December Martyrs

THE MARTYRS OF DECEMBER
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).

DECEMBER 1ST
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. ANSANUS & ST. MAXIMA
Martyred in the Third Century around 258

Ansanus was born of a noble Roman family in the third century. While still a child, Ansanus was secretly baptized by his nurse Maxima (venerated as St. Maxima of Rome) and was secretly brought up as a Christian. Ansanus openly declared his Christian Faith during the persecutions of Diocletian, when he was nineteen years old. According to tradition, St. Ansanus preached the Gospel in Bagnoregio (then Bagnorea) and the church of Santa Maria delle Carceri outside the Alban Gate was said to have been built above the prison in which he was confined.

According to tradition, Ansanus and Maxima were scourged; Maxima died from this. Ansanus, however, survived this torture, as well as the next one: being thrown into a pot of boiling oil. He was then taken to the city of Siena as a prisoner. He managed to preach Christianity there and make many converts to this religion. He was decapitated by order of Roman Emperor Diocletian.

DECEMBER 2ND
The Martyr of the Day
ST. BIBIANA
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 363

We are informed by Ammianus Marcellinus, a pagan historian of that age, and an officer in the court of Julian the Apostate, that this emperor made Apronianus governor of Rome in the year 363, who, while he was on the way to that city, had the misfortune to lose an eye. This accident he superstitiously imputed to the power of magic, through the malice of some who excelled in that art; and, in this foolish persuasion, to gratify his spleen and superstition, he resolved to punish and exterminate the magicians; in which accusation, Christians were involved above all others, on account of many wonderful miracles which were wrought in the primitive ages.

Under this magistrate, St. Bibiana received the crown of martyrdom. This holy virgin was a native of Rome, and daughter to Flavian, a Roman knight, and his wife Dafrosa, who were both zealous Christians.

Flavian was apprehended, deprived of a considerable post which he had held in the city, burned in the face with a hot iron, and banished to Acquapendente, then called Aquæ Taurinæ, where he died of his wounds a few days after.

Dafrosa, by an order of Apronianus, who had thus treated her husband for his constancy in his Faith, was, on the same account, confined to her house for some time; and, at length, carried out of the gates of the city, and beheaded.

Bibiana and her sister Demetria, after the death of their holy parents, were stripped of all they had in the world, and suffered much from poverty for five months, but spent that time in their own house in fasting and prayer, Apronianus had flattered himself that hunger and want would bring them to a compliance; but seeing himself mistaken, summoned them to appear before him. Demetria, having made a generous confession of her Faith, fell down and expired at the foot of the tribunal, in the presence of the judge.

Apronianus gave orders that Bibiana should be put into the hands of a wicked woman named Rufina, who was extremely artful, and undertook to bring her to another way of thinking. That agent of hell employed all the allurements she could invent: which were afterwards succeeded by blows; but Bibiana, making prayer her shield, remained invincible. Apronianus, enraged at the courage and perseverance of a tender virgin, at length passed sentence of death upon her, and ordered her to be tied to a pillar, and whipped with scourges loaded with leaden plummets till she expired.

The saint underwent this punishment cheerfully, and died in the hands of the executioners. Her body was left in the open air, that it might be a prey to beasts; but, having lain exposed two days, was buried in the night, near the palace of Licinius, by a holy priest called John.

Peace being soon after restored to the church, a chapel was erected over her tomb; and a hundred years after, in 465, Pope Simplicius built there a fair church, as Anastasius mentions in his life. This church was called Olympina, from a pious lady of that name, who defrayed the expenses. It was repaired by Honorius III, but, being fallen to decay, was afterwards united to St. Mary Major, till it was sumptuously rebuilt by Pope Urban VIII in 1628, who placed in it the relics of St. Bibiana, St. Demetria, and St. Dafrosa, which were discovered in that place which has been sometimes called St. Bibian’s cemetery.

The only affair which a Christian has in this world, and in which consists all his happiness and joy, is to seek God, to attain to the perfect possession of his grace and love, and in all things most perfectly to do his will. By this disposition of heart he is raised above all created things, and united to the eternal and unchangeable object of his felicity. He receives the good things of this world with gratitude to the Giver, but always with indifference; leaves them with joy, if God requires that sacrifice at his hands; and, in his abundance, fears not so much the flight of what he possesses as the infection of his own heart, or lest his affections be entangled by them.

Such attachments are secretly and imperceptibly contracted, yet are ties by which the soul is held captive, and enslaved to the world. Only assiduous prayer and meditation on heavenly things, habitual self-denial, humble distrust and watchfulness, and abundant alms-deeds proportioned to a person’s circumstances, can preserve a soul from this dangerous snare amidst worldly affluence. To these means is that powerful grace annexed. This disengagement of the heart, how sincere soever, usually acquires a great increase and perfection by the actual sacrifice of earthly goods, made with heroic sentiments of Faith and divine love, when God calls for it. Such an offering is richly compensated by the most abundant spiritual graces and comforts at present, and an immense weight of eternal glory in the next life.

DECEMBER 3RD
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. HILARIA, ST. CLAUDIUS,
ST. JASON & ST. MAURUS
Martyred in the Third Century around 257

The holy martyrs St. Hilaria, her husband St. Claudius the Tribune, and their sons St. Jason and St. Maurus, and St. Diodorus the Priest, and St. Marianus the deacon suffered with St. Chrysanthus and St. Daria.

The tribune Claudius himself came to believe in Christ and accepted holy Baptism together with his wife Hilaria, their sons Jason and Maurus, and all his household and soldiers. When news of this reached the emperor Numerian (283-284), he commanded them all to be executed.

The Martyr Claudius was drowned in the sea, and his sons and soldiers were beheaded. Christians buried the bodies of the holy martyrs in a nearby cave, and St. Hilaria constantly went there to pray. Once, they followed her and led her off for torture. The saint asked that they give her a few moments to pray, and as soon as she finished, she gave up her soul to God. A servant buried the saint in the cave beside her sons.

DECEMBER 4TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. BARBARA
Martyred in the Third Century around 235

This holy virgin and martyr is honored with particular devotion in the Latin, Greek, Muscovite, and Syriac calendars, but her history is obscured by a variety of false acts. Baronius prefers those who tell us, that she was a scholar of Origen, and suffered martyrdom at Nicomedia, in the reign of Maximinus the First, who raised the sixth general persecution after the murder of Alexander Severus, in 235.

But Joseph Assemani shows the acts which we have in Metaphrastes and Mombritius to be the most exact and sincere. By these we are informed that St. Barbara suffered at Heliopolis in Egypt, in the reign of Galerius, about the year 306. This account agrees with the emperor Basil’s Menology, and the Greek Synaxary. There stood an old monastery near Edessa, which bore her name.

DECEMBER 5TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. CRISPINA
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 304

St. Augustine informs us, that this glorious martyr was a lady of high birth, very rich, and engaged in the marriage state; that she had several children; and that though of a delicate and tender constitution, she was endued with a masculine courage, preferred heaven to earth, and God to the world, and, despising the tears of her children, rejoiced to see herself taken and called to confess Jesus Christ on a scaffold, and in the sight of the whole world.

Her acts we have only imperfect, giving an account of her last examination. By them we learn that she was a native of Thagara, in the Proconsular Africa, and was apprehended for professing the Faith of Christ, and conducted to Thebeste, before Anulinus the proconsul of Africa. This magistrate exhorted her to sacrifice to the gods, as the edicts of the emperors commanded.

The martyr answered: “I have never sacrificed, nor do sacrifice to any other than to one God, and to our Lord Jesus Christ, his Son, who was born and suffered for us.”

Anulinus threatened her with the rigor of the law. She said that she adored and knew only one God, and observed the law of Jesus Christ, her Lord. The proconsul pressed her to give some token of piety towards the gods.

“There can be no devotion and piety,” said the martyr, “where everything is compulsion.”

When he again thundered out his threats, she replied: “That his torments were nothing; but that if she despised the God of heaven, she should incur the guilt of sacrilege, and be punished by him at the last day.”

Anulinus commanded that her head should be shaved, and that she should be publicly shown in this condition, and exposed to the derision of the people.

Crispina said: “If the gods are offended at my words, let them speak themselves.”

Anulinus in great anger said she should be treated as her companions Maxima, Donatilla, and Secunda had been before.

She made answer: “My God is with me to preserve me from ever consenting to the sacrilege which is required of me.”

The proconsul then ordered the whole process of what had passed at the trial to be read aloud; after which he dictated the sentence of death against her. Crispina, flushed with joy, gave thanks to God and was led to execution. She was beheaded on the 5th of December, 304, and is named in the Roman Martyrology.

DECEMBER 6TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. DIONYSIA, ST. DATIVA, ST. AEMILIANUS,
ST. BONIFACE, ST. LEONTINA, ST. TERTIUS &
ST. MAJORCUS
Martyred in the Fifth Century around 484

In the year 484, King Huneric banished the Catholic bishops; and soon after commanded those who refused to comply with certain impious orders which he published, to be tormented and put to death.

Dionysia, a lady remarkable for her great beauty, but much more so for her holy zeal and piety, was so long scourged in the most conspicuous place of the forum, that every part of her body was covered with wounds and blood. Seeing Majoricus, her only son, tremble at the sight of her torments, she said to him: “Son, remember that we have been baptized in the name of the holy Trinity, in the Catholic church, our mother. Let us not lose the clothing of our salvation, lest the master of the feast, finding us without the nuptial garment, command his servants to cast us into outer darkness.”

The young man being strengthened by her words, suffered a most cruel martyrdom with constancy. The courageous mother embracing his body, gave thanks to God with a loud voice, and buried him in her own house, that she might frequently pray upon his tomb.

Dativa, sister to Dionysia, Æmilianus a physician, who was her cousin, Leontia, Tertius, and Boniface suffered, with great constancy, horrible torments for the Faith.

A nobleman of Suburbis, named Servus, was tortured by the persecutors with the utmost fury. After his body was bruised with clubs, he was hoisted in the air by pulleys, and then let down again, that he might fall with all his weight on the pavement; and this was repeated several times. After this, he was dragged along the streets, and torn with flint stones and pebbles, insomuch, that his flesh and skin hung down in many places from his sides, back, and belly, and his ribs appeared bare.

At Cucusa there was an infinite number of martyrs and confessors. Among these a courageous lady, named Victoria, was suspended in the air whilst a fire was kindled under her. All this while her husband, who had apostatized from the Catholic Faith, talked to her in the most moving and passionate manner, conjuring her at least to have pity on him and her innocent babes, and save herself by obeying the king.

The martyr stopped her ears not to hear his seducing words, and turned her eyes from her children, that she might more perfectly raise her heart to heaven. The executioners seeing her shoulders dislocated, and several of her bones broken, and not perceiving her to breathe, thought she was dead, and took her down. But she came to herself, and afterwards related, that a virgin had appeared to her, who, touching every part of her body, immediately healed it.

DECEMBER 7TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. AGATHO OF ALEXANDRIA
Martyred in the Third Century around 250

St. Agatho was a soldier in Alexandria, Egypt. During the persecution under the Emperor Decius, there were some that would make a mockery of the bodies of the martyrs. When Agatho forbade and prevented a mob of pagans from desecrating the bodies of Christian martyrs, who had been killed in the persecutions of Decius, straightway the cry of the whole mob was raised against him. The furious mob dragged Agatho before the local judge in the court of Alexandria. Agatho confessed to being a Christian himself and since he stood firm in the confession of Christ, despite threats and insults, he was therefore sentenced to death and beheaded about the year 250.

DECEMBER 8TH
The Martyr of the Day
POPE ST. EUTYCHIAN
Martyred in the Third Century around 283

At Rome, the blessed Pope St. Eutychian, who with his own hands buried in divers places three hundred and forty-two martyrs, whose fellow he himself afterwards became, being crowned with martyrdom under the Emperor Numerian and buried in the cemetery of St. Callistus. He succeeded Felix I (269-274); after five days’ interregnum he became Pope on January 3rd, 275, and died on December 8th, 283.

DECEMBER 9TH
The Martyrs of the Day
THE SEVEN MARTYRS OF SAMOSATA
Martyred in the Third Century around 297

In the year 297 the Emperor Maximian, returning victorious from the defeat of the Persian army, celebrated the quinquennial games at Samosata, the capital of Syria Comagene, upon the banks of the Euphrates. On this occasion he commanded all the inhabitants to repair to the temple of fortune, situate in the middle of the city, to assist at the solemn supplications and sacrifices which were there to be made to the gods. The whole town echoed with the sound of trumpets, and was infected with the smell of victims and incense.

Hipparchus and Philotheus, persons for birth and fortune of the first rank in the city, had some time before embraced the Christian Faith. In a secret closet in the house of Hipparchus, upon the eastern wall, they had made an image of the cross, before which, with their faces turned to the east, they adored the Lord Jesus Christ seven-times-a-day.

Five intimate friends, much younger in years, named, James, Paragrus, Habibus, Romanus, and Lollianus, coming to visit them at the ninth hour, or three in the afternoon, found them in this private chamber praying before the cross, and asked them why they were in mourning, and prayed at home, at a time when, by the emperor’s orders, all the gods of the whole city had been transported into the temple of fortune, and all persons were commanded to assemble there to pray.
They answered, that they adored the Maker of the world.
James said: “Do you take that cross for the maker of the world? For I see it is adored by you.”
Hipparchus answered: “Him we adore who hung upon the cross. Him we confess to be God, and the Son of God begotten, not made, co-essential with the Father, by whose deity we believe this whole world is created, preserved, and governed. It is now the third year since we were baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, by James, a priest of the true Faith, who since has never intermitted from time to time to give us the Body and Blood of Christ. We, therefore, think it unlawful for us during these three days to stir out of doors: for we abhor the smell of victims with which the whole city is infected.”

After much discourse together the five young noblemen declared they desired to be baptized, but feared the severity of the laws, saying these two were protected by their dignities in the magistracy and their favor at court; but that as for themselves they were young and without protection. Hipparchus and Philotheus said: “The earthen vessel or brick is but dirt till it be tempered with clay and has passed the fire.”

And they discoursed so well on martyrdom, and on the contempt of the world, which Faith inspireth, that the five young men desired to be baptized, and to bear the badge of Christ, confessing that when they first saw their two friends at prayer before the cross, they felt an unusual fire glowing within their breasts. Hipparchus and Philotheus at first advised them to defer their baptism, but at length, pleased with their ardor, they dispatched a messenger to the priest James, with a letter sealed with their own seal the contents of which were as follows: “Be pleased to come to us as soon as possible, and bring with you a vessel of water, an host, and a horn of oil for anointing. Your presence is earnestly desired by certain tender sheep which are come over to our fold, and are impatient that its mark be set upon them.” James forthwith covered the sacred utensils with his cloak, and coming to the house found the seven blessed men on their knees at prayer. Saluting them he said: “Peace be with you, servants of Jesus Christ who was crucified for his creatures.” They all arose, and James, Paragrus, Habibus, Romanus, and Lollianus fell at his feet and said: “Have pity on us, and give us the mark of Christ, whom you adore.” He asked them if they were ready to suffer tribulation and torments for Christ, who suffered first for them.

They answered with one voice, that nothing should ever be able to separate them from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. He then bade them join him in prayer. When they had prayed together on their knees for the space of an hour, the priest rose up, and saluting them said, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.” When they had made a confession of their Faith, and abjured idolatry, he baptized them, and immediately gave them the Body and Blood of Christ. This being done, he took up the sacred utensils, and covering them with his cloak made haste home, fearing lest the pagans should discover them together; for the priest was an old man in a mean ragged garment; and Hipparchus and Philotheus were men of the first rank, and enjoyed posts of great honor, and the other five were illustrious for their birth.

On the third day of the festival, the emperor inquired whether none among the magistrates contemned the gods, and whether they had all performed the duty of sacrificing on this public occasion. He was answered, that Hipparchus and Philotheus had for three years past constantly absented themselves from the public worship of the gods. Hereupon the emperor gave orders that they should be conducted to the temple of fortune, and compelled to offer sacrifice. The messengers coming to the house of Hipparchus, found the seven above mentioned assembled together; but at first apprehended only Hipparchus and Philotheus. The emperor asked them why they contemned both him and the immortal gods?

Hipparchus said: “I blush to hear wood and stones called gods.”

The emperor commanded that he should receive fifty stripes, with whips loaded with leaden plummets, on the back, and then be confined in a dark dungeon. Philotheus being presented before him, the emperor promised to make him prætor, and to bestow on him other preferments if he complied. The confessor replied, that honors upon such terms would be an ignominy, and that he esteemed disgrace suffered for Christ the greatest of all honors. He then began to explain the creation of the world, and spoke with great eloquence.

The emperor interrupted him, saying, he saw that he was a man of learning, and that he would not put him to the torture, hoping that his own reason would convince him of his errors. But he gave orders that he should be put in irons, and confined in a separate dungeon from that in which Hipparchus was detained. In the meantime an order was sent to seize the other five that were found with them. The emperor put them in mind, that they were in the flower of their age, and exhorted them not to despise the blessings of life.

They answered, that Faith in Christ is preferable to life, adding, that no treacherous artifices should draw them from their duty to God: “Especially,” said they, “as we carry in our bodies the Body and Blood of Christ. Our bodies are consecrated by the touch of his Body: nor ought bodies which have been made holy, to be prostituted, by offering an outrageous affront to the dignity to which they have been raised.”

The emperor entreated them to have pity on their youth, and not throw away their lives, swearing by the gods, that if they persisted in their obstinacy, they should be unmercifully beaten, and should miserably perish. He repeated, that they should be crucified like their master. Their answer was, that they were not affrighted with torments. The emperor ordered that they should be chained, and kept in separate dungeons, without meat or drink, till the festival should be over.

The solemnity which was celebrated for several days in honor of the gods, being concluded, the emperor caused a tribunal to be erected without the walls of the city, in a meadow near the banks of the Euphrates, and the fields thereabouts were covered with rich hangings like tents. Maximian having taken his seat, by his order, the confessors were brought before him.

The two old magistrates were first led by chains thrown about their necks: the other five followed them, all having their hands tied behind their backs. Upon their peremptory refusal to offer sacrifice, they were all stretched upon the rack, and each received twenty stripes upon his back, and was then scourged with thongs upon the breast and belly. This being done, they were carried back each to his own dungeon, with strict orders that no one should be allowed to see them, or send them anything to comfort or support them, and that they should be furnished by their keepers with just so much coarse bread as would keep them alive.

In this condition they lay from the 15th of April to the 25th of June. Then they were again brought before the emperor, but looked more like carcasses than living men. He told them, that if they would comply, he would cause their hair to be shorn, and would have them washed in the bath, carried to the palace, and re-established in their dignities. They all prayed that he would not seek to draw them from the way which Jesus Christ had opened to them.

The emperor, whose eyes sparkled with fury, upon hearing this answer, said: “Wretches, you seek death. Your desire is granted, that you may at length cease to insult the gods.” He then commanded that cords should be put across their mouths, and bound round them, and that they should be crucified. The cords were immediately put in their mouths, and fastened tight about their bodies, so that they could only mutter broken words, and not speak distinctly.

In this condition, however, they returned thanks to God, and encouraged one another, rejoicing that they were leaving this miserable world, to go to God, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost. They were immediately hurried towards the tetradian, the common place of execution, at some distance from the city, and were followed by a long train of relations, friends, servants, and others, who filled the fields in the way, and rent the air with their lamentations.

In the meantime the lords of that territory, Tiberianus, Gallus, Longinianus, Felicianus, Proclus, Cosmianus, Mascolianus, and Priscus, to whom, by an imperial decree, the government of the city was committed, waited on the emperor in a body, and represented to him that a great multitude of citizens followed the prisoners all in tears, grieved to see seven princes of their country led chained to a cruel and ignominious death; they alleged that Hipparchus and Philotheus were their colleagues in the magistracy, who ought to settle their accounts, and the public affairs which had been left in their hands, that the other five were senators of their city, who ought to be allowed at least to make their wills; they, therefore, begged that some respite might be granted them. The emperor readily assented, and gave order that the martyrs should be put into the hands of these magistrates for the aforesaid purposes.

The magistrates led them into the porch of the circus, and having taken the cords from their mouths, privately said to them: “We obtained this liberty under pretense of settling with you the public accounts, and civil affairs; but in reality to have the favor of speaking to you in private, begging your intercession with God, for whom you die, and desiring your blessing for this city and ourselves.”

The martyrs gave their blessing, and harangued the people that were assembled. The emperor was informed, and sent a reprimand to the magistrates for suffering the martyrs to speak to the people. Their excuse was, that they durst not forbid it for fear of a tumult.

The emperor ascending his tribunal, would again see the martyrs; but found their resolution unshaken. He therefore ordered seven crosses to be erected over against the gate of the city, and again conjured Hipparchus to obey. The venerable old man, laying his hand upon his bald head, said: “As this, according to the course of nature, cannot be again covered with hair; so never shall I change or conform to your will in this point.”

Maximian commanded a goat’s skin to be fastened with sharp nails upon his head; then jeering, said: “See, your bald head is now covered with hair: sacrifice, therefore, according to the terms of your own condition.”

The martyrs were hoisted on their crosses; and at noon several ladies came out of the city, and having bribed the guards with money, obtained leave to wipe the faces of the martyrs, and to receive their blood with sponges and linen cloths. Hipparchus died on the cross in a short time. James, Romanus, and Lollianus expired the next day, being stabbed by the soldiers whilst they hung on their crosses.

Philotheus, Habibus, and Paragrus were taken down from their crosses whilst they were living. The emperor being informed that they were yet alive, commanded huge nails to be driven into their heads. This was executed with such cruelty that their brains were thrust out through their noses and mouths.

Maximian ordered that their bodies should be dragged by the feet, and thrown into the Euphrates; but Bassus, a rich Christian, redeemed them privately of the guards for seven hundred denarii, and buried them in the night at his farm in the country. The Acts of their martyrdom were compiled by a priest, who says he was present in a mean garb when the holy martyrs gave their blessing to their citizens.

DECEMBER 10TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. EULALIA
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 303

Prudentius has celebrated the triumph of this holy virgin, who was a native of Merida, then the capital city of Lusitania in Spain, now a declining town in Estremadura, the archiepiscopal dignity having been translated to Compostella. Eulalia, descended from one of the best families in Spain, was educated in the Christian religion, and in sentiments of perfect piety, from her infancy distinguished herself by an admirable sweetness of temper, modesty, and devotion; showed a great love of the holy state of virginity, and by her seriousness and her contempt of dress, ornaments, diversions, and worldly company, gave early proofs of her sincere desire to lead on earth a heavenly life. Her heart was raised above the world before she was thought capable of knowing it, so that its amusements, which usually fill the minds of young persons, had no charms for her, and every day of her life made an addition to her virtues.

She was only twelve years of age when the bloody edicts of Diocletian were issued, by which it was ordered that all persons, without exception of age, sex, or profession, should be compelled to offer sacrifice to the gods of the empire. Eulalia, young as she was, took the publication of this order for the signal of battle: but her mother, observing her impatient ardor for martyrdom, carried her into the country.

The saint found means to make her escape by night, and after much fatigue, arrived at Merida before break of day. As soon as the court sat the same morning, she presented herself before the cruel judge, whose name was Dacianus, and reproached him with impiety in attempting to destroy souls, by compelling them to renounce the only true God. The governor commanded her to be seized, and, first employing caresses, represented to her the advantages which her birth, youth, and fortune gave her in the world, and the grief which her disobedience would bring to her parents. Then he had recourse to threats, and caused the most dreadful instruments of torture to be placed before her eyes, saying to her, all this you shall escape if you will but touch a little salt and frankincense with the tip of your finger.

Provoked at these seducing flatteries, she threw down the idol, trampled upon the cake which was laid for the sacrifice, and, as Prudentius relates, spat at the judge: an action only to be excused by her youth and inattention under the influence of a warm zeal, and fear of the snares which were laid for her.

At the judge’s order two executioners began to tear her tender sides with iron hooks, so as to leave the very bones bare. In the mean time she called the strokes so many trophies of Christ. Next, lighted torches were applied to her breasts and sides; under which torment, instead of groans, nothing was heard from her mouth but thanksgivings. The fire at length catching her hair, surrounded her head and face, and the saint was stifled by the smoke and flame. Prudentius tells us that a white dove seemed to come out of her mouth, and to wing its way upward when the holy martyr expired: at which prodigy the executioners were so much terrified that they fled and left the body. A great snow that fell covered it and the whole form where it lay; which circumstance shows that the holy martyr suffered in winter.

The treasure of her relics was carefully entombed by the Christians near the place of her martyrdom; afterwards a stately church was erected on the spot, and the relics were covered by the altar which was raised over them, before Prudentius wrote his hymn on the holy martyr in the fourth century. He assures us that “pilgrims came to venerate her bones; and that she, near the throne of God, beholds them, and, being made propitious by hymns, protects her clients.” Her relics are kept with great veneration at Oviedo, where she is honored as patroness. The Roman Martyrology mentions her name on the 10th of December.

DECEMBER 11TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. FUSCIAN, ST. VICTORINUS & ST. GENTIAN
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 303

St. Fuscian and St. Victoricus were two apostolic men who came to preach the Faith in Gaul, about the same time as St. Dionysius of Paris. They penetrated to the remotest parts of that kingdom, and at length made Terouenne the seat of their mission. Going back to Amiens, where Rictius Varus persecuted the Christians, with more than savage barbarity, they lodged with a certain man called Gentian, who was desirous to become a disciple of Jesus Christ. He informed them that St. Quintin had lately glorified God by martyrdom.

They were soon after caught and arrested together with their charitable host, and all three died for Christ about the year 287. Rictius Varus the governor, had iron spikes driven into their nostrils and ears, and red-hot nails hammered into their temples after which their eyes were torn out, their bodies pierced with darts, and their heads cut off. Their bodies were found laid in coffins in the village Sama, now called St. Fusieu—St. Fuscian’s—in a garden. St. Honoratus, then bishop of Amiens, translated them into the cathedral. Childebert II, at that time king, gave to the church of Amiens the royal village Magie, about the year 580.

DECEMBER 12TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. EPIMACHUS & ST. ALEXANDER
Martyred in the Third Century around 250

Whilst the persecution set on foot by Decius raged with the utmost violence at Alexandria in 250, and the magistrates were very industrious and active in searching for Christians, Alexander and Epimachus fell into their hands, and upon confessing the name of Jesus Christ, were loaded with chains, committed to prison, and suffered all the hardships of a long and rigorous confinement. Remaining the same after this severe trial of their Faith and patience, they were beaten with clubs, their sides were torn with iron hooks, and they consummated their martyrdom by fire.

St. Dionysius, archbishop of that city, and an eye-witness of some part of their sufferings, gives this short account of their sufferings, and also makes mention of four martyrs of the other sex, who were crowned on the same day, and at the same place. Ammonarium, the first of them, a virgin of irreproachable life, endured unheard-of torments without opening her mouth, only to declare that no arts or power should ever prevail with her to let drop the least word to the prejudice of her holy profession. She kept her promise inviolably, and was at length led to execution, being, as it seems, beheaded.

The second of these holy women was named Mercuria, a person venerable for her age and virtue; the third was Dionysia, who, though a tender mother of many children, cheerfully commended them to God, and preferred his holy love to all human considerations; the fourth was another Ammonarium.

The judge blushing to see himself shamefully baffled and vanquished by the first of these female champions, and observing the like fortitude and resolution in the countenances of the rest, commanded the other three to be beheaded without more ado. They are all commemorated in the Roman Martyrology on this day.

To place the virtue of the Christian martyrs in its true light, we have but to consider it as contrasting the pretended heroism of the greatest sages of paganism. The martyr’s constancy is founded in humility, and its motive is the pure love of God, and perfect fidelity to his holy law. He regards himself as a weak reed; therefore God strengthens him, and by his grace makes him an unshaken pillar.

The martyr considers himself as a base sinner, who deserves to suffer the death he is going to endure; he looks upon his martyrdom as the beginning of his penance, not as the consummation of his virtue; and he is persuaded that whatever he can suffer falls short of what he deserves; that it is the highest honor, of which he is infinitely unworthy, to be called to make a sacrifice to God of his life and all that he has received of his bounty, to give so pregnant a testimony of his fidelity and love, to be rendered conformable to Christ, and to die for his sake who, out of infinite mercy and love, laid down his most precious life, and suffered the most cruel torments, and the most outrageous insults and affronts for us; he calls it the greatest happiness to redeem eternal torments by momentary sufferings.

Again, the martyr suffers with modesty and tender fortitude; he desires not acclamations, seeks no applause, thinks only that God is the spectator of his conflict, and flies the eyes of men, at least unless with a pure view that God may be known and glorified through the testimony which he bears to his law and sovereign goodness and greatness. Lastly, he praises and thanks God amidst his torments; he feels no sentiments of revenge, but tenderly loves, and earnestly prays for the prosperity of those by whose hands or unjust calumnies he suffers the most exquisite and intolerable pain, and is only afflicted at the danger of their eternal perdition.

On the other side, the vain and proud philosopher is puffed up in his own mind because he suffers; he sets forth his pretended virtue and constancy with a foolish groveling ostentation; he conceals his inward spite, rage, and despair under the hypocritical exterior of a forced and affected patience; he insults his enemies, or at least studies and wishes revenge.

The boasted Cato dreaded and abhorred the sight of Cæsar, and killed himself that he might not be presented before, or owe his life to, an enemy by whom he was vanquished. A Christian hero would have appeared before him without either indignation or fear, and would have overcome him by humility, meekness, patience, and charity. Socrates by the haughtiness of his looks despised and insulted his judges, and by the insolence of his behavior, provoked them to condemn him; whereas the Christian martyr affectionately embraces, loves, and prays for his tormentors, like St. Stephen under a shower of stones, and covered with wounds and blood.

DECEMBER 13TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. LUCY
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 303 or 304

The glorious virgin and martyr St. Lucy, one of the brightest ornaments of the church of Sicily, was born of honorable and wealthy parents in the city of Syracuse, and educated from her cradle in the Faith of Christ. She lost her father in her infancy, but Eutychia, her mother, took singular care to furnish her with tender and sublime sentiments of piety and religion.

By the early impressions which Lucy received, and the strong influence of divine grace, Lucy discovered no disposition but towards virtue, and she was yet very young when she offered to God the flower of her virginity. This vow, however, she kept a secret, and her mother, who was a stranger to it, pressed her to marry a young gentleman, who was a pagan. The saint sought occasions to hinder this design from taking effect, and her mother was visited with a long and troublesome flow of blood, under which she labored four years without finding any remedy by recourse to physicians.

At length she was persuaded by her daughter to go to Catana, and offer up her prayers to God for relief at the tomb of St. Agatha. St. Lucy accompanied her there, and their prayers were successful. Hereupon our saint disclosed to her mother her desire of devoting herself to God in a state of perpetual virginity, and bestowing her fortune on the poor: and Eutychia, in gratitude, left her at full liberty to pursue her pious inclinations.

The young nobleman with whom the mother had treated about marrying her, came to understand this by the sale of her jewels and goods, and the distribution of the price among the poor, and in his rage accused her before the governor, Paschasius, as a Christian, at a time when the Christian persecution of the Emperor Diocletian was raging with the utmost fury. The judge commanded the holy virgin to be exposed to prostitution in a brothel-house; but God rendered her immoveable, so that the guards were not able to carry her there. He also made her an overmatch for the cruelty of the persecutors, in overcoming fire and other torments. After a long and glorious combat she died in prison of the wounds she had received, about the year 304.

She was honored at Rome in the sixth century among the most illustrious virgins and martyrs, whose triumphs the Church celebrates, as appears from the Sacramentary of St. Gregory, Bede, and others. Her festival was kept in England, till the change of religion, as a holiday of the second rank, in which no work but tillage or the like was allowed. Her body remained at Syracuse for many years; but was at length translated into Italy, and thence, by the authority of the Emperor Otho I, to Metz. It is there exposed to public veneration in a rich chapel of St. Vincent’s church. A portion of her relics was carried to Constantinople, and brought then to Venice, where it is kept with singular veneration. St. Lucy is often painted with the balls of her eyes laid in a dish: perhaps her eyes were defaced or plucked out, though her present acts make no mention of any such circumstance. In many places her intercession is particularly implored for distempers of the eyes.

It is a matter of the greatest consequence what ideas are stamped upon the docile minds of children, what sentiments are impressed on their hearts, and to what habits they are first formed. Let them be accustomed to little denials—both in their will and senses—and learn that pleasures which gratify the senses must be guarded against, and used with great fear and moderation: for by them the taste is debauched, and the constitution of the soul broken and spoiled much more fatally, than that of the body can be, by means contrary to its health. Let them be taught that, as one of the ancient philosophers said: Temperance is the highest luxury; for only its pleasures are easy, solid, and permanent. It is much easier to conquer than to satisfy the passions, which, unless they are curbed by a vigorous restraint, whilst they are pliable, will be harder to be subdued. Obstinacy, unmanageability, sloth, and voluptuousness, are of all dispositions in youth the most dangerous.

“Children, like tender osiers, take the bow,
And as they first are fashioned always grow.”

There are few Lucies now-a-days amongst Christian ladies, because sensuality, pride, and vanity are instilled into their minds by the false maxims and pernicious example of those with whom they first converse. Alas! Unless a constant watchfulness and restraint produce and strengthen good habits, the inclinations of our souls lean of their own accord towards corruption.

DECEMBER 14TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. NICASIUS & COMPANIONS
Martyred in the Fifth Century around 407

In the fifth century an army of barbarians from Germany ravaging part of Gaul, plundered the city of Rheims. Nicasius, the holy bishop, had foretold this calamity to his flock. When he saw the enemy at the gates and in the streets, forgetting himself, and solicitous only for his dear spiritual children, he went from door to door encouraging all to patience and constancy, and awaking in every one’s breast the most heroic sentiments of piety and religion.

In endeavoring to save the lives of some of his flock, he exposed himself to the swords of the infidels, who, after a thousand insults and indignities, which he endured with the meekness and fortitude of a true disciple of God crucified for us, cut off his head. Florens his deacon, and Jocond his lector, were massacred by his side. His sister Eutropia, a virtuous virgin, seeing herself spared in order to be reserved for wicked purposes, boldly cried out to the infidels, that it was her unalterable resolution to sacrifice her life, rather than her Faith or her integrity and virtue. Upon which they killed her with their cutlasses.

St. Nicasius and St. Eutropia were buried in the church-yard of St. Agricola. Many miracles rendered their tombs illustrious, and this church was converted into a famous abbey, which bears the name of St. Nicasius, and is now a member of the congregation of St. Maur. The archbishop Fulco, in 893, translated the body of St. Nicasius into the cathedral, which the martyr himself had built, and dedicated to God in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary. His head is kept in the abbey of St. Vedast at Arras.

DECEMBER 15TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. EUSEBIUS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 371

St. Eusebius was born of a noble family in the isle of Sardinia, where his father is said to have died in chains for the Faith. His mother, whose name was Restituta, being left a widow, carried him and a daughter she had, both in their infancy, to Rome.

Eusebius was brought up in the practice of piety, and in the study of sacred learning, and ordained lector by St. Sylvester. We know not by what accident he was called to Vercelli, a city now in Piedmont. He served that church among the clergy with such applause, that the episcopal chair becoming vacant, he was unanimously chosen by the clergy and people to fill it. He is the first bishop of Vercelli whose name we know. St. Ambrose assures us, that he was the first who in the West united the monastic life with the clerical, living himself and making his clergy in the city live almost in the same manner as the monks in the East did in the deserts. They shut themselves up in one house with their pastor, and exercised themselves night and day in a heavenly warfare, continually occupied in the praises of God, having no other ambition than to appease his anger by fervent and uninterrupted prayers. Their minds were always employed in reading, or at work.

“Can anything be more admirable than this life,” cries out St. Ambrose, “where there is nothing to fear, and everything is worthy of imitation! Where the austerity of fasting is compensated by tranquility and peace of mind, supported by example, sweetened by habit, and charmed by the occupations of virtue! This life is neither troubled with temporal cares, nor distracted with the tumults of the world, nor hindered by idle visits, nor relaxed by the commerce of the world.” The holy bishop saw that the best and first means to labor effectually for the edification and sanctification of his people, was to form a clergy under his eyes, on whose innocence, piety, and zeal in the functions of their ministry he could depend.

In this design he succeeded so well, that other churches earnestly demanded his disciples for their bishops, and a great number of holy prelates came out of his school, who were burning and shining lamps in the church of God. He was at the same time very careful to instruct his flock, and inspire them with the maxims of the Gospel. Many, moved by his exhortations, embraced virginity to serve God in purity of heart, without being divided by the cares or pleasures of the world.

In a short time the whole city of Vercelli appeared inflamed with the fire of divine love which Jesus Christ came to bring on earth, and which he ardently desired to see kindled in all hearts. Convicted by the force of the truth which the zealous pastor preached, persuaded by the sweetness and charity of his conduct, and still more powerfully excited by his example, sinners encouraged themselves to a change of their lives, and all were animated to advance more and more in virtue. But his sanctity would have been imperfect without the trial of persecutions.

The Arians governed all things by violence under the authority of the Arian Emperor Constantius. In 354 Pope Liberius deputed St. Eusebius with Lucifer of Cagliari to beg leave of that emperor, who passed the winter at Arles in Gaul, to assemble a free council. Constantius agreed to a council, which met at Milan in 355, whilst the emperor resided in that city. Eusebius seeing all things would be there carried on by violence through the power of the Arians, though the Catholic prelates were more numerous, refused to go to it till he was pressed by Liberius himself, and by his legates Lucifer of Cagliari, Pancratius, and Hilary, in order to resist the Arians, as St. Peter had done Simon the magician.

When he was come to Milan the Arians excluded him the council for the ten first days. When he was admitted, he laid the Nicene Creed on the table, and insisted on all signing that rule of Faith before the cause of St. Athanasius should be brought to a hearing; for the chief drift of the heretics was to procure if possible the condemnation of that most formidable champion of the Faith.

St. Dionysius of Milan offered to subscribe his name to the creed; but Valens bishop of Mursia, the most furious of the Arians, tore the paper out of his hands, and broke his pen. The Arians, to set aside the motion for the previous signing of the Nicene Creed, procured the removal of the synod to the emperor’s palace, where the subscription to the Catholic Faith was superseded, and the condemnation of St. Athanasius immediately brought upon the carpet.

Many were gained by the artifices of the Arians, or intimidated by the threats of the emperor, and signed the sentence which was pronounced against him. St. Dionysius of Milan had once given his subscription, only exacting a promise that the Arians would receive the Nicene Faith. But St. Eusebius of Vercelli discovered the snare to him, and in order to withdraw his friend’s subscription, objected that he could not sign the sentence after Dionysius, who was younger, and his son. Upon which the Arians consented to blot out the name of Dionysius; and both afterwards peremptorily refused to subscribe a decree which was injurious to an innocent and holy prelate.

The emperor sent for St. Eusebius, St. Dionysius, and Lucifer of Cagliari, and pressed them to condemn Athanasius.
They insisted upon his innocence, and that he could not be condemned without being heard.
“I am his accuser,” said Constantius: “believe upon my word the charge brought against him.”
The bishops answered: “This is not a secular affair, that requires your opinion as emperor.”
Constantius took them up in anger, saying: “My will ought to pass for a rule. The bishops of Syria are satisfied that it should be so. Obey, or you shall be banished.”

The bishops represented to him, that he must one day give an account to God of his administration. The prince, in the transport of his rage, thought once of putting them to death; but was content to banish them. The officers entered the sanctuary, tore the holy prelates from the altar, and conducted them to different places. Dionysius was sent into Cappadocia, where he died. He is commemorated in the Roman Martyrology on the 25th of May. Lucifer was banished to Germanicia in Syria, of which city Eudoxus, a celebrated Arian, was bishop; and our saint to Scythopolis, in Palestine, there to be treated at the discretion of the Arian bishop Patrophilus. Their chains did not hinder them from serving the church, and they confounded the heretics wherever they went. Pope Liberius wrote to them a letter of congratulation, exhorting them to courage and constancy.

St. Eusebius was lodged at first with the good Count Joseph, and was comforted by the visits of St. Epiphanius and other holy men, and by the arrival of the deputies of his church of Vercelli, with presents for his subsistence. He wept for joy to hear of the zeal and constancy of his whole flock in the Catholic Faith under the priests whom he had appointed to govern his church in his absence.

A great share of the presents he gave to his fellow-confessors, and to the poor. But his patience was to be exercised by greater trials. Count Joseph died, and the Arians, with the emperor’s officers, insulted the saint, dragged him on the ground through the streets, sometimes carried him backwards half naked, and at last shut him up in a little chamber, plying him for four days with all manner of violence, to engage him to conform. They forbade his deacons and other fellow-confessors to be admitted to see him. The saint had abandoned his body to suffer all manner of evil treatments from their hands, without opening his mouth all that while; but seeing himself debarred of his only comfort and support, he sent a letter to the Arian bishop Patrophilus, with the following direction: “Eusebius, the servant of God, with the other servants of God who suffer with me for the Faith, to Patrophilus, the jailer, and to his officers.”

After a short relation of what he had suffered, he desired that his deacons might be allowed to come to him. After he remained in that confinement four days without eating, the Arians sent him back in his lodgings. Twenty-five days afterwards they came again, armed with clubs, broke down a wall in the house, and dragged him again into a little dungeon, with a priest named Tegrinus. They rifled his lodgings, plundered all his provisions, and cast many priests, monks, and even nuns into the public prisons. St. Eusebius found means to write a letter out of his dungeon to his flock, extant in Baronius, in which he mentions these particulars. His sufferings here were aggravated every day, till the place of his exile was changed.

From Scythopolis he was sent into Cappadocia, and, some time afterwards, into Upper Thebais in Egypt. We have a letter which he wrote from this third place of his banishment, to Gregory bishop of Elvire, to encourage him vigorously to oppose Osius (who had unhappily fallen) and all who had forsaken the Faith of the church, without fearing the power of kings. He expressed a desire to end his life in sufferings, that he might be glorified in the kingdom of God. This short letter discovers the zeal of a holy pastor, joined with the courage of a martyr. Constantius being dead, towards the end of the year 361, Julian gave leave to all the banished prelates to return to their sees.

St. Eusebius left Thebais, and came to Alexandria, to concert measures with St. Athanasius for applying proper remedies to the evils of the church. He was present, and subscribed immediately after St. Athanasius, in the council held there in 362, by which it was resolved to allow the penitent prelates, who had been deceived by the Arians, especially at Rimini, to preserve their dignity. From Alexandria our saint went to Antioch, to endeavor to extinguish the great schism there; but found it widened by Lucifer of Cagliari, who had blown up the coals afresh, and ordained Paulinus bishop. He would not communicate with Paulinus, but made haste out of Antioch. Lucifer resented this behavior, and broke off communion with him, and with all who with the late council of Alexandria received the Arian bishops in their dignity upon their return to the true Faith. This was the origin of the schism of Lucifer, who, by pride, lost the fruit of his former zeal and sufferings.

St. Eusebius travelled over the East, and through Illyricum, confirming in the Faith those who were wavering, and bringing back many that were gone astray. Italy, at his return, changed its mourning garments, according to the expression of St. Jerome. There St. Hilary of Poitiers and St. Eusebius met, and were employed in opposing the Arians, particularly Auxentius of Milan: but that crafty heretic had gained the favour of Valentinian, and maintained himself under his protection against the united zealous efforts of St. Hilary and St. Eusebius. St. Jerome, in his chronicle places the death of the latter in 371. An ancient author says it happened on the 1st of August.

He is styled a martyr in two old panegyrics in his praise, printed in the appendix of the works of St. Ambrose. There only remain of his works the three epistles above quoted. In the cathedral of Vercelli is shown an old Manuscript (MS) copy of the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Mark, said to be written by St. Eusebius; it was almost worn out with age near eight hundred years ago, when King Berengarius caused it to be covered with plates of silver. The body of St. Eusebius is laid in a shrine raised above a side altar in the cathedral at Vercelli. The Roman Missal and Breviary give his office on the 15th of December, which is probably the day on which his relics were removed; for his name occurs in ancient calendars on the 1st of August.

DECEMBER 16TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. EUSEBIUS (also celebrated on the 15th)
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 371

DECEMBER 17TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. FLORIAN, ST. CALANICUS AND
FIFTY-EIGHT OTHER MARTYRS
Martyred in the Seventh Century around 637

At Eleutheropolis, in Palestine, the holy martyrs St. Florian, St. Calanicus, and fifty-eight others, their companions in martyrdom, who were slain by the Saracens for Christ’s Faith’s sake in the time of the Emperor Heraclius.

Little information is available about these martyrs.

DECEMBER 18TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. RUFUS & ST. ZOZIMUS
Martyred in the Second Century around 116

From the eminent spirit of sanctity which the actions and writings of the great St. Ignatius breathe, we are to form a judgment of that with which these holy martyrs were animated. They had the happiness to share in his chains and sufferings for Christ, and likewise glorified God by martyrdom under Trajan, about the year 116.

St. Polycarp says of them, “they have not run in vain, but in Faith and righteousness; and they are gone to the place that was due to them from the Lord, with whom they also suffered. For they loved not the present world, but Him who died, and was raised again by God for us.”

Whether it was Antioch or Philippi, where they seemed to have preached, or whether it was some other city of the East that was the theater and scene of their triumph, is uncertain to historians. St. Polycarp, writing to the Philippians, says: “Wherefore I exhort all of you that ye obey the word of righteousness, and exercise all patience, which ye have seen set forth before your eyes, not only in the blessed Ignatius, and Zozimus, and Rufus, but in others that have been among you; and in Paul himself, and the rest of the Apostles.”

The primitive martyrs rejoiced exceedingly in being called to suffer for Christ. If Faith was as lively and active in us, and if the divine love exerted its power in our hearts, we should rejoice at all occasions of practicing meekness and patience, which we should look upon as our greatest happiness and gain. To forgive an injury, to bear well an affront, or to suffer with perfect resignation, patience, and humility, is a glorious victory gained over ourselves, by which we vanquish our passions, and improve in our souls the habits of those divine virtues in which consists the spirit of Christ, and the resemblance we are commanded to bear to him.

Occasions occur in almost all our actions; yet we lose them, and even suffer our passions to reign in them to the offence of God, the scandal of our holy religion, and the infinite prejudice of our souls. Do we consider that the least exertion of meekness, humility, or charity, is something much greater and more advantageous than the conquest of empires and the whole world could be? For Alexander to have once curbed his anger on ever so small an occasion, would have been a far more glorious victory than all his conquests, even if his wars had been just. For nothing is so heroic as for a man to vanquish his passions, and learn to govern his own soul.

Why then do not we take all necessary precautions to watch and to arm ourselves for these continual occasions? Why are we not prepared, and upon our guard to check all sudden sallies of our passions, and, under provocations, to show by silence, meekness, and patience, that we study truly to prove ourselves disciples of Christ?

DECEMBER 19TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. NEMESIUS & COMPANIONS
Martyred in the Third Century around 250

In the persecution of Decius, Nemesius, an Egyptian, was apprehended at Alexandria upon an indictment for theft. The servant of Christ easily cleared himself of that charge, but was immediately accused of being a Christian. Hereupon he was sent to the prefect of the Emperor Augustus in Egypt, and, confessing his Faith at his tribunal, he was ordered to be scourged and tormented doubly more grievously than the thieves: after which he was condemned to be burnt with the most criminal amongst the robbers and other malefactors; whereby he had the honor and happiness more perfectly to imitate the death of our divine Redeemer.

There stood at the same time near the prefect’s tribunal four soldiers, named Ammon, Zeno, Ptolemy, and Ingenuus, and another person, whose name was Theophilus, who, being Christians, boldly encouraged a confessor who was hanging on the rack. They were soon taken notice of, and presented to the judge, who condemned them to be beheaded: but was himself astonished to see the joy with which they walked to the place of execution.

Heron, Ater, and Isidore, both Egyptians, with Dioscorus, a youth only fifteen years old, were committed at Alexandria in the same persecution. First of all the judge took the youth in hand, and began to entreat him with fair speeches; then he assailed him with various torments; but the generous youth neither would bow at his flatteries, nor could be terrified or broken by his threats or torments. The rest, after enduring the most cruel rending and disjointing of their limbs, were burnt alive. But the judge discharged Dioscorus, on account of the tenderness of his years, saying, he allowed him time to repent, and consult his own advantage, and expressing that he was struck with admiration at the dazzling beauty of his countenance. In the Roman Martyrology St. Nemesius is commemorated on the 19th of December, the rest of these martyrs on other days.

St. Meuris and St. Thea, two holy women at Gaza in Palestine, when the persecution raged in that city under the successors of Diocletian, bore up bravely against all the cruelty of men, and malice of the devil, and triumphed over both to the last moment. Meuris died under the hands of the persecutors: but Thea languished some time after she had passed through a dreadful variety of exquisite torments, as we learn from the author of the life of St. Porphyrius of Gaza, written about the close of the fourth century. Their relics were deposited in a church which bore the name of St. Timothy.

Can we call to mind the fervor of the saints in laboring and suffering cheerfully for God, and not feel a holy ardor glow in our own breasts, and our souls strongly affected with their heroic sentiments of virtue? This St. Macarius of Egypt used to illustrate by the following familiar address: “As he that goes into a shop, where are ointments and perfumes, and takes a few turns in it, though he neither buys nor tastes of anything, yet he enjoys the scent, and is perfumed thereby: even so he that converses with the holy fathers, (or reads their actions,) derives a salutary influence from them. They show him true humility; and both their discourses and example are of service, and as a wall and fence against the incursions of demons.”

DECEMBER 20TH
The Martyrs of the Day
ST. EUGENIUS & ST. MACARIUS
Martyred in the Fourth Century around 363

The Holy Confessors Eugene and Macarius were presbyters of the Antiochian Church. During the reign of Julian the Apostate (361-363) they were brought to the emperor for trial for their refusal to participate in pagan orgies. The presbyters boldly denounced him for his apostasy and they were given over to fierce tortures, which they underwent with prayer and spiritual rejoicing.

After the tortures, they sent them off to exile at Oasim, an oasis in the Arabian desert, and they intended to settle there upon a hill. The local people warned the saints that they should immediately abandon the place, since an enormous snake lived there. The holy martyrs asked them to point out this place, and through their prayer a lightning bolt struck the cave, reducing the monster to ashes.

Ss. Eugene and Macarius began to live in this cave. The confessors prayed that they might die together. The Lord heard their prayer, and they died in 363 at the same time.

DECEMBER 21ST
The Martyr of the Day
ST. THOMAS THE APOSTLE
Martyred in the First Century

It was not unusual for the Jews and other Orientals, when they conversed with other nations, to assume names in the language of those countries of the same import with those which they bore in their own, that the sound might be less uncouth or harsh to such foreigners. For where languages, though there is always some general analogy, differ too widely, as those of the Orientals on one side, and on the other the Sclavonian, do from ours, names in the one appear disagreeable in pronunciation, unless they are softened and brought to some affinity. Thus Tabitha was in Greek called Dorcas, a doe; Cephas, Peter, Thomas and Didymus, Thauma, or Thama, in Chaldaic signifying a twin.

St. Thomas was a Jew, and probably a Galilæan of low condition, according to Metaphrastes, a fisherman. He had the happiness to follow Christ, and was made by him an Apostle in the year 31. If he appears to have been slow in understanding, and unacquainted with secular learning, he made up for this by the candour and simplicity of his heart, and the ardour of his piety and desires. Of this he gave a proof when Jesus was going up to the neighbourhood of Jerusalem in order to raise Lazarus to life, where the priests and Pharisees were contriving his death. The rest of the disciples endeavoured to dissuade him from that journey, saying: Rabbi, the Jews but now sought to stone thee; and goest thou thither again? But St. Thomas said to his fellow-disciples: “Let us also go, that we may die with Him!” So ardent was his love of his divine Master, even before the descent of the Holy Ghost.

When our Lord, at His Last Supper, acquainted His disciples that He was about to leave them, but told them for their comfort that He was going to prepare a place for them in His Father’s house, our Apostle, who vehemently desired to follow Him, said: “Lord, we know not whither thou goest, and how can we know the way?” Christ presently rectified his misapprehension by returning this short, but satisfactory answer: “I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No man cometh to the Father but by Me!” By which He gave to understand, that by His doctrine and example He had taught men the path of salvation, and that He is the author of the Way that leadeth to life, which He hath both opened and discovered to us; that He is the teacher of that Truth which directs to it; and the giver of that life of grace here, and of a glorious eternity hereafter, which is to be obtained by walking in this way, and according to this truth.

After Our Lord had suffered, was risen from the dead, and on the same day had appeared to His disciples, to convince them of the truth of His resurrection, Thomas not being with them on that occasion, refused to believe, upon their report that He was truly risen, presuming that it was only a phantom, or mere apparition, unless he might see the very prints of the nails, and feel the wounds in His hands and side. On that day seven-night, our merciful Lord, with infinite condescension to this Apostle’s weakness, presented Himself again, when he and his colleagues were assembled together, probably at their devotions; and after the usual salutation of “Peace be unto you!” He turned to Thomas, and bid him look upon His hands, and put his finger into the hole of His side, and into the prints of the nails.

St. Augustine and many others doubt not but this Apostle did so; though this be not mentioned by the Evangelist, and some think, that being convinced, he refrained out of modesty and respect. It is observed by St. Augustine and others, that he sinned by obstinacy, presumption, and incredulity; for the resurrection of Christ was no more than Moses and the prophets had long before foretold. Nor was it reasonable in him to reject the testimony of such eye-witnesses: and this stubbornness might have betrayed him into infidelity. However, his refractoriness was not a sin of malice, and the mercy of our Redeemer not only brought him to saving repentance, but raised him to the summit of holy charity and perfect virtue.

St. Thomas was no sooner convinced of the reality of the mystery, but, penetrated with compunction, awe, and tender love, he cried out: “My Lord and my God!” Prostrating to Him all the powers of his soul, he acknowledged Him the only and sovereign Lord of his heart, and the sole object of all his affections. Nothing is more easy than to repeat these words; but to pronounce them with a sincere and perfect disposition, is a privilege reserved to those who are crucified to the world, and in whose affections God only reigns by His pure and perfect love. So long as pride, envy, avarice, sensuality, or other passions challenge to themselves any share in our affections, Christ has not established in them the empire of His grace; and it is only in lying and hypocrisy that we call Him our God and our King.

Let us at least labor without ceasing, by compunction and holy prayer, to attain to this happiness, that Christ may establish His reign in us, and that we may be able to say with our whole hearts, “My Lord and my God.” These words St. Thomas spoke with an entire Faith, believing Him truly God, whose humanity only he saw, confessing Him omnipotent, in overcoming death and Hell, and acknowledging His omniscience, who knew the doubts and scruples of his heart. The Apostle also expressed by them the ardor of his love, which the particle “my God” clearly indicates. If we love our God and Redeemer, can we cease sweetly, but with awe and trembling, to call Him our Lord and our God, and to beg with torrents of tears that He become more and more perfectly the God and King of our hearts? From this Apostle’s incredulity Christ mercifully drew the strongest evidence of His resurrection from the confirmation of our Faith beyond all cavil or contradiction. Whence St. Gregory the Great says: “By this doubting of Thomas we are more confirmed in our belief, than by the Faith of the other Apostles.”

Some other fathers take notice, that our Apostle, by this confession, shows himself a perfect theologian, instructed in the very school of truth, declaring in Christ two distinct natures in one and the same person, His humanity by the word Lord, and His divinity by the word God. Faith in the beginning stood in need of miracles, by which God impressed the stamp of His authority upon His holy revelation. But such are the marks and characteristics of His truth herein, that those who can still stand out against all the light and evidence of the Christian revelation, would bar their heart against all conviction from miracles. There were infidels amidst the dispensation of the most evident miracles as well as now. So true it is, that he who believeth not Moses and the prophets, would not believe the greatest of all miracles, one risen from the dead.

After the descent of the Holy Ghost, St. Thomas commissioned Thaddæus to instruct and baptize Abgar, king or toparch of Edessa. This prince, according to the records kept in the church of Edessa, transcribed by Eusebius, and mentioned by St. Ephrem, had written to Christ to invite Him into his kingdom, and begging to be cured by Him of a distemper with which he was afflicted. Christ, in His answer, told him, that He must accomplish the things for which He was sent, and then return to Him who sent Him; but that immediately after His ascension He would send one of His disciples to the king, to heal him, and give life to him and all his family.

This promise of our Lord was made good by St. Thomas, who, by a special direction of the Holy Ghost, sent Thaddæus, one of the seventy-two disciples, and, according to some, his own brother, to Edessa, who restored the king to his health, baptized him and many others, and planted Christianity in that country. This disciple Thaddæus is distinct from St. Judas the Apostle, and is honored by the Greeks, who tell us that he died at Berytus in Phenicia, on the 21st of August.

As for St. Thomas, Origen informs us, that in the distribution made by the twelve, Parthia was particularly assigned to him for his apostolic province, when this nation held the place of the Persian Empire, and disputed the sovereignty with the Romans. After preaching with good success in the particular province of Parthia, he did the same in other nations subject to that empire, and over all the East. Sophronius mentions, that by his apostolic labors he established the Faith among the Medes, Persians, Carmanians, Hyrcanians, Bactrians, and other nations in those parts. Modern Greeks mention also the Indians and Ethiopians; but these appellations were sometimes given by the ancients to all the eastern nations.

The modern Indians and Portuguese tell us, that St. Thomas preached to the Bracmans, and to the Indians beyond the great island Taprobana, which some take to be Ceylon, others Sumatra. They add, that he suffered martyrdom at Meliapor, or St. Thomas’s, in the peninsula on this side the Ganges, on the coast of Coromandel, where his body was discovered, with certain marks that he was slain with lances; and that such was the manner of his death is the tradition of all the eastern countries. Eusebius affirms in general, that the Apostles died by martyrdom. Theodoret, and St. Asterius of Amasea, mention St. Thomas among the principal martyrs of the church. St. Nilus says, that he received the crown of martyrdom after Saints Peter and Paul.

St. Gaudentius mentions, that he was slain by the infidels, and that the miracles which, were performed through him, show that he still lives with God. The same father and Sophronius testify, that he died at Calamina, in India. This city the modern Indians suppose to be Meliapor; but Tillemont and many others think it was not far from Edessa, and that it is not clear that he ever preached beyond the isle of Taprobana. Beausobre thinks he never preached far beyond Parthia and Persia: for the name of King Gundaphore, mentioned by Leucius, in his false Acts, and his copier, Pseudo Abdias, seems corruptly written for the king of Gundschavur, or Gandisapor, which city was rebuilt by Artaxerxes, who founded the second Persian monarchy, and called from his son Schavar, whom the Greeks name Sapor I., who made it has residence.

The author of these false Acts gave to the city the name which it bore when he wrote. All the false Acts, and the Greek Menæ agree, that the infidel king was incensed against the Apostle for having baptized some persons of his court (some say his wife and son), that he delivered him over to his soldiers, in order to be put to death, and that he was conveyed by them to a neighboring mountain, and there stabbed with a lance. It is certain that his body was carried to the city of Edessa, where it was honored in the great church with singular veneration, when St. Chrysostom, Rufin, Socrates, Sozomen, and St. Gregory of Tours wrote. St. Chrysostom says, that the sepulchers only of Saints Peter and Paul, John and Thomas, among all the Apostles were then known; and it is mentioned to have been at Edessa in the oration on this Apostle compiled in the year 402, published among the works of St. John Chrysostom. The church of Edessa was certainly most numerous and flourishing in the second, third, and fourth ages.

Many distant churches in the East ascribe their first foundation to St. Thomas, especially that of Meliapor; but many of them probably received the Faith only from his disciples. The use of the Chaldean language in the churches, and the dependence on the patriarch of Mosul, which the church of Meliapor, and all the Christians of St. Thomas in the East profess, seem to show, that their first teachers came from the churches of Assyria; in which the patriarchs of Mosul (a city built upon the ruins of Seleucia, erroneously called Babylon) exercise a jurisdiction, and have been for many ages the propagators of the Nestorian heresy, with which they are tinctured.

The Portuguese, when they came into the East-Indies, found there the St. Thomas-Christians, it is said, to the number of fifteen thousand families, on the coast of Malabar. For a detail of the Nestorian phrases, and other errors, abuses, and superstitions which prevail among them, see the synod held at Diamper, in the kingdom of Cochin, in 1599, by Alexius de Menezes, archbishop of Goa; in the preface it is shown, that these Christians were drawn into Nestorianism only in the ninth century, by means of certain Nestorian priests who came thither from Armenia and Persia. On two festivals which they keep in honor of St. Thomas, they resort in great crowds to the place of his burial; on Low-Sunday, in honor of his confession of Christ, which Gospel is then read, and chiefly on the 1st of July, his principal feast in the churches of the Indies. John III, king of Portugal, ordered the body of St. Thomas to be sought for in an old ruinous chapel which stood over his tomb without the walls of Meliapor.

By digging there, in 1523, a very deep vault in form of a chapel was discovered, in which were found the bones of the saint, with a part of the lance with which he was slain, and a vial tinged with his blood. The body of the Apostle was put in a chest of porcelain, varnished and adorned with silver. The bones of the prince whom he had baptized, and some others of his disciples, which were discovered in the same vault, were laid in another less precious chest. The Portuguese built a new town about this church, which is called St. Thomas’s, inhabited by Christians of several denominations, and situate near Meliapor, which is inhabited by the Indians.

Many of the Christians of St. Thomas have been brought over to the Catholic Faith and communion; but many continue in the Nestorian errors, and in obedience to the Nestorian patriarch of Mosul. Since the Dutch have taken or ruined most of the Portuguese settlements on that coast, the Indian king of Golcond has taken possession of the town of St. Thomas; but the Portuguese missionaries continue to attend the Catholics there. The Latins keep the feast of St. Thomas on the 21st of December, the Greeks on the 6th of October, and the Indians on the 1st of July.

The Apostles were mean and contemptible in the eyes of the world, neither recommended by birth, riches, friends, learning, nor abilities. Yet totally destitute as they were of all those advantages on which men here set so high a price, they were chosen by Christ, made his friends, replenished with his graces and holy charity, and exalted to the dignity of spiritual princes of his kingdom, and judges of the world. Blind and foolish are all men who over-rate and eagerly pursue the goods of this life; or who so enjoy them as to suffer their hearts to be wedded to them.

Worldly pleasures, riches, or honors, if they become the object of our affections, are, as it were, fetters which fasten us to the earth, and clog our souls; and it is so hard to enjoy them with perfect indifference, to consider them barely as a dangerous stewardship, and to employ them only for the advancement of virtue in ourselves and others, that many saints thought it safer utterly to renounce them, and others rejoiced to see themselves removed from what it is difficult to possess, and not be entangled by.

Are not the maxims of the Gospel, and the example of Christ, our king and leader, and of all his saints, sufficient to inspire those who enjoy the advantages of this world with a saving fear, and to make them study the various obligations of their stewardship, and by watchfulness, voluntary humiliations, mortification, compunction, assiduous prayer, and conversing on heavenly things by holy meditation or reading, to stand infinitely upon their guard, lest the love of the world, or the infection of its pride, vanity, or pleasures seize their hearts.

Faith must be extremely weak and inactive in us, if we look upon the things of this world in any other light than that in which the Gospel places them; if we regard any other goods as truly valuable but those of divine grace and charity, or if we set not ourselves with our whole strength to pursue them by the road of humility, patience, meekness, and piety, in imitation of the saints. The Apostles are herein the objects of our veneration, and our guides and models. We honor them as the doctors of the law of Christ, after Him the foundation-stones of His Church, the twelve gates and the twelve precious stones of the heavenly Jerusalem, and as the leaders and princes of the saints. They also challenge our gratitude, inasmuch as it is by their ardent charity for our souls, and by their labors and sufferings, that we enjoy the happiness of holy Faith, and are ourselves Christians: through them we have received the Gospel.

DECEMBER 22ND
The Martyr of the Day
ST. ISCHYRION
Martyred in the Third Century, around 253

Ischyrion was an inferior officer who attended on a magistrate of a certain city in Egypt, which St. Dionysius has not named. His master commanded him to offer sacrifice to the idols; and because he refused to commit that sacrilege, reproached him with the most contumelious and threatening speeches. By giving way to his passion and superstition, he at length worked himself up to that degree of frenzy, as to run a stake into the bowels of the meek servant of Christ, who, by his patient constancy attained to the glory of martyrdom.

We justly praise and admire the tender piety and heroic fortitude of this holy servant and martyr. It is not a man’s condition, but virtue, that can make him truly great, or truly happy. How mean soever a person’s station or circumstances may be, the road to both is open to him; and there is not a servant or slave who ought not to be enkindled with a laudable ambition of arriving at this greatness, which will set him on the same level with the rich and the most powerful. Nay, a servant’s condition has generally stronger incitements to holiness, and fewer obstacles and temptations than most others. But for this he must, in the first place, be faithful to God, and ardent in all practices of devotion. Some allege want of time to pray; but their meals, their sleep, their diversions demonstrate, that it is not time, but zeal for the divine service that is wanting.

What Christian does not blush at his laziness in this duty, when he calls to mind Epictetus’s lamp, and Cleanthes’s labor, who wrought and earned by night what might maintain him in the study of philosophy by day! Prayer in such a station ought not to trespass upon work, but who cannot, even at his work, raise his mind to God in frequent ejaculations! Also industry, faithfulness, with the most scrupulous exactness, obedience, respect, esteem, and sincere love which a servant owes to a master, with a care of their honor and interest, are duties to God, whose will he does, and whom he honors in proportion to the diligence and ardor with which he acquits himself of them.

Justice, charity, concord, and ready mutual assistance are virtues constantly to be exercised towards fellow-servants, upon which depend the peace, happiness, and good order of the whole family. Patience, meekness, humility, and charity, must be called forth on all occasions, especially under reproofs and injuries, which must always be received in silence, and with sweetness, kindness, and a degree of gratitude when they carry any admonitions with them. Perfect resignation to the will of God, and confidence in his infinite wisdom, power, and goodness, must be joined with constant cheerfulness and contentedness in a person’s station, which brings servants much greater advantages for happiness, and removes them from dangers, hazards, and disappointments, more than is generally considered.

Servants who are kept mostly for state, are of all others most exposed to dangers and ruin, and most unhappy; but must by devotion and other serious employments fill up all their moments. By such a conduct, a servant, how low soever his condition may appear in the eyes of men, will arise to the truest greatness, attain to present and future happiness, and approve himself dear to God, valuable to man, a most useful member of the republic of the world, and a blessing to the family wherein he lives.

DECEMBER 23RD
The Martyrs of the Day
THE TEN MARTYRS OF CRETE
Martyred in the Third Century, around 258

Upon the publication of the edict for persecuting the Christians under Decius, by the activity of a barbarous governor in seeing it rigorously executed, the isle of Crete, now called Candia, soon became one large field of blood. Among the martyrs who there triumphed over the world, the devil and sin, none were more conspicuous than Theodulus, Saturninus, Euporus, Gelasius, Eunicianus, Zoticus, Cleomenes, Agathopus, Basilides, and Evarestus, commonly called the Ten Martyrs of Crete.

The three first were citizens of Gortyna, the metropolis, where they had probably been grounded in the faith by St. Cyril, bishop of that city, who was beheaded for the faith in the same persecution, and is honoured in the Roman Martyrology on the 9th of July. The rest were brought from other towns of the same island; Zoticus (called by some Zeticus) from Gnossus, Pontius from Epinium, Agathopus from Panormus, Basilides from Cydonia, and Evarestus from Heracleum.

Their zeal had united them in their confession of Christ; they were apprehended, insulted, dragged on the ground, beaten, stoned, covered with phlegm and spittle, and at length presented to the governor of the island at Gortyna, and the 23rd of December was appointed for their trial. As soon as they appeared in court, they were ordered to sacrifice to Jupiter, who was particularly worshipped in Crete, and on that very day their countrymen celebrated a festival in his honour with all manner of pleasures, diversions, and sacrifices.

The martyrs answered, they could never offer sacrifice to idols.

The governor said: “You shall know the power of the great gods. Neither do you show respect to this illustrious assembly, which adores the great Jupiter, Juno, Rhea, and the rest.”

The martyrs replied, “Mention not Jupiter, O governor: nor his mother Rhea. We are no strangers to his pedigree, or to the history of his life and actions. We can show you his grave: he was a native of this island, the tyrant of his country, and a man abandoned to every kind of lust, even with his own sex: with these crimes he defiled himself every hour, and made use of spells and enchantments to debauch others. Those who look upon him as a god, must look upon it as a divine thing to imitate his lust and intemperance.”

The proconsul not being able to deny or confute what they alleged, swelled with rage, and the people were ready to tear them to pieces upon the spot, if he had not restrained them, and commanded the martyrs to be inhumanly tormented several ways.

Some of them were hoisted on the rack, and torn with iron nails, so that the ground underneath was covered with great morsels of their flesh; others were pierced on their sides, and in almost every other part with sharp stones, reeds, and pointed sticks; others were beaten with heavy plummets of lead with such cruelty, that their very bones were in some parts broken, and in others disjointed, and their flesh was bruised and torn.

The martyrs endured all with joy, and often repeated to the outcries of the judge and mob, who pressed them to spare themselves by obeying the prince and sacrificing to their gods: “We are Christians: were a thousand deaths prepared for us, we would receive them with joy.”

The whole city thronged about them, and many cried out to the judge against them; nor did he cease stirring up the executioners to exert their whole strength in tormenting them. The saints stood like meek lambs in the midst of so many raging tigers, and only raised their voices to praise God, and declare their constant adherence to his law.

The proconsul at length seeing himself vanquished, condemned them to die by the sword. The soldiers of Christ went forth triumphant to the place of execution without the city, praying to their last breath that God would have mercy on them, and on all mankind, and would deliver their countrymen from the blindness of spiritual ignorance, and bring them to see him in his true light. They were ambitious who should first receive his crown.

When their heads were struck off, and the crowds retired, certain Christians interred their bodies, which were afterwards conveyed to Rome. The fathers who composed the council of Crete in 558, writing to the emperor Leo, say, that through the intercession of these holy martyrs, their island had been till that time preserved from heresy. The Greeks, Latins, and Muscovites commemorate them on this day.

DECEMBER 24TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. GREGORY OF SPOLETO
Martyred in the Fourth Century, around 304

This martyr was a holy priest of Spoleto, who employed his time night and day in fasting and prayer, and in teaching others the holy law of God. It happened that Flaccus, a general of the forces, arrived at that city with a she Emperor Maximian to punish all the Christians. Information was laid before him, that Gregory seduced many and despised the gods and the emperors. Soldiers were immediately dispatched to bring him bound before his tribunal.

When he appeared, Flaccus, with a stern countenance, said: “Are you Gregory of Spoleto?”
The martyr answered, “I am.”
Flaccus again said, “Are you the enemy of the gods, and the contemner of the princes?”
St. Gregory replied, “From my infancy I have always served the God who framed me out of the earth.”
Flaccus asked, “Who is your God?”
“He,” replied the martyr, “who made man to his own image and likeness, who is all-powerful and immortal, and who will render to all men according to their works.”
Flaccus said, “Do not use many words, but do what I command you.”
The martyr replied, “I know not what your command implies, but I do what I am bound to do.”
Flaccus urged, “If you desire to save yourself, go to the wonderful temple, and sacrifice to the great gods; and you shall be our friend, and shall receive many favors from our most invincible emperors.”
St. Gregory said, “I desire not such a friendship, nor do I sacrifice to devils, but to my God, Jesus Christ.”
The judge commanded him to be buffeted on the face, beaten with clubs, and tortured on the rack; and at length ordered his head to be cut off. This happened in 304.

His relics lie in a church which bears his name at Spoleto. Baronius found in the close of a copy of these Acts an authentic testimony of a glorious miracle wrought by their touch in 1037.

DECEMBER 25TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. ANASTASIA
Martyred in the Fourth Century, around 304

Her name is mentioned in the Canon of the Mass, in the Sacramentary of St. Gregory, and in other ancient catalogues of martyrs. There stands in Rome an ancient church, which is dedicated to God in her memory. In the acts of St. Chrysogonus, we are told that she was of an illustrious descent at Rome; that had St. Chrysogonus for her tutor and director in the Faith; and, when that holy martyr was apprehended at Aquileia in the persecution of Diocletian, she went there to comfort him in his chains.

It is further related, that after suffering exquisite tortures, she was sentenced by the prefect of Illyricum to be burnt alive in 304. Her body was removed to Rome, and laid in the church which still bears her name. In this church the popes anciently said their second Mass on Christmas-night, or rather that of the morning, whence a commemoration of her is made in the second Mass.

The relics of St. Anastasia were translated to Constantinople in the time of the Emperor Leo, and deposited first in the church of Anastasia or the Resurrection, afterwards in the patriarchal church of St. Sophia: but were lost when that city was taken by the Turks. The Greek Menologies and the Muscovite Calendars commemorate our saint on the 22nd of December, the Roman Missal on the 25th.

DECEMBER 26TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. STEPHEN THE PROTOMARTYR
Martyred in the First Century

That St. Stephen was a Jew is unquestionable, himself owning that relation in his testimony to the people. But whether he was of Hebrew extraction, and descended of the stock of Abraham, or whether he was of foreign parents incorporated and brought into that nation by the gate of proselytism is uncertain. The name Stephen, which signifies a crown, is evidently Greek; but the priest Lucian, in the history of the discovery of his relics, and Basil of Seleucia inform us, that the name Cheliel, which in modern Hebrew signifies a crown, was engraved on his tomb at Caphragamala.

It is generally held that he was one of the seventy-two disciples of Our Lord; for immediately after the descent of the Holy Ghost, we find him perfectly instructed in the law of the Gospel, endowed with extraordinary measures, both of the interior and exterior gifts of that divine spirit which was but lately shed upon the Church, and incomparably furnished with miraculous powers. The Church of Christ then increased daily, and was illustrious for the spirit and practice of all virtues, but especially for charity. The faithful lived and loved one another as brethren, and were of one heart and one soul. Love and charity were the common soul that animated the whole body of believers.

The rich sold their estates to relieve the necessities of the poor, and deposited the money in one common treasury, the care whereof was committed to the Apostles, to see the distribution made as every body’s necessity required. Heaven alone is free from all occasions of offence, and the number of converts being very great, the Greeks (that is, the Christians of foreign countries, who were born and brought up in countries which spoke chiefly Greek, or at least were Gentiles by descent, though proselytes to the Jewish religion before they came over to the faith of Christ) murmured against the Hebrews, complaining that their widows were neglected in the daily ministration.

The Apostles, to provide a speedy remedy, assembled the faithful, and observed to them, that they could not relinquish the duties of preaching, and other spiritual functions of the ministry to attend to the care of tables; and recommended to them the choice of seven men of an unblemished character, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, who might superintend that affair, that so themselves might be freed from distractions and encumbrances, the more freely to devote themselves without interruption to prayer and preaching the Gospel.

This proposal was perfectly agreeable to the whole assembly, who immediately pitched on Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Ghost, and Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicholas a proselyte of Antioch. All these names are Greek; whence some think they were chosen among the Greeks, in order to appease the murmurs that had been raised. But it frequently happened that Hebrews changed their names into Greek words of a like import, when they conversed with Greeks and Romans, to whom several names in the oriental languages sounded harsh, and were difficult to pronounce. Stephen is named the first of the deacons, as Peter is of the Apostles, says St. Augustine. Hence he is styled by Lucian, archdeacon.

These seven were presented to the Apostles, who praying, imposed hands upon them, by which rite they received the Holy Ghost, to qualify them to become ministers of God’s holy mysteries. Their ordination was made by virtue of a commission, either general or particular, given by Christ to his Apostles for the establishment of inferior ministers or Levites for the service of the altar. Whence St. Paul requires almost the same conditions in deacons as in bishops and priests, and speaks of their sacred ministry. St. Ignatius, the disciple of the Apostles, orders the faithful “to reverence deacons as the command of God,” and calls them, “ministers of the mysteries of Jesus Christ.” And again, “Ministers not of meat and drink, but of the Church of God.”

St. Stephen had the primacy and precedence among the deacons newly elected by the Apostles, as St. John Chrysostom observes, and being filled with the Holy Ghost, preached and pleaded the cause of Christianity with undaunted courage, confirming his doctrine by many public and unquestionable miracles. The number of believers were multiplied in Jerusalem, and a great multitude even of the priests obeyed the faith. The distinguished zeal and success of our holy deacon stirred up the malice and envy of the enemies of the Gospel, who bent their whole force, and all their malice against him.

The conspiracy was formed by the Libertines, (or such as had been carried captives to Rome by Pompey, and had since obtained their freedom,) those of Cyrene, in Lybia, of Alexandria, Cilicia, and Lesser Asia, who had each a distinct synagogue at Jerusalem. At first they undertook to dispute with St. Stephen; but finding themselves unequal to the task, and unable to resist the wisdom and spirit with which he spoke, they suborned false witnesses to charge him with blasphemy against Moses and against God.

The indictment was laid against him in the Sanhedrim, and the saint was hauled thither. After the charge was read, Caiphas, the high priest, ordered him to make his defence. The main point urged against him was, that he affirmed that the temple would be destroyed, that the Mosaic sacrifices were but shadows and types, and were no longer acceptable to God, Jesus of Nazareth having put an end to them. It pleased God to diffuse a heavenly beauty and a shining brightness on the saint’s face, whilst he stood before the council, so that to all that were present it seemed as if it had been the countenance of an angel.

According to the license given him by the high priest to speak for himself, he made his apology, but in such a manner as boldly to preach Jesus Christ in the Sanhedrim itself. He showed that Abraham, the father and founder of their nation, was justified, and received the greatest favors of God without the temple: that Moses was commanded to erect a tabernacle, but foretold a new law and the Messias: that Solomon built the temple, but it was not to be imagined that God was confined in houses made by hands, and that the temple and the Mosaic law were temporary ministrations, and were to give place when God introduced more excellent institutions. The martyr added, that this he had done by sending the Messias himself; but that they were like their ancestors, a stiff-necked generation, circumcised in body, but not in heart, and always resisting the Holy Ghost; and that as their fathers had persecuted and slain many of the prophets who foretold the Christ, so they had betrayed and murdered Him in person, and though they had received the law by the ministry of angels, they had not observed it.

This stinging reproach touched them to the quick, and kindled them into a rage, gnashing with their teeth at the holy martyr, and expressing all the symptoms of unbridled passion. The saint, not heeding what was done below, had his eyes and heart fixed on higher objects, and being full of the Holy Ghost, and looking up steadfastly to the heavens, saw them opened, and beheld his divine Savior standing at the right hand of his Father, appearing by that posture ready to protect, receive, and crown his servant. With this vision the saint was inexpressibly ravished, his soul was inspired with new courage, and a longing to arrive at that bliss, a glimpse of which was shown him. His heart overflowed with joy, and in an ecstasy, not being able to forbear expressing his happiness in the very midst of his enemies, he said: “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God.”

Thus divine consolations are then nearest to us, when human help is furthest from us: but on such occasions we must cleave to God with confidence, and a perfect disengagement of heart from earthly things. If we still hold to them by the least twig, we have not perfectly attained to the dispositions of the saints.

The Jews became more hardened and enraged by hearing the saint’s declaration of this vision, and calling him a blasphemer, resolved upon his death without any further process. In the fury of their blind zeal they staid not for a judicial sentence, not for the warrant of the Roman governor, without which no one could at that time be legally put to death amongst them. But stopping their ears against his supposed blasphemies, they with great clamor rushed upon him, furiously hauled him out of the city, and with a tempest of stones satiated their rage against him.

The witnesses who, according to the Levitical law, were to begin the execution in all capital cases, threw their clothes at the feet of Saul, who thus partook of their crime. In the meantime the holy martyr prayed, saying: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And falling on his knees, he cried with a loud voice, and the greatest earnestness: “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” When he had said this he fell asleep in the Lord. This word is used by the Holy Ghost elegantly to express the sweetness of the death of the just, which is to them a rest after the toils of this painful life, a secure harbor after the dangers of this mortal pilgrimage, and the gate to eternal life.

St. Augustine and other fathers doubt not but the eminent conversion of St. Paul was the fruit of the dying groans and prayer of this martyr, and is a proof of his great interest in heaven. The edification and manifold advantages which the church received from the martyrdom of this great and holy man compensated the loss which it sustained in him. Certain devout men took order to inter him in a decent manner, and made great mourning over him, though such a death was his own most glorious triumph, and unparalleled gain. The priest Lucian, who recounts the manner of the miraculous discovery of his relics in the fifth century, informs us, that they were deposited about twenty miles from Jerusalem, by the direction of Gamaliel, and at his expense. St. Stephen seems to have suffered towards the end of the same year in which Christ was crucified.

DECEMBER 27TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. JOHN THE EVANGELIST & APOSTLE
Martyred in the First or Second Century, around 98 to 101

St. John, a martyr? Well, yes and no! He would have been martyred, had not a miracle preserved him from being boiled alive in oil. St. John the Divine as the son of Zebedee, and his mother’s name was Salome (Matthew 4:21, 27:56; Mark 15:40, 16:1). They lived on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. The brother of St. John, probably considerably older, was St. James. The mention of the “hired men” (Mark 1:20), and of St. John’s “home” (John 19:27), implies that the condition of Salome and her children was not one of great poverty.

SS. John and James followed the Baptist when he preached repentance in the wilderness of Jordan. There can be little doubt that the two disciples, whom St. John does not name (John 1:35), who looked on Jesus “as he walked,” when the Baptist exclaimed with prophetic perception, “Behold the Lamb of God!” were Andrew and John. They followed and asked the Lord where he dwelt. He bade them come and see, and they stayed with him all day. Of the subject of conversation that took place in this interview no record has come to us, but it was probably the starting-point of the entire devotion of heart and soul which lasted through the life of the Beloved Apostle.

John apparently followed his new Master to Galilee, and was with him at the marriage feast of Cana, journeyed with him to Capernaum, and thenceforth never left him, save when sent on the missionary expedition with another, invested with the power of healing.

He, James, and Peter, came within the innermost circle of their Lord’s friends, and these three were suffered to remain with Christ when all the rest of the apostles were kept at a distance (Mark 5:37, Matthew 17:1, 26:37). Peter, James, and John were with Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane. The mother of James and John, knowing our Lord’s love for the brethren, made special request for them, that they might sit, one on his right hand, the other on his left, in his kingdom (Matthew 20:21). There must have been much impetuosity in the character of the brothers, for they obtained the nickname of Boanerges, Sons of Thunder (Mark 3:17, see also Luke 9:54).

It is not necessary to dwell on the familiar history of the Last Supper and the Passion. To John was committed by our Lord the highest of privileges, the care of his mother (John 19:27). John (the “disciple whom Jesus loved”) and Peter were the first to receive the news from the Magdalene of the Resurrection (John 20:2), and they hastened at once to the sepulcher, and there when Peter was restrained by awe, John impetuously “reached the tomb first.”

In the interval between the Resurrection and the Ascension, John and Peter were together on the Sea of Galilee (John 21:1), having returned to their old calling, and old familiar haunts.

When Christ appeared on the shore in the dusk of morning, John was the first to recognize him. The last words of the Gospel reveal the attachment which existed between the two apostles. It was not enough for Peter to know his own fate, he must learn also something of the future that awaited his friend. The Acts show us them still united, entering together as worshippers into the Temple [Acts 3:1], and protesting together against the threats of the Sanhedrin (Acts 4:13). They were fellow-workers together in the first step of Church expansion. The apostle whose wrath had been kindled at the unbelief of the Samaritans, was the first to receive these Samaritans as brethren (Luke 9:54, Acts 8:14).

He probably remained at Jerusalem until the death of the Virgin, though tradition of no great antiquity or weight asserts that he took her to Ephesus. When he went to Ephesus is uncertain. He was at Jerusalem fifteen years after St. Paul’s first visit there [Acts 15:6]. There is no trace of his presence there when St. Paul was at Jerusalem for the last time.

Tradition, more or less trustworthy, completes the history. Irenaeus says that St. John did not settle at Ephesus until after the death Saints Peter and Paul, and this is probable. He certainly was not there when St. Timothy was appointed bishop of that place. St. Jerome says that he supervised and governed all the Churches of Asia. He probably took up his abode finally in Ephesus around 97.

In the persecution of Domitian he was taken to Rome, and was placed in a cauldron of boiling oil, outside the Latin gate, without the boiling fluid doing him any injury. Eusebius makes no mention of this. The legend of the boiling oil occurs in Tertullian and in St. Jerome. He was sent to labor at the mines in Patmos. At the accession of Nerva he was set free, and returned to Ephesus, and there it is thought that he wrote his Gospel.

Of his zeal and love combined we have examples in Eusebius, who tells, on the authority of Irenaeus, that St. John once fled out of a bath on hearing that Cerinthus was in it, lest, as he asserted, the roof should fall in, and crush the heretic. On the other hand, he showed the love that was in him. He commended a young man in whom he was interested to a bishop, and bade him keep his trust well. Some years after he learned that the young man had become a robber. St. John, though very old, pursued him among the mountain paths, and by his tenderness recovered him.

In his old age, when unable to do more, he was carried into the assembly of the Church at Ephesus, and his sole exhortation was, “Little children, love one another.”

The date of his death cannot be fixed with anything like precision, but it is certain that he lived to a very advanced age. He is represented holding a chalice from which issues a dragon, as he is supposed to have been given poison, which was, however, innocuous. Also his symbol is an eagle.

DECEMBER 28TH
The Martyr of the Day
THE HOLY INNOCENTS
Martyred in the First Century, around the birth of Christ

Our Divine Redeemer was persecuted by the world as soon as He made his appearance in it; for He was no sooner born than it declared war against Him. We cannot expect to be better treated than our great Master was before us. He Himself bids us remember that if the world hated Him first, it will likewise hate us, though we have more reason to fear its flatteries and smiles than its rage. The first make a much more dangerous and more violent assault upon our hearts.

Herod, in persecuting Christ, was an emblem of Satan and of the world. That ambitious and jealous prince had already sacrificed to his fears and suspicions the most illustrious part of his council, his virtuous wife Mariamne, with her mother Alexandra, the two sons he had by her, and the heirs to his crown, and all his best friends. Hearing from the Magians who were come from distant countries to find and adore Christ, that the Messias, or spiritual king of the Jews, foretold by the prophets, was born among them, he trembled lest He was come to take his temporal kingdom from him.

So far are the thoughts of carnal and worldly men from the ways of God; and so strangely do violent passions blind and alarm them. The tyrant was disturbed beyond measure, and resolved to take away the life of this child, as if he could have defeated the decrees of Heaven. He had recourse to his usual arts of policy and dissimulation, and hoped to receive intelligence of the child by feigning a desire himself to adore Him; but God laughed at the folly of his short-sighted prudence, and admonished the Magians not to return to him.

St. Joseph was likewise ordered by an angel to take the Child and His mother, and to fly into Egypt. Is our Blessed Redeemer, the Lord of the universe, to be banished as soon as born! What did not He suffer! What did not His pious parents suffer on His account in so tedious and long a journey, and during a long abode in Egypt, where they were entirely strangers, and destitute of all succor under the hardships of extreme poverty! It is an ancient tradition of the Greeks mentioned by Sozomen, St. Athanasius, and others, that at His entrance into Egypt all the idols of that kingdom fell to the ground, which literally verified the prediction of the prophet Isaias. Mary and Joseph were not informed by the angel how long their exile would be continued; by which we are taught to leave all to divine providence, acquiescing with confidence and simplicity in the adorable and ever holy will of Him Who disposes all things in infinite goodness, sanctity, and wisdom.

Herod, finding that he had been deluded by the Magians, was transported with rage and anxious fears. To execute his scheme of killing the Messias, the desired of all nations and the expectation of Israel, he formed the bloody resolution of murdering all the male children in Bethlehem and the neighboring territory which were not above two years of age. In this example we admire how blind and how furious the passion of ambition is. Soldiers are forthwith sent to execute these cruel orders, who, on a sudden, surrounded the town of Bethlehem, and massacred all the male children in that and the adjacent towns and villages, who had been born in the two last years. This more than brutish barbarity, which would almost have surpassed belief, had not Herod been the contriver, and ambition the incentive, was accompanied with such shrieks of mothers and children, that St. Matthew applies to it a prophecy of Jeremias, which may be understood in part to relate more immediately to the Babylonian captivity, but which certainly received the most eminent completion at this time. A voice in Rama was heard, lamentation and great mourning: Rachel bewailing her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not. Rama is a village not far from Bethlehem, and the sepulcher of Rachel was in a field belonging to it. The slaughter also was probably extended into the neighboring tribe of Benjamin, which descended from Rachel. The Ethiopians in their liturgy, and the Greeks in their calendar, count fourteen thousand children massacred on this occasion; but that number exceeds all bounds, nor is it confirmed by any authority of weight.

Innocent victims became the spotless Lamb of God; and how great a happiness was such a death to these glorious martyrs! They deserved to die for Christ, though they were not yet able to know or invoke His Name. They were the flowers and the first fruits of His martyrs, and triumphed over the world, without having ever known it, or experienced its dangers. They just received the benefit of life, to make a sacrifice of it to God, and to purchase by it eternal life. Almost at the same time they began to live and to die; they received the fresh air of this mortal life forthwith to pass to immortality; and it was their peculiar glory not only to die for the sake of Christ, and for justice and virtue, but also in the place of Christ, or in His stead.

How few perhaps of these children, if they had lived, would have escaped the dangers of the world, which, by its maxims and example, bear everything down before it like an impetuous torrent! What snares, what sins, what miseries were they preserved from by this grace! With what songs of praise and love do they not to all eternity thank their Savior, and this His infinite mercy to them! Their ignorant foolish mothers did not know this, and therefore they wept without comfort. So we often lament as misfortunes many accidents, which, in the designs of Heaven, are the greatest mercies.

In Herod we see how blind and how cruel ambition is, which is ready to sacrifice everything, even Jesus Christ, to its views. The tyrant lived not many days longer to enjoy the kingdom which he feared so much to lose.

About the time of Our Lord’s nativity he fell sick, and as his distemper sensibly increased, despair and remorse followed him, and made him insupportable both to himself and others. The innumerable crimes which he had committed were the tortures of his mind, whilst a slow imposthume, inch by inch, gnawed and consumed his bowels, feeding principally upon one of the great guts, though it extended itself over all the rest, and, corroding the flesh, made a breach in the lower belly, and became a sordid ulcer, out of which worms issued in swarms, and lice were also bred in his flesh. A fever violently burnt him within, though outwardly it was scarcely perceptible; and he was tormented with a canine appetite, which no victuals could satisfy.

Such an offensive smell exhaled from his body, as shocked his best friends; and uncommon twitchings and vellications upon the fibrous and membraneous parts of his body, like sharp razors, cut and wounded him within; and the pain thence arising overpowered him, at length, with cold sweats, tremblings, and convulsions. Antipater. in his dungeon, hearing in what a lamentable condition Herod lay, strongly solicited his jailer to set him at liberty, hoping to obtain the crown; but the officer acquainted Herod with the whole affair. The tyrant groaning under the complication of his own distempers, upon this information, vented his spleen by raving and beating his own head, and calling one of his guards, commanded him to go that instant and cut off Antipater’s head.

Not content with causing many to be put to barbarous deaths during the course of his malady, he commanded the Jews, that were of the principal rank and quality, to be shut up in a circus at Jericho, and gave orders, to his sister Salome and her husband Alexas, to have them all massacred as soon as he should have expired, saying, that as the Jews heartily hated him, they would rejoice at his departure; but he would make a general mourning of the whole nation at his death.

This circumstance is at least related by the Jewish historian Josephus. Herod died five days after he had put his son Antipater to death. Macrobius, a heathen writer of the fifth century, relates, that Augustus, “when he heard that, among the children which Herod had commanded to be slain under two years old, his own son had been massacred, said: ‘It is better to be Herod’s hog than his son.’” By this he alluded to the Jewish law of not eating, and consequently not killing swine. Probably the historian imagined the son to have been slain amongst the children, because the news of both massacres reached Rome about the same time.

DECEMBER 29TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. THOMAS BECKET
Martyred in the Twelfth Century, around 1170

There is a romantic legend that the mother of Thomas Becket was a Saracen princess who followed his father, a pilgrim or crusader, back from the Holy Land, and wandered about Europe repeating the only English words she knew, “London” and “Becket,” until she found him. There is no historical evidence to show as a foundation for the story. According to a contemporary writer, Thomas Becket was the son of Gilbert Becket, the Sheriff of London; another relates that both parents were of Norman blood. Take which version you will—whatever his parentage, we know with certainty that the future chancellor and archbishop of Canterbury was born on St. Thomas day, 1118, of a good family, and that he was educated at a school of canons regular at Merton Priory in Sussex, and later at the University of Paris.

When Thomas returned from France, his parents had died. Obliged to make his way unaided, he obtained an appointment as clerk to the sheriff’s court, where he showed great ability. All accounts describe him as a strongly built, spirited youth, a lover of field sports, who seems to have spent his leisure time in hawking and hunting. One day when he was out hunting with his falcon, the bird swooped down at a duck, and as the duck dived, plunged after it into the river. Thomas himself leapt in to save the valuable hawk, and the rapid stream swept him along to a mill, where only the accidental stopping of the wheel saved his life. The episode serves to illustrate the impetuous daring which characterized Becket all through his life.

At the age of twenty-four Thomas was given a post in the household of Theobald, archbishop of Canterbury, and while there he apparently resolved on a career in the Church, for he took minor orders. To prepare himself further, he obtained the archbishop’s permission to study canon law at the University of Bologna, continuing his studies at Auxerre, France. On coming back to England, he became provost of Beverley, and canon at Lincoln and St. Paul’s cathedrals. His ordination as deacon occurred in 1154. Theobald appointed him archdeacon of Canterbury, the highest ecclesiastical office in England after a bishopric or an abbacy, and began to entrust him with the most intricate affairs; several times he was sent on important missions to Rome.

It was Thomas’ diplomacy that dissuaded Pope Eugenius III from sanctioning the coronation of Eustace, eldest son of Stephen, and when Henry of Anjou, great grandson of William the Conqueror, asserted his claim to the English crown and became King Henry II, it was not long before he appointed this gifted churchman as chancellor, that is, chief minister. An old chronicle describes Thomas as “slim of growth, and pale of hue, with dark hair, a long nose, and a straightly featured face. Blithe of countenance was he, winning and lovable in conversation, frank of speech in his discourses but slightly stuttering in his talk, so keen of discernment that he could always make difficult questions plain after a wise manner.” Thomas discharged his duties as chancellor conscientiously and well.

Like the later chancellor of the realm, Thomas Moore, who also became a martyr and a saint, Thomas Becket was the close personal friend as well as the loyal servant of his young sovereign. They were said to have one heart and one mind between them, and it seems possible that to Becket’s influence were due, in part, those reforms for which Henry is justly praised, that is, his measures to secure equitable dealing for all his subjects by a more uniform and efficient system of law.

But it was not only their common interest in matters of state that bound them together. They were also boon companions and spent merry hours together. It was almost the only relaxation Thomas allowed himself, for he was an ambitious man. He had a taste for magnificence, and his household was as fine—if not finer—than the King’s. When he was sent to France to negotiate a royal marriage, he took a personal retinue of two hundred men, with a train of several hundred more, knights and squires, clerics and servants, eight fine wagons, music and singers, hawks and hounds, monkeys and mastiffs. Little wonder that the French gaped in wonder and asked, “If this is the chancellor’s state, what can the King’s be like?” His entertainments, his gifts, and his liberality to the poor were also on a very lavish scale.

In 1159 King Henry raised an army of mercenaries in France to regain the province of Toulouse, a part of the inheritance of his wife, the famous Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Thomas served Henry in this war with a company of seven hundred knights of his own. Wearing armor like any other fighting man, he led assaults and engaged in single combat. Another churchman, meeting him, exclaimed: “What do you mean by wearing such a dress? You look more like a falconer than a cleric. Yet you are a cleric in person, and many times over in office-archdeacon of Canterbury, dean of Hastings, provost of Beverley, canon of this church and that, procurator of the archbishop, and like to be archbishop, too, the rumor goes!” Thomas received the rebuke with good humor.

Although he was proud, strong-willed, and irascible, and remained so all his life, he did not neglect to make seasonal retreats at Merton and took the discipline imposed on him there. His confessor during this time testified later to the blamelessness of his private life, under conditions of extreme temptation. If he sometimes went too far in those schemes of the King which tended to infringe on the ancient prerogatives and rights of the Church, at other times he opposed Henry with vigor.

In 1161 Archbishop Theobald died. King Henry was then in Normandy with Thomas, whom he resolved to make the next primate of England. When Henry announced his intention, Thomas, demurring, told him: “Should God permit me to be the archbishop of Canterbury, I would soon lose your Majesty’s favor, and the affection with which you honor me would be changed into hatred. For there are several things you do now in prejudice of the rights of the Church which make me fear you would require of me what I could not agree to; and envious persons would not fail to make it the occasion of endless strife between us.”

The King paid no heed to this remonstrance, and sent bishops and noblemen to the monks of Canterbury, ordering them to labor with the same zeal to set his chancellor in the see as they would to set the crown on the young prince’s head. Thomas continued to refuse the promotion until the legate of the Holy See, Cardinal Henry of Pisa, overrode his scruples. The election took place in May, 1162. Young Prince Henry, then in London, gave the necessary consent in his father’s name. Thomas, now forty-four years old, rode to Canterbury and was first ordained priest by Walter, bishop of Rochester, and then on the octave of Pentecost was consecrated archbishop by the bishop of Winchester. Shortly afterwards he received the pallium sent by Pope Alexander III.

From this day worldly grandeur no longer marked Thomas’ way of life. Next his skin he wore a hairshirt, and his customary dress was a plain black cassock, a linen surplice, and a sacerdotal stole about his neck. He lived ascetically, spent much time in the distribution of alms, in reading and discussing the Scriptures with Herbert of Bosham, in visiting the infirmary, and supervising the monks at their work. He took special care in selecting candidates for Holy Orders. As ecclesiastical judge, he was rigorously just.

Although as archbishop Thomas had resigned the chancellorship, against the King’s wish, the relations between the two men seemed to be unchanged for a time. But a host of troubles was brewing, and the crux of all of them was the relationship between Church and state. In the past the landowners, among which the Church was one of the largest, for each hide of land they held, had paid annually two shillings to the King’s officers, who in return undertook to protect them from the rapacity of minor tax- gatherers. This was actually a flagrant form of graft and the King now ordered the money paid into his own exchequer. The archbishop protested, and there were hot words between him and the King. Thenceforth the King’s demands were directed solely against the clergy, with no mention of other landholders who were equally involved.

Then came the affair of Philip de Brois, a canon accused of murdering a soldier.

According to a long-established law, as a cleric he was tried in an ecclesiastical court, where he was acquitted by the judge, the bishop of Lincoln, but ordered to pay a fine to the deceased man’s relations. A king’s justice then made an effort to bring him before his civil court, but he could not be tried again upon that indictment and told the king’s justice so in insulting terms. Thereat Henry ordered him tried again both for the original murder charge—and for his later misdemeanor. Thomas now pressed to have the case referred to his own archiepiscopal court; the King reluctantly agreed, and appointed both lay and clerical assessors. Philip’s plea of a previous acquittal was accepted as far as the murder was concerned, but he was punished for his contempt of a royal court. The King thought the sentence too mild and remained dissatisfied. In October, 1163, the King called the bishops of his realm to a council at Westminster, at which he demanded their assent to an edict that thenceforth clergy proved guilty of crimes against the civil law should be handed over to the civil courts for punishment.

Thomas stiffened the bishops against yielding. But finally, at the council of Westminster they assented reluctantly to the instrument known as the Constitutions of Clarendon, which embodied the royal “customs” in Church matters, and including some additional points, making sixteen in all. It was a revolutionary document: it provided that no prelate should leave the kingdom without royal permission, which would serve to prevent appeals to the Pope; that no tenant-in-chief should be excommunicated against the King’s will; that the royal court was to decide in which court clerics accused of civil offenses should be tried; that the custody of vacant Church benefices and their revenues should go to the King. Other provisions were equally damaging to the authority and prestige of the Church. The bishops gave their assent only with a reservation, “saving their order,” which was tantamount to a refusal.

Thomas was now full of remorse for having weakened, thus setting a bad example to the bishops, but at the same time he did not wish to widen the breach between himself and the King. He made a futile effort to cross the Channel and put the case before the Pope. On his part, the King was bent on vengeance for what he considered the disloyalty and ingratitude of the archbishop. He ordered Thomas to give up certain castles and honors which he held from him, and began a campaign to persecute and discredit him. Various charges of chicanery and financial dishonesty were brought against Thomas, dating from the time he was chancellor. The bishop of Winchester pleaded the archbishop’s discharge. The plea was disallowed; Thomas offered a voluntary payment of his own money, and that was refused.

The affair was building up to a crisis, when, on October 13th, 1164, the King called another great council at Northampton. Thomas went, after celebrating Mass, carrying his archbishop’s cross in his hand. The Earl of Leicester came out with a message from the King: “The King commands you to render your accounts. Otherwise you must hear his judgment.”
“Judgment?” exclaimed Thomas. “I was given the church of Canterbury free from temporal obligations. I am therefore not liable and will not plead with regard to them. Neither law nor reason allows children to judge and condemn their fathers. Wherefore I refuse the King’s judgment and yours and everyone’s. Under God, I will be judged by the Pope alone.”

Determined to stand out against the King, Thomas left Northampton that night, and soon thereafter embarked secretly for Flanders. Louis VII, King of France, invited Thomas into his dominions. Meanwhile King Henry forbade anyone to give him aid.

Gilbert, abbot of Sempringham, was accused of having sent him some relief. Although the abbot had done nothing, he refused to swear he had not, because, he said, it would have been a good deed and he would say nothing that might seem to brand it as a criminal act. Henry quickly dispatched several bishops and others to put his case before Pope Alexander, who was then at Sens. Thomas also presented himself to the Pope and showed him the Constitutions of Clarendon, some of which Alexander pronounced intolerable, others impossible. He rebuked Thomas for ever having considered accepting them. The next day Thomas confessed that he had, though unwillingly, received the see of Canterbury by an election somewhat irregular and uncanonical, and had acquitted himself badly in it. He resigned his office, returned the episcopal ring to the Pope, and withdrew. After deliberation, the Pope called him back and reinstated him, with orders not to abandon his office, for to do so would be to abandon the cause of God. He then recommended Thomas to the Cistercian abbot at Pontigny.

Thomas then put on a monk’s habit, and submitted himself to the strict rule of the monastery. Over in England King Henry was busy confiscating the goods of all the friends, relations, and servants of the archbishop, and banishing them, first binding them by oath to go to Thomas at Pontigny, that the sight of their distress might move him. Troops of these exiles soon appeared at the abbey. Then Henry notified the Cistercians that if they continued to harbor his enemy he would sequestrate all their houses in his dominions. After this, the abbot hinted that Thomas was no longer welcome in his abbey. The archbishop found refuge as the guest of King Louis at the royal abbey of St. Columba, near Sens.

This historic quarrel dragged on for three years. Thomas was named by the Pope as his legate for all England except York, whereupon Thomas excommunicated several of his adversaries; yet at times he showed himself conciliatory towards the King. The French king was also drawn into the struggle, and the two kings had a conference in 1169 at Montmirail. King Louis was inclined to take Thomas’ side. A reconciliation was finally effected between Thomas and Henry, although the lines of power were not too clearly drawn. The archbishop now made preparations to return to his see. With a premonition of his fate, he remarked to the bishop of Paris in parting, “I am going to England to die.” On December 1st, 1170, he disembarked at Sandwich, and on the journey to Canterbury the way was lined with cheering people, welcoming him home. As he rode into the cathedral city at the head of a triumphal procession, every bell was ringing. Yet in spite of the public demonstration, there was an atmosphere of foreboding.

At the reconciliation in France, Henry had agreed to the punishment of Roger, archbishop of York, and the bishops of London and Salisbury, who had assisted at the coronation of Henry’s son, despite the long-established right of the archbishop of Canterbury to perform this ceremony and in defiance of the Pope’s explicit instructions. It had been another attempt to lower the prestige of the primate’s see. Thomas had sent on in advance of his return the papal letters suspending Roger and confirming the excommunication of the two bishops involved. On the eve of his arrival a deputation waited on him to ask for the withdrawal of these sentences. He agreed on condition that the three would swear thenceforth to obey the Pope. This they refused to do, and together went to rejoin King Henry, who was visiting his domains in France.

At Canterbury Thomas was subjected to insult by one Ranulf de Broc, from whom he had demanded the restoration of Saltwood Castle, a manor previously belonging to the archbishop’s see. After a week’s stay there he went up to London, where Henry’s son, “the young King,” refused to see him. He arrived back in Canterbury on or about his fifty-second birthday. Meanwhile the three bishops had laid their complaints before the King at Bur, near Bayeux, and someone had exclaimed aloud that there would be no peace for the realm while Becket lived. At this, the King, in a fit of rage, pronounced some words which several of his hearers took as a rebuke to them for allowing Becket to continue to live and thereby disturb him. Four of his knights at once set off for England and made their way to the irate family at Saltwood. Their names were Reginald Fitzurse, William de Tracy, Hugh de Morville, and Richard le Bret.

On St. John’s day Thomas received a letter warning him of danger, and all southeast Kent was in a state of ferment. On the afternoon of December 29th, the four knights came to see him in his episcopal palace. During the interview they made several demands, in particular that Thomas remove the censures on the three bishops. The knights withdrew, uttering threats and oaths. A few minutes later there were loud outcries, a shattering of doors and clashing of arms, and the archbishop, urged on by his attendants, began moving slowly through the cloister passage to the cathedral.

It was now twilight and vespers were being sung. At the door of the north transept he was met by some terrified monks, whom he commanded to get back to the choir. They withdrew a little and he entered the church, but the knights were seen behind him in the dim light. The monks slammed the door on them and bolted it. In their confusion they shut out several of their own brethren, who began beating loudly on the door.

Becket turned and cried, “Away, you cowards! A church is not a castle!” He reopened the door himself, then went towards the choir, accompanied by Robert de Merton, his aged teacher and confessor, William Fitzstephen, a cleric in his household, and a monk, Edward Grim. The others fled to the crypt and other hiding places, and Grim alone remained. At this point the knights broke in shouting, “Where is Thomas the traitor?” “Where is the archbishop?”
“Here I am,” he replied, “no traitor, but archbishop and priest of God!” He came down the steps to stand between the altars of Our Lady and St. Benedict.

The knights clamored at him to absolve the bishops, and Thomas answered firmly, “I cannot do other than I have done. Reginald, you have received many favors from me. Why do you come into my church armed?”
Fitzurse made a threatening gesture with his axe. “I am ready to die,” said Thomas, “but God’s curse on you if you harm my people.” There was some scuffling as they tried to carry Thomas outside bodily.

Fitzurse flung down his axe and drew his sword. “You pander, you owe me fealty and submission!” exclaimed the archbishop.
Fitzurse shouted back, “I owe no fealty contrary to the King!” and knocked off Thomas’ cap.
At this, Thomas covered his face and called aloud on God and the saints. Tracy struck a blow, which Grim intercepted with his own arm, but it grazed Thomas’ skull and blood ran down into his eyes.
He wiped the stain away and cried, “Into Thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit!”
Another blow from Tracy beat him to his knees, and he pitched forward onto his face, murmuring, “For the name of Jesus and in defense of the Church I am willing to die.”
With a vigorous thrust Le Bret struck deep into his head, breaking his sword against the pavement, and Hugh of Horsea added a blow, although the archbishop was now dying. Hugh de Morville stood by but struck no blow. The murderers, brandishing their swords, now dashed away through the cloisters, shouting: “The King’s men! The King’s men!”

The cathedral itself was filling with people unaware of the catastrophe, and a thunderstorm was breaking overhead. The archbishop’s body lay in the middle of the transept, and for a time no one dared approach it. A deed of such sacrilege was bound to be regarded with horror and indignation. When the news was brought to the King, he shut himself up and fasted for forty days, for he knew that his chance remark had sped the courtiers to England bent on vengeance. He later performed public penance in Canterbury Cathedral and in 1172 received absolution from the papal delegates.

Within three years of his death the archbishop had been canonized as a martyr. Though far from a faultless character, Thomas Becket, when his time of testing came, had the courage to lay down his life to defend the ancient rights of the Church against an aggressive state. The discovery of his hairshirt and other evidences of austerity, and the many miracles which were reported at his tomb, increased the veneration in which he was held.

The shrine of the “holy blessed martyr,” as Chaucer called him, soon became famous, and the old Roman road running from London to Canterbury known as “Pilgrim’s Way.” His tomb was magnificently adorned with gold, silver, and jewels, only to be despoiled by Henry VIII; the fate of his relics is uncertain. They may have been destroyed as a part of Henry’s policy to subordinate the English Church to the civil authority. Mementoes of this saint are preserved at the cathedral of Sens. The feast of St. Thomas of Canterbury is now kept throughout the Roman Catholic Church, and in England he is regarded as the protector of the secular clergy.

DECEMBER 30TH
The Martyr of the Day
ST. SABINUS & COMPANIONS
Martyred in the Fourth Century, around 304

The cruel edicts of Diocletian and Maximian, against the Christians, being published in the year 303, Sabinus, bishop of Assisium, and several of his clergy, were apprehended and kept in custody till Venustianus, the governor of Etruria and Umbria, came thither. Upon his arrival in that city, he caused the hands of Sabinus, who had made a glorious confession of his faith before him, to be cut off; and his two deacons, Marcellus and Exuperantius, to be scourged, beaten with clubs, and torn with iron nails or broad tenters, under which torments they both expired.

Sabinus is said to have cured a blind boy; and a weakness in the eyes of Venustianus himself, who was thereupon converted, and afterwards beheaded for the faith. Lucius, his successor, commanded Sabinus to be beaten to death with clubs at Spoleto. The martyr was buried a mile from that city; but his relics have been since translated to Faënza. St. Gregory the Great speaks of a chapel built in his honor near Fermo, in which he placed some of his relics which he had obtained from Chrysanthus, bishop of Spoleto. These martyrs are mentioned on this day in Ado, Usuard, and the Roman Martyrology.

How powerfully do the martyrs cry out to us by their example, exhorting us to despise a false and wicked world! What have all the philosophers and princes found by all their researches and efforts in quest of happiness in it! They only fell from one precipice into another. Departing from its true center they sought it in every other object, but in their pursuits only wandered further and further from it. A soul can find no rest in creatures.

How long then shall we suffer ourselves to be seduced in their favor! Be always deceived, yet always ready to deceive ourselves again! How long shall we give false names to objects round about us, and imagine a virtue in them which they have not! Is not the experience of near six thousand years enough to undeceive us! Let the light of heaven, the truths of the gospel, shine upon us, and the illusions of the world and our senses will disappear. But were the goods and evils of the world real, they can have no weight if they are compared with eternity. They are contemptible, because transient and momentary. In this light the martyrs viewed them. Who is not strongly affected with reading the epitaph which the learned Antony Castalio composed for himself, and which is engraved upon his tomb in the cathedral of Florence.

That peace and rest, now in the silent grave,
At length I taste, which life, oh! never gave.
Pain, labour, sickness, tortures, anxious cares,
Grim death, fasts, watchings, strife, and racking fears,
Adieu! my joys at last are ever crowned;
And what I hop’d so long, my soul hath found.

DECEMBER 31ST
The Martyr of the Day
ST. COLUMBA
Martyred in the Third Century, around 258 to 273

It is reported that her name may have originally been Eporita and came from a noble pagan family of Saragossa. At the age of 16, she fled Spain for Vienne in Gaul (modern-day France), where she was baptized and given the name Columba. Emperor Aurelian wanted her to marry his son, and when she refused he had her imprisoned in a brothel at the amphitheater. While she was in prison, one of the jailers tried to rape her. A she-bear that was being held at the nearby amphitheater attacked the guard and saved her.

Aurelian wanted both Columba and the she-bear burnt alive, but the bear escaped and rain put out the fire, so he had her beheaded, near a fountain called d'Azon. A man who had recovered his sight after praying for her intercession, saw to her burial.

The New Paris Breviary fixes her death either in 258 or in 273. The latter date reduces it to the journey which Aurelian took into Gaul in that year, when he gained a great victory at Chalons.

A chapel was built at the grave, followed later by the Abbey of Sens. Her relics were kept in the Benedictine abbey till they were dispersed by the Huguenots, together with those of many other saints kept there, as Baillet observes. St. Owen, in his life of St. Eligius, mentions a chapel which bore her name at Paris.