April Martyrs

THE MARTYRS OF APRIL
Living With The Daily Martyrology of the Church

“Can you drink the chalice that I shall drink? … My chalice indeed you shall drink!” (Matthew 20:22-23).

APRIL 1ST
The Martyr of the Day
ST. THEODORA
Martyred in the Second Century around 125

According to the Acts of Pope St. Alexander (105-115), St. Theodora was the sister of St. Hermes and was martyred some time after her brother. Hermes was born in Greece and was a wealthy freedman. Around the years 120-125 he was arrested and imprisoned for being a Christian. Theodora had given aid and care to her brother during his imprisonment and torture at the time of the Christian persecution under the Roman Emperor Hadrian. Sometime around 120-125, Hermes was martyred in Rome with companions in Rome, at the orders of a judge named Aurelian. Theodora was arrested, tried, and martyred a few months after her brother and they are buried together in the cemetery on the Old Salarian Way. The entry is as follows: “In the Cemetery of Basilia on the Old Salarian Way, Saint Hermes, Martyr, whom, as reported by St. Damasus, Greece sent forth, but Rome kept as its citizen when he died for the holy name.”

APRIL 2ND
The Martyr of the Day
ST. APIAN
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 306

St. Apian was called Aphian by the Greeks and Latins, and sometimes Amphian. He was born of rich and illustrious parents in Lycia, and by them sent in his youth to study eloquence, philosophy, and the Roman laws, in the famous schools of Berytus, in Phœnicia. He made a most rapid progress in learning: but it was his greatest happiness that, having embraced the Christian Faith, he, by the means of prayer and retirement, preserved his innocence and virtue untainted in the midst of vice and lewdness.

Returning home after his studies, he found his parents yet idolaters; and therefore withdrew to Cæsarea in Palestine, being at that time eighteen years of age. St. Pamphilus there expounded the holy scriptures with great piety and learning, and Apian became one of his auditors. Such was his conduct in that school of martyrs, as prepared him to take the lead among them, and set the rest an example.

Diocletian having abdicated the empire at Nicomedia, on the 1st of May, in 305, Galerius Maximianus, the chief promoter of his bloody persecution, was declared Emperor of the East, which Maximinus Daia governed under him, as Cæsar. There came letters to Cæsarea from the last-mentioned, containing orders to the governor to compel all persons whatever to attend the public solemn sacrifices.

Then Apian, without having communicated his design to any person, “not even to us,” says the historian Eusebius, with whom he dwelt, went to find out the governor Urbanus, as he was sacrificing, and came near to him without being perceived by the guards that surrounded him; and taking hold of his right hand, with which he was performing the ceremony, stopped him, saying, it was an impious thing to neglect the worship of the true God, and to sacrifice to idols and demons.

God inspired this generous youth, not yet twenty years of age, by this daring and extraordinary action, to confound the impiety of the persecutors, and to show them the courage of his servants. The guards instantly fell upon him, like so many wild beasts, cruelly buffetted his face, beat him down to the ground, kicked him unmercifully, hideously tore his mouth and lips, and wounded him in every part of his body. He was then thrown into a dark dungeon, where he remained a day and a night with his feet stretched very wide in the stocks.

The next day he was brought before the governor, who commanded he should suffer the most exquisite tortures. He had his sides torn so that his bones and entrails appeared: and his face was so swollen with the blows he had received, that he could not be known by his most intimate acquaintance. His only answer to all questions was: “I am a servant of Christ.”

His constancy having thrown the tyrant into a transport of rage, he ordered the executioners to apply to his feet lighted matches of flax dipped in oil. The fire burned up his flesh and penetrated even to the very bones, and the juice of his body dropped from him like melted wax, but he still continued resolute. His patience struck the persecutors with astonishment: and when pressed by his tormentors to sacrifice and obey the judge, fixing his eyes upon them, he only replied: “I confess Christ the only God, and the same God with the Father.”

He was then remanded to prison, where he continued three days. Being then brought before the judge, he persisted in his confession, and, though half-dead, was by his order cast into the sea. A prodigy ensued, of which there were as many witnesses, says Eusebius, as citizens of Cæsarea. He was no sooner thrown into the water, with stones tied to his feet, but both the sea and the city were shook with an earthquake, accompanied with a dreadful noise, and the sea, as if it was not able to endure the corpse of the martyr, threw it up before the gates of the city: all the inhabitants went out to see this prodigy, and gave glory to the God of the Christians, confessing aloud the name of Jesus Christ. The triumph of St. Apian happened on the 2nd of April, 306, in the nineteenth year of his age.

APRIL 3RD
The Martyr of the Day
ST. AGAPE, ST. CHIONIA, ST. IRENE & COMPANIONS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 304

These three sisters lived at Thessalonica, and their parents were heathens when they suffered martyrdom. In the year 303, the emperor Diocletian published an edict forbidding, under pain of death, any persons to keep the holy scriptures. These saints concealed many volumes of those sacred books, but were not discovered or apprehended till the year following; when, as their acts relate, Dulcetius, the governor, being seated in his tribunal, Artemesius, the secretary, said: “If you please, I will read an information given in by the Stationary, concerning several persons here present.”

Dulcetius said: “Let the information be read.”
The solicitor read as follows: “The Pensioner Cassander to Dulcetius, governor of Macedonia, greeting. I send to your highness six Christian women, with a man, who have refused to eat meats sacrificed to the gods. They are called Agape, Chionia, Irene, Casia, Philippa, Eutychia, and the man’s name is Agatho, therefore I have caused them to be brought before you.”

The governor, turning to the women, said: “Wretches, what madness is this of yours, that you will not obey the pious commands of the emperors and Cæsars?” He then said to Agatho: “Why will you not eat of the meats offered to the gods, like other subjects of the empire?”
He answered: “Because I am a Christian.”
Dulcetius: “Do you still persist in that resolution?”
“Certainly,” replied Agatho.

Dulcetius next addressed himself to Agape, saying: “What are your sentiments?”
Agape answered: “I believe in the living God, and will not by an evil action lose all the merit of my past life.”
Then the governor said: “What say you, Chionia?”
She answered: “I believe in the living God, and for that reason did not obey your orders.”
The governor, turning to Irene, said: “Why did not you obey the most pious command of our emperors and Cæsars?”
Irene said: “For fear of offending God.”
Governor: “But what say you, Casia?”
She said: “I desire to save my soul.”
Governor: “Will not you partake of the sacred offerings?” Casia.”
Casia: “By no means.”

Governor: “But you, Philippa, what do you say?”
She answered: “I say the same thing.”
Governor: “What is that?”
Philippa: “That I had rather die than eat of your sacrifices.”

Governor: “And you, Eutychia, what do you say?”
“I say the same thing,” said she, “that I had rather die than do what you command.”
Governor: “Are you married?”
Eutychia: “My husband has been dead almost these seven months.”
Governor: “By whom are you with child?”
She answered: “By him whom God gave me for my husband.”
Governor: “I advise you, Eutychia, to leave this folly, and resume a reasonable way of thinking; what do you say? will you obey the imperial edict?”
Eutychia: “No: for I am a Christian, and serve the Almighty God.”
Governor: “Eutychia being big with child, let her be kept in prison.”

Afterwards Dulcetius added: “Agape, what is your resolution? Will you do as we do, who are obedient and dutiful to the emperors?”
Agape: “It is not proper to obey Satan; my soul is not to be overcome by these discourses.”

Governor: “And you, Chionia, what is your final answer?”
“Nothing can change me,” said she.
Governor: “Have you not some books, papers, or other writings, relating to the religion of the impious Christians?”Chionia said: “We have none: the emperors now reigning have taken them all from us.”
Governor: “Who drew you into this persuasion?”
She said: “Almighty God.”
Governor: “Who induced you to embrace this folly?”
Chionia repeated agai: “Almighty God and his only Son our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Dulcetius: “You are all bound to obey our most puissant emperors and Cæsars. But because you have so long obstinately despised their just commands, and so many edicts, admonitions, and threats, and have had the boldness and rashness to despise our orders, retaining the impious name of Christians; and since to this very time you have not obeyed the stationaries and officers who solicited you to renounce Jesus Christ in writing, you shall receive the punishment you deserve.”

Then he read their sentence, which was worded as follows: “I condemn Agape and Chionia to be burned alive, for having out of malice and obstinacy acted in contradiction to the divine edicts of our lords the emperors and Cæsars, and who at present profess the rash and false religion of Christians, which all pious persons abhor.” He added: “As for the other four, let them be confined in close prison during my pleasure.”

After these two had been consumed in the fire, Irene was a third time brought before the governor. Dulcetius said to her: “Your madness is plain, since you have kept to this day so many books, parchments, codicils, and papers of the scriptures of the impious Christians. You were forced to acknowledge them when they were produced before you, though you had before denied you had any. You will not take warning from the punishment of your sisters, neither have you the fear of death before your eyes, your punishment therefore is unavoidable. In the meantime, I do not refuse even now to make some condescension in your behalf. Notwithstanding your crime, you may find pardon and be freed from punishment, if you will yet worship the gods. What say you then? Will you obey the orders of the emperors? Are you ready to sacrifice to the gods, and eat of the victims?”
Irene: “By no means: for those who renounce Jesus Christ, the Son of God, are threatened with eternal fire.”
Dulcetius: “Who persuaded you to conceal those books and papers so long?”
Irene: “Almighty God, who has commanded us to love him even unto death; on which account we dare not betray him, but rather choose to be burnt alive, or suffer anything whatsoever than discover such writings.”
Governor: “Who knew that those writings were in the house?”
“Nobody,” said she, “but the Almighty, from whom nothing is hidden: for we concealed them even from our own domestics, lest they should accuse us.”
Governor: “Where did you hide yourselves last year, when the pious edict of our emperors was first published?”
Irene: “Where it pleased God, in the mountains.”
Governor: “With whom did you live?”
Irene: “We were in the open air, sometimes on one mountain, sometimes on another.”
Governor: “Who supplied you with bread?”
Irene: “God, who gives food to all flesh.”
Governor: “Was your father privy to it?”
Irene: “No; he had not the least knowledge of it.”
Governor: “Which of your neighbors knew it?”
Irene: “Inquire in the neighborhood, and make your search.”
Governor: “After you returned from the mountains, as you say, did you read those books to anybody?”
Irene: “They were hidden at our own house, and we durst not produce them; and we were in great trouble, because we could not read them night and day, as we had been accustomed to do.”
Dulcetius: “Your sisters have already suffered the punishments to which they were condemned. As for you, Irene, though you were condemned to death before your flight for having hid these writings, I will not have you die so suddenly: but I order that you be exposed naked in a brothel, and be allowed one loaf a day, to be sent you from the palace; and that the guards do not suffer you to stir out of it one moment under pain of death to them.”
The infamous sentence was rigorously executed; but God protecting her, no man dared approach her, nor say or do any indecency to her. The governor caused her to be brought again before him, and said to her: “Do you still persist in your rashness?”
“Not in rashness,” said Irene, “but in piety towards God.”
Dulcetius: “You shall suffer the just punishment of your insolence and obstinacy.”
And having called for paper, he wrote this sentence: “Since Irene will not obey the emperor’s orders and sacrifice to the gods, but, on the contrary, persists still in the religion of the Christians, I order her to be immediately burnt alive, as her sisters have been.”

Dulcetius had no sooner pronounced this sentence but the soldiers seized Irene, and brought her to a rising ground, where her sisters had suffered martyrdom, and having lighted a large pile of wood, ordered her to mount thereon. Irene, singing psalms, and celebrating the glory of God, threw herself on the pile, and was there consumed in the ninth consulship of Diocletian, and the eighth of Maximian, on the 1st day of April; but Ado, Usuard, and the Roman Martyrology name St. Agape and Chionia on the 3rd, and St. Irene on the 5th of April.

APRIL 4TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. ISIDORE OF SEVILLE
Martyred in the Seventh Century around 636

St. Isidore is honored in Spain as the most illustrious doctor of that church, in which God raised him, says St. Braulio, to stem the torrent of barbarism and ferocity which everywhere followed the arms of the Goths, who had settled themselves in that kingdom, in 412. The eighth great council of Toledo, fourteen years after his death, styles him “the excellent doctor, the late ornament of the Catholic church, the most learned man, given to enlighten the latter ages, always to be named with reverence.”

The city of Carthagena was the place of his birth, which his parents, Severian and Theodora, persons of the first quality in the kingdom, edified by the example of their extraordinary piety. His two brothers, Leander and Fulgentius, bishops, and his sister Florentina, are also honored among the saints. Isidore having qualified himself in his youth for the service of the church by an uncommon stock of virtue and learning, assisted his brother, Leander, archbishop of Seville, in the conversion of the Visigoths from the Arian heresy. This great work he had the happiness to see perfectly accomplished by his indefatigable zeal and labors, which he continued during the successive reigns of the kings Reccared, Liuba, Witeric, Gundemar, Sisebut, and Sisemund.

Upon the death of St. Leander, in 600, or 601, he succeeded him in the see of Seville. He restored and settled the discipline of the church of Spain in several councils, of all which he was the oracle and the soul. The purity of their doctrine, and the severity of the canons enacted in them, drawn up chiefly by him, are incontestable monuments of his great learning and zeal.

In the council of Seville, in 619, in which he presided, he, in a public disputation, convinced Gregory (a bishop of the Acephali) of his error, who had come over from Syria; and so evidently did he confute the Eutychian heresy, that Gregory upon the spot embraced the Catholic Faith. In 610, the bishops of Spain, in a council held at Toledo, agreed to declare the archbishop of that city primate of all Spain, as, they say, he had always been acknowledged; which decree king Gundemar confirmed by a law the same year; and St. Isidore subscribed the same.

Yet we find that in the fourth council of Toledo, in 633, the most famous of all the synods of Spain, though Justus, the archbishop of Toledo, was present, St. Isidore presided, not by the privilege of his see, but on the bare consideration of his extraordinary merit; for he was regarded as the eminent doctor of the churches of Spain. The city of Toledo was honored with the residence of the Visigoth kings.

St. Isidore, to extend to posterity the advantages which his labors had procured to the church, compiled many useful works: in which he takes in the whole circle of the sciences, and discovers a most extensive reading, and a general acquaintance with the ancient writers, both sacred and profane. In the moral parts his style is pathetic and moving, being the language of a heart overflowing with sentiments of religion and piety: and though elegance and politeness of style were not the advantage of that age, the diction of this father is agreeable and clear. The saint was well versed in the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages.

St. Ildefonse says, that this saint governed his church nearly forty years, but cannot mean above thirty-six or thirty-seven. When he was almost fourscore years old, though age and fatigues had undermined and broken his health, he never interrupted his usual exercises and labours. During the last six months of his life, he increased his charities with such profusion, that the poor of the whole country crowded his house from morning till night. Perceiving his end to draw near, he entreated two bishops to come to see him. With them he went to the church, where one of them covered him with sackcloth, the other put ashes on his head. Clothed with the habit of penance, he stretched his hands towards heaven, prayed with great earnestness, and begged aloud the pardon of his sins.

He then received from the hands of the bishops the body and blood of our Lord, recommended himself to the prayers of all who were present, remitted the bonds of all his debtors, exhorted the people to charity, and caused all the money which he had not as yet disposed of to be distributed among the poor. This done, he returned to his own house, and calmly departed this life on the fourth day after, which was the 4th of April, in the year 636, as is expressly testified by Ædemptus, his disciple, who was present at his death. His body was interred in his cathedral, between those of his brother, St. Leander, and his sister, St. Florentina. Ferdinand, king of Castile and Leon, recovered his relics from the Moors, and placed them in the church of St. John Baptist, at Leon, where they still remain.

All who are employed in the functions of Martha, or of an exterior active life, must always remember that action and contemplation ought to be so constantly intermingled, that the former be always animated and directed by the latter, and amidst the exterior labors of the active life, we constantly enjoy the interior repose of the contemplative, and that no employments entirely interrupt the union of our souls to God; but those that are most distracting serve to make us more closely, more eagerly, and more amorously plunge our hearts in Him, embracing him in himself by contemplation, and in our neighbor by our actions.

APRIL 5TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. ZENO
Martyred in the Third Century around 258

St. Zeno, martyr, who was flayed alive, then smeared and covered with pitch, after which he was cast into the fire. While he being burnt alive, he was further wounded by the thrust of a spear, thus gaining the crown of martyrdom.

No more is known about St Zeno.

APRIL 6TH
The Martyrs of the Day
THE 120 MARTYRS OF HADIAB, PERSIA
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 345

In the fifth year of Sapor’s persecution, with Sapor being at Seleucia, he caused to be apprehended in the neighboring places one hundred and twenty Christians, of which nine were virgins consecrated to God; the others were priests, deacons, or of the inferior clergy. They lay six months in filthy stinking dungeons, till the end of winter: during all which space Jazdundocta, a very rich, virtuous lady of Arbela, the capital city of Hadiabena, supported them by her charities, not admitting of a partner in that good work.

During this interval they were often tortured, but always courageously answered the president that they would never adore the sun, a mere creature, for God; and begged he would finish speedily their triumph by death, which would free them from dangers and insults.

Jazdundocta, hearing from the court, one day, that they were to suffer the next morning, flew to the prison, gave to every one of them a fine, white, long robe, as to chosen spouses of the heavenly bridegroom; prepared for them a sumptuous supper, served and waited on them herself at table, gave them wholesome exhortations, and read the Holy Scriptures to them. They were surprised at her behavior, but could not prevail on her to tell them the reason.

The next morning she returned to the prison, and told them she had been informed that that was the happy morning in which they were to receive their crown, and be joined to the blessed spirits. She earnestly recommended herself to their prayers for the pardon of her sins, and that she might meet them at the last day, and live eternally with them.

Soon after, the king’s order for their immediate execution was brought to the prison. As they went out of it Jazdundocta met them at the door, fell at their feet, took hold of their hands, and kissed them. The guards hastened them on, with great precipitation, to the place of execution; where the judge who presided at their tortures asked them again if any of them would adore the sun, and receive a pardon.

They answered, that their countenance must show him they met death with joy, and contemned this world and its light, being perfectly assured of receiving an immortal crown in the kingdom of heaven. He then dictated the sentence of death, whereupon their heads were struck off.

Jazdundocta, in the dusk of the evening, brought out of the city two undertakers, or embalmers, for each body, caused them to wrap the bodies in fine linen, and carry them in coffins, for fear of the Magians, to a place at a considerable distance from the town. There she buried them in deep graves, with monuments, five and five in a grave.

They were of the province called Hadiabena, which contained the greater part of the ancient Assyria, and was in a manner peopled by Christians. Helena, queen of the Hadiabenians, seems to have embraced Christianity in the second century. Her son Izates, and his successors, much promoted the Faith; so that Sozomen says, the country was almost entirely Christian. These one hundred and twenty martyrs suffered at Seleucia, in the year of Christ 345, of King Sapor the thirty-sixth, and the sixth of his great persecution, on the 6th day of the moon of April, which was the 21st of that month. They are mentioned in the Roman Martyrology on the 6th.

APRIL 7TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. CALLIOPIUS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 304

The holy martyr St. Calliopius was born in Perge, Pamphylia, to the pious woman Theoklia, wife of a renowned senator. Theoklia was childless for a long time. She fervently prayed for a son, vowing to dedicate him to God.

Soon after the birth of her son Theoklia was widowed. When Calliopius reached adolescence, a fierce persecution against Christians began. Theoklia, learning that her son would be denounced as a Christian, sent him to Cilicia in Asia Minor.

When the saint arrived at Pompeiopolis, Paphlagonia there was a celebration in honor of the pagan gods. They invited the youth to take part in the proceedings, but he said he was a Christian and refused. They reported this to the prefect of the city Maximus. Calliopius was brought before him to be tried. At first, he attempted to persuade Calliopius to worship the gods, promising to give him his own daughter in marriage. After the youth rejected this offer, Maximus subjected him to terrible tortures. He ordered the martyr to be beaten on the back with iron rods, and on the stomach with ox-hide thongs. Finally, the prefect had him tied to an iron wheel, and he was roasted over a slow fire. After these tortures, they threw the martyr Calliopius into prison.

When Theoklia heard about the sufferings of her son, she wrote her last will, freed her slaves, distributed her riches to the poor, and hastened to Calliopius. The brave mother gave money to the guard and got into the prison to see her son. There she encouraged him to endure suffering to the end for Christ.

When on the following day the saint refused to renounce Christ, Maximus gave orders to crucify the martyr. The day of execution happened to be Great Thursday, when the Savior’s last meal with His disciples is commemorated.

Theoklia begged the guard to crucify her son head downward, since she considered it unworthy for him to be crucified like the Lord. Her wish was granted. The holy martyr hung on the cross overnight and died on Great Friday in the year 304.

When the holy martyr was removed from the cross, Theoklia gave glory to the Savior. She embraced the lifeless body of her son and gave up her own spirit to God. Christians buried their bodies in a single grave.

APRIL 8TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. EDESIUS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 306

St. Edesius (Aedesius), was a brother to St. Apian (Apphian), who received his crown at Cæsarea, on the 2nd of April, and a native of Lycia, had been a professed philosopher, and continued to wear the cloak after his conversion to the Faith. He was for a long time a scholar of St. Pamphilus at Cæsarea.

In the persecution of Galerius Maximianus he often confessed his Faith before magistrates, had sanctified several dungeons by his imprisonment, and had been condemned to the mines in Palestine. Being released from there, he went into Egypt, but there he found the persecution more violent than in Palestine itself, under Hierocles, the most barbarous prefect of Egypt, for Maximinus Daia, Cæsar. This governor had also employed his pen against the Faith, presuming to put the sorceries of Apollonius of Tyana upon a level with the miracles of Christ, whom Eusebius confuted by a book entitled, Against Hierocles.

Edesius being at Alexandria, and observing how outrageously the judge proceeded against the Christians, by gravely tormenting men, and delivering women of singular piety, and even virgins, to the infamous purchasers of slaves, Edesius boldly presented himself before this savage monster, rather than a man, and reproached him with his crying inhumanity, especially in exposing holy virgins to lewdness.

As a result, he endured courageously the scourge, and the greatest torments which the rage of such a tyrant was capable of inventing, and was at length cast into the sea, in 306, after the same manner as his brother, who obtained his crown a little while before.

APRIL 9TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. EUPSYCHIUS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 362

Julian the Apostate, in his march to Antioch, arriving at Cæsarea, the capital of Cappadocia, was exceedingly irritated to find the greater part of the city Christians, and that they had lately demolished a temple dedicated to Fortune, being the last pagan temple remaining there: wherefore he struck it out of the list of cities, and ordered that it should resume its ancient name of Mazaca, instead of that of Cæsarea, the name with which Tiberius had honored it.

He deprived the churches, in the city and its territory, of all that they possessed in moveables or other goods, making use of torments to oblige them to a discovery of their wealth. He caused all the clergy to be enlisted among the train-bands, under the governor of the province, which was the most contemptible, and frequently the most burdensome service, and on the lay Christians he imposed a heavy tax.

Many of them he put to death, the principal of which number was St. Eupsychius, a person of noble extraction, lately married. The tyrant left an order that the Christians should be compelled to rebuild the temples; but, instead of that, they erected a church to the true God, under the title of St. Eupsychius: in which, on the 8th of April, eight years after, St. Basil celebrated the feast of this martyr, to which he invited all the bishops of Pontus, in a letter yet existant.

APRIL 10TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. BADEMUS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 376

Bademus was a rich and noble citizen of Bethlapeta, in Persia, who, desiring to devote himself to the service of God, out of his estates founded a monastery near that city, which he governed with great sanctity. The purity of his soul had never been sullied by any crime, and the sweet odor of his sanctity diffused a love of virtue in the hearts of those who approached him. He watched whole nights in prayer, and passed sometimes several days together without eating: bread and water were his usual fare. He conducted his religious in the paths of perfection with sweetness, prudence, and charity. In this amiable retreat he enjoyed a calmness and happiness which the great men of the world would view with envy, did they compare with it the unquiet scenes of vice and vanity in which they live.

But, to crown his virtue, God permitted him, with seven of his monks, to be apprehended by the pursuivants of King Sapor, in the thirty-sixth year of his persecution. He lay four months in a dungeon, loaded with chains; during which lingering martyrdom he was every day called out to receive a certain number of stripes. But he triumphed over his torments by the patience and joy with which he suffered them for Christ.

At the same time, a Christian lord of the Persian court, named Nersan, prince of Aria, was cast into prison, because he refused to adore the sun. At first he showed some resolution; but at the sight of tortures his constancy failed him, and he promised to conform. The king, to try if his change was sincere, ordered Bademus to be brought to Lapeta, with his chains struck off, and to be introduced into the prison of Nersan, which was a chamber in the royal palace.

Then his majesty sent word to Nersan, by two lords, that if, with his own hand, he would despatch Bademus, he should be restored to his liberty and former dignities. The wretch accepted the condition; a sword was put into his hand, and he advanced to plunge it into the breast of the abbot. But being seized with a sudden terror, he stopped short, and remained some time without being able to lift up his arm to strike.

The servant of Christ stood undaunted, and, with his eyes fixed upon him, said: “Unhappy Nersan, to what a pitch of impiety do you carry your apostasy. With joy I run to meet death; but could wish to fall by some other hand than yours: why must you be my executioner?”

Nersan had neither courage to repent, nor heart to accomplish his crime. He strove, however, to harden himself, and continued with a trembling hand to aim at the sides of the martyr. Fear, shame, remorse, and respect for the martyr, whose virtue he wanted courage to imitate, made his strokes forceless and unsteady; and so great was the number of the martyr’s wounds, that they stood in admiration at his invincible patience.

At the same time they detested the cruelty, and despised the base cowardice of the murderer, who at last, aiming at his neck, after four strokes severed his head from the trunk. Neither did he escape the divine vengeance: for a short time after, falling into public disgrace, he perished by the sword, after tortures, and under the maledictions of the people. Such is the treachery of the world towards those who have sacrificed their all in courting it. Though again and again deceived by it, they still listen to its false promises, and continue to serve this hard master, till their fall becomes irretrievable.

The body of St. Bademus was reproachfully cast out of the city by the infidels: but was secretly carried away and interred by the Christians. His disciples were released from their chains four years afterward upon the death of King Sapor. St. Bademus suffered on the 10th of April, in the year 376, of King Sapor the sixty-seventh year.

Monks were called Mourners by the Syrians and Persians, because by their state they devoted themselves in a particular manner to the most perfect exercises of compunction and penance, which indeed are an indispensable duty of every Christian. The name of angels was often given them over all the East, during several ages, because by making heavenly contemplation and the singing of the divine praises their great and glorious employment, if they duly acquit themselves of it, they may be justly called the seraphim of the earth.

The soul which loves God, is made a heaven which he inhabits, and in which she converses with him in the midst of her own substance. Though he is infinite, and the highest heavenly spirits tremble before him, and how poor and base soever we are, he invites us to converse with him, and declares that it is his delight to be with us. Shall not we look upon it as our greatest happiness and comfort to be with Him, and to enjoy the unspeakable sweetness of his presence? Oh! what ravishing delights does a soul taste which is accustomed, by a familiar habit, to converse in the heaven of her own interior with the three persons of the adorable Trinity!

Dissipated worldlings wonder how holy solitaries can pass their whole time buried in the most profound solitude and silence of creatures. But those who have had any experience of this happiness, are surprised with far greater reason how it is possible that any souls which are created to converse eternally with God, should here live in constant dissipation, seldom entertaining a devout thought of Him, whose charms and sweet conversation eternally ravish all the blessed.

APRIL 11TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. ANTIPAS
Martyred in the First Century around 68 or 92

St. Antipas, a disciple of the holy Apostle St. John the Evangelist, was bishop of the Church of Pergamum during the reign of the emperor Nero (54-68).

During these times, everyone who would not offer sacrifice to the idols, lived under threat of either exile or execution by order of the emperor. On the island of Patmos (in the Aegean Sea) the holy Apostle St. John, was imprisoned, he to whom the Lord revealed the future judgment of the world and of Holy Church.

“And to the angel of the church of Pergamus write: These things, saith he, that hath the sharp two edged sword: ‘I know where thou dwellest, where the seat of Satan is: and thou holdest fast my name, and hast not denied My Faith. Even in those days when Antipas was my faithful witness, who was slain among you, where Satan dwelleth’”(Apocalypse 2:12-13).

By his personal example, firm Faith and constant preaching about Christ. Antipas began to turn the people of Pergamum from offering sacrifice to idols. The pagan priests reproached the bishop for leading the people away from their ancestral gods. and they demanded that he stop preaching about Christ and offer sacrifice to the idols instead.

Antipas calmly answered that he was not about to serve the demons that fled from him. a mere mortal. He said he worshiped the Lord Almighty and he would continue to worship the Creator of all, with His Only-Begotten Son and the Holy Spirit. The pagan priests retorted that their gods existed from of old, whereas Christ was not from of old, but was crucified under Pontius Pilate as a criminal. The saint replied that the pagan gods were the work of human hands and that everything said about them was filled with iniquities and vices. He steadfastly confessed his Faith in the Son of God. incarnate of the Most Holy Virgin.

The enraged pagan priests dragged Antipas to the temple of Artemis and threw him into a red-hot copper bull, where usually they put the sacrifices to the idols. In the red-hot furnace the martyr prayed loudly to God, imploring Him to receive his soul and to strengthen the Faith of the Christians. He also asked forgiveness for his tormentors and that he would help be a source of healing to the faithful. especially those suffering from ailments of teeth. He went to the Lord peacefully, as if he were going to sleep (around 68 or around 92).

At night Christians took the body of the Antipas, which was untouched by the fire. They buried him at Pergamum. The tomb of Antipas became a font of miracles and of healings from various sicknesses.

APRIL 12TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. SABAS THE GOTH
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 372

The Faith of Christ erected its trophies not only over the pride and sophistry of the heathen philosophers, and the united power of the Roman empire, but also over the kings of barbarous infidel nations; who, though in every other thing the contrast of the Romans, and enemies to their name, yet vied with them in the rage with which they sought, by every human stratagem, and every invention of cruelty, to depress the cross of Christ: by which the finger of God was more visible in the propagation of his Faith.

Even among the Goths, his name was glorified by the blood of martyrs. Athanaric, king of the Goths, in the year 370, and according to St. Jerome, raised a violent persecution against the Christians among them. The Greeks commemorate fifty-one martyrs who suffered in that nation. The two most illustrious are SS. Nicetas and Sabas.

Sabas was by birth a Goth, converted to the Faith in his youth, and a faithful imitator of the obedience, mildness, humility, and other virtues of the apostles. He was affable to all men, yet with dignity; a lover of truth, an enemy to all dissimulation or disguise, intrepid, modest, of few words, and a lover of peace; yet zealous and active. To sing the divine praises in the church, and to adorn the altars, was his great delight. He was so scrupulously chaste, that he shunned all conversation with women, except what was indispensable. He often spent whole days and nights in prayer, and devoted his whole life to the exercises of penance: flying vain glory, and by words and example inducing others to a love of virtue, he burned with an ardent desire, in all things to glorify Jesus Christ.

The princes and magistrates of Gothia began, in 370, to persecute the Christians, by compelling them to eat meats which had been sacrificed to idols, out of a superstitious motive, as if they were sanctified. Some heathens who had Christian relations, desiring to save them, prevailed upon the king’s officers to present them common meats which had not been offered to the idols.

Sabas condemned this impious collusion, and not only refused to eat such meats, but protested aloud that whoever should eat them would be no longer a Christian, having by that scandalous compliance renounced his Faith. Thus he hindered many from falling into that snare of the devil, but displeased others, who banished him from his town, though they some time after recalled him home. The next year the persecution was renewed, and a commissary of the king arrived at St. Sabas’s town in search of Christians.

Some of the inhabitants offered to swear on the victims that there were no Christians in the place. Sabas appeared, and stepping up to those who were going to take that oath, said: “Let no man swear for me: for I am a Christian.”

Notwithstanding this, the commissary ordered the oath to be tendered. Therefore the principal men of the city hid the other Christians, and then swore that there was but one Christian in their town. The commissary commanded that he should appear. Sabas boldly presented himself. The commissary asked the by-standers what wealth he had: and being told he had nothing besides the clothes on his back, the commissary despised him, saying: “Such a fellow can do us neither good nor harm.”

The persecution was renewed with much greater fury in 372, before Easter. Sabas considered how he could celebrate that solemnity, and for this purpose set out to go to a priest named Gouttica in another city. Being on the road, he was admonished by God to return, and keep the festival with the priest Sansala. He did so, and on the third night after Atharidus, son of one that enjoyed a petty sovereignty in that country, entered the town, and with an armed troop suddenly broke into the lodgings of Sansala, surprised him asleep, bound him, and threw him on a cart. They pulled Sabas out of bed without suffering him to put on his clothes, and dragged him naked as he was over thorns and briers, forcing him along with whips and staves.

When it was day, Sabas said to his persecutors: “Have not you dragged me, quite naked, over rough and thorny grounds? Observe whether my feet are wounded, or whether the blows you gave me have made any impression on my body!” and indeed they could not perceive any the least marks.

The persecutors being enraged, for want of a rack, took the axle-tree of a cart, laid it upon his neck, and stretching out his hands, fastened them to each end. They fastened another in like manner to his feet, and in this situation they tormented him a considerable part of the following night. When they were gone to rest, the woman of the house in which they lodged untied him: but he would not make his escape, and spent the remainder of that night in helping the woman to dress victuals for the family.

The next day Atharidus commanded his hands to be tied, and caused him to be hung upon a beam of the house, and soon after ordered his servants to carry him and the priest certain meats that had been offered to idols, which they refused to eat, and Sabas said: “This pernicious meat is impure and profane, as is Atharidus himself who sent it.”

One of the slaves of Atharidus, incensed at these words, struck the point of his javelin against the saint’s breast with such violence, that all present believed he had been killed.

But St. Sabas said: “Do you think you have slain me? Know, that I felt no more pain than if the javelin had been a lock of wool.”

Atharidus, being informed of these particulars, gave orders that he should be put to death. Wherefore, having dismissed the priest Sansala, his companion, they carried away St. Sabas in order to throw him into the Musæus. The martyr, filled with joy in the Holy Ghost, blessed and praised God without ceasing for thinking him worthy to suffer for his sake. Being come to the river side, the officers said one to another: “Why don’t we let this man go? He is innocent; and Atharidus will never know anything of the matter.”

St. Sabas, overhearing them, asked them why they trifled, and were so dilatory in obeying their orders? “I see,” said he, “what you cannot: I see persons on the other side of the river ready to receive my soul, and conduct it to the seat of glory: they only wait the moment in which it will leave my body.”

Hereupon they threw him into the river, praising God to the last: and by the means of the axle-tree they had fastened about his neck, they strangled him in the water. He therefore suffered martyrdom, say the acts, by water and wood, the symbols of baptism and the cross: which happened on the 12th of April, Valentinian and Valens being emperors, in 372. After this the executioners drew his body out of the water, and left it unburied: but the Christians of the place guarded it from birds and beasts of prey.

Junius Soranus, duke of Scythia, a man who feared God, carried off the body, which he sent into his country, Cappadocia. With these relics was sent a letter from the church of Gothia to that of Cappadocia, which contains an account of the martyrdom of St. Sabas, and concludes thus: “Wherefore offering up the holy sacrifice on the day whereon the martyr was crowned, impart this to our brethren, that the Lord may be praised throughout the Catholic and Apostolic Church for thus glorifying his servants.” Thus the acts, which were sent to the church of Cappadocia, together with the relics of St. Sabas. 3 Both the Greek and Latin Martyrologies mention this martyr.

The martyrs despised torments and death, because the immense joys of heaven were always before their eyes. If they made a due impression upon our souls, we should never be slothful in the practice of virtue. When an ancient monk complained of being weary of living in close solitude, his abbot said to him: “This weariness clearly proves that you have neither the joys of heaven nor the eternal torments of the damned before your eyes: otherwise no sloth or discouragement could ever seize your soul.” St. Augustine gives the following advice: “Not only think of the road through which thou art travelling, but take care never to lose sight of the blessed country in which thou art shortly to arrive. Thou meetest here with passing sufferings, but will soon enjoy everlasting rest. In order to labor with constancy and cheerfulness, consider the reward. The laborer would faint in the vineyard, if he were not cheered by the thought of what he is to receive. When thou lookest up at the recompense, everything thou doest or sufferest will appear light, and no more than a shadow: it bears no manner of proportion with what thou art to receive for it. Thou wilt wonder that so much is given for such trifling pains.”

APRIL 13TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. HERMENEGILD
Martyred in the Sixth Century around 586

Levigild, or Leovigild, the Goth, king of Spain, had two sons by his first wife Theodosia, namely, Hermenegild and Recared. These he educated in the Arian heresy, which he himself professed, but married Hermenegild, the eldest, to Ingondes, a zealous Catholic, and daughter to Sigebert, king of Austrasia, in France. The grandees had hitherto disposed of their crown by election, but Levigild, to secure it to his posterity, associated his two sons with him in his sovereignty, and allotted to each a portion of his dominions to inure them to government, and Seville fell to the lot of the elder.

Ingondes had much to suffer from Gosvint, a bigoted Arian, whom Levigild had married after the death of Theodosia; but, in spite of all her cruel treatment, she adhered strictly to the Catholic Faith. And such was the force of her example, and of the instructions and exhortations of St. Leander, bishop of Seville, that the prince became a convert; and, taking the opportunity of his father’s absence, abjured his heresy, and was received into the church by the imposition of hands, and the unction of chrism on the forehead.

Levigild, who was already exasperated against his son, upon the first appearance of his change, being now informed of his open profession of the Catholic Faith, in a transport of rage divested him of the title of king, and resolved to deprive him of his possessions, his princess, and even his life, unless he returned to his former sentiments.

Hermenegild, looking upon himself as a sovereign prince, resolved to stand upon his defense, and was supported by all the Catholics in Spain; but they were by much too weak to defend him against the Arians. The prince therefore sent St. Leander to Constantinople, to solicit Tiberius for help. But he dying soon after, and his successor Maurice being obliged to employ all his forces to defend his own dominions against the Persians, who had made many irruptions into the imperial territories, no help was to be obtained.

Hermenegild implored next the assistance of the Roman generals, who were with a small army in that part of Spain, on the coast of the Mediterranean, of which the empire of Constantinople still retained possession. They engaged themselves by oath to protect him, and received his wife Ingondes and infant son for hostages; but, being corrupted by Levigild’s money, they basely betrayed him.

Levigild held his son besieged in Seville above a year, till Hermenegild, no longer able to defend himself in his capital, fled secretly to join the Roman camp; but, being informed of their treachery, he went to Cordova, and thence to Osseto, a very strong place, in which there was a church held in particular veneration over all Spain. He shut himself up in this fortress with three hundred chosen men; but the place was taken and burnt by Levigild.

The prince sought a refuge in a church at the foot of the altar; and the Arian king not presuming to violate that sacred place, permitted his second son, Recared, then an Arian, to go to him, and to promise him pardon, in case he submitted himself and asked forgiveness. Hermenegild believed his father sincere, and going out threw himself at his feet. Levigild embraced him, and renewed his fair promises, with a thousand caresses, till he had got him into his own camp. He then ordered him to be stripped of his royal robes, loaded with chains, and conducted prisoner to the tower of Seville, in 586, when the saint had reigned two years, as F. Flores proves from one of his coins, and other monuments.

There he again employed all manner of threats and promises to draw him back to his heresy, and hoping to overcome his constancy, caused him to be confined in a most frightful dungeon, and treated with all sorts of cruelty.

The martyr repeated always what he had before wrote to his father: “I confess your goodness to me has been extreme. I will preserve to my dying breath the respect, duty, and tenderness which I owe you; but is it possible that you should desire me to prefer worldly greatness to my salvation? I value the crown as nothing; I am ready to lose scepter and life too, rather than abandon the divine truth.”

The prison was to him a school of virtue. He clothed himself in sackcloth, and added other voluntary austerities to the hardships of his confinement, and with fervent prayers begged of God to vouchsafe him the strength and assistance which was necessary to support him in his combat for the truth.

The solemnity of Easter being come, the perfidious father sent to him an Arian bishop in the night, offering to take him into favor, if he received the communion from the hand of that prelate; but Hermenegild rejected the proposal with indignation, reproaching the messenger with the impiety of his sect, as if he had been at full liberty.

The bishop, returning to the Arian king with this account, the furious father, seeing the Faith of his son proof against all his endeavours to pervert him, sent soldiers out of hand to dispatch him. They entered the prison, and found the saint fearless and ready to receive the stroke of death, which they instantly inflicted on him, cleaving his head with an axe, whereby his brains were scattered on the floor.

St. Gregory the Great attributes to the merits of this martyr the conversion of his brother, King Recared, and of the whole kingdom of the Visigoths in Spain. Levigild was stung with remorse for his crime, and though by God’s secret, but just judgment, he was not himself converted, yet, on his death-bed, he recommended his son Recared to St. Leander, desiring him to instruct him in the same manner as he had done his brother Hermenegild—that is, to make him a Catholic.

This saint received the crown of martyrdom on Easter-Eve, the 13th of April. His body remains at Seville. St. Gregory of Tours observes, that whatever guilt this holy king and martyr incurred by taking up arms against his father, this at least was expiated by his heroic virtue and death. Before St. Hermenegild declared himself a Catholic, the persecution was raised with great violence against the Goths, who embraced the orthodox Faith of the Trinity, and many lost their goods, many were banished, and several died of hunger, or by violence. St. Gregory of Tours ascribes not only the death of St. Hermenegild, but also this whole persecution, chiefly to the instigation of Gosvint.

St. Hermenegild began then to be truly a king, says St. Gregory the Great, when he became a martyr. From his first conversion to the true Faith, it was his main study to square his life by the most holy maxims of the Gospel. Yet, perhaps, whilst he lived amidst the hurry, flatteries, and pomp of a throne, his virtue was for some time imperfect, and his heart was not perfectly crucified to the world. But humiliations and sufferings for Christ, which the saint bore with the heroic courage, the fidelity, and perfect charity of the martyrs, entirely broke all secret ties of his affections to the earth, and rendered him already a martyr in the disposition of his soul, before he attained to that glorious crown.

Christ founded all the glory of his humanity and that of his spiritual kingdom, the salvation of the universe, and all the other great designs of his sacred incarnation, upon the meanness of his poor and abject life, and his ignominious sufferings and death. This same conduct he held in his apostles and all his saints. Their highest exaltation in his grace and glory, was built upon their most profound humility, and the most perfect crucifixion of their hearts to the world and themselves; the foundation of which was most frequently laid by the greatest exterior as well as interior humiliations. How sweet, how glorious were the advantages of which, by this means, they became possessed, even in this life!

God making their souls his kingdom, and by his grace and holy charity reigning sovereignly in all their affections. Thou hast made us a kingdom to our God, and we shall reign, say all pious souls to Christ, penetrated with gratitude for his inexpressible mercy and goodness, with esteem for his grace and love alone, and with a contempt of all earthly things. They are truly kings, depending on God alone, being in all things, with, inexpressible joy, subject to him only, and to all creatures, purely for his sake; enjoying a perfect liberty, despising equally the frowns and the flatteries of the world, ever united to God. The riches of this interior kingdom, which they possess in Christ, are incomprehensible, as St. Paul assures us. They consist in his grace, light, science of divine things, true wisdom, and sublime sentiments of his love and all virtues.

In this kingdom, souls are so replenished with the fullness of God as St. Paul expresses it, that they can desire no other goods. This is to be truly rich. Joy and pleasure are possessed in this kingdom. The solid delight, sweetness, comfort, and peace, which a soul relishes in it, surpass all the heart can desire, or the understanding conceive.

Lastly, all worldly splendor is less than a dream or shadow, if compared to the dignity, glory, and honor of this happy state. Thus was St. Hermenegild a great king in his chains. We also are invited to the same kingdom.

APRIL 14TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. TIBURTIUS, ST. VALERIAN & ST. MAXIMUS
Martyred in the Third Century around 229

These holy martyrs have always been held in singular veneration in the church, as appears from the ancient calendar of Fronto, the sacramentary of St. Gregory, St. Jerome’s Martyrology, that of Thomasius, etc. Valerian was espoused to St. Cecilia, and converted by her to the Faith; and with her he became the instrument of the conversion of his brother Tiburtius. Masimus, the officer appointed to attend their execution, was brought to the Faith by the example of their piety, and received with them the crown of martyrdom, in the year 229.

The theater of their triumph seems to have been Rome, though some have imagined they suffered in Sicily. They were interred in the burying place of Prætextatus, which, from them, took the name of Tiburtius. It was contiguous to that of Calixtus. In that place Pope Gregory III repaired their monument in 740; and Pope Adrian I built a church under their patronage. But Pope Paschal translated the remains of these martyrs, of St. Cecily, and the popes SS. Urban and Lucius, into the city, where the celebrated church of St. Cecily stands. These relics were found in it in 1599, and visited by the Order of Clement VIII., and approved genuine by the Cardinals Baronius and Sfondrate. The Greeks vie with the Latins in their devotion to these martyrs.

Most agreeable to the holy angels was this pious family, converted to God by the zeal and example of St. Cecily, who frequently assembled to sing together, with heavenly purity and fervor, the divine praises. We shall also draw upon ourselves the protection, constant favor, and tender attention of the heavenly spirits, if we faithfully imitate the same angelical exercise.

Mortification, temperance, humility, meekness, purity of mind and body, continual sighs toward heaven, prayer, accompanied with tears and vehement heavenly desires, disengagement of the heart from the world, a pure and assiduous attention to God and to his holy will, and a perfect union by the most sincere fraternal charity, are virtues and exercises infinitely pleasing to them.

The angels of peace are infinitely delighted to see the same perfect intelligence and union, which make an essential part of their bliss in heaven, reign among us on earth, and that we have all but one heart and one soul. Happy are those holy souls which have renounced the world, in order more perfectly to form in their hearts the spirit of these virtues, in which they cease not, day and night, to attend to the divine praises, and consecrate themselves to Jesus Christ, by employing their whole life in this divine exercise. Their profession is a prelude to, or rather a kind of anticipation of, the bliss of heaven.

The state of the blessed, indeed, surpasses it in certain high privileges and advantages.
First, they praise God with far greater love and esteem, because they see and know him much more clearly, and as he is in himself.
Secondly, they praise him with more joy, because they possess him fully.
Thirdly, their praises have neither end nor interruption.

Yet our present state has also its advantages.
First, If our praises are mingled with tears, compunction, watchfulness, and conflicts, they merit a continual immense increase of grace, love, and bliss for eternity.
Secondly, Our praises cost labour, difficulty, and pain: they are a purgatory of love; those of the blessed the reward and the sovereign bliss.
Thirdly, We praise God in a place where he is little loved and little known: we celebrate his glory in an enemy’s country, amidst the contradiction of sinners. This obliges us to acquit ourselves of this duty with the utmost fidelity and fervor.

A second motive to excite us to assiduity in this exercise is, that it associates us already to the angels and saints, and makes the earth a paradise: it is also, next to the sacraments, the most powerful means of our sanctification and salvation. With what delight do the holy angels attend and join us in it! With what awe and fervor, with what purity of heart, ardent love, and profound sentiments of humility, adoration, and all virtues, ought we in such holy invisible company to perform this most sacred action!

We should go to it penetrated with fear and respect, as if we were admitted into the sanctuary of heaven itself, and mingled in its glorious choirs. We ought to behave at it as if we were in paradise, with the utmost modesty, in silence, annihilating ourselves in profound adoration with the seraphim, and pronouncing every word with interior sentiment and relish.

From prayer we must come as if we were just descended from heaven, with an earnest desire of speedily returning thither, bearing God in our souls, all animated and inflamed by him, and preserving that spirit of devotion with which his presence filled us at prayer.

APRIL 15TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. BASILISSA & ST. ANASTASIA
Martyred in the First Century around 68

The holy women martyrs, Basilissa and Anastasia, lived in Rome and were converted to Christianity by the holy Apostles Peter and Paul. They devoted themselves to the service of the Lord.

When Emperor Nero persecuted the Christians and gave them over to torture and execution, St. Basilissa and St. Anastasia took the bodies of the holy Apostles and gave them a reverent burial. Rumors of this reached Nero, and he ordered that Basilissa and Anastasia be locked up in the prison. The women were subjected to cruel tortures: were scourged with whips, had their skin scraped with hooks, and were burned with fire. However, the holy martyrs remained unyielding, and bravely confessed their Faith in Christ the Savior. By Nero’s command, they were beheaded with the sword in 68.

APRIL 16TH
The Martyrs of the Day
THE EIGHTEEN MARTYRS OF SARAGOSSA
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 304

St. Optatus, and seventeen other holy men, received the crown of martyrdom on the same day, at Saragossa, under the cruel governor Dacian, in the persecution of Diocletian, in 304. Two others, Caius and Crementius, died of their torments after a second conflict, as Prudentius relates.

The same venerable author describes, in no less elegant verse, the triumph of St. Encratis, or Engratia, Virgin. She was a native of Portugal. Her father had promised her in marriage to a man of quality in Rousillon: but, fearing the dangers, and despising the vanities of the world, and resolving to preserve her virginity, in order to appear more agreeable to her heavenly spouse, and serve him without hindrance, she fled privately to Saragossa, where the persecution was hottest, under the eyes of Dacian.

She even reproached him with his barbarities, upon which he ordered her to be long tormented in the most inhuman manner: her sides were torn with iron hooks, and one of her breasts was cut off, so that the inner parts of her chest were exposed to view, and part of her liver pulled out.

In this condition she was sent back to prison, being still alive, and died by the mortifying of her wounds, in 304. The relics of all these martyrs were found at Saragossa in 1389. Prudentius recommended himself to their intercession, and exhorts the city, through their prayers, to implore the pardon of their sins, with him, that they might follow them to glory.

The martyrs, by a singular happiness and grace, were made perfect holocausts of divine love. Every Christian must offer himself a perpetual sacrifice to God, and by an entire submission to his will, a constant fidelity to his law, and a total consecration of all his affections, devote to him all the faculties of his soul and body, all the motions of his heart, all the actions and moments of his life, and this with the most ardent unabated love, and the most vehement desire of being altogether his.

Can we consider that our most amiable and loving God, after having conferred upon us numberless other benefits, has with infinite love given us Himself by becoming man, making Himself a bleeding victim for our redemption, and in the Holy Eucharist remaining always with us, to be our constant sacrifice of adoration and propitiation, and to be our spiritual food, comfort, and strength; lastly, by being the eternal spouse of our souls?

Can we, I say, consider that our infinite God has so many ways, out of love, made himself all ours, and not be transported with admiration and love, and cry out with inexpressible ardor: “My beloved is mine, and I am His.”

Yes, I will, from this moment, dedicate myself entirely to Him. Why am not I ready to die of grief and compunction that I ever lived one moment not wholly to Him! Oh, my soul! Base, mean, sinful, and unworthy as thou art, the return which, by thy love and sacrifice thou makest to thy infinite God, bears no proportion, and is on innumerable other titles a debt, and thy sovereign exaltation and happiness. It is an effect of his boundless mercy that He accepts thy oblation, and so earnestly sues for it by bidding thee give Him thy heart.

Set at least no bounds to the ardor with which thou makest it the only desire of thy heart, and thy only endeavor to be wholly His, by faithfully corresponding to His grace, and by making thy heart an altar on which thou never ceasest to offer all thy affections and powers to Him, and to His greater glory, and to become a pure victim to burn and be entirely consumed with the fire of divine love. In union with the divine victim, the spotless lamb, who offers himself on our altars and in Heaven for us, our sacrifice, however unworthy and imperfect, will find acceptance; but for it to be presented with, and by, what is so holy, what is sanctity itself, with what purity, with what fervor ought it to be made!

APRIL 17TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. ANICETUS
Martyred in the Second Century around 173 or 175

Anicetus succeeded St. Pius in the latter part of the reign of Antoninus Pius, sat about eight years, from 165 to 173, and is styled a martyr in the Roman and other Martyrologies: if he did not shed his blood for the Faith, he at least purchased the title of martyr by great sufferings and dangers.

Anicetus received a visit from St. Polycarp, and tolerated the custom of the Asiatics in celebrating Easter on the fourteenth day of the first moon after the vernal equinox, with the Jews. His vigilance protected his flock from the wiles of the heretics, Valentine and Marcion, instruments whom the devil sent to Rome, seeking to corrupt the Faith in the capital of the world. Marcion, in Pontus, after having embraced a state of continence, fell into a crime with a young virgin, for which he was excommunicated by the bishop who was his own father.

Anicetus came to Rome in hopes to be there received into the communion of the church, but was rejected till he had made satisfaction, by penance, to his own bishop. Upon which he commenced heresiarch, as Tertullian and St. Epiphanius relate. He professed himself a stoic philosopher, and seems to have been a priest. Joining the heresiarch Cerdo, who was come out of Syria to Rome, in the time of Pope Hyginus, he established two gods, or first principles, the one, the author of all good; the other of all evil: also of the Jewish law, and of the Old Testament: which he maintained to be contrary to the New.

Tertullian informs us, that he repented, and was promised at Rome to be again received into the church, on condition that he brought back all those souls which he had perverted. This he was laboring to effect when he died, though some understand this circumstance of his master Cerdo. He left many unhappy followers of his errors at Rome, in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Persia, and Cyprus.

The thirty-six first bishops of Rome, down to Liberius, and, this one excepted, all the popes to Symmachus, the fifty-second, in 498, are honored among the saints; and out of two hundred and forty eight popes, from St. Peter to Clement XIII, seventy-eight are named in the Roman Martyrology. In the primitive ages, the spirit of fervor and perfect sanctity, which is now-a-days so rarely to be found in the very sanctuaries of virtue, and in the world, seems in most places scarcely so much as known, was conspicuous in most of the faithful, and especially in their pastors.

The whole tenor of their lives, both in retirement and in their public actions, breathed it in such a manner as to render them the miracles of the world, angels on earth, living copies of their divine Redeemer, the odor of whose virtues and holy law and religion they spread on every side. Indeed, what could be more amiable, what more admirable, than the perfect simplicity, candor, and sincerity; the profound humility, invincible patience and meekness: the tender charity, even towards their enemies and persecutors; the piety, compunction, and heavenly zeal, which animated all their words and their whole conduct, and which, by fervent exercise under sufferings and persecutions, were carried to the most heroic degree of perfection?

By often repeating in our prayers, sacred protestations of our love of God, we easily impose upon ourselves, and fancy that his love reigns in our affections. But by relapsing so frequently into impatience, vanity, pride, or other sins, we give the lie to ourselves. For it is impossible for the will to fall so easily and so suddenly from the sovereign degree of sincere love. If, after making the most solemn protestations of inviolable friendship and affection for a fellow-creature, we should have no sooner turned our backs, but should revile and contemn him, without having received any provocation or affront from him, and this habitually, would not the whole world justly call our protestations hypocrisy, and our pretended friendship a mockery? Let us by this rule judge if our love of God be sovereign, so long as our inconstancy betrays the insincerity of our hearts.

APRIL 18TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. APPOLONIUS
Martyred in the Second Century around 186

The Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius had persecuted the Christians from principle, being a bigoted Pagan: but his son, Commodus, who, in 180, succeeded him in ruling the Roman Empire, after some time, though a vicious man, showed himself favorable to them out of regard to Marcia, a lady whom he had honored with the title of empress, and who was an admirer of the Faith.

During this calm, the number of the faithful was exceedingly increased, and many persons of the first rank enlisted themselves under the banner of the cross, of which number was Apollonius, a Roman senator. He was a person very well versed both in philosophy and the Holy Scripture. In the midst of the peace which the Church enjoyed, he was publicly accused of Christianity by one of his own slaves, named Severus, before Perennis, prefect of the Prætorium.

The slave was immediately condemned by the prefect to have his legs broken, and to be put to death, in consequence of an edict of Marcus Aurelius, who, without repealing the former laws against convicted Christians, ordered by it that their accusers should be put to death. The slave being executed, pursuant to the sentence already mentioned, the same judge sent an order to his master, St. Apollonius, to renounce his religion as he valued his life and fortune.

The saint courageously rejected such ignominious terms of safety, wherefore Perennis referred him to the judgment of the Roman senate, commanding him to give an account of his Faith to that body. The martyr hereupon composed an excellent discourse, but which has not reached our times, in vindication of the Christian religion, and spoke it in a full senate. St. Jerome, who had perused it, did not know whether more to admire the eloquence, or the profound learning, both sacred and profane, of its illustrious author: who, persisting in his refusal to comply with the condition, was condemned by a decree of the senate, and beheaded, about the year 186, and in the sixth year of the reign of Commodus.

It is the prerogative of the Christian religion to inspire men with such resolution, and form them to such heroism, that they rejoice to sacrifice their life to truth. This is not the bare force and exertion of nature, but the undoubted power of the Almighty, whose strength is thus made perfect in weakness. Every Christian ought to be an apologist for his religion by the sanctity of his manners. Such would be the force of universal good example, that no libertine or infidel could withstand it.

But, by the scandal and irregularity of our manners, we fight against Christ, and draw a reproach upon His most holy religion. Thus, through us, are His Name and Faith blasphemed among the Gentiles. The primitive Christians converted the world by the sanctity of their example; and, by the spirit of every heroic and divine virtue which their actions breathed, spread the good odor of Christ on all sides; but we, by a monstrous inconsistency between our lives and our Faith, scandalize the weak among the faithful, strengthen the obstinacy of infidels, and furnish them with arms against that very religion which we profess. “Either change thy Faith, or change thy manners,” said an ancient father.

APRIL 19TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. ELPHEGE
Martyred in the Eleventh Century around 1012

St. Elphege was born of noble and virtuous parents, who gave him a good education. Fearing the snares of riches he renounced the world whilst he was yet very young; and though most dutiful to his parents in all other things, he in this courageously overcame the tears of his tender mother. He served God first in the monastery of Derherste in Gloucestershire. His desire of greater perfection taught him always to think that he had not yet begun to live to God.

After some years he left Derherste, and built himself a cell in a desert place of the abbey of Bath, where he shut himself up, unknown to men, but well known to God, for whose love he made himself a voluntary martyr of penance. His virtue, after some time, shone to men the brighter through the veils of his humility, and many noblemen and others addressed themselves to him for instructions in the paths of perfection, and he was at length obliged to take upon himself the direction of the great abbey of Bath.

Perfection is more difficultly maintained in numerous houses. St. Elphege lamented bitterly the irregularities of the tepid among the brethren, especially little junketings, from which he in a short time reclaimed them; and God, by the sudden death of one, opened the eyes of all the rest. The good abbot would not tolerate the least relaxation in his community, being sensible how small a breach may totally destroy the regularity of a house. He used to say, that it would have been much better for a man to have stayed in the world, than to be an imperfect monk; and that to wear the habit of a saint, without having the spirit, was a perpetual lie, and an hypocrisy which insults, but can never impose upon Almighty God.

St. Ethelwold, bishop of Winchester, dying in 984, St. Dunstan being admonished by St. Andrew, in a vision, obliged our holy abbot to quit his solitude, and accept of episcopal consecration. The virtues of Elphege became more conspicuous in this high station, though he was no more than thirty years of age when he was first placed in it. In winter, how cold soever it was, he always rose at midnight, went out, and prayed a long time barefoot, and without his upper garment. He never ate flesh unless on extraordinary occasions. He was no less remarkable for charity to his neighbor, than severity to himself. He accordingly provided so liberally for the needs of the poor, that during his time there were no beggars in the whole diocese of Winchester.

The holy prelate had governed the see of Winchester twenty-two years with great edification, when, after the death of Archbishop Alfric, in 1006, he was translated to that of Canterbury, being fifty-two years of age. He who trembled under his former burden, was much more terrified at the thought of the latter: but was compelled to acquiesce. Having been at Rome to receive his pall, he held at his return a great national council at Oenham, in 1009, in which thirty-two canons were published for the reformation of errors and abuses, and the establishment of discipline; and, among other things, the then ancient law, commanding the fast on Friday, was confirmed.

The Danes at that time made the most dreadful havoc in England. They landed where they pleased, and not only plundered the country, but committed excessive barbarities on the native, with little or no opposition from the weak King Ethelred. Their army being joined by the traitorous Earl Edric, they marched out of the West into Kent, and sat down before Canterbury. But before it was invested, the English nobility, perceiving the danger the place was in, desired the archbishop, then in the city, to provide for his security by flight, which he refused to do, saying, that it was the part only of a hireling to abandon his flock in the time of danger.

During the siege, he often sent out to the enemies to desire them to spare his innocent sheep, whom he endeavored to animate against the worst that could happen. And having prepared them, by his zealous exhortations, rather to suffer the utmost than renounce their Faith, he gave them the Blessed Eucharist, and recommended them to the divine protection.

Whilst he was thus employed in assisting and encouraging his people, Canterbury was taken by storm. The infidels on entering the city made a dreadful slaughter of all that came in their way, without distinction of sex or age. The holy prelate was no sooner apprised of the barbarity of the enemy, but breaking from the monks, who would have detained him in the church, where they thought he might be safe, he pressed through the Danish troops, and made his way to the place of slaughter. Then, turning to the enemy, he desired them to forbear the massacre of his people, and rather discharge their fury upon him, crying out to the murderers: “Spare these innocent persons. There is no glory in spilling their blood. Turn your indignation rather against me. I have reproached you for your cruelties: I have fed, clothed, and ransomed these your captives.”

The archbishop, talking with this freedom, was immediately seized, and used by the Danes with all manner of barbarity. Not content with making him the spectator of the burning of his cathedral, and the decimation of his monks, and of the citizens, having torn his face, beat and kicked him unmercifully, they laid him in irons, and confined him several months in a filthy dungeon. But being afflicted with an epidemical mortal colic in their army, and attributing this scourge to their cruel usage of the saint, they drew him out of prison. He prayed for them, and gave to their sick bread which he had blessed; by eating this their sick recovered, and the calamity ceased.

Their chiefs returned thanks to the servant of God, and deliberated about setting him at liberty, but covetousness prevailed in their council, they exacted for his ransom three thousand marks of gold. He said that the country was all laid waste; moreover, that the patrimony of the poor was not to be squandered away. He therefore was bound again, and on Easter Sunday was brought before the commanders of their fleet, which then lay at Greenwich, and threatened with torments and death unless he paid the ransom demanded. He answered that he had no other gold to offer them than that of true wisdom, which consists in the knowledge and worship of the living God: which if they refused to listen to, they would one day fare worse than Sodom; adding, that their empire would not long subsist in England.

The barbarians, enraged at this answer, knocked him down with the backs of their battle-axes, and then stoned him. The saint like St. Stephen, prayed our Lord to forgive them, and to receive his soul. In the end raising himself up a little, he said, “O good Shepherd! O incomparable Shepherd! look with compassion on the children of thy church, which I, dying, recommend to thee.” And here a Dane, that had been lately baptized by the saint, perceiving him agonizing and under torture, grieved to see him suffer in so slow and painful a manner, to put an end to his pain, clove his head with his battle-axe, and gave the finishing stroke to his martyrdom. Thus died St. Elphage, on the 19th of April, 1012, in the fifty-ninth year of his age. He was solemnly interred in the cathedral of St. Paul’s in London.

In 1023, his body was found entire, and translated with honor to Canterbury: Knut, the Danish king, and Agelnoth, the archbishop, went with it from St. Paul’s to the river: it was carried by monks down a narrow street to the water side, and put on board a vessel; the king held the stern. Queen Emma also attended with great presents, and an incredible multitude of people followed the procession from London. The church of Canterbury, on the occasion, was most magnificently adorned. This translation was made on the 8th of June, on which it was annually commemorated. His relics lay near the high altar till the dispersion of relics under Henry VIII.

Hacon, Turkill, and the other Danish commanders, perished miserably soon after, and their numerous fleet of above two hundred sail was almost all lost in violent storms. St. Elphege is named in the Roman Martyrology.

APRIL 20TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. VICTOR, ST. ZOTICUS & COMPANIONS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 303

The holy martyrs St. Victor, St. Zoticus, St. Acindinus, St. Xeno, St. Severian and St. Caesarius suffered during the persecution of Emperor Diocletian (284-305). When Diocletian began a fierce persecution against Christians, one of the first to suffer was the holy great martyr and victory-bearer St. George, who was martyred in 303, and his feast is commemorated a few days hence, on the 23rd of April. St. George’s unshakable Faith and bravery during the time of his suffering led many pagans to Christ. The saints were struck with astonishment that St. George suffered no harm from the tortuous wheel, and they declared within earshot of all, that they too did believe in Christ. By order of the judge the holy martyrs were beheaded at Nicomedia in the year 303.

APRIL 21ST
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. ANASTASIUS OF ANTIOCH & ST. SIMEON
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 317

Anastasius II of Antioch, also known as Anastasius the Younger, succeeded Anastasius of Antioch as Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, in 599. He is known for his opposition and suppression of simony in his diocese, with the support of Pope Gregory the Great. In 609 Anastasius is said to have been murdered during an uprising of Syrian Jews against Emperor Phocas, although Persian soldiers have also been suggested. Anastasius is one of the 140 Colonnade saints which adorn St. Peter's Square.

Simon (real name Shimun Bar Sabbae) was born the son of a fuller. In 316, he had been named coadjutor bishop of his predecessor, Papa bar Gaggai, in Seleucia-Ctesiphon (now al-Mada'in). He was later accused of being a friend of the Roman emperor and of maintaining secret correspondence with him. On that basis, Shapur II ordered the execution of all Christian priests. Because he specifically refused to worship the sun, Shimoun was beheaded with several thousands, including bishops, priests, and faithful. These include the priests Abdella (or Abdhaihla), Ananias (Hannanja), Chusdazat (Guhashtazad, Usthazan, or Gothazat), and Pusai (Fusik), Askitrea, the daughter of Pusai, the eunuch Azad (Asatus) and several companions, numbered either 1150 or 100. Sozomen, a historian of the 5th Century maintained that the numbers registered were 16,000 of the martyrs. Another historian, Al-Masoudy from the 10th century, held that there were killed around 200,000 Assyrians.

APRIL 22ND
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. AZADES, ST. THARBA & COMPANIONS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 341

ST. AZADES, ST. THARBA & COMPANIONS
(Mentioned in the Roman Martyrology for April 22nd)
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 341

In the thirty-second year of king Sapor II, (which Sozomen and others from him call, by an evident mistake, the thirty-third,) on Good Friday, which fell that year on the 17th day of April, according to our solar year, the same day on which St. Simeon and his companions suffered, a most cruel edict was published in Persia, inflicting on all Christians the punishment of instant death or slavery, without any trial or form of judicature.

The swords of the furious were everywhere unsheathed; and Christians looked upon slaughter as their glory, and courageously went out to meet it. They had even in this life the advantage of their enemies, who often trembled or were fatigued, while the persecuted professors of the truth stood unshaken. “The cross grew and budded upon rivers of blood,” says St. Maruthas; “the troops of the saints exulted with joy, and, being refreshed by the sight of that saving sign, were themselves animated with fresh vigor, and inspired others continually with new courage. They were inebriated by drinking the waters of divine love, and produced a new offspring to succeed them.”

From the sixth hour on Good-Friday to the second Sunday of Pentecost, that is, Low-Sunday, (the Syrians and Chaldeans calling all the space from Easter-day to Whitsunday, Pentecost,) the slaughter was continued without interruption. The report of this edict no sooner reached distant cities, than the governors threw all the Christians into prisons, to be butchered as soon as the edict itself should be sent them: and upon its arrival in any place, whoever confessed themselves Christians were stabbed, or had their throats cut upon the spot.

The eunuch Azades, a very great favorite with the king, was slain on this occasion; but the king was so afflicted at his death, that he thereupon published another edict, which restrained the persecution from that time to the bishops, priests, monks, and nuns. Great numbers also of the soldiery were crowned with martyrdom, besides innumerable others throughout the whole kingdom. Sozomen computes the number at sixteen thousand; but an ancient Persian writer, published by Renaudot, makes it amount to two hundred thousand.

The queen, in the meantime, fell dangerously ill. The Jews, to whom she was very favorable, easily persuaded her that her sickness was the effect of a magical charm or spell, employed by the sisters of the St. Simeon, to be revenged for their brother’s death. One was a virgin, called Tharba, whom Henschenius and Ruinart corruptly call, with the Greeks, Pherbuta. Her sister was a widow, and both had consecrated themselves by vow to God in a state of continence.

Hereupon the two sisters were apprehended, and with them Tharba’s servant, who was also a virgin. Being accused of bewitching the queen, Tharba replied, that the law of God allowed no more of enchantment than of idolatry. And being told they had done it out of revenge, she made answer, that they had no reason to revenge their brother’s death, by which he had obtained eternal life in the kingdom of heaven: revenge being moreover strictly forbidden by the law of God. After this they were remanded to prison.

Tharba, being extremely beautiful, one of her judges was enamored of her. He therefore sent her word the next day, that if she would consent to marry him, he would obtain her pardon and liberty of the king. But she refused the offer with indignation, saying, that she was the spouse of Jesus Christ, to whom she had consecrated her virginity, and committed her life; and that she feared not death, which would open to her the way to her dear brother, and to eternal rest from pain. The other two judges privately made her the like proposals, but were rejected in the same manner.

They hereupon made their report to the king, as if they had been convicted of the crime; but he not believing them guilty, was willing their lives should be spared, and their liberty restored to them, on condition they would offer sacrifice to the sun. They declared nothing should ever prevail on them to give to a creature the honor due to God alone; whereupon the Magians cried out, “They are unworthy to live by whose spells the queen is wasting in sickness.” And it being left to the Magians to assign their punishments, and determine what death they should be put to, they, out of regard to the queen’s recovery, as they pretended, ordered their bodies to be sawn in two, and half of each to be placed on each side of a road, that the queen might pass between them, which, they said, would cure her. Even after this sentence, Tharba’s admirer found means to let her know, that it was still in her power to prevent her death, by consenting to marry him.

But she cried out with indignation: “Most impudent of men, how could you again entertain such a dishonest thought? For me courageously to die is to live; but life, purchased by baseness, is worse than any death.”

When they were come to the place of execution, each person was tied to two stakes, and with a saw sawn in two; each half, thus separated, was cut into six parts, and being thrown into so many baskets, were hung on two forked stakes, placed in the figure of half crosses, leaving an open path between them; through which the queen superstitiously passed the same day. St. Maruthas adds, that no sight could be more shocking or barbarous, than this spectacle of the martyrs’ limbs cruelly mangled, and exposed to scorn. They suffered in the year 341.

APRIL 23RD
The Martyr of the Day
ST. GEORGE
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 303

St. George is honored in the Catholic Church as one of the most illustrious martyrs of Christ. The Greeks have long distinguished him by the title of The Great Martyr, and keep his festival a holiday of obligation. There stood formerly in Constantinople five or six churches dedicated in his honor; the oldest of which was always said to have been built by Constantine the Great; who seems also to have been the founder of the church of St. George, which stood over his tomb in Palestine. Both these churches were certainly built under the first Christian emperors.

In the middle of the sixth age the Emperor Justinian erected a new church, in honor of this saint, at Bizanes, in Lesser Armenia: the Emperor Mauritius founded one in Constantinople. It is related in the life of St. Theodorus of Siceon, that he served God a long while in a chapel which bore the name of St. George, had a particular devotion to this glorious martyr, and strongly recommended the same to Mauritius, when he foretold him the empire. One of the churches of St. George in Constantinople, called Manganes, with a monastery adjoining, gave to the Hellespont the name of the Arm of St. George.

To this day is St. George honored as principal patron or tutelar saint by several eastern nations, particularly the Georgians. The Byzantine historians relate several battles to have been gained, and other miracles wrought through his intercession. From frequent pilgrimages to his church and tomb in Palestine, performed by those who visited the Holy Land, his veneration was much propagated over the West.

St. Gregory of Tours mentions him as highly celebrated in France in the sixth century. St. Gregory the Great ordered an old church of St. George, which was fallen to decay, to be repaired. His office is found in the sacramentary of that pope, and many others. St. Clotildis, wife of Clovis, the first Christian king of France, erected altars under his name; and the church of Chelles, built by her, was originally dedicated in his honour. The ancient life of Droctovæus mentions, that certain relics of St. George were placed in the church of St. Vincent, now called St. Germaris, in Paris, when it was first consecrated. Fortunatus of Poitiers wrote an epigram on a church of St. George, in Mentz.

The intercession of this saint was implored especially in battles, and by warriors, as appears by several instances in the Byzantine history, and he is said to have been himself a great soldier. He is at this day the tutelar saint of the republic of Genoa; and was chosen by our ancestors in the same quality under our first Norman kings. The great national council, held at Oxford in 1222, commanded his feast to be kept a holiday of the lesser rank throughout all England.

Under his name and ensign was instituted by our victorious King Edward III, in 1330, the most noble Order of knighthood in Europe, consisting of twenty-five knights, besides the sovereign. Its establishment is dated fifty years before the knights of St. Michael were instituted in France, by Lewis XI, eighty years before the Order of the Golden Fleece, established by Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy; and one hundred and ninety before the Order of St. Andrew was set up in Scotland by James V. The Emperor Frederick IV instituted, in 1470, an Order of Knights in honor of St. George; and an honorable military Order in Venice bears his name.

The extraordinary devotion of all Christendom to this saint, is an authentic proof how glorious his triumph and name have always been in the church. All his acts relate, that he suffered under Diocletian, at Nicomedia. Joseph Assemani shows, from the unanimous consent of all churches, that he was crowned on the 23rd of April.

According to the account given us by Metaphrastes, he was born in Cappadocia, of noble Christian parents. After the death of his father, he went with his mother into Palestine, she being a native of that country, and having there a considerable estate, which fell to her son George. He was strong and robust in body, and having embraced the profession of a soldier, was made a tribune, or colonel in the army. By his courage and conduct, he was soon preferred to higher stations by the Emperor Diocletian.

When that prince waged war against the Christian religion, St. George laid aside the marks of his dignity, threw up his commission and posts, and complained to the emperor himself of his severities and bloody edicts. He was immediately cast into prison, and tried, first by promises, and afterwards put to the question, and tortured with great cruelty; but nothing could shake his constancy. The next day he was led through the city and beheaded.

Some think him to have been the same illustrious young man who tore down the edicts when they were first fixed up at Nicomedia, as Lactantius relates in his book, On the Death of the Persecutors, and Eusebius in his history. The reason why St. George has been regarded as the patron of military men, is partly upon the score of his profession, and partly upon the credit of a relation of his appearing to the Christian army in the holy war, before the battle of Antioch. The success of this battle proving fortunate to the Christians, under Godfrey of Bouillon, made the name of St. George more famous in Europe, and disposed the military men to implore more particularly his intercession.

This devotion was confirmed, as it is said, by an apparition of St. George to our king, Richard I, in his expedition against the Saracens: which vision, being declared to the troops, was to them a great encouragement, and they soon after defeated the enemy. St. George is usually painted on horseback, and tilting at a dragon, under his feet; but this representation is no more than an emblematical figure, purporting, that, by his Faith and Christian fortitude, he conquered the devil, called the dragon in the Apocalypse.

Though many dishonor the profession of arms by a licentiousness of manners, yet, to show us that perfect sanctity is attainable in all states, we find the names of more soldiers recorded in the martyrologies than almost of any other profession. Every true disciple of Christ must be a martyr in the disposition of his heart, as he must be ready to lose all, and to suffer anything, rather than to offend God. Every good Christian is also a martyr, by the patience and courage with which he bears all trials.

There is no virtue more necessary, nor of which the exercise ought to be more frequent, than patience. In this mortal life we have continually something to suffer from disappointments in affairs, from the severity of the seasons, from the injustice, caprice, peevishness, jealousy, or antipathy of others; and from ourselves, in pains either of mind or body. Even our own weaknesses and faults are to us subjects of patience. And as we have continually many burdens, both of our own and others, to bear, it is only in patience that we are to possess our souls. This affords us comfort in all our sufferings, and maintains our souls in unshaken tranquility and peace.

This is true greatness of mind, and the virtue of heroic souls. But, alas! every accident ruffles and disturbs us: and we are insupportable even to ourselves. What comfort should we find, what peace should we enjoy, what treasures of virtue should we heap up, what an harvest of merits should we reap, if we had learned the true spirit of Christian patience! This is the martyrdom, and the crown of every faithful disciple of Christ.

APRIL 24TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. FIDELIS OF SIGMARINGEN
Martyred in the Seventeenth Century around 1622

Fidelis was born in 1577, at Sigmaringen, a town in Germany, in the principality of Hoinvenzollen. The name of his father was John Rey. The saint was baptized with the name of Mark; performed his studies in the University of Fribourg in Switzerland, and whilst he taught philosophy, commenced doctor of laws. He at that time never drank wine, and wore a hair-shirt. His modesty, meekness, chastity, and all other virtues, charmed all who had the happiness of his acquaintance.

In 1604, he accompanied three young gentlemen of that country on their travels through the principal parts of Europe. During six years, which he continued in this employment, he never ceased to instill into them the most heroic and tender sentiments of piety. He received the Holy Sacrament very frequently, particularly on all the principal holidays. In every town where he came, he visited the hospitals and churches, passed several hours on his knees in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, and gave to the poor sometimes the very clothes off his back.

APRIL 25TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. MARK THE EVANGELIST
Martyred in the First Century around 68

St. Mark was of Jewish extraction. The style of his Gospel abounding with Hebraisms, shows that he was by birth a Jew, and that the Hebrew language was more natural to him than the Greek. His acts say he was of Cyrenaica, and Bede from them adds, of the race of Aaron. Papias, quoted by Eusebius, St. Augustine, Theodoret, and Bede say, he was converted by the apostles after Christ’s resurrection.

St. Irenæus calls him the disciple and interpreter of St. Peter; and, according to Origen and St. Jerome, he is the same Mark whom St. Peter calls his son. By his office of interpreter to St. Peter, some understood that St. Mark was the author of the style of his epistles; others that he was employed as a translator into Greek or Latin, of what the apostle had written in his own tongue, as occasion might require it.

St. Jerome and some others take him to be the same with that John, surnamed Mark, son to the sister of St. Barnabas: but it is generally believed that they were different persons: and that the latter was with St. Paul in the East, at the same time that the Evangelist was at Rome, or at Alexandria.

According to Papias, and St. Clement of Alexandria, he wrote his Gospel at the request of the Romans; who, as they relate, desired to have that committed to writing which St. Peter had taught them by word of mouth. Mark, to whom this request was made, did accordingly set himself to recollect what he had by long conversation learned from St. Peter; for it is affirmed by some, that he had never seen our Savior in the flesh. St. Peter rejoiced at the affection of the faithful; and having revised the work, approved of it, and authorized it to be read in the religious assemblies of the faithful. Hence it might be that, as we learn from Tertullian, some attributed this Gospel to St. Peter himself.

Many judge, by comparing the two Gospels, that St. Mark abridged that of St. Matthew; for he relates the same things, and often uses the same words; but he adds several particular circumstances, and changes the order of the narration, in which he agrees with St. Luke and St. John. He relates two histories not mentioned by St. Matthew, namely, that of the widow giving two mites, and that of Christ’s appearing to the two disciples going to Emmaus. St. Augustine calls him the abridger of St. Matthew. But Ceillier and some others think nothing clearly proves that he made use of St. Matthew’s Gospel.

This evangelist is concise in his narrations, and writes with a most pleasing simplicity and elegance. St. Chrysostom admires the humility of St. Peter (we may add also of his disciple St. Mark), when he observes, that his evangelist makes no mention of the high commendations which Christ gave that apostle on his making that explicit confession of his being the Son of God; neither does he mention his walking on the water; but gives at full length the history of St. Peter’s denying his Master, with all its circumstances. He wrote his Gospel in Italy; and, in all appearance, before the year of Christ, 49.

St. Peter sent his disciples from Rome to found other churches. Some moderns say St. Mark founded that of Aquileia. It is certain at least that he was sent by St. Peter into Egypt, and was by him appointed bishop of Alexandria, (which, after Rome, was accounted the second city of the world,) as Eusebius, St. Epiphanius, St. Jerome, and others assure us. Pope Gelasius, in his Roman council, Palladius, and the Greeks, universally add, that he finished his course at Alexandria, by a glorious martyrdom.

St. Peter left Rome, and returned into the East in the ninth year of Claudius, and forty-ninth of Christ. About that time St. Mark went first into Egypt, according to the Greeks. The Oriental Chronicle, published by Abraham Eckellensis, places his arrival at Alexandria only in the seventh year of Nero, and sixtieth of Christ. Both which accounts agree with the relation of his martyrdom, contained in the ancient acts published by the Bollandists, which were made use of by Bede and the Oriental Chronicle, and seem to have been extant in Egypt in the fourth and fifth centuries.

By them we are told that St. Mark landed at Cyrene, in Pentapolis, a part of Libya bordering on Egypt, and, by innumerable miracles, brought many over to the Faith, and demolished several temples of the idols. He likewise carried the Gospel into other provinces of Libya, into Thebais, and other parts of Egypt. This country was heretofore of all others the most superstitious: but the benediction of God, promised to it by the prophets, was plentifully showered down upon it during the ministry of this apostle.

He employed twelve years in preaching in these parts, before he, by a particular call of God, entered Alexandria, where he soon assembled a very numerous church, of which it is thought says Fleury, that the Jewish converts then made up the greater part. And it is the opinion of St. Jerome and Eusebius, that these were the Therapeutes described by Philo, and the first founders of the ascetic life in Egypt.

The prodigious progress of the Faith in Alexandria stirred up the heathens against this Galilæan. The apostle therefore left the city, having ordained St. Anianus bishop, in the eighth year of Nero, of Christ the sixty-second, and returned to Pentapolis, where he preached two years, and then visited his church of Alexandria, which he found increased in Faith and grace, as well as in numbers. He encouraged the faithful and again withdrew: the Oriental Chronicle says to Rome. On his return to Alexandria, the heathens called him a magician, on account of his miracles, and resolved upon his death. God, however, concealed him long from them.

At last, on the pagan feast of the idol Serapis, some who were employed to discover the holy man, found him uttering to God the prayer of the oblation, or the mass. Overjoyed to find him in their power, they seized him, tied his feet with cords, and dragged him about the streets, crying out, that the ox must be led to Bucoles, a place near the sea, full of rocks and precipices, where probably oxen were fed. This happened on Sunday, the 24th of April, in the year of Christ 68, of Nero the fourteenth, about three years after the death of SS. Peter and Paul.

The saint was thus dragged the whole day, staining the stones with his blood, and leaving the ground strewed with pieces of his flesh; all the while he ceased not to praise and thank God for his sufferings. At night he was thrown into prison, in which God comforted him by two visions, which Bede has also mentioned in his true martyrology. The next day the infidels dragged him, as before, till he happily expired on the 25th of April, on which day the Oriental and Western churches keep his festival.

The Christians gathered up the remains of his mangled body, and buried them at Bucoles, where they afterwards usually assembled for prayer. His body was honorably kept there, in a church built on the spot, in 310; and towards the end of the fourth age, the holy priest Philoromus made a pilgrimage thither from Galatia to visit this saint’s tomb, as Palladius recounts. His body was still honored at Alexandria, under the Mahometans, in the eighth age, in a marble tomb. It is said to have been conveyed by stealth to Venice, in 815.

Bernard, a French monk, who travelled over the East in 870, writes, that the body of St. Mark was not then at Alexandria, because the Venetians had carried it to their isles. It is said to be deposited in the Doge’s stately rich chapel of St. Mark, in a secret place, that it may not be stolen, under one of the great pillars. This saint is honored by that republic with extraordinary devotion as principal patron.

APRIL 26TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. CLETUS & ST. MARCELLINUS
Martyred in the First and Fourth Centuries around 89 and 304

St. Cletus was the third bishop of Rome, and succeeded St. Linus, which circumstance alone shows his eminent virtue among the first disciples of St. Peter in the West. He reigned for twelve years, from 76 to 89. The Canon of the Roman Mass, (which Bossuet and all others agree to be of primitive antiquity,) St. Bede, and other Martyrologists, style him a martyr. He was buried near St. Linus, on the Vatican hill, and his relics still remain in that church.

St. Marcellinus succeeded St. Caius, in the bishopric of Rome, in 296, about the time that Diocletian set himself up as a deity, and impiously claimed divine honors. Theodoret says, that in those stormy times of persecution, Marcellinus acquired great glory. He sat in St. Peter’s chair eight years, three months, and twenty-five days, dying in 304, a year after the cruel persecution broke out, in which he gained much honor. He has been styled a martyr, though his blood was not shed in the cause of religion, as appears from the Liberian Calendar, which places him among those popes that were not put to death for the Faith. Although some hold that he was beheaded.

It is a fundamental maxim of the Christian morality, and a truth which Christ has established in the clearest terms, and in innumerable passages of the gospel, that the cross, or sufferings and mortification, are the road to eternal bliss. They, therefore, who lead not here a crucified and mortified life, are unworthy ever to possess the unspeakable joys of his kingdom. Our Lord himself, our model and our head, walked in this path, and his great apostle puts us in mind that he entered into bliss only by his blood and by the cross.

Nevertheless, this is a truth which the world can never understand, how clearly soever it be preached by Christ, and recommended by his powerful example, and that of his martyrs and of all the saints. Christians still pretend, by the joys and pleasures of this world, to attain to the bliss of heaven, and shudder at the very mention of mortification, penance, or sufferings.

So prevalent is this fatal error, which self-love and the example and false maxims of the world strongly fortify in the minds of many, that those who have given themselves to God with the greatest fervor, are bound always to stand upon their guard against it, and daily to renew their fervor in the love and practice of penance, and to arm themselves with patience against sufferings, lest the weight of the corruption of our nature, the pleasures of sense, and flattering blandishments of the world, draw them aside, and make them leave the path of mortification, or lose courage under its labors, and under the afflictions with which God is pleased to purify them, and afford them means of sanctifying themselves.

APRIL 27TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. ANTHIMUS & MANY OTHER MARTYRS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 303

St. Anthimus and these many other martyrs, were the first victims offered to God in the most bloody persecution raised by Diocletian. That prince was a native of Dalmatia, of the basest extraction, and a soldier of fortune. After the death of the Emperor Numerian, son of Carus, slain by a conspiracy in 284, he was proclaimed emperor by the army at Chalcedon.

The year following he defeated Carinus, the other son of Carus, who reigned in the West: but finding the empire too unwieldy a body to govern alone, and secure himself at the same time against the continual treasons of the soldiery, especially the Pretorian guards, who during the last three hundred years had murdered their emperors almost at pleasure; having moreover no male issue, and reposing an entire confidence in Maximian Herculeus, Diocletian chose him for his partner in the empire, and honored him with the title of Augustus.

He was a barbarian, born of obscure parents at a village near Sirmium in Pannonia, of a cruel and savage temper, and addicted to all manner of wickedness; but was reckoned one of the best commanders of his time. The two emperors, alarmed at the dangers which threatened the empire on every side, and not thinking themselves alone able to oppose so many enemies at once, in 292 named each of them a Cæsar, or emperor of an inferior rank, who should succeed them respectively in the empire, and jointly with them defend the Roman dominions against foreign invaders and domestic usurpers.

Diocletian chose Maximian Galerius for the East, who, before he entered the Roman army, was a peasant of Dacia; a man of a brutal ferocity, whose very aspect, gesture, voice, and discourse were all terrifying; and who, besides his cruel disposition, was extremely bigoted to idolatry. Maximian Herculeus chose Constantius, surnamed Chlorus, for the West, an excellent prince and nobly born.

The first years of the reign of Diocletian were tolerably favorable to the Christians, though several even then suffered martyrdom by virtue of former edicts. But Galerius began to persecute them in the provinces within his jurisdiction, by his own authority; and never ceased to stir up Diocletian to do the like, especially in 302, when he passed the winter with him at Nicomedia.

Diocletian, however, appeared unwilling to come into all his violent measures, foreseeing that so much blood could not be spilt without disturbing the peace of the empire to a high degree. The oracle of Apollo at Miletus was therefore consulted, and gave such an answer as might have been expected from an enemy to the Christian religion. The same author in two places relates another accident which contributed to provoke the emperor against the faith.

Whilst Diocletian was offering victims at Antioch, in 302, in order to consult the entrails for the discovery of future events, certain Christian officers, who stood near his person, “made on their foreheads the immortal sign of the cross.” This disturbed the sacrifices and confounded the aruspices, or diviners, who could not find the ordinary marks they looked for in the entrails of the victims, though they offered up many, one after another pretending that the divinity was not yet appeased. But all their sacrifices were to no purpose, for no signs appeared. Upon which the person set over the diviners declared, that their rites did not succeed, because some profane persons, meaning the Christians, had thrust themselves into their assembly.

Hereupon Diocletian, in a rage, commanded that not only those who were present, but all the rest of his courtiers should come and sacrifice to their gods; and ordered those to be scourged who should refuse to do it. He also sent orders to his military officers to require all the soldiers to sacrifice, or, in case of refusal, to be disbanded. Another thing determined Diocletian to follow these impressions, which one would have imagined should have had a quite contrary effect; it is mentioned by Constantine the Great, who thus speaks in an edict directed to the whole empire, preserved by Eusebius.

“A report was spread that Apollo out of his dark cavern had declared, that certain just men on earth hindered him from delivering true oracles, and were the cause that he had uttered falsehood. For this reason he let his hair grow, as a token of his sorrow, and lamented this evil among men, having hereby lost his art of divination. Thee I attest, most high God. Thou knowest how I, being then very young, heard the emperor Diocletian inquiring of his officers who these just men were? When one of his priests made answer, that they were the Christians; which answer moved Diocletian to draw his bloody sword, not to punish the guilty, but to exterminate the righteous, whose innocence stood confessed by the divinities he adored.”

For beginning this work, choice was made of the festival of the god Terminus, six days before the end of February, that month closing the Roman year before the correction of Julius Cæsar, and when that feast was instituted. By this they implied that an end was to be put to our religion. Early in the morning the prefect, accompanied with some officers and others, went to the church; and having forced open the door, all the books of the scriptures that were there found were burnt, and the spoil that was made on that occasion was divided among all that were present.

The two princes, who from a balcony viewed all that was done, (the church which stood upon an eminence being within the prospect of the palace,) were long in debate whether they should order fire to be set to it. But in this Diocletian’s opinion prevailed, who was afraid that if the church was set on fire, the flames might spread themselves into the other parts of the city; so that a considerable body of the guards were sent thither with mattocks and pickaxes, who, in a few hours’ time, levelled that lofty building with the ground.

The next day an edict was published, by which it was commanded that all the churches should be demolished, the scriptures burnt, and the Christians declared incapable of all honors and employments, and that they should be liable to torture, whatever should be their rank and dignity. All actions were to be received against them, while they were put out of the protection of the law, and might not sue either upon injuries done them, or debts owing to them; deprived moreover of their liberties and their right of voting.

This edict was not published in other places till a month later. But it had not been long set up, before a certain Christian of quality and eminence in that city, whom some have conjectured to be St. George, had the boldness publicly to pull down this edict, out of a zeal which Lactantius justly censures as indiscreet; but which Eusebius, considering his intention, styles divine. He was immediately apprehended, and after having endured the most cruel tortures, was broiled to death on a gridiron, upon a very slow fire. All which he suffered with admirable patience.

The first edict was quickly followed by another, enjoining that the bishops should be seized in all places, loaded with chains, and compelled by torments to sacrifice to the idols. St. Anthimus was, in all appearance, taken up on this occasion; and Nicomedia, then the residence of the emperor, was filled with slaughter and desolation.

But Galerius was not satisfied with the severity of this edict. Wherefore, in order to stir up Diocletian to still greater rigors, he procured some of his own creatures to set fire to the imperial palace, some parts of which were burnt down; and the Christians, according to the usual perverseness of the heathens, being accused of it, as Galerius desired and expected, this raised a most implacable rage against them: for it was given out, that they had entered into consultation with some of the eunuchs, for the destruction of their princes, and that the two emperors were well-nigh burnt alive in their own palace.

Diocletian, not in the least suspecting the imposture, gave orders that all his domestics and dependents should be cruelly tortured in his presence, to oblige them to confess the supposed guilt; but all to no purpose; for the criminals lay concealed among the domestics of Galerius, none of whose family were put to the torture.

A fortnight after the first burning, the palace was set on fire a second time, without any discovery of the author; and Galerius, though in the midst of winter, left Nicomedia the same day, protesting that he went away through fear of being burnt alive by the Christians. The fire was stopped before it had done any great mischief, but it had the effect intended by the author of it: for Diocletian, ascribing it to the Christians, resolved to keep no measures with them; and his rage and resentment, being now at the highest pitch, he vented them with the utmost cruelty upon the innocent Christians, beginning with his daughter Valeria, married to Galerius, and his own wife, the Empress Prisca, whom, being both Christians, he compelled to sacrifice to idols.

The reward of their apostasy was, that after an uninterrupted series of grievous afflictions, they were both publicly beheaded, by the order of Licinius, in 313, when he extirpated the families of Diocletian and Maximian. Some of the eunuchs who were in the highest credit, and by whose directions the affairs of the palace had been conducted before this edict, having long presided in his courts and councils, were the first victims of his rage: and they bravely suffered the most cruel torments and death for the faith. Among these were Saints Peter, Gorgonius, Dorotheus, Indus, Migdonius, Mardonius, and others.

The persecution which began in the palace, fell next on the clergy of Nicomedia. St. Anthimus, the good bishop of that city, was cut off the first, being beheaded for the Faith. He was followed by all the priests and inferior ministers of his church, with all those persons that belonged to their families. From the altar the sword was turned against the laity. Judges were appointed in the temples to condemn to death all who refused to sacrifice, and torments till then unheard of were invented. And that no man might have the benefit of the law who was not a heathen, altars were erected in the very courts of justice, and in the public offices, that all might be obliged to offer sacrifice, before they could be admitted to plead.

Eusebius adds, that the people were not suffered to buy or sell anything, to draw water, grind their corn, or transact any business, without first offering up incense to certain idols set up in market places, at the corners of the streets, at the public fountains, etc. But the tortures which were invented, and the courage with which the holy martyrs laid down their lives for Christ, no words can express. Persons of every age and sex were burnt, not singly one by one, but, on account of their numbers, whole companies of them were burnt together, by setting fire round about them: while others, being tied together in great numbers, were cast into the sea. The Roman Martyrology commemorates, on the 27th of April, all who suffered on this occasion at Nicomedia.

The month following, these edicts were published in the other parts of the empire; and in April, two new ones were added, chiefly regarding the clergy. In the beginning of the year 304, a fourth edict was issued out, commanding all Christians to be put to death who should refuse to renounce their faith. Lactantius describes how much the governors made it their glory to overcome one Christian by all sorts of artifice and cruelty: for the devil by his instruments, sought not so much to destroy the bodies of the servants of God by death, as their souls by sin.

Almost the whole empire seemed a deluge of blood, in such abundance did its streams water, or rather drown the provinces. Constantius himself, though a just prince, and a favorer of the Christians, was not able to protect Britain, where he commanded, from the first fury of this storm. The persecutors flattered themselves they had extinguished the Christian name, and boasted as much in public inscriptions, two of which are still extant.

But God by this very means increased his church, and the persecutors’ sword fell upon their own heads. Diocletian, intimidated by the power and threats of this very favourite Galerius, resigned to him the purple at Nicomedia, on the first of April, in 304. Herculeus made the like abdication at Milan. But the persecution was carried on in the East by their successors, ten years longer, till, in 313, Licinius having defeated Maximinus Daia, the nephew and successor of Galerius, joined with Constantine in a league in favor of Christianity.

Diocletian had led a private life in his own country, Dalmatia, near Salone, where now Spalatro stands, in which city stately ruins of his palace are pretended to be shown. When Herculeus exhorted him to reassume the purple, he answered: “If you had seen the herbs, which with my own hands I have planted at Salone, you would not talk to me of empires.” But this philosophic temper was only the effect of cowardice and fear. He lived to see his wife and daughter put to death by Licinius, and the Christian religion protected by law, in 313.

Having received a threatening letter from Constantine and Licinius, in which he was accused of having favored Maxentius and Maximinus against them, he put an end to his miserable life by poison, as Victor writes. Lactantius says, that seeing himself despised by the whole world, he was in a perpetual uneasiness, and could neither eat nor sleep. He was heard to sigh and groan continually, and was seen often to weep, and to be tumbling sometimes on his bed, and sometimes on the ground. His colleague Maximinian Herculeus thrice attempted to resume the purple, and even snatched it from his own son, Maxentius, and at length in despair hanged himself, in 310.

Miserable also was the end of all their persecuting successors, Maxentius, the son of Herculeus, in the West, and of Galerius and his nephew Maximinus Daia, in the East. No less visible was the hand of God in punishing the authors of the foregoing general persecutions, as is set forth by Lactantius, in a valuable treatise entitled On the Death of the Persecutors.

Thus, whilst the martyrs gained immortal crowns, and virtue triumphed by the means of malice itself, God usually, even in this world, began to avenge his injured justice in the chastisement of his enemies. Though it is in eternity that the distinction of real happiness and misery will appear. There all men will clearly see that the only advantage in life is to die well: all other things are of very small importance. Prosperity or adversity, honor or disgrace, pleasure or pain, disappear and are lost in eternity. Then will men entirely lose sight of those vicissitudes which here so often alarmed, or so strongly affected them. Worldly greatness and abjection, riches and poverty, health and sickness, will then seem equal, or the same thing. The use which everyone has made of all these things will make the only difference. The martyrs having eternity always present to their minds, and placing all their joy and all their glory in the divine will and love, ran cheerfully to their crowns, contemning the blandishments of the world, and regardless even of torments and death.

APRIL 28TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. DIDYMUS & ST. THEODORA
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 304

Eustratius Proculus, imperial prefect of Alexandria, being seated on his tribunal, said: “Call here the virgin Theodora.”
A sergeant of the court answered:“ She is here.”
The prefect said to her: “Of what condition are you?”
Theodora replied: “I am a Christian.”
Prefect. “Are you a slave or a free woman?”
Theodora. “I am a Christian, and made free by Christ; I am also born of what the world calls free parents.”
Prefect. “Call hither the bailiff of the city.”
When he was come, the prefect asked him what he knew of the virgin Theodora.
Lucias, the bailiff, answered: “I know her to be a free woman, and of a very good family in the city.”
“What is the reason, then,” said the judge to Theodora, “that you are not married?”
Theodora. “That I may render myself the more pleasing and acceptable to Jesus Christ, who, being become man, hath withdrawn us from corruption; and as long as I continue faithful to him, will, I hope, preserve me from all defilement.”
Prefect. “The emperors have ordered that you virgins shall either sacrifice to the gods, or be exposed in infamous places.”
Theodora. “I believe you are not ignorant that it is the will which God regards in every action; and that if my soul continue chaste and pure, it can receive no prejudice from outward violence.”
Prefect. “Your birth and beauty make me pity you: but this compassion shall not save you unless you obey. I swear by the gods, you shall either sacrifice or be made the disgrace of your family, and the scorn of all virtuous and honorable persons.”
He then repeated the ordinance of the emperors, to which Theodora made the same reply as before, and added: “If you cut off unjustly my arm or head, will the guilt be charged to me or to him that commits the outrage? I am united to God by the vow I have made to him of my virginity; he is the master of my body and my soul, and into his hands I commit the protection of both my faith and chastity.”
Prefect. “Remember your birth: will you dishonor your family by an eternal infamy?”
Theodora. “The source of true honour is Jesus Christ: my soul draws all its luster from him. He will preserve his dove from falling into the power of the hawk.”
Prefect. “Alas, silly woman! do you place your confidence in a crucified man? Do you imagine it will be in his power to protect your virtue if you expose it to the trial?”
Theodora. “Yes; I most firmly believe that Jesus, who suffered under Pilate, will deliver me from all who have conspired my ruin, and will preserve me pure and spotless. Judge, then, if I can renounce him.”
Prefect. “I bear with you a long time, and do not yet put you to the torture. But if you continue thus obstinate, I will have no more regard for you than for the most despicable slave.”
Theodora. “You are master of my body: the law has left that at your disposal; but my soul you cannot touch, it is in the power of God alone.”
Prefect. “Give her two great buffets to cure her of her folly, and teach her to sacrifice.”
Theodora. “Through the assistance of Jesus Christ, I will never sacrifice to, nor adore devils. He is my protector.”
Prefect. “You compel me, notwithstanding your quality, to affront you before all the people. This is a degree of madness.”
Theodora. “This holy madness is true wisdom; and what you call an affront will be my eternal glory.”
Prefect. “I am out of patience; I will execute the edict. I should myself be guilty of disobeying the emperors, were I to dally any longer.”
Theodora. “You are afraid of displeasing a man, and can you reproach me because I refuse to offend God, because I stand in awe of the emperor of heaven and earth, and seek to obey his will?”
Prefect. “In the mean time you make no scruple of slighting the commands of the emperors, and abusing my patience. I will, notwithstanding, allow you three days to consider what to do; if within that term you do not comply with what I require, by the gods, you shall be exposed, that all other women may take warning from your example.”
Theodora. “Look on these three days as already expired. You will find me the same then as now. There is a God who will not forsake me. Do what you please. My only request is, that I may be screened in the meantime from insults on my chastity.”
Prefect. “That is but just. I therefore ordain that Theodora be under guard for three days, and that no violence be offered her during that time, nor rudeness shown her, out of regard to her birth and quality.”

The three days being elapsed, Proculus ordered Theodora to be brought before him: and seeing she persisted in her resolution said: “The just fear of incurring the indignation of the emperors obliges me to execute their commands: wherefore sacrifice to the gods, or I pronounce the threatened sentence. We shall see if your Christ, for whose sake you continue thus obstinate, will deliver you from the infamy to which the edict of the emperors condemns you.”
Theodora. “Be in no pain about that.”

Sentence hereupon being pronounced, the saint was conducted to the infamous place. On entering it she lifted up her eyes to God and said: “Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, assist me and take me hence: Thou who deliveredst St. Peter from prison without his sustaining any hurt, guard and protect my chastity here, that all may know I am thy servant.”

A troop of debauchees quickly surrounded the house, and looked on this innocent beauty as their prey. But Jesus Christ watched over his spouse, and sent one of his servants to deliver her. Among the Christians of Alexandria, there was a zealous young man, named Didymus, who desiring earnestly to rescue the virgin of Christ out of her danger, clothed himself like a soldier, and went boldly into the room where she was. Theodora, seeing him approach her, was at first much troubled, and fled from him into the several corners of the room.

He, overtaking her, said to her: “Sister, fear nothing from me. I am not such a one as you take me to be. I am your brother in Christ, and have thus disguised myself on purpose to deliver you. Come, let us change habits: take you my clothes and go out, and I will remain here in yours: thus disguised, save yourself.”

Theodora did as she was desired: she also put on his armor, and he pulled down the hat over her eyes, and charged her in going out to cast them on the ground, and not stop to speak to anyone, but walk fast, in imitation of a person seeming ashamed, and fearing to be known after the perpetration of an infamous action. When Theodora was by this stratagem out of danger, her soul took its flight towards heaven, in ardent ejaculations to God her deliverer.

A short time after, came in one of the lewd crew on a wicked intent, but was extremely surprised to find a man there instead of the virgin: and hearing from him the history of what had passed, went out and published it abroad. The judge, being informed of the affair, sent for the voluntary prisoner, and asked him his name.

He answered: “I am called Didymus.”
The prefect then asked him, who put him upon this extraordinary adventure? Didymus told him it was God who had inspired him with this method to rescue his handmaid.
The prefect then said: “Before I put you to the torture, declare where Theodora is.”
Didymus. “By Christ, the Son of God, I know not. All that I certainly know of her is, that she is a servant of God, and that he has preserved her spotless: God hath done to her according to her faith in him.”
Prefect. “Of what condition are you?”
Didymus. “I am a Christian, and delivered by Jesus Christ.”
Prefect. “Put him to the torture doubly to what is usual, as the excess of his insolence deserves.”
Didymus. “I beg you to execute speedily on me the orders of your masters, whatever they may be.”
Prefect. “By the gods, the torture doubled is your immediate lot, unless you sacrifice: if you do this your first crime shall be forgiven you.”
Didymus. “I have already given proof that I am a champion of Christ, and fear not to suffer in his cause. My intention in this matter was twofold, to prevent the virgin’s being deflowered, and to give an instance of my steady faith and hope in Christ; being assured I shall survive all the torments you can inflict upon me. The dread of the cruelest death you can devise will not prevail on me to sacrifice to devils.”
Prefect. “For your bold rashness, and because you have contemned the commands of our lords the emperors, you shall be beheaded and your corpse shall be burnt.”
Didymus. “Blessed be God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath not despised my offering, and hath preserved spotless his handmaid Theodora. He crowns me doubly.”
Didymus was, according to this sentence, beheaded, and his body burnt. Thus far the acts.

St. Ambrose, who relates this history of Theodora, (whom he calls by mistake a virgin of Antioch,) adds, that she ran to the place of execution to Didymus, and would needs die in his place, and that she was also beheaded; which the Greeks say happened shortly after his martyrdom. St. Ambrose most beautifully paints the strife of these holy martyrs, at the place of execution, which of the two should bear away the palm of martyrdom. The virgin urged, that she owed indeed to him the preservation of her corporal integrity; but would not yield to him the privilege of carrying away her crown.

“You were bail,” said she, “for my modesty, not for my life. If my virginity be in danger, your bond holds good: if my life be required, this debt I myself can discharge. The sentence of condemnation was passed upon me: I am further obnoxious, not only by my flight, but by giving occasion to the death of another. I fled, not from death, but from an injury to my virtue. This body, which is not to be exposed to an insult against its integrity, is capable of suffering for Christ. If you rob me of my crown, you have not saved but deceived me.”

The two saints, thus contending for the palm, both conquered: the crown was not divided, but given to each. St. Didymus is looked upon to have suffered under Diocletian, in 304, and at Alexandria. The Roman Martyrology commemorates these two saints on this day.

APRIL 29TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. PETER THE MARTYR
Martyred in the Thirteenth Century around 1252

St. Peter the martyr was born at Verona, in 1205, of parents infected with the heresy of the Cathari, a sort of Manichees, who had insensibly made their way into the northern parts of Italy, during the quarrel between the Emperor Frederic Barbarossa and the Holy See. God preserved him from the danger which attended his birth, of being infected with heretical sentiments. His father being desirous of giving him an early tincture of learning, sent him, while very young, to a Catholic schoolmaster; not questioning but by his own instruction afterwards, and by the child’s conversing with his heretical relations, he should be able to efface whatever impressions he might receive at school to the contrary.

One of the first things he learned there was the Apostles’ Creed, which the Manicheans held in abhorrence (to put it simplistically, Manicheans believed in two Gods or two principles, the God of Good and the God of Evil—creation of things was done by the God of Evil). His uncle one day, out of curiosity, asked him his lesson. The boy recited to him the Creed, and explained it in the Catholic sense, especially in those words: “Creator of Heaven and Earth.” In vain did his uncle long endeavor to persuade him it was false, and that it was not God, but the evil principle that made all things that are visible; pretending many things in the world to be ugly and bad, which he thought inconsistent with the idea we ought to entertain of an infinitely perfect being. The resolute steadiness which the boy showed on the occasion, his uncle looked upon as a bad omen for their sect; but the father laughed at his fears, and sent Peter to the university of Bologna, in which city then reigned a licentious corruption of manners among the youth.

God, however, who had before protected him from heresy, preserved the purity of his heart and the innocence of his manners amidst these dangers. Nevertheless he continually deplored his melancholy situation, and fortified himself every day anew in the sovereign horror of sin, and in all precautions against it. To fly it more effectually, he addressed himself to St. Dominic, and though but fifteen years of age, received at his hands the habit of his Order. But he soon lost that holy director, whom God called to glory.

Peter continued with no less fervor to square his life by the maxims and spirit of his holy founder, and to practice his rule with the most scrupulous exactness and fidelity. He went beyond it even in those times of its primitive fervor. He was assiduous in prayer; his watchings and fasts were such, that even in his novitiate they considerably impaired his health; but a mitigation in them restored it before he made his solemn vows. When by them he had happily deprived himself of his liberty, to make the more perfect sacrifice of his life to God, he drew upon him the eyes of all his brethren by his profound humility, incessant prayer, exact silence, and general mortification of his senses and inclinations.

He was a professed enemy of idleness, which he knew to be the bane of all virtues. Every hour of the day had its employment allotted to it; he being always either studying, reading, praying, serving the sick, or occupying himself in the most mean and abject offices, such as sweeping the house, etc., which, to entertain himself in sentiments of humility, he undertook with wonderful alacrity and satisfaction, even when he was senior in religion. But prayer was, as it were, the seasoning both of his sacred studies (in which he made great progress) and of all his other actions.

The awakening dangers of salvation he had been exposed to, from which the divine mercy had delivered him in his childhood, served to make him always fearful, cautious, and watchful against the snares of his spiritual enemies. By this means, and by the most profound humility, he was so happy as, in the judgment of his superiors and directors, to have preserved his baptismal innocence unsullied to his death by the guilt of any mortal sin. Gratitude to his Redeemer for the graces he had received, a holy zeal for his honor, and a tender compassion for sinners, moved him to apply himself with great zeal and diligence to procure the conversion of souls to God. This was the subject of his daily tears and prayers; and for this end, after he was promoted to the holy order of priesthood, he entirely devoted himself to the function of preaching, for which his superiors found him excellently qualified by the gifts both of nature and grace.

He converted an incredible number of heretics and sinners in the Romagna, the marquisate of Ancona, Tuscany, the Bolognese, and the Milanese. And it was by many tribulations, which befell him during the course of his ministry, that God prepared him for the crown of martyrdom. He was accused by some of his own brethren of admitting strangers, and even women, into his cell. He did not allow the charge, because this would have been a lie, but he defended himself, without positively denying it, and with trembling in such a manner as to be believed guilty, not of anything criminal, but of a breach of his rule: and his superiors imposed on him a cloistered punishment, banished him to the remote little Dominican convent of Jesi, in the marquisite of Ancona, and removed him from the office of preaching. Peter received this humiliation with great interior joy, on seeing himself suffer something in imitation of Him, who, being infinite sanctity, bore with patience and silence the most grievous slanders, afflictions, and torments for our sake.

But after some months his innocence was cleared, and he was commanded to return and resume his former functions with honor. He appeared everywhere in the pulpits with greater zeal and success than ever, and his humility drew on his labors an increase of graces and benedictions. The fame of his public miracles attested in his life, and of the numberless wonderful conversions wrought by him, procured him universal respect: as often as he appeared in public, he was almost pressed to death by the crowds that flocked to him, some to ask his blessing, others to offer the sick to him to be cured, others to receive his holy instructions. He declared war in all places against vice. In the Milanese he was met in every place with the cross, banner, trumpets, and drums; and was often carried on a litter on men’s shoulders, to pass the crowd. He was made superior of several houses of his order, and in the year 1232 was constituted by the pope inquisitor general of the faith.

He had ever been the terror of the new Manichean heretics, a sect whose principles and practice tended to the destruction of civil society and Christian morals. Now they saw him invested with this dignity, they conceived a greater hatred than ever against him. They bore it however under the papal reign of Gregory IX, but seeing him continued in his office, and discharging it with still greater zeal under Pope Innocent IV, they conspired his death, and hired two assassins to murder him on his return from Como to Milan. The ruffians lay in ambush for him on his road, and one of them, Carinus by name, gave him two cuts on the head with an axe, and then stabbed his companion, called Dominic. Seeing Peter rise on his knees, and hearing him recommend himself to God by those words: “Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my soul”, and recite the Creed, he dispatched him by a wound in the side with his cuttle-axe, on the 6th of April, in 1252, the saint being forty-six years and some days old.

His body was pompously buried in the Dominicans’ church dedicated to St. Eustorgius, in Milan, where it still rests: his head is kept apart in a case of crystal and gold. The heretics were confounded at his heroic death, and at the wonderful miracles God wrought at his shrine; and in great numbers desired to be admitted into the bosom of the Catholic Church. Carinus, the murderer of the martyr, fled out of the territory of Milan to the city of Forli, where, being struck with remorse, he renounced his heresy, put on the habit of a lay-brother among the Dominicans, and persevered in penance to the edification of many. St. Peter was canonized the year after his death by Innocent IV, who appointed his festival to be kept on the 29th of April. The history of miracles, performed by his relics and intercession, fills twenty-two pages in folio in the Acta Sanctorum, by the Bollandists, Apr. t. 3, p. 697 to 719.

Our divine Redeemer was pleased to represent himself to us, both for a model to all who should exercise the pastoral charge in his church, and for the encouragement of sinners, under the figure of the good shepherd, who, having sought and found his lost sheep, with joy carried it back to the fold on his shoulders. The primitive Christians were so delighted with this emblem of his tender love and mercy, that they engraved the figure of the good shepherd, loaded with the lost sheep on his shoulders, on the sacred chalices which they used for the holy mysteries or at mass, as we learn from Tertullian. This figure is found frequently represented in the tombs of the primitive Christians in the ancient Christian cemeteries at Rome.

All pastors of souls ought to have continually before their eyes this example of the good shepherd and prince of pastors. The aumusses, or furs, which most canons, both secular and regular, wear, are a remnant of the skins or furs worn by many primitive pastors for their garments. They wore them not only as badges of a penitential life, in imitation of those saints in the Old Law who wandered about in poverty, clad with skins, as St. Paul describes them, and of St. Antony and many other primitive Christian anchorets, but chiefly to put them in mind of their obligation of imitating the great pastor of souls in seeking the lost sheep, and carrying it back on his shoulders: also of putting on his meekness, humility, and obedience, represented under his adorable title of Lamb of God, and that of sheep devoted to be immolated by death. Every Christian, in conforming himself spiritually to this divine model, must study daily to die more and more to himself and to the world. In the disposition of his soul, he must also be ready to make the sacrifice of his life.

APRIL 30TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. MAXIMUS
Martyred in the Third Century around 251

Maximus was an inhabitant of Asia, and a merchant by profession. Decius having formed an impious but vain design of extirpating the Christian religion, published edicts over the whole empire to enforce idolatry, commanding all to adore idols. Maximus having openly declared himself a Christian, he was immediately apprehended, and brought before Optimus, the proconsul of Asia, who, after asking him his name, inquired also after his condition.
He replied: “I am born free, but am the slave of Jesus Christ.”
Proconsul. “What is your profession?”
Maximus. “I am a plebeian, and live by my dealings.”
Proconsul. “Are you a Christian?”
Maximus. “Yes, I am, though a sinner.”
Proconsul. “Have not you been informed of the edicts that are lately arrived?”
Maximus. “What edicts? and what are their contents?”
Proconsul. “That all the Christians forsake their superstition, acknowledge the true prince whom all obey, and adore his gods.”
Maximus. “I have been told of that impious edict, and it is the occasion of my appearing abroad.”
Proconsul. “As then you are apprised of the edicts, sacrifice to the gods.”
Maximus. “I sacrifice to none but that God to whom alone I have sacrificed from my youth, the remembrance of which affords me great comfort.”
Proconsul. “Sacrifice as you value your life: if you refuse to obey you shall expire in torments.”
Maximus. “This has ever been the object of my desires: it was on this very account that I appeared in public, to have an opportunity offered me of being speedily delivered out of this miserable life, to possess that which is eternal.”
Then the proconsul commanded him to be bastinadoed, and in the meantime said to him, “Sacrifice, Maximus, and thou shalt be no longer tormented.”
Maximus. “Sufferings for the name of Christ are not torments, but comfortable unctions: but if I depart from his precepts contained in the gospel, then real and eternal torments would be my portion.”
The proconsul then ordered him to be stretched on the rack, and while he was tortured said to him: “Renounce, wretch, thy obstinate folly, and sacrifice to save thy life.”
Maximus. “I shall save it if I do not sacrifice; I shall lose it if I do. Neither your clubs, nor your iron hooks, nor your fire give me any pain, because the grace of Jesus Christ dwelleth in me, which will deliver me out of your hands to put me in possession of the happiness of the saints, who have already in this same conflict triumphed over your cruelty. It is by their prayers I obtain this courage and strength which you see in me.”
The proconsul then pronounced this sentence on him: “I command that Maximus, for refusing to obey the sacred edicts, be stoned to death, to serve for an example of terror to all Christians.”

St. Maximus was immediately seized by the executioners and carried without the city walls, where they stoned him on the 14th of May. Thus his acts. The Greeks honour him on the day of his death: the Roman Martyrology on the 30th of April. He suffered in 250 or 251.