The Holy Prophet Aggaeus (Haggai)

Saints, Feasts, and Readings for 12/16/2025

Saints and Feasts: The Holy Prophet Aggaeus (Haggai); Modestos, Archbishop of Jerusalem; Our Righteous Mother Blessed Empress Theophania; Nicholas Chrysoberges, Patriarch of Constantinople; Memnonus, Archbishop of Ephesus

Strict Fast

Epistle Reading: St. Paul’s Second Letter to Timothy 3:16-17; 4:1-4

Timothy, my son, all scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word, be urgent in season and out of season, convince, rebuke, and exhort, be unfailing in patience and in teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander into myths.

Gospel Reading: Mark 8:22-26

At that time, Jesus came to Bethsaida. And some people brought to him a blind man, and begged him to touch him. And he took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the village; and when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands upon him, he asked him, “Do you see anything?” And he looked up and said, “I see men; but they look like trees, walking.” Then again he laid his hands upon his eyes; and he looked intently and was restored, and saw everything clearly. And he sent him away to his home, saying, “Do not even enter the village.”