Written by Fr. Dennis O'Neill
We recently welcomed to the Shrine of All Saints a spectacular reliquary, containing the bones of seven of the great Fathers of the Church. They were first placed in the reliquary and sealed and certified by Cardinal Marcantonio Colonna, the Vicar General of Rome, on May 12, 1790. Then they were recertified and resealed in the same, freshly cleaned, reliquary on January 14, 1983 by Cardinal Marco Ce, the Patriarch of Venice. He kept it in his own private collection. There are relics of the "Three Hierarchs": Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian of Nazianzus, and John Chrysostom. There are two other Greek Church Fathers: John of Damascus and Maximus the Confessor. Also included are two of the greatest Latin Church Fathers: Pope Gregory I, the Great, and Aurelius Augustine of Hippo.
We recently welcomed to the Shrine of All Saints a spectacular reliquary, containing the bones of seven of the great Fathers of the Church. They were first placed in the reliquary and sealed and certified by Cardinal Marcantonio Colonna, the Vicar General of Rome, on May 12, 1790. Then they were recertified and resealed in the same, freshly cleaned, reliquary on January 14, 1983 by Cardinal Marco Ce, the Patriarch of Venice. He kept it in his own private collection. There are relics of the "Three Hierarchs": Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian of Nazianzus, and John Chrysostom. There are two other Greek Church Fathers: John of Damascus and Maximus the Confessor. Also included are two of the greatest Latin Church Fathers: Pope Gregory I, the Great, and Aurelius Augustine of Hippo.
BASIL THE GREAT (329-379) became to eastern monasticism what St. Benedict was to monasticism in the west. The Rule of St. Basil is the foundational rule for all eastern monks. He was born in Cappadocia (in modern Turkey) to a family of saints. He first studied in Athens and then returned home to become a monk, to be ordained a priest, and to assist the Archbishop of Caesarea. He succeeded as Archbishop and spent the rest of his life pastoring, strongly resisting the Arian heresy, and writing splendid works of theology. His speculations contributed to the final expression of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. After his death, his relics were widely scattered. His skull was given to the Monastery of Great Lavra on Mount Athos by Emperor Nikephoros Phokas. His right arm is in a silver reliquary in the Holy Synod of the Church in Greece. A portion of his right hand is in the church of St. George of the Greeks in Venice. The silver reliquary was made in Constantinople . In 1528, it was brought to Gabriel Severus, the Metropolitan of Monemvasia, who died in Venice in 1616. A portion of his right hand is in Iveron Monastery on Mount Athos. A portion of his left hand is in the Church of the Dormition in New Philadelphia, Greece. There are more relics in the monastery of St. Paul on Mount Athos, the Church of Panagia Pantanassa in Patras, Greece, the Monastery of Kykkos in Cyprus, the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow, the Dionysiou Monastery and the Pantokratoros Monastery on Mount Athos, the Monastery of St. Theodosios in Argos, Greece, and the Lavra of St. Alexander Nevsky in St. Petersburg.
GREGORY THE THEOLOGIAN, OF NAZIANZEN (329-390) gladly accepted his friend Basil's invitation to join him in a newly founded monastery after his baptism at the age of 30. When his father Gregory, bishop of Nazianzen, needed help, Basil, by now the Archbishop, ordained his friend Gregory practically by force and sent him to Nazianzen - a wretched place that he always resented. It led to the cooling of their friendship. During this time, the Arian heresy had so widely spread that its followers had taken over all the churches in Constantinople. Gregory was sent there to combat this and revive the faith. He stayed in a house-church dedicated to the Resurrection and wrote magnificent theological works. His theological discourses earned him the title "the Theologian". As patriarch of Constantinople, He presided at the first, highly-combative Council of Constantinople. There he managed to complete the Nicene Creed as we know it and then quickly retired to Nazianzen, doing all he could to avoid the public until he died. He was buried in his home town. Subsequently, his mortal remains were brought to and kept in the Cathedral of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople. The transfer of the relics to Rome is closely linked to the history of the Benedictine monastery of Santa Maria in the Field of Mars and its oratory annex of "San Gregorio de Nacianzo". The relics were first brought there by Byzantine nuns from Santa Anastasia in Constantinople. They were fleeing the persecutions of the emperors Leo III and Constantine V in the eighth century. They deposited the relics at Santa Maria in the Field in 986. When the new Basilica of St. Peter was being constructed, Pope Gregory XIII asked that the relics be transferred there and had them enshrined in the Gregorian chapel. The Pope allowed the nuns to retain one of St. Gregory's arms. (Another arm in in the Cathedral of Lisbon). On August 19, 2004, by will of Pope St. John Paul II, were removed from their bronze chest and delivered to the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, on November 27, 2004. They are now in the patriarchal church of St. George in Istanbul. Along with them were transferred the bulk of the relics of five others.
JOHN CHRYSOSTOM (344-497) Born in Antioch, as a young man, he attended the lectures of the pagan rhetor Libanius. At 39, he was baptized and ordained a lector. After the death of his mother, he withdrew to a cave to live an extremely ascetic life, which left him with stomach problems for the rest of his life. He returned to Antioch and was ordained in 386 by the Patriarch, St. Flavian. He was both the bishop's able assistant and an outstanding preacher until he was called to become Patriarch of Constantinople in 398. He was a determined and tough reformer of the Church - especially of the clergy and of the profligate Empress Eudoxia, who hated him for his constantly challenging her lifestyle in his preaching. She and the Emperor Arcadius conspired with the villainous Patriarch Theophilus of Alexandria to get John deposed for heresy and exiled from the capital. The uproar in reaction was so great that they were forced to bring him back. But when he protested at the boisterous activities surround the unveiling of a silver statue of Arcadius, he was driven into a more severe exile, during which he died of the rough treatment at Comana in 407. The children of the royal couple, Theodosius II and Pulcheria felt so badly about the way their parents had treated the patriarch that, in 438, at the behest of St. Proclus, the patriarch, they ordered his remains to be solemnly brought back to the capital and to be placed in the Church of Holy Peace (St. Irene). When St. John's remains were discovered to be incorrupt, they were transferred to the Church of the Holy Apostles. There they remained until looting crusaders stole them during the sack of Constantinople in 1204. They ended up in St. Peter's in Rome, near the remains of St. Gregory of Nazianzus, beneath the Altar of Our Lady of Succour, until they were returned to the Ecumenical Patriarch, together with the remains of John Chrysostom on the same day. The skulls of Sts. Gregory of Nazianzus and John Chrysostom are in the Vatopedi Monastery on Mount Athos.
MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR (589-662) was a Christian monk, theologian, and scholar. In his early life, he was a civil servant of the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius. But he gave this up to become a monk. He used his broad and deep education in philosophy and theology in support of the Nicene Constantinople Creed and the doctrine that Jesus had both a human and a divine nature, against the Monothelites. He was eventually persecuted for his Christological positions. Following a trial, his tongue and right hand were mutilated. He was then exiled and died on August 13, 662 in Tsageri in present-day Georgia. However, his theology was upheld by the Third Council of Constantinople and he was venerated as a saint soon after his death. His tomb is under the altar of a small church in Tsageri, Georgia. The monastery of St. Maximus was built on the site of the ancient church dedicated to St. Arsenius. During the Communist era, the tomb was abandoned and the monastery destroyed. However, the saint's name continued to be venerated in the area. This motivated the local bishop, Stephen Kalaijshvili to initiate archaeological research into this church. The remains of four men were excavated, and they are pretty sure which bones are those of St. Maximus. But the only piece of relic absolutely known to date consists of the saint's right hand, cut off during his second trial in 622 and later recovered by his disciples. It has been preserved for centuries at the monastery of St. Paul on Mount Athos.
JOHN OF DAMASCUS (675-749) was a Christian priest, a monk, a famous hymnographer, and the foremost writer in the defense of the veneration of images. He spent most of his life in the monastery of St. Sabas (Mar Saba), near Jerusalem, and all of his life was under Muslim rule, indeed protected by it. He was born in Damascus, received a classical and theological education, and followed his father in a government position under the Arabs. After a few years, he resigned and moved to Mar Saba. He is famous in three areas: he is known for his writings against the Iconoclasts, who opposed the veneration of images.
Paradoxically, it was the Christian Emperor Leo who forbade the practice, and it was only because John lived under Muslim protection that his enemies could not harm him. Second, he is famous for his treatise, "Exposition of the Orthodox Faith", a summary of the writings of all of the Greek fathers, of whom he became the last. Thirdly, he was known as a poet - one of the two greatest of the Eastern Church (the other being Romanos the Melodist). His devotion to the Blessed Virgin is especially well known. After John passed away on December 4, 749, he was buried in his monastery at Mar Saba. His relics were probably transferred to Constantinople by the Emperor Andronikos II Paleologus (d. 1328). But some of them ended up at the monastery of the Blessed Virgin in Kaharitomeni. Other places where his relics can be found are St. Georgios Alamanos Monastery, Pendakomo, Cyprus; in the Monastery of St. John the Theologian in Patmos, Greece, and the Church of San Giorgio dei Greci in Venice.
AURELIUS AUGUSTINUS OF HIPPO (354-430) A Christian at 33, a priest at 35, a bishop at 41. Everyone is familiar with the sketch-biography of Augustine of Hippo, sinner turned saint. His writings reveal the intensity with which he lived his life, whether his path led away from or to God. The tears of his mother Monica, the instructions of Ambrose, and most of all, God himself speaking to him in the Scriptures redirected Augustine's love of life to a life of love. He is one of the greatest and most prolific of the Fathers of the Western Church. His times were truly decadent - politically, socially, and morally. He was both feared and loved, like his Master. The perennial criticism: a fundamental rigorism. In his day, he providentially filled the office of prophet, outspoken critic of the declining world around him. When he died in Hippo Regius on August 28, 430, his city was under siege and about to be overrun by Vandals. Owing to the threat of the Vandals, his remains were brought to Sardinia in 508 by St. Fulgentius, bishop of Ruspe, and other North African bishops fleeing Vandal persecution. In 721, to protect them from Saracen raiders, the Lombard King Liutprand ordered that the relics be transferred again to Pavia, where they were placed in the church of St. Michele in Cielo d'Orio - now the Cathedral of San Pietro Cielo d'Orio. They remain there to this day in a glorious medieval sarcophagus. One of his right forearm bones can be found in the arm of a marble recumbent statue of him in the Basilica in Algeria built above the ruins of ancient HIppo and dedicated to St. Augustine.
POPE GREGORY I THE GREAT (540-604) The son of a senator and himself prefect of Rome at 30, Gregory decided to turn his estate in Rome into a Benedictine monastery and also to give the extensive property he inherited in Sicily to the Benedictines. He was appointed Papal ambassador to Constantinople for 6 years. When he returned to Rome, he was elected Pope. Although he was the first pope from a monastic background, his prior political experiences may have helped him be a talented administrator. During his papacy, his administration greatly surpassed those of the emperors in improving the welfare of the people of Rome. He also challenged the theological views of Patriarch Eutychius of Constantinople before the Emperor Tiberius II. He regained papal authority in Spain and France and sent Augustine, prior of his monastery in Rome, and Paulinus, to lead a group of 40 missionaries to Kent in England, marking the beginning of the English church. He combatted the heresy of Donatism in North Africa and came to be regarded as the "father of Christian worship" because of his exceptional efforts in revising the Roman liturgy of the day. Immediately after his death in 604, he was regarded as a saint. His relics are in the Clementine Chapel in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. Part of his relics were stolen and brought, along with those of St. Sebastian, to St. Medard in Soissons. During the Middle Ages, several relics were sent to England and ended up in churches in Durham, Exeter, and London. These are the sorts of bone in the reliquary: Basil the Great: distal part of his right tibia; Gregory the Theologian of Nazianzus: distal part of his right tibia; John Chrysostom: proximal part of his left tibia; Maximus the Confessor: bottom of his right humerus; John of Damascus: two parts of the head of his femur: Aurelius Augustinus of Hippo: distal part of his left femur: Gregory I the Great: xyphoid part of his sternum.
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GREGORY THE THEOLOGIAN, OF NAZIANZEN (329-390) gladly accepted his friend Basil's invitation to join him in a newly founded monastery after his baptism at the age of 30. When his father Gregory, bishop of Nazianzen, needed help, Basil, by now the Archbishop, ordained his friend Gregory practically by force and sent him to Nazianzen - a wretched place that he always resented. It led to the cooling of their friendship. During this time, the Arian heresy had so widely spread that its followers had taken over all the churches in Constantinople. Gregory was sent there to combat this and revive the faith. He stayed in a house-church dedicated to the Resurrection and wrote magnificent theological works. His theological discourses earned him the title "the Theologian". As patriarch of Constantinople, He presided at the first, highly-combative Council of Constantinople. There he managed to complete the Nicene Creed as we know it and then quickly retired to Nazianzen, doing all he could to avoid the public until he died. He was buried in his home town. Subsequently, his mortal remains were brought to and kept in the Cathedral of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople. The transfer of the relics to Rome is closely linked to the history of the Benedictine monastery of Santa Maria in the Field of Mars and its oratory annex of "San Gregorio de Nacianzo". The relics were first brought there by Byzantine nuns from Santa Anastasia in Constantinople. They were fleeing the persecutions of the emperors Leo III and Constantine V in the eighth century. They deposited the relics at Santa Maria in the Field in 986. When the new Basilica of St. Peter was being constructed, Pope Gregory XIII asked that the relics be transferred there and had them enshrined in the Gregorian chapel. The Pope allowed the nuns to retain one of St. Gregory's arms. (Another arm in in the Cathedral of Lisbon). On August 19, 2004, by will of Pope St. John Paul II, were removed from their bronze chest and delivered to the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, on November 27, 2004. They are now in the patriarchal church of St. George in Istanbul. Along with them were transferred the bulk of the relics of five others.
JOHN CHRYSOSTOM (344-497) Born in Antioch, as a young man, he attended the lectures of the pagan rhetor Libanius. At 39, he was baptized and ordained a lector. After the death of his mother, he withdrew to a cave to live an extremely ascetic life, which left him with stomach problems for the rest of his life. He returned to Antioch and was ordained in 386 by the Patriarch, St. Flavian. He was both the bishop's able assistant and an outstanding preacher until he was called to become Patriarch of Constantinople in 398. He was a determined and tough reformer of the Church - especially of the clergy and of the profligate Empress Eudoxia, who hated him for his constantly challenging her lifestyle in his preaching. She and the Emperor Arcadius conspired with the villainous Patriarch Theophilus of Alexandria to get John deposed for heresy and exiled from the capital. The uproar in reaction was so great that they were forced to bring him back. But when he protested at the boisterous activities surround the unveiling of a silver statue of Arcadius, he was driven into a more severe exile, during which he died of the rough treatment at Comana in 407. The children of the royal couple, Theodosius II and Pulcheria felt so badly about the way their parents had treated the patriarch that, in 438, at the behest of St. Proclus, the patriarch, they ordered his remains to be solemnly brought back to the capital and to be placed in the Church of Holy Peace (St. Irene). When St. John's remains were discovered to be incorrupt, they were transferred to the Church of the Holy Apostles. There they remained until looting crusaders stole them during the sack of Constantinople in 1204. They ended up in St. Peter's in Rome, near the remains of St. Gregory of Nazianzus, beneath the Altar of Our Lady of Succour, until they were returned to the Ecumenical Patriarch, together with the remains of John Chrysostom on the same day. The skulls of Sts. Gregory of Nazianzus and John Chrysostom are in the Vatopedi Monastery on Mount Athos.
MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR (589-662) was a Christian monk, theologian, and scholar. In his early life, he was a civil servant of the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius. But he gave this up to become a monk. He used his broad and deep education in philosophy and theology in support of the Nicene Constantinople Creed and the doctrine that Jesus had both a human and a divine nature, against the Monothelites. He was eventually persecuted for his Christological positions. Following a trial, his tongue and right hand were mutilated. He was then exiled and died on August 13, 662 in Tsageri in present-day Georgia. However, his theology was upheld by the Third Council of Constantinople and he was venerated as a saint soon after his death. His tomb is under the altar of a small church in Tsageri, Georgia. The monastery of St. Maximus was built on the site of the ancient church dedicated to St. Arsenius. During the Communist era, the tomb was abandoned and the monastery destroyed. However, the saint's name continued to be venerated in the area. This motivated the local bishop, Stephen Kalaijshvili to initiate archaeological research into this church. The remains of four men were excavated, and they are pretty sure which bones are those of St. Maximus. But the only piece of relic absolutely known to date consists of the saint's right hand, cut off during his second trial in 622 and later recovered by his disciples. It has been preserved for centuries at the monastery of St. Paul on Mount Athos.
JOHN OF DAMASCUS (675-749) was a Christian priest, a monk, a famous hymnographer, and the foremost writer in the defense of the veneration of images. He spent most of his life in the monastery of St. Sabas (Mar Saba), near Jerusalem, and all of his life was under Muslim rule, indeed protected by it. He was born in Damascus, received a classical and theological education, and followed his father in a government position under the Arabs. After a few years, he resigned and moved to Mar Saba. He is famous in three areas: he is known for his writings against the Iconoclasts, who opposed the veneration of images.
Paradoxically, it was the Christian Emperor Leo who forbade the practice, and it was only because John lived under Muslim protection that his enemies could not harm him. Second, he is famous for his treatise, "Exposition of the Orthodox Faith", a summary of the writings of all of the Greek fathers, of whom he became the last. Thirdly, he was known as a poet - one of the two greatest of the Eastern Church (the other being Romanos the Melodist). His devotion to the Blessed Virgin is especially well known. After John passed away on December 4, 749, he was buried in his monastery at Mar Saba. His relics were probably transferred to Constantinople by the Emperor Andronikos II Paleologus (d. 1328). But some of them ended up at the monastery of the Blessed Virgin in Kaharitomeni. Other places where his relics can be found are St. Georgios Alamanos Monastery, Pendakomo, Cyprus; in the Monastery of St. John the Theologian in Patmos, Greece, and the Church of San Giorgio dei Greci in Venice.
AURELIUS AUGUSTINUS OF HIPPO (354-430) A Christian at 33, a priest at 35, a bishop at 41. Everyone is familiar with the sketch-biography of Augustine of Hippo, sinner turned saint. His writings reveal the intensity with which he lived his life, whether his path led away from or to God. The tears of his mother Monica, the instructions of Ambrose, and most of all, God himself speaking to him in the Scriptures redirected Augustine's love of life to a life of love. He is one of the greatest and most prolific of the Fathers of the Western Church. His times were truly decadent - politically, socially, and morally. He was both feared and loved, like his Master. The perennial criticism: a fundamental rigorism. In his day, he providentially filled the office of prophet, outspoken critic of the declining world around him. When he died in Hippo Regius on August 28, 430, his city was under siege and about to be overrun by Vandals. Owing to the threat of the Vandals, his remains were brought to Sardinia in 508 by St. Fulgentius, bishop of Ruspe, and other North African bishops fleeing Vandal persecution. In 721, to protect them from Saracen raiders, the Lombard King Liutprand ordered that the relics be transferred again to Pavia, where they were placed in the church of St. Michele in Cielo d'Orio - now the Cathedral of San Pietro Cielo d'Orio. They remain there to this day in a glorious medieval sarcophagus. One of his right forearm bones can be found in the arm of a marble recumbent statue of him in the Basilica in Algeria built above the ruins of ancient HIppo and dedicated to St. Augustine.
POPE GREGORY I THE GREAT (540-604) The son of a senator and himself prefect of Rome at 30, Gregory decided to turn his estate in Rome into a Benedictine monastery and also to give the extensive property he inherited in Sicily to the Benedictines. He was appointed Papal ambassador to Constantinople for 6 years. When he returned to Rome, he was elected Pope. Although he was the first pope from a monastic background, his prior political experiences may have helped him be a talented administrator. During his papacy, his administration greatly surpassed those of the emperors in improving the welfare of the people of Rome. He also challenged the theological views of Patriarch Eutychius of Constantinople before the Emperor Tiberius II. He regained papal authority in Spain and France and sent Augustine, prior of his monastery in Rome, and Paulinus, to lead a group of 40 missionaries to Kent in England, marking the beginning of the English church. He combatted the heresy of Donatism in North Africa and came to be regarded as the "father of Christian worship" because of his exceptional efforts in revising the Roman liturgy of the day. Immediately after his death in 604, he was regarded as a saint. His relics are in the Clementine Chapel in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. Part of his relics were stolen and brought, along with those of St. Sebastian, to St. Medard in Soissons. During the Middle Ages, several relics were sent to England and ended up in churches in Durham, Exeter, and London. These are the sorts of bone in the reliquary: Basil the Great: distal part of his right tibia; Gregory the Theologian of Nazianzus: distal part of his right tibia; John Chrysostom: proximal part of his left tibia; Maximus the Confessor: bottom of his right humerus; John of Damascus: two parts of the head of his femur: Aurelius Augustinus of Hippo: distal part of his left femur: Gregory I the Great: xyphoid part of his sternum.
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