Augustine Sokolovski
On May 8, the Church celebrates the memory of the holy Apostle and Evangelist Mark. On this day, Mark, by that time the head of the Christian community of the city and the first bishop of Alexandria, was martyred by a pagan mob for preaching the name of Christ.
This happened in the year 68. 760 years later, in 828, the body of the Apostle was transferred from Alexandria to Venice. 1900 years after the martyrdom of St Mark, in 1968, part of the relics of the saint, as a sign of repentance of the Catholic Church before the ancient Orthodox Christians of Alexandria for the theft of holy relics, was returned to Egypt, and placed in Cairo, where it rests to this day.
These are the main dates in the earthly biography of the Apostle. Even after leaving this world, he continued to preach, not only with the Gospel he left behind, but also with the presence of his relics and his name in very important parts of the Christian world.
It is noteworthy that the day of remembrance of the Apostle coincides with the latest possible date of Easter in Orthodoxy. This amazing sign of the coincidence of dates not only helps to remember memorable days, but also mysteriously indicates that the Gospel of Mark, like any other of the canonical apostolic Gospels, is not just a historical monument or a story about the earthly life of the Lord Jesus, but the good news of the Risen Christ.
If for scientists around the world Mark is first of all the author of the Gospel, then for Orthodox Christians, he is the founder of the ancient Alexandrian Church. Once, before the emergence of the Patriarchate of Constantinople in the canons of the IV Ecumenical Council in Chalcedon in 451, Alexandria was the first Orthodox Church in the entire East.
The ancient Fathers of the Church went to Alexandria for scientific knowledge, Christians around the world learned the date of the upcoming celebration of Easter from there, and the piety of the Church was adorned with the emergence of the first monasticism in Egypt and Alexandria.
The Divine Liturgy has been preserved with the name of Apostle Mark. Although it is not used in the modern charter of orthodox worship, its content is rich in prayerful description of the depths of theology and conveys the manifestation of the Easter mystery, as it was expressed in the praise of God almost two thousand years ago by Evangelist Mark himself and the Church he founded.