13 AUGUST – SAINTS HIPPOLYTUS AND CASSIAN (Martyrs)

Hippolytus was baptised by the deacon Saint Lawrence. He was tried before Valerian and sentenced to be torn to pieces by wild horses, as in the myth of his namesake, the son Theseus. After Hippolytus, his nurse Concordia and nineteen other Christians were beheaded outside the Porta Tiburtina and were buried in the cemetery of Saint Lawrence. Cassian, a schoolmaster, was denounced as a Christian and condemned by Julian the Apostate to die at the hands of his pupils. They stabbed him to death with their styli. He died at Imola in central Italy in 363 AD.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

Not far from the sepulchre of Saint Laurence, on the opposite side of the Via Tiburtina, lies the tomb of Saint Hippolytus, one of the sanctuaries most dear to the Christians in the days of triumph. Prudentius has described the magnificence of the crypt, and the immense concourse attracted to it each year on the Ides of August. Who was this Saint? Of what rank and manner of life? What facts of his history are there to be told, beyond that of his having given his blood for Christ? All these questions have in modern times become the subject of numerous and learned works. He was a martyr, and that is nobility enough to make him glorious in our eyes. Let us honour him then, and together with him another soldier of Christ, Cassian of Imola, whom the Church offers to our homage at the same time. Hippolytus was dragged by wild horses over rocks and briars till his body was all torn: Cassian, who was a schoolmaster, was delivered by the judge to the children he had taught, and died of the thousands of wounds inflicted by their styles. The prince of Christian poets has sung of him as of Hippolytus, describing his combat and his tomb.

Also on this day according to the ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:

At Burgos in Spain, the Saints Centolla and Helena, martyrs.

At Constantinople, St. Maximus, a monk, distinguished for learning and for zeal for Catholic truth. Combating valiantly the Monothelites, he had his hands and tongue torn from him by the heretical emperor Constans, and was banished to Chersonesus, where he breathed his last. At this time, two of his disciples, both called Anastasius, and many others endured diverse torments and the hardships of exile.

In Germany, St. Wigbert, priest and confessor.

At Rome, St. John Berchmans, a scholastic of the Society of Jesus, illustrious for his innocence and for his fidelity to the rules of the religious life. He was canonised by Pope Leo XIII.

And in other places, many other holy martyrs, confessors and virgins.

Thanks be to God.