Introducing Sister Marta and Sister Thekla

Our new rasophore nuns received the monastic habit and the names Sister Marta and Sister Thekla at their tonsure on Sunday, September 13, during Vespers for the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. 

Before their tonsure, they submitted names to our hegumena, Mother Cecilia, for consideration, and in prayer she chose from among their suggestions. Below, you can read the new nuns' explanations of their names.

Sister Marta (Aramaic form of Martha)

Patron: St. Martha of Bethany

Feast Day: June 4

“Now Jesus loved Martha […] [and] said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?’ She said to him, ‘Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, he who is coming into the world.” (Jn 11:5; 25-27). 

Saint Martha has been pursuing me as a friend longer than I probably have noticed. I often noted, prior to my friendship with her, when people would share about saints wanting to be their friend, not really understanding what this would look like. Sure, I had saints that I liked because they shared interests or such but had not felt pursued particularly by any individual. Until Martha that is. 

I can first remember Martha popping up into my prayer life during my observership on the feast of Dormition. As with all Marian feasts in our Byzantine tradition the Gospel for the day was Luke 10:38–42;11:27–28, the reading of Jesus visiting Mary and Martha. As I read the words of Jesus, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things” (Luke 10: 41) I felt the Lord speaking directly to me and heard in my head, “Maddie, Maddie, you are anxious about many things” and I was. My desire to serve mixed with my perfectionism easily lends to anxiety if I am not careful. 

The next significant moment that I can remember Martha aiding me in my relationship with Jesus was later that same year on the feast of Holy Protection, again during the Gospel reading for the day as I prayed it during my private prayer. As I read the words this time, I noticed the emphasis of Martha’s serving being disordered. Not that her serving in and of itself was bad, but in that moment, she was serving out of obligation instead of love, which was lending to resentment of her sister. Her mistake wasn’t that she served, but that she took her eyes off Jesus while doing so. Like how Peter began to sink when he took his eyes off Jesus and allowed himself to be distracted by the wind and the waves; an image furthered during my first months at the monastery. As I felt distracted by the wind and the waves, I used this image of Martha to remind myself to orient all that I do to the Lord and He will take care of the rest. 

More reflections with Martha that I have had since the monastery have been related to different things I have been struggling with at different times. Something I often struggle with is comparing myself to others and one day was lamenting to Jesus that I would spend my whole life trying to be less like Martha and more like Mary. He quickly corrected me and told me that he doesn’t want me to be more like Mary any more than He wanted Martha to be like Mary. Instead, He only wants each person to become more who He created us to be in His image and His likeness. This reflection helped lead me to know that Jesus was inviting me to tonsure when I continued to pray with it and how, vocationally, He wants me to follow Him. In that moment, as I thought about tonsure and pursuing Him through continued monastic life, I felt an immeasurable peace, His peace. 

Sister Thekla (using Greek pronunciation, so it's pronounced just like it looks; the "h" isn't silent)

Patron: St. Thekla, Protomartyr       

Feast Day: September 24

Thekla demonstrates the wholeheartedness to God we all desperately desire. I cannot help but feel some envy hearing Thekla’s reaction to hearing St. Paul preaching. Sitting for days without eating or sleeping while listening to Paul’s preaching reminds me of my own excitement when I began to study Paul’s letters as a teenager. This intense desire and hunger for God remains with me even today.

It is in Thekla’s intense and deeply rooted love for God and the spreading of the Gospel, I find an attraction to her life. When reading about her life, we find a personality that is both adventurous and witty. She understands the dangers, such as when she dresses up as a man when traveling for safety, but never allows danger to hold her back.

This impulsiveness was noted even by Paul, who when she requested baptism, told her to wait, seemingly concerned that her Faith needed some time to ensure it was genuine. Yet that same impulsiveness was also what allowed her to kiss Paul’s chains when he was in prison. A well-to-do woman going around kissing the chains of a man preaching the madness of a bodily resurrection and celibacy for the kingdom would cause any person who thought first and acted later to hesitate. Not so with Thekla. Not because she was foolish. She knew exactly what she wanted. Finding it, she embraced it. Leaving behind her good name and fiancé for a life where even something as abhorrent as chains were glorious in the sight of God because they were borne out of love, she demonstrated the glory of God surpassing worldly praise.

An element of Thekla’s life I find relatable is how God protected Thekla in her missionary activities and allowed even the dangers that He thwarted to only increase her witness and the conversion of those around her. My ministries have occasionally been dangerous, but also in those moments, I knew I was protected by God and was a witness to His power. Many live in fear and make choices out of fear. Living a life of love allows one to do what is right and exemplify true freedom, not one enslaved by fear. As Scripture says many times, we have nothing to fear when God is with us. We should only fear abandoning God for some passing good.

One may also think that Thekla, with all of her missionary success, was bound to spend the next several decades preaching. Instead, Thekla went to found what seems to be among the earliest monastic communities, though such language had not been developed. She went to a mountain and settled there in obscurity. Other women joined who desired the same life of total dedication to God.

Thekla models the monastic life to me in her total readiness and willingness to do all that God asks of her. Whether it was abandoning all she knew, facing danger, preaching, or seeking God in solitude, she embraced it all in loving trust.