The Feast of Saint Andrew at Patras

On 30 November, the feast of Saint Andrew the First-Called, Patras keeps the day of its patron — the apostle the city holds as its own, martyred here near the harbour in the first century. The Holy Church of Saint Andrew rises on that ground: the largest church in Greece, sixty metres in length, its great dome ringed by twelve smaller — Christ among his apostles — and a five-metre cross above it all.

The day follows a settled order. A vigil keeps the eve; the Metropolitan of Patras presides at the festal liturgy; and the holy relics and the great silver icon of the saint are then carried in litany through the central streets — a procession instituted in 1836, suspended in 1874, and held without fail since 1930.

Within the church rests the apostle’s head, returned from St Peter’s in Rome in September 1964 by decision of Pope Paul VI — after more than five centuries abroad. The cathedral also holds fragments of the cross of his martyrdom, brought from the Abbey of Saint-Victor in Marseille in 1980.