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On this day we observe the memory the holy and blessed Fathers who convened in Nicaea for a second time, under the Orthodox and Christ-loving emperors Constantine and Irene, against those who in an impious, uneducated, and thoughtless manner said that the Church of God practiced idolatry and who had taken down the august and holy icons...
Today we remember the 350 Holy Fathers of the 7th Ecumenical Council which convened in 787, who refuted the Iconoclast heresy. The Council decreed that the veneration of icons was not idolatry (Exodus 20:4-5), because the honor shown to them is not directed to the wood or paint, but passes to the prototype (the person depicted). The council ended almost fifty years of iconoclast persecution and established the veneration of the holy icons as basic to the belief and spirituality of Christ's Church. As the Synaxarion says, "It was not simply the veneration of the holy images that the Fathers defended in these terms but, in fact, the very reality of the Incarnation of the Son of God.
By the intercessions of the holy Fathers, O God, have mercy on us. Amen!
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