My Beloved the benevolent                    September 2025

Grace and peace, wishing you every goodness and blessings

On Thursday, September 11, we celebrate the Feast of El-Nayrouz, which is the Coptic New Year, 1742. Wishing you a blessed feast and a new Coptic year which we start with joy and hope, that God will make the new Coptic year a happy and blessed year.

In this letter, I would like to meditate with you on the life of a blessed saint, Pa’esa. We celebrate the departure of this blessed saint on the second of Misra.

The life of this saint reminds me of the divine prophecy in Psalm 40: “Blessed is he who considers the poor; The Lord will deliver him in time of trouble. The Lord will preserve him and keep him alive, and he will be blessed on the earth; You will not deliver him to the will of his enemies.” Psalm 40:1, 2.

+ St. Pa’esa was born in Menouf to wealthy parents in the fourth century who raised her with a Christian upbringing.

+ St. Pa’esa loved serving the poor and showed compassion on them; when her parents departed, they left for her a great fortune. She gave from it to the poor and needy; she turned her house into a shelter for the poor and strangers, and sent charitable contributions to the monasteries.

+ This saint who loved doing good fell into a day of evil, or rather days of evil, because some evil people surrounded her and took advantage of her good heart; but without wisdom and spiritual caution, they began to influence her, especially when her money began to run out. They suggested her to follow the path of sin in order to earn her money.  Indeed, her life changed and she became impure. Her house was transformed from a place of prayer and hosting strangers into a house of prostitution to which those seeking physical pleasure would come.

+ Our loving and merciful God, who does not forget good deeds, looked upon this poor woman in the days of evil, and moved the hearts of the elders of Shiheet, who were saddened when they heard about the transformation of the life of this saint from a life of holiness to a life of vice.

+ The elders of Shiheet sent St. John the Short to her to bring her back to a life of repentance and to help her save herself.

+ St. John the Short entered her house saying, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for You are with me.” Psalm 23:4.

+ When St. John the Short rebuked her for abandoning a life of purity and walking in the path of sin, he said to her, “Why did you belittle the Lord Christ and do this evil deed?” He cried, and she was moved, and she said to him, “Why do you weep?” He answered, “Because I see the devils playing on your face, and therefore I weep for you.” She asked him, “Is there any repentance for me?” The saint answered her, “Yes, but not in this place.” She said to him, “Take me to wherever you wish.”

+ The saint went out, and she went after him, leaving the place of sin. They walked in the wilderness. When the time came, she slept and he slept in a place far away from her. In the middle of the night, the saint got up to pray and saw a column of light coming down from heaven to earth, and the angels were carrying her soul. When he approached her, he found that she had departed from this world.

+ St. John the Short prayed to God to reveal to him whether God accepted her repentance? He heard a voice saying to him, “Her repentance was accepted in the moment that she repented.”

+ St. Pa’esa offered true repentance with spiritual fervor and left the place of sin without hesitation, so she escaped the trap of Satan.

+ God in His love, did not forget her toil and love for the service of the poor. He looked at her on the day of evil and saved her from the hands of her enemies, the demons, who wanted to destroy her soul. She became blessed in heaven and on earth, because the story of her repentance became a source of encouragement for those on earth who struggled against sin. It also shows us the importance of serving the poor and needy and how, if we do, the Lord will save us in the day of evil, preserve us and revive us, so that we will have a share in eternal life.

May the Lord bless your offerings to support Santa Verena’s charitable programs.

Metropolitan Serapion