Pray for Me, St. Symeon of Syracuse, Mt. Sinai & Trier

Pray for me St. Symeon and lead me along the paths of prayer in solitude and the building up of a community of faithful who desire to serve.

St. Symeon was a recluse of the late tenth and early eleventh centuries and is considered one of the last great figures who linked the Christian East and West. He was born in Syracuse, Sicily, to a Greek father and Calabrian mother, and was educated in Constantinople. When Symeon became an adult, he went on a pilgrimage to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem where he stayed for seven years. He became a monk at the Monastery of St. Mary in Bethlehem, then moved to St. Catherine's where he restored a ruined monastery on top of Mt. Sinai. After being asked by the Abbot to raise funds, Symeon left and spent the last seven years of his life as a recluse in the Roman gate of the Porta Nigra in Trier. He died in 1035.

An icon of St. Symeon of Trier