“Saint Ephrem the Syrian was a gifted and prolific poet of the fourth century who is said to have written over 3 million lines of verse. He also happens to be a saint and Doctor of the Church who eloquently defended Christian Orthodoxy during a time of great upheaval.
Born in 306 AD in the town of Nisibis in Syria (today called Nusaybin, Turkey), Ephrem became a deacon and a part of a community called the “members of the covenant,” a kind of proto-monasticism in which Christians practiced sexual abstinence and service to the Church. However, unlike later monasticism, the “sons” and “daughters” of the covenant remained in the wider community and worked alongside other Christians, evangelizing and participating in Church life.”