Hieromartyr Hierotheos, the first Bishop of Athens, was a member of the Athenian Areopagos and was converted to Christ by the Apostle Paul together with Saint Dionysius the Areopagite (October 3).  The saint was consecrated by the Apostle Paul to the rank of bishop. According to Tradition, Bishop Hierotheos was present with Saint Dionysius at the funeral of the Most Holy Theotokos.

According to Pseudo-Dionysius (On the Divine Names, 3:2), Hierotheos was an accomplished hymnographer: “He was wholly transported, wholly outside himself and was so deeply absorbed in communion with the sacred things he celebrated in hymnology, that to all who heard him and saw him and knew him, and yet knew him not, he seemed to be inspired of God, a divine hymnographer.”  The holy Saint and Bishop Hierotheos died a martyr’s death in the first century.

APOLYTIKION
We the faithful all praise Hierótheos, the disciple of Paul, / Hierarch of Athens, / the world’s teacher and a preacher of the Faith, / who revealed to us Christ’s Mysteries / and poured forth streams of godly doctrine. / His life was well-pleasing to God, who is greatly merciful.

KONTAKIION
Hierarch of Athens, we praise you for you have instructed us in awesome and ineffable things, / and you were revealed to be a divinely-inspired writer of hymns. / Pray that we be delivered from every kind of sin, so that we may cry to you: / “Rejoice, divinely-wise Father Hierótheos.”

Let us remember in prayer today His Eminence Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and St. Vlassios who celebrates his patronal feast.  He is regarded as a modern day “Father of the Church” who has worked to focus the attention of all Orthodox believers on the illness and cure of the soul and the use of the ancient Fathers in their spiritual quest for intimacy with God.  May the Lord God remember his Episcopacy in His Kingdom and grant him many years of continued ministry.  Eis polla eti Despota!