by St. Tikhon of Moscow
“We live surrounded by people of alien creeds; in the sea of other religions, our church is a small island of salvation, towards which swim some of the people,plunged in the sea of life … But who is to work for the spread of the Orthodox faith, for the increase of the children of the Orthodox Church? Pastors and missionaries, you answer. You are right, but are they to be alone? … At the beginning, not only pastors alone suffered for the faith of Christ, but lay people also, men, women, and even children. Heresies were fought against by lay people as well. Likewise, the spread of Christ’s faith ought to be near and precious to the heart of every Christian.”
— St. Tikhon of Moscow, in 1903 on the Sunday of Orthodoxy, when he was Bishop of the Diocese of the Aleutians and North America
