On July 23, the holy Orthodox Church commemorates the memory of our venerable mother Anna of Lefkadios or Leukati. This was an area in northeastern Greece, almost directly north of Athens. She was born to parents of very wealthy provenance who were also very devout and who raised her accordingly. Unfortunately, her father died fairly early on, and her mother followed only about a year afterward. This left Anna almost orphaned, but yet a very wealthy orphan. In fact, her wealth was such that she became known far and wide for her great philanthropical activities. She cared greatly for those who were less fortunate than she was.

Later on, she found herself in a certain [situation] where there was a man of Hagarene descent who became interested in her and started pursuing her. In fact, he even was able to get a blessing from Emperor Basil to marry Anna. Now, Anna was not very excited by this. She saw nothing worthwhile in this man, and she eventually told him in no uncertain terms that “You can forget it; it’s not going to happen.” He continued to pursue her, wouldn’t let her alone, and ultimately his obstinacy paid the price, for the Lord himself granted that this man would perish from the earth, which he did.

Anna, having gone through all of this, began to look more and more towards the spiritual side of life. She had always had a great spiritual nature in her that was given to her by her parents, but now she became much more serious, and headed towards a church that was dedicated to the Theotokos, where she began undergoing a lot of ascetical exercises and efforts, increased her prayer, still helped many, many people around her, and molded herself into the type of woman that she felt our Lord Jesus Christ wanted her to be.

She struggled in this way for the rest of her life: quietly, but with a determined stillness, and she finally achieved her goal, after becoming a little ill, around 50 years of age, when she reposed. Wonder of wonders, after this she was buried back in a family plot, and though it was said that all of those who were buried there had decayed, Anna’s body shone bright with radiance and with a divine fragrance. People became attracted to this. They understood that it was a great mark of her sanctity, and it’s said that all sorts of diseases known to man, whatever they were—whether they were blindness or you couldn’t speak or you had some sort of horrible illness or whatever it was—all of these things were cured by the relics of venerable Anna.

She was, although wealthy, someone not noted in the world, although she did become famous because of her philanthropical activity. But she was what we would consider today someone just passing through like the most of us, who, if we are lucky, would be remembered by someone, who would perhaps make a mark during our presence here by some of the good things that we did or some of our own spiritual accomplishments, but she was not considered great or large in the pantheon of saints, even though at the time of her death she was considered great in that particular region.

I think it’s a saint that calls all of us to emulate her, because not many of us will become Mary Magdalenes, or St. Seraphim of Sarov or Nektarios of Aegina or Blessed Xenia of St. Petersburg. That’s probably not what the Lord is calling most of us to, but the Lord still calls us to sanctity in our own way, in our own time, and in our own place. Anna showed, simply by rechanneling her thoughts and desires to more pious and spiritual activities, just what God can accomplish in all of us, if we let him. By her prayers, may we all emulate her and become great beacons of light, even if in a small area around us, so that others might see us and also desire to follow and emulate our Lord Jesus Christ.