{"id":1118208,"date":"1969-12-31T18:00:00","date_gmt":"1970-01-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/news\/1118208\/"},"modified":"2022-06-27T06:58:16","modified_gmt":"2022-06-27T11:58:16","slug":"saint-cyril-of-alexandria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/saint-of-the-day\/1118208\/","title":{"rendered":"Saint Cyril of Alexandria"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Statue\n<\/div>\n
\nImage:<\/a>\u00a0Statue of Saint Cyril in Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora do Sameiro, Braga, Portugal | photo by Joseolgon<\/h6>\n
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Saint of the Day for June 27<\/h4>\n

(378\u00a0\u2013\u00a0June 27, 444)<\/h5>\n

Click here to listen<\/a><\/p>\n

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Saint Cyril of Alexandria\u2019s Story<\/strong><\/p>\n

Saints are not born with halos around their heads. Cyril, recognized as a great teacher of the Church, began his career as archbishop of Alexandria, Egypt, with impulsive, often violent, actions. He pillaged and closed the churches of the Novatian heretics\u2014who required those who denied the faith to be re-baptized\u2014participated in the deposing of Saint\u00a0John Chrysostom, and confiscated Jewish property, expelling the Jews from Alexandria in retaliation for their attacks on Christians.<\/p>\n

Cyril\u2019s importance for theology and Church history lies in his championing the cause of orthodoxy against the heresy of Nestorius, who taught that in Christ there were two persons, one human and one divine.<\/p>\n

The controversy centered around the two natures in Christ. Nestorius would not agree to the title \u201cGod-bearer\u201d for Mary. He preferred \u201cChrist-bearer,\u201d saying there are two distinct persons in Christ\u2014divine and human\u2014joined only by a moral union. He said Mary was not the mother of God but only of the man Christ, whose humanity was only a temple of God. Nestorianism implied that the humanity of Christ was a mere disguise.<\/p>\n

Presiding as the pope\u2019s representative at the Council of Ephesus in 431, Cyril condemned Nestorianism and proclaimed Mary truly the \u201cGod-bearer\u201d\u2014the mother of the one Person who is truly God and truly human. In the confusion that followed, Cyril was deposed and imprisoned for three months, after which he was welcomed back to Alexandria.<\/p>\n

Besides needing to soften some of his opposition to those who had sided with Nestorius, Cyril had difficulties with some of his own allies, who thought he had gone too far, sacrificing not only language but orthodoxy. Until his death, his policy of moderation kept his extreme partisans under control. On his deathbed, despite pressure, he refused to condemn the teacher of Nestorius.<\/p>\n

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Reflection<\/strong><\/p>\n

Lives of the saints are valuable not only for the virtue they reveal but also for the less admirable qualities that also appear. Holiness is a gift of God to us as human beings. Life is a process. We respond to God\u2019s gift, but sometimes with a lot of zigzagging. If Cyril had been more patient and diplomatic, the Nestorian church might not have risen and maintained power so long. But even saints must grow out of immaturity, narrowness, and selfishness. It is because they\u2014and we\u2014do grow, that we are truly saints, persons who live the life of God.<\/p>\n

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Image:\u00a0Statue of Saint Cyril in Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora do Sameiro, Braga, Portugal | photo by Joseolgon Saint of the Day for June 27 (378\u00a0\u2013\u00a0June 27, 444) Click here to\u2026Read More\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1118209,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1118208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-saint-of-the-day"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1118208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1118208"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1118208\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1118210,"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1118208\/revisions\/1118210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1118209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1118208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1118208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lourdescatholic.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1118208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}