site.btaBulgarian Church Commemorates Saint Paraskeva of Epivates

Saint Venerable Paraskeva of Epivates, known among our people as Petka of Bulgaria, is one of the most highly revered female saints in Bulgaria and in the Orthodox Christian world. She was born in the 11th century in the town of Epivates (present-day Selimpasa in Turkiye, on the Thracian coast of the Sea of Marmara). Her parents were wealthy and virtuous people.

Paraskeva - whose name means "preparation" and also "Friday" (the day of preparation for the Sabbath rest in Jewish tradition) - showed love and compassion for the poor and suffering from an early age. After the death of her parents, she gave away all her possessions to the poor and went to venerate the many holy sites in the capital city of Constantinople, where she lived as an ascetic near a church. After some time, she boarded a ship for Jerusalem. There she venerated all the places where the Savior had walked and entered a women's monastery, where she took monastic vows.

Years later, she went to live as a hermit in the Jordanian desert.

Near the end of her life, she returned to her native region but lived near a church in the town of Kallikrateia (today Mimardinan, in Turkey), where she took care of the cleanliness of the house of God. No one recognized in the humble nun the young woman from Epivates. When she passed away, the unknown nun was buried in the cemetery for strangers in Kallikrateia.

Some time later, her body was miraculously discovered to be incorrupt. Many miracles occurred at her holy relics. For this reason, in 1238, Tsar Ivan Asen II and Patriarch Joachim of Tarnovo had them transferred to the Bulgarian capital. Her life was written in the following century by Saint Patriarch Euthymius.

After the fall of Tarnovo to the Ottomans, her relics were moved to Vidin, then to Belgrade, and since 1641, they have been kept in the Trei Ierarhi church in the city of Iasi, Romania.