Menas Kallikelados

Saint Menas Kallikelados (that is, "the sweet-⁠voiced") was, according to the tradition kept in the Greek synaxarion, a learned Athenian, rhetor and missionary, made prefect of Alexandria, who confessed Christ and was beheaded in the time of the emperor Maximinus. He is commemorated on 10 December, and the finding of his relics is celebrated on 17 February.

Life according to tradition

He was born at Athens in the time of the emperor Maximinus II, around the year 311. He studied with great philosophers and became very learned, then turned to the study of Christian writings. Charmed by the Gospel and Christian theology, he became a Christian and devoted himself to mission. He was a skilled master of speech and a rhetor, whence he received the surname "Kallikelados".

At that time Maximinus, not knowing that he was a Christian, sent him to Alexandria of Egypt as prefect, with the special mission to reconcile the inhabitants of the city, who had revolted and were tearing one another apart. Arrived there, Menas quelled the revolt and urged the Christians to be more fervent in faith. When Maximinus ordered persecutions of Christians in Egypt, Menas opposed the order, preached faith in Christ and strengthened the faithful with his teaching.

Angered at this betrayal, Maximinus sent to Alexandria another prefect, the learned Athenian Hermogenes, who tortured Menas cruelly. He ordered his soldiers to cut off his soles and his tongue and put out his eyes and then shut him in prison to die there. According to tradition, that evening Christ appeared to Menas, gave him courage and strength and restored his tongue, eyes and feet. The next day Hermogenes sent soldiers to see whether Menas had died. All saw with amazement that Menas had not only not died but that his wounds were wholly healed. Then the prefect asked him publicly, in the stadium of the city, how this had happened, and Menas answered that he had been healed at the hour when, fallen on the ground, he sang with tears to God: "Though I walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me, O Lord". The answer moved Hermogenes deeply, and at that moment he believed in Christ, confessed his faith and was baptized, as were other inhabitants of the city. Seeing that the whole city might abandon paganism, the emperor ordered the beheading of Saint Menas.

The relics

On 17 February the finding of the saint's relics is celebrated in the Orthodox calendar. According to tradition, his relics were found when, in a night vision, Saint Menas showed a man named Philomates the place where they lay. When the news of the vision reached the ears of the emperor Marcian (450-457), that beneath the ground, on the shore toward the Acropolis, the honored relics of Saint Menas lay hidden, the place was dug up and they were found in an iron coffer with an inscription showing where they should be placed. Today a small piece of the holy relics is at the Holy Metropolis of Phthiotis, in Lamia, and is brought out for veneration by the faithful on the day of his feast, 10 December.

Veneration

Saint Menas is regarded as protector of the town of Eleftheroupoli (Pravishta), in the prefecture of Kavala. There, on the eve of the saint's feast, a procession is held with his icon and the traditional "kourbani", boiled meat with bread, is given to the faithful. It is said that in years when Eleftheroupoli was struck by cholera, the inhabitants saw Saint Menas dragging by the hair, outside the town toward the mountains, a dirty and wild-⁠looking woman. They said she was the cholera, and that after that the epidemic stopped in the town. Saint Menas Kallikelados is also regarded as protector of journalists.