Vatican City, Apr 29, 2009 / 08:32 am
Benedict XVI dedicated this morning's general audience to teaching on St. Germanus of Constantinople, the defender of icons. St. Germanus’ teaching, he explained, invites people to follow Christ in order to become the image of God again, to love the Church and to develop a love for the beauty of the liturgy.
The Pope recounted for the 35,000 faithful in St. Peter’s Square how during Germanus’ patriarchate "the capital of the Byzantine empire, Constantinople, was subject to a threatening siege by the Saracens.”
On that occasion, St. Germanus led a procession with the image of the Mother of God ... and the relic of the Holy Cross. The faithful called upon the Most High to defend the city, and Constantinople was liberated from the siege.
This event, the Holy Father said, convinced the patriarch "that God's intervention was to be interpreted as evident approval of the reverence people showed towards holy icons.” The Holy Father went on: "Patriarch Germanus' appeals to Church tradition and to the real effectiveness of certain images, unanimously recognized as 'miraculous', were all to no avail.”