Tamar: Name Day and Patron Saint

St Tamar was born in 1166, the daughter of King George III of Georgia. Her father had no son, so he made her co-ruler when she was twelve, and after his death in 1184 she reigned alone; the Georgians called her “King”, for she ruled in her own right. At the start of her reign she gathered a Church council and asked the clergy to judge by righteousness, promising to accept correction herself. Her reign is remembered as the golden age of Georgia. When enemy armies came, she prayed barefoot through the night before the icons, and her armies won the great victories of Shamkori and Basiani. She built the churches of Pitareti, Kvabtakhevi and Betania, and in her time the cave monastery of Vardzia was carved into the rock; she helped churches and monasteries from Jerusalem and Sinai to Mount Athos and Constantinople. She abolished the death penalty and bodily torture, gave alms freely, and sewed vestments with her own hands. In secret she fasted, slept on a stone bed and walked barefoot in processions. When her last illness came, she entrusted her people, her children and her soul to Christ. She reposed in the early thirteenth century, and no one knows for certain where she is buried. The Church keeps her memory on 1 May (14 May on the Old Calendar), and also on the Sunday of the Myrrh-bearing Women. The faithful ask her prayers for Georgia and for all who govern and defend their people.

What the faithful pray for

• those who govern, that they may rule with justice and mercy
• the people and Church of Georgia
• women who carry heavy responsibility
• those who defend their homeland
• the poor, and a generous heart toward them