Feast Day: 2 January
“Remember God more often than you breathe.”
Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, bishop of Constantinople, opponent of Arianism, wrote major theological treatises as well as letters and poetry, called the “Christian Demosthenes” and, in the East, “The Theologian”.
A Doctor of the Church, Saint Gregory was born at Arianzus, in Asia Minor and died at the same place. He was son — one of three children — of Gregory, Bishop of Nazianzus (329-374), in the southwest of Cappadocia, and of Nonna, a daughter of Christian parents. A phenomenally wealthy man, he went to school in Athens with his friend Saint Basil and Julian.
Also known as the Theologian or Gregory Nazianzen, Saint Gregory of Nazianus’ defences of the doctrine of the Trinity (God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) made him one of the noted preacher on the Trinity. When it seemed that orthodox Christianity had been restored in the city, Saint Gregory retired to live the rest of his days as a hermit.
Saint Gregory is a saint in both Eastern and Western Christianity. In the Roman Catholic Church he is numbered among the Doctors of the Church. One of the Cappadocian fathers and the Three Hierarchs of the Eastern Church, he was a bishop at Constantinople for a short time. Known in the Orthodox Church as “the Theologian”, his many writings include the forty-five “Orations”.
Saint Gregory of Nazianzus stands as the founding father of the Byzantine religious synthesis. He lived an illustrious life as an orator, poet, priest, and bishop. As a Greek poet and prose writer, some of his most popular books are On God and Christ: The Five Theological Orations and Two Letters to Cledonius, On God and Man: The Theological Poetry of Gregory of Nazianzen, Festal Orations: Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, Saint Gregory of Nazianzus: Three Poems and Funeral Orations by Saint Gregory Nazianzen.
Following his death, Saint Gregory was buried at Nazianzus. His relics were transferred to Constantinople in 950, into the church of the Holy Apostles.
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