December 13- Holy Virgin Martyr Lucy of Syracuse (†304)

St. Nikolaj Velimirovic in The Prologue of Ohrid tells us that:

With her mother, Lucy visited the grave of St. Agatha in Catania, where St. Agatha appeared to her. Her mother, who had dropsy, was then miraculously healed in the church. Lucy distributed all her goods to the poor, and this embittered her betrothed, who accused her of being a Christian before Paschasius the judge. The wicked judge ordered that she be taken to a brothel in order to defile her. However, by the power of God she remained immovable, as if rooted to the earth, and not even a multitude of people was able to move her from that spot. Then an enraged pagan pierced her throat with a sword and she gave up her soul to God and took up her habitation in the Kingdom of Eternity. Lucy suffered in the year 304 A.D.

It is clear that stories of St. Lucy were brought to Scandinavia, as she is deeply venerated there and a continual light to those dark regions. There is a story that during the Middle Ages, Sweden was suffering from a terrible famine and on the darkest night of the year a ship sailed into Lake Vannern with a lady full of light at the helm. Once in port, she distributed bags of wheat that lasted all winter long. 

Orthodox Saints: October 1 to December 31, by George Poulos, provides us with a more detailed account of St. Lucy (or Lucia): 

Seldom in the twenty centuries of Christianity has a woman been called upon to defend her honor as well as her faith in the Savior, but there was such a valiant woman of the third century who thwarted her enemies on both counts at the cost of her life. In a display of raw courage that places serious doubt as to which is the weaker sex, this daughter of Christendom glorified the name of Jesus Christ as well as the name of woman in a final hour of noble defiance of an ignoble foe.

The name of this sweet saint of Orthodoxy was Lucia who was born in Syracuse, Sicily, in the year 235, the daughter of pagan parents who became Christian shortly after her mother became a widow. After the death of the father, Lucia came to know the light of the Savior but her mother withdrew into the darkness of paganism, responding to her daughter's pleas for Jesus Christ with a skepticism that made her little better than an agnostic. How Lucia became so devout a Christian in an atmosphere less than conducive to recognition puzzled her mother, but it required more than the words of her pious daughter to win her over to Christianity.

Lucia's mother who answered to the name of the Christian-sounding Eutychia, became seriously ill with a blood disease, perhaps a form of cancer, when she was taken to the shrine of St. Agathi in Catania, Sicily, where the daughter prayed for a cure, invoking over and over the name of St. Agathi who had lived in the previous century and who is commemorated on February 5. The ailing mother felt her daughter's loving spirit and with it also felt refreshed and vigorous, walking away with her health restored and with an awareness that Christianity is the true religion.

In accordance with pagan custom Lucia had been committed in marriage as a child by her mother, who returned to Syracuse in total agreement with her daughter that this arrangement should now be formally dissolved. The dissolution of an engagement was not taken lightly in pagan circles, particularly when the intended groom had every intention of marrying the girl. Despite that both women were aware that the break would lead to serious consequences. The pagan family was apprised of the change of heart of the girl, particularly since she was a confirmed Christian, a confession of faith which only compounded the pagans.

With the pagan Emperor Diocletian in sympathy only with those who, like himself, had no sympathy for Christians, the full fury of the spurned suitor was turned on Lucia who was summoned before a tribunal to answer for her actions. St. Agathi had appeared in a vision to Lucia to forewarn her that she, too, would be martyred for Christ and the vision's omen was now taking form. Nevertheless, Lucia made an eloquent plea in her defense, stating that it was not her intention to offend anyone, pagan or Christian, but that her religion precluded marriage to a pagan, stating further that she would be willing to marry a converted pagan to fulfill the promise in which she had no part but she would observe as a compromise to custom.

There was no compromising with Pashasion, the presiding, Roman judge, and when Lucia refused to resume the pagan ways of her betrothed and consent to marriage, she was condemned not to die but to suffer a degradation worse than death. The vindictive court sought to vilify her, as well as her Christian image, by forcing her to serve in a brothel for the amusement of a depraved Roman citizenry. Knowing this to be scarcely more than a prolonged agony to end in shame and death, Lucia refused to budge from the prisoner's dock, but her furious resistance was no match for the burly guard who attempted to take her away.

An unseen power seemed to come to her assistance as guard after guard was repelled by the Christian girl who preferred death to dishonor, and it was then that she was looked upon as some sorceress who would make a bad bride anyway. She was then instructed to disavow the King of Kings of whom she spoke, but her defiance brought a platoon of guards lunging at her and a sword ended her life on 13 December 304. The western sector also commemorates St. Lucia, who was honored in the poetry and prose of bishop of Sherborne, England at the end of the seventh century. A stone is inscribed in her memory in the cemetery of St. John at Syracuse.

Optional Resources:

Lucia Saint of Light (Katherine Bolger Hyde) – Picture book 

St. Lucia play set from Draw Near Designs

Sources:

Velimirovic, Nikolaj. The Prologue of Ohrid. Lives of Saints, Hymns, Reflections and Homilies for Every Day of the Year. July to December. United States, Sebastian Press, Western American Diocese, 2008.

Poulos, George. Orthodox Saints: October 1 to December 31. United States, Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 1990.