Saint Dorotheus of Gaza was a sixth-century monk and abbot. After spending some time as a monk at the Abba Serid monastery near Gaza, he founded his own monastery not far from there. Many of teachings were preserved and gathered as Directions on Spiritual Training. These were widely read in the East, and translated into Syriac, Arabic, Georgian, and Church Slavonic. His teaching is clear, simple, straightforward and practical, avoiding excesses of both theory and rhetoric.

The theological virtue of hope is symbolized by the colour green, just as the burning fire of love is symbolized by red. Green is the colour of growing things, and hope, like them, is always new and always fresh. Liturgically, green is the colour of Ordinary Time, the orderly sequence of weeks through the year, a season in which we are being neither single-mindedly penitent (in purple) nor overwhelmingly joyful (in white).