reason we keep this day as a strict fast day. Saint John Chrysostom urges us to give heed carefully: "Let us hearken therefore, as many as suffer ill, living in virtue, at the hands of wicked men. For then too God induced that even he in the wilderness, he in the leather girdle, in the garment of hair, the Prophet, the man greater than all the Prophets, who had no superior among those born of women, should actually be murdered, and that by an immodest damsel, and a corrupt harlot, and all in vindicating the laws of God. These things then let us consider, and bear all nobly, whatever we may suffer."

The New Testament reaches that all four "orders" which form the government of the Church--laity, deacons, presbyters, and bishops--are necessary to the proper functioning of the body of Christ. All four are visible in Saint Paul's First Letter (Epistle) to Timothy.

One's identity has always been sacred and something that could never be violated. In recent years, however, there has been a deliberate and consistent attempt to steal one's identity. It is referred to as 'identity theft.' People who have experienced an identity theft feel violated and devastated. Currently, there are many ways or measures for securing one's identity and preventing this breach from taking place.

Today is the commemoration of the translation of Saint Bartholomew's holy relics, while his main feast falls on June 11th. When this Great Apostle was crucified in Ourbanopolis in Armenia, Christians took his body and buried it in a leaden coffin. When numerous miracles had been wrought over the Apostle's grave, especially healings of the sick - which led to an increase in the number of Christians - the pagans took the coffin containing Bartholomew's holy relics and cast it into the sea.

Take away from me, O Lord, every destructive pride and give a prudent countenance to my eyes; set a bridle on my tongue, make my ears obedient to Thy Holy Commandments, provide me with patience in afflictions, make my heart wise and strong in forbearance, in goodness, in restraint, in sympathy, in charity, in love, in humility, in peace toward myself and all others, and in rejecting the indolence and slothfulness of the demons in which I once indulged as if they were mere confections.