For more than one hundred years the Church of Christ was troubled by the persecution of the Iconoclasts of evil belief, beginning in the reign of Leo the Isaurian (717-741) and ending in the reign of Theophilus (829-842). After Theophilus's death, his widow the Empress Theodora (celebrated Feb. 11), together with the Patriarch Methodius (June 14), established Orthodoxy anew. This ever-memorable Queen venerated the icon of the Mother of God in the presence of the Patriarch Methodius and the other confessors and righteous men, and openly cried out these holy words: "If anyone does not offer relative worship to the holy icons, not adoring them as though they were gods, but venerating them out of love as images of the archetype, let him be anathema." Then with common prayer and fasting during the whole first week of the Forty-day Fast, she asked God's forgiveness for her husband. After this, on the first Sunday of the Fast, she and her son, Michael the Emperor, made a procession with all the clergy and people and restored the holy icons, and again adorned the Church of Christ with them. This is the holy deed that all we the Orthodox commemorate today, and we call this radiant and venerable day the Sunday of Orthodoxy, that is, the triumph of true doctrine over heresy.

This saint lived during the reign of emperor Decius in 251. He came from the town of Nazareth. He left his hometown and went to the city of Mandron, in the province of Pamphylia. There he stayed at a place called Karmela or Karmena cultivating a garden which he used to water and plant with various vegetables. From this garden he obtained what is necessary for life. He had such an upright and simple mind that, when he met those who wished to arrest him and saw that they greeted him, he also greeted in return from the bottom of his soul and heart. When they told him that governor Publius called the saint to go to him, the saint answered with simplicity: "What does the governor need me, since I am a Christian? Let him call those who think the way he does and have the same religion with him." So, the blessed man was tied and brought to the governor, who tried to move him to sacrifice to the idols. But the saint sighed from the bottom of his heart, cursed the tyrant and confirmed his faith in Christ with his confession, saying that it is not possible to be moved from it even though he might be tortured cruelly. So, for this reason they nailed his feet and made the saint run in front of the governor's coach. But the saint fainted in the street. Having fallen on his knees, he prayed and, thus, he commended his holy soul to the hands of God.

Saint Mark the Ascetic lived in the fifth century and according to Nicephorus Callistus was a disciple of Saint John Chrysostom's. Besides his blameless life of asceticism, Saint Mark was distinguished for his writings, some of which are preserved in Volume One of the Philokalia. His writings were held in such great esteem that in old times there was a saying, "Sell all that thou hast, and buy Mark."

Of our righteous Fathers commemorated today, Saint Mark of Athens lived in the fourth century. Born in Athens of pagan parents, he believed in Christ, was baptized, and forsook the world, living the eremitical life in extreme privation in the deep wilderness beyond Egypt. His life is recounted by the monk Serapion, who found Mark in deep old age and about to depart this lfe, not having seen a man for ninety-five years. Serapion gave him burial after his blessed repose, even as Paphnutius had done for Saint Onuphrius (see June 12).