SS Constantine and Helen, Equals-to-the-Apostles
Polyeleos. Kept with the Polyeleos at Matins.
Commemorated today
- Holy Equals-to-the-Apostles Emperor Constantine (337) and Helen, his mother (327)Apostle · d. 337 life on this site
The lives we have written
Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Constantine the Great
The emperor who ended the age of state persecution and summoned the Council of Nicaea changed the conditions under which the Church lived, yet his complicated life reminds us that sainthood is not the declaration that every political act was holy.
- Era
- c. 272–337
- Region
- The Roman Empire, especially Britain, Italy, Asia Minor, and Constantinople
- Category
- Emperor and Equal-to-the-Apostles
- Feast
- May 21, with his mother St. Helen
Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Helen
Given extraordinary resources late in life, Helen travelled to the places of Christ’s Passion and Resurrection, supported the building of churches, served the poor, and helped restore Christian memory to a landscape scarred by persecution.
- Era
- c. 248–c. 330
- Region
- The Roman Empire, especially Palestine and Constantinople
- Category
- Empress, pilgrim, patron of the holy places, and Equal-to-the-Apostles
- Feast
- May 21, with her son St. Constantine
- Holy New Martyr Pachomius (1730)New Martyr — killed under Ottoman or modern persecution · d. 1730
What is known
A new martyr died in one of the later persecutions rather than the Roman ones — most often under Ottoman rule, or in the twentieth century under Soviet and other modern regimes. The word new distinguishes the era, not the manner.
The year given is 1730.
Beyond this, no life of them survives that could be checked — which is true of most of the saints kept on any given day. The commemoration is the record.
Appointed readings
- 3[1] Kings 8:22–23, 27–30
- Isaiah 61:10–62:5 continues in 62
- Isaiah 60:1–16
- John 10:9–16
- Acts 26:1–5, 12–20
- John 10:1–9
About this page. This is the Menaion date — the fixed calendar. Parishes on the New Calendar keep it on May 21 by the civil calendar. On the Julian calendar this same commemoration is kept on June 3 by the civil calendar. The movable cycle, which turns on the date of Pascha and changes every year, is on the calendar page. Where a life has been written on this site the name links to it; where it has not, only what the commemoration itself attests is shown, and nothing is added to it.