Candles & Incense
Church calendar · 2026
5 August Wednesday
Old Style — 23 JulyToday
Sts Trophimus, Theophilus and companions
The 10th week after Pentecost. Wednesday
Commemoration
Tap a name to open the life
2 of 2 names — the rest are in Georgian only
All the lives for this day — 2Readings
The tone and the day's psalms
8
This week's tone is 8Eight tones — the Octoechos
What is a tone?
A tone is not a psalm number. It is the mode in which that week's resurrection hymns are sung — the whole week's Vespers, Matins and Liturgy are set in one tone.
There are eight tones, and they change each week. The cycle opens with the first tone on Thomas Sunday after Pascha and returns to the first every eight weeks; Bright Week itself has no tone of its own. A new tone begins on Saturday evening, with the new church week.
The Psalter is divided into twenty kathismata and, by the usual rule, is read through once a week. Appointed for this day:
- At Matins · kathisma 10Psalms 70–76›
- At Matins · kathisma 11Psalms 77–84›
- At Vespers · kathisma 12Psalms 85–90›
This is the usual rule. In Great Lent the Psalter is read twice a week, and the kathismata are divided differently.
Word of the day
The crown of thorns brought down to our own day by our forebears is beautiful with this beauty, renowned with this renown, glorious with this glory. If it can justly be said of anyone that they burned themselves away and lit the path for others, it is said of our fathers and grandfathers, and we, their grateful children, should fall down with tender hearts before their graves and sing glory to the glorious and praise to the praised.
