November 11: Agios Minas celebratestranslated

Today our Church honors the memory of the Great Martyr Minas. We also honor the memory of the Holy Martyrs Vincent deacon, Victor and Stefanidos and Saint Theodore the Studite. Saint Minas was born in Egypt in the middle of the 3rd century AD. from pagan parents. As a teenager he became a Christian and chose a career in the cavalry of the Roman army, in which he distinguished himself with wisdom and valor. When Diocletian and Maximian ordered persecution against the Christians, Minas renounced his military duties and became an ascetic wearing the monastic form.

At the age of fifty, feeling that the hour of martyrdom was approaching, he went down to the city, at a pagan festival and defiantly confessed the God-man Jesus as true God. He was then taken to prison, subjected to various tortures and finally beheaded. Saints Victor and Vincent were martyred on the same day, having received courage and strength from his own martyrdom.

Saint Minas is especially honored in the Patriarchate of Alexandria and all Africa as well as in Crete, especially after the miracle he performed in Heraklion, on Easter 1826, saving the Christians who were in danger from the Ottomans...