Encounters with angels; Angels: 226

Two  ancient anecdotes of Egyptian monks tell of their encounters with angels. Whether  their visions were really angelic visits or merely dreams, the stories point out how real the heavenly hosts were to the early Christian monks. These devoted men simply expected that angels would be part of their daily lives.

Piammon and John presided over two celebrated Egyptian monasteries near Diolcus. They were presbyters who discharged their priesthood very carefully and reverently. It is said that one day, when Piammon was officiating as priest, he beheld an angel standing near the holy table and writing down in a book the names of the monks who were present, while he erased the names of those who were absent. John had received from God such power over sufferings and diseases, that he healed the gouty and restored the paralytic.

Another ascetic, Mark was, from his youth upwards, distinguished by ex- treme mildness and prudence; he committed the sacred Scriptures to memory, and manifested such eminent piety that Macarius himself, the presbyter of Cel- liae, declared that he had never given to him what priests present to the initiated at the holy table, but that an angel administered it to him whose hand up to the forearm he declares himself to have seen. –Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History, 6.29

IN GOD’S PRESENCE, CONSIDER . . .

How often do I remember the angelic spirits who surround all of us?

CLOSING PRAYER

Pure and happy spirits sent by God to be our protectors, I owe my preservation to you a thousand times, and I humbly offer my thanks for your protection.

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