Saint Andrew, pray for me.

Today is the Feast of Saint Andrew the Protokletos (First-called) Apostle. I took the name Andrew at Confirmation decades ago when Auxiliary Bishop of Los Angeles + John Ward of blessed memory sealed me with Sacred Chrism and tapped my cheek proclaiming me a soldier of Christ. I knelt before him in the same spot in that tiny parish church where many years later I would be ordained a priest of the same Lord by the hands of Auxiliary Bishop + Carl Fisher of blessed memory.

Of historical interest: In 357 the Emperor Constantine (son of Constantine The Great) ordered that the body of Saint Andrew be re-interred in the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople [modern Istanbul.] With all the magnificence and honor of the Byzantine Empire and the Great Church of Christ at Constantinople, Saint Andrew was returned to the City that had first heard the message of Jesus Christ from his lips. Thus he became in death, as well as in life, the founder of the Great Church of Christ in Constantinople. His relics are in Constantinople along with the Apostle Luke and Timothy, the disciple of Paul, in the Church of the Apostles.