The memory of St. George the Confessor

The holy martyr and confessor of Christ, St. George, was born in Constantinople, and was seized by the iconoclasts for his worship and veneration of holy icons and brought before the wicked emperor Theophilus [Byzantine Emperor Theophilus, son and successor of Emperor Michael II, under the influence of his tutor John Grammaticus, who from childhood had a strong aversion to icons, cruelly persecuted the iconoclasts, although he did not betray them to death. He reigned from 829 to 842]. The latter threatened to force him to turn from Christ and from the worship of holy icons, but the saint did not agree. In anger and in the words of the venerated gnostic, he said: "It is incumbent on him to convert all true Christians and to worship them honestly".

For these words St. George was tied with a rope around his neck and dragged through the streets of the city like a villain, then imprisoned and, finally, having taken and plundered all his property, together with his wife Irina and children sent into exile, where, having endured many tribulations, he rejoiced to the Lord [The time of St. George's death is unknown. In any case he died still under Theophilus, therefore at the end of the first half of the IX century.] ____________________________________________________