On the day of August 1, two holidays are connected: 1) Origin, i.e., the removal of the honorable trees of the honorable and life-giving Cross of the Lord, and 2) the celebration of the All-Merciful Savior Christ God and the Most Holy Theotokos Mary, His Mother. The holiday is one of the small ones. In Constantinople, under the Greek emperors, on August 1st they carried the life-giving Cross from the palace to the Church of St. Sophia, and they performed the blessing of water. This custom came from Greece to us, to Russia. On this day, after the liturgy, a small blessing of water is performed on rivers, ponds and lakes, for which they go there with a procession of the cross. The small blessing of water differs from the great, Epiphany, both in the hymns during the procession and in the fact that the prayer for the blessing of water is shorter, and when the cross is immersed in water, the following is sung: “Save, O Lord, Thy people,” and not “I am baptized in the Jordan, O Lord.”
Troparion to the All-Merciful Savior.
Looking down from on high, accepting the wretched, visit us with embittered sins, O All-Merciful Lord, through the prayers of the Mother of God, grant great mercy to our souls.
Troparion of waters.
Let us now be diligent to the Mother of God with sinfulness and humility, and let us fall in repentance calling from the depths of our souls: Lady, help us, having mercy on us: struggling, we perish from many sins: do not turn away your vain servants, for you are the only hope of the imams.
Let us never be silent, Mother of God, in speaking Your strength to those who are unworthy: if You had not stood before us to pray, who would have delivered us from such troubles? who would have kept them free to this day? We will not retreat, O Lady, from You: for Your servants always save You from all evil ones.
Rejoice, having received as an Angel, and having given birth to Your Creator, O Virgin, save You who magnify.
We glorify Your Son, O Theotokos, and cry: Most pure Lady, deliver Your servants from all troubles.
King, prophet, and apostle, and martyr You are the praise, and the representative of the world, all-blameless.
Every Orthodox language praises, and blesses, and glorifies Your most pure Nativity, Mary, unbride of God.
Glory: We glorify the Father and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, saying: Holy Trinity, save our souls.
And now: Ineffable in the last, conceived, and gave birth to Thy Creator, O Virgin, save Thy great One.