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St. Nilus the Younger

Feast 09-26

Patron of

About

Nilus the Younger, also called Neilos of Rossano, was a Griko monk and abbot born around 910 in Rossano, Calabria, in southern Italy. He grew up where the Greek-speaking Christian tradition had long flourished, and from his youth was drawn to the ascetic life. After a brief marriage and the birth of a daughter, he received his wife's consent to enter religious life and became a monk, gathering disciples. He traveled widely through southern Italy, founding monasteries and defending the Italo-Byzantine monastic tradition he did more than anyone to establish. In 1004 he founded the Abbey of Grottaferrata, which remains a living center of the Byzantine-Italian monastic tradition. He died later that year, venerated in both the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic churches, his feast on September 26.

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Suggested prayer

O God, who called St. Nilus the Younger to found a monastic house that still praises You after a thousand years, grant through his intercession that we may build up Your Church in ways that endure from generation to generation. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.

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