Saints.

Saints. A saint (from the Latin, Sanctus, meaning “holy”) is one who is set apart for service to God and who has cooperated with God’s grace to the extent that their holiness is beyond question. In the Scriptures, saint is used to denote those who have been consecrated to God’s purposes, a way in which we still may use the word to refer to those who have elected to live lives dedicated completely to God. Another popular use, though not one we utilize frequently for obvious reasons, counts saints as comprising everyone within the Church. Saints as we most often think of them, and as we wish to refer to them here are those whose lives have shown most clearly what it means to follow Christ and His Church, and they are popularly glorified/ canonized by the Church (in modern days with a formal service) to affirm their veneration by the faithful. It’s important to note that they don’t have to be universally glorified to be recognized as saints, nor is the formal process always necessary. Good examples of this would be the Royal Martyrs who were canonized by ROCOR before other jurisdictions acknowledged their saintliness, and Blessed Seraphim Rose, of whom we have an icon in the parish - not officially, but frequently unofficially acknowledged to have been a saint. It’s important to remember that we don’t view saints to have been perfect, nor are they infallible, and it’s only because of the way Christ worked in and through them that the Church has come to glorify them. In saints we see Christ’s face reflected, and this is precisely why we venerate them and icons of them, ask them to pray for us before God, and strive to follow their examples. A very common question when folks convert to Orthodoxy concerns protestant hangups regarding prayers addressed to saints; rather than recreate the wheel on this issue, I will direct you to an excellent article that can found here: https://www.oca.org/reflections/fr.-lawrence-farley/praying-to-the-saints