Saint Maroun Day in Lebanon (09/02)

St. Maroon's Day (St. Maroun's Day) — Maroonite Patron — is celebrated annually on February 9th. The entire Marunite Christian community, numbering more than 3.5 million people worldwide, noisily celebrates this day.

The history of the Lebanese Marunites dates back to the late 4th century, when a group of disciples gathered around St. Maroun.

Saint John Maroon (St. John Maroun), who lived at the turn of the 4th and 5th centuries AD, — according to Marunite tradition — patriarch of Antioch and Syria, nicknamed after the Syrian monastery of Maroun on the Orontes.

He was bishop of Botris or Votrun, and after the death of Patriarch Theophanes was elected to the patriarchal throne of Antioch, but only by the Marunites. In 410, at the age of seventy, after completing a noble mission, Saint Marun rested peacefully, surrounded by his disciples and followers.

At the beginning of the 8th century, the monks, along with a group of their followers, moved to a remote area of mountainous Lebanon, where they existed in relative isolation for several centuries. It was during this period that they recognized themselves as a special Church and began to call their bishop the Patriarch of Antioch and the entire East.

In the 12th century, the Marunites came into contact with the Latin Church. In 1182, the Marunites formally confirmed their unity with Rome.

In 1736, a council of the Marunite Church was held on Mount Lebanon, where a set of canons was adopted, according to which the Church was first divided into dioceses, and the rules of church life were established, the main of which have survived to this day.

Beginning in 1790, the seat of the Marunite patriarch is in Bkirki, 25 miles from Beirut. The Marunite Church — is the largest in Lebanon, comprising 37% of Christians and 17% of Lebanon's population.

Marunite priests, like most Eastern Catholics, do not observe celibacy (vow of celibacy). The services are conducted according to a special Marunite rite, which is based on the West Syriac (Antiochian rite), with elements of the East Syriac and Latin rites. Worship services are held in Arabic, and some communities still retain the Aramaic language of worship.

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