March 9
Gregory of Nyssa
Bishop and Theologian, 394
art by Rev. Kirsten Kohr of UHRICHSVILLE, OHIO
Almighty God, who has revealed to your Church your eternal Being of glorious majesty and perfect love as one God in Trinity of Persons: Give us grace that, like your bishop Gregory of Nyssa, we may continue steadfast in the confession of this faith, and constant in our worship of you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit; who live and reign for ever and ever. Amen.
Gregory was a man enchanted with Christ and dazzled by the meaning of his Passion. He was born in Caesarea in Cappadocia around 334, the younger brother of Basil the Great and, in his youth, a reluctant Christian.
When he was twenty, the transfer of the relics of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste to the family chapel at Annesi quickened Gregory's faith, and he became a practicing Christian and a lector. He later abandoned this ministry, however, to become a rhetorician like his father.
His brother Basil, in his struggle against the Emperor Valens, compelled Gregory to become Bishop of Nyssa, a town ten miles from Caesarea. Knowing himself to be unfit for the charge, Gregory described his ordination as the most miserable day of his life. He lacked the important episcopal skills of tact and understanding, and had no sense of the value of money. Falsely accused of embezzling church funds, Gregory went into hiding for two years, not returning to his diocese until Valens died.
Although he resented his brother's dominance, Gregory was shocked by Basil's death in 379. Several months later, he received another shock: his beloved sister Marina was dying. Gregory hastened to Annesi and conversed with her for two days about death, the soul, and the meaning of the resurrection. Marina died in her brother's arms.
The two deaths, while stunning Gregory, also freed him to develop as a deeper and richer philosopher and theologian. He reveals his delight in the created order in his treatise, On the Making of Man. He exposes the depth of his contemplative and mystical nature in his Life of Moses and again in his Commentary on the Song of Songs. His Great Catechism is considered second only to Origen's treatise On First Principles, and his treatise On Virginity is a masterpiece of ascetical theology.
Gregory's theological writings have received a resurgence of interest among Christian theologians starting in the mid-twentieth century, and he is regarded as one of the "Cappadocian Fathers" together with his brother Basil and their friend Gregory of Nazianzus. Gregory died on March 9, probably in Nyssa, around the year 394.
Excerpted directly from “Lesser Feasts and Fasts 2022,” p. 128-129.
Lessons and Psalm
Wisdom 7:24-8:1
Psalm 119:97-104
John 14:23-26
Preface of Trinity Sunday