ST. THEODORUS OF SICEON, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR

HE was a native of Siceon, in Galatia, and from his infancy so much given to prayer, that, when at school, he often deprived himself of his dinner, to spend the time allowed for it in the church. All his leisure hours he consecrated to the exercises of prayer and pious reading. He very early shut himself up in a cell in the house of his mother, afterwards in a cave under a retired chapel; and flying at length from thence, to avoid applause, lived on a desert mountain. He was ordained priest by the bishop of Anastasiopolis, and near an ancient chapel built in honor of St. George, to which holy martyr he was exceedingly devoted, he founded a great monastery. In a second pilgrimage to Jerusalem, like another Elias, he, by his prayers, obtained rain from heaven in a great drought in Palestine. He formed many eminent disciples, and built a large monastery at Siceon, which town was situated in the diocese of Anastasiopolis; but still made his chief abode in a little remote cell. Count Mauritius, general of the armies of he emperor Tiberius, when he returned triumphant from Persia, paid a visit to this saint, who foretold him the empire, by a revelation which he had received through the merits of St. George the martyr. Mauritius being advanced to the imperial throne, in 582, sent to recommend himself and his empire to the prayers of this humble servant of God. Theodorus was, by main force, consecrated bishop of Anastasiopolis, and having held that see ten years, he obtained an order from Cyriacus, patriarch of Constantinople, and the emperor Mauritius, to the archbishop of Ancyra, his metropolitan, to accept his resignation, which he had till then refused. Theodorus returned with joy to Siceon, but was called to Constantinople to give his blessing to the emperor and senate. He healed one of the emperor’s sons, afflicted with a leprosy. And being returned to his solitude at Siceon, he died there, in 613, on the 22d of April, on which day his name occurs in the Roman Martyrology. See his life, compiled by his disciple, George Eleusius, with the notes of Henschenius, t. 3, Apr. p. 32.