Today December 5

Today is the feast of St. Sabas (439 -532). He was a great Cappadocian Father, defender of orthodoxy, monk of the desert (but not a so-called "Desert Father") and known much more for the monastery he founded, known as Mar Saba, than anything else. Although Sabas traveled much, solved disputes, was ordained a priest and even had a monastic order and part of the Divine Office named for him, he is still commonly known most for the monastery. And of that I have an epigram, or at least the setting for one.

A brother who followed the life off stillness in the monastery of Mar Saba came to Abba Elias and said to him, "Abba, give me a way of life." The old man said to the brother, "In the days of our predecessors they took great care about these three virtues: poverty, obedience and fasting. But among monks nowadays avarice, self-confidence and great greed have taken charge. Choose for yourself which way you will go."

Amen to that.

The monastery itself, in the Kedron Valley, started out as a cave, a cave Sabas fled to after the complaining monks had forced him first to take orders -- so they could have a priest -- and second to change the "laura" so they wouldn't be so isolated. A laura is a series of cells, each independent and isolated from the others, but built around a church or common area. Sabas finally had had enough -- he hadn't wanted to be a priest anyway (feeling that for himself, at least, it violated a desire for humility) and he certainly didn't want to live in common -- so he took off for the cave.

He dug a well outside, which delightfully yielded sweet water, planted a date palm, which even more delightfully yielded seedless dates, and settled back to pray. A lion came in while Sabas was sleeping and clawed him. Sabas kept his cool, didn't yield his spot and eventually tamed the lion. (True story. Later the lion took off, but it never harmed him again.) He also made friends with the grackles, which he called his "blackbirds," and which still to this day are fed by the monks. The well and the seedless date palms are still there too.

He died in peace on this day in 532, in the 95th year of his age. St. Sabas, pray for us.