"Father Nicholas, during the Ninth Ode, you didn't cense me—but you went and censed the empty stall!"

 

 Once, during the Ninth Ode—just as the chanters were singing "More honorable than the Cherubim..."—Father Nicholas Planas was censing the church. He passed by a lady standing in one of the side *stasidia* (choir stalls) but did not cense her.

He did not cense her at all; he simply walked right past her. Two stalls further along, there was an empty one. He stopped there, censed it five or six times, and moved on. When the Divine Liturgy concluded, the lady approached him and said:

"Father Nicholas, during the Ninth Ode, you didn't cense me—but you went and censed the empty stall!"

"Well, Kyra Georgia," he replied, "you weren't actually there! That empty stall belongs to Kyra Maria, who is ill. She may have been sick at home, but her heart and her mind were here. You, on the other hand, were here in body—but your mind was off with the goats!"