Friends at Court

New Zealand Tablet, 11 January 1917, Page 3

Friends at Court

January 14, Sunday.— Second Sunday after the Epiphany. t ~ 15, Monday.St. Paul, the First Hermit. |- - ',, 16, Tuesday.— St. Marcellus, Pope and Martyr ~ 17, Wednesday.—St. Anthony, Abbot. ~ 18, Thursday.—St. Peter’s Chair, Rome. ~ 19, Friday. —SS. Marius and Companions, Martyrs. ~ 20, Saturday.— SS. Fabian and Sebastian, Martyrs. Chair of St. Peter at Rome. This feast commemorates the residence and pontificate of St. Peter at Rome. At first he had fixed his See at Antioch, but, thinking it advisable that the Supreme Head of the Church should reside in the capital of the then known world, lie came to Rome. His residence there extended, according to the more Commonly received opinion, from A.I). 42 to his martyrdom in 67. SS. Fabian and Sebastian, Martyrs. St. Fabian was elected Pope in 236, and governed the Church for fourteen years. His life, like that of so many of the early Popes, was closed by martyrdom, A.D. 250. St. Sebastian was an officer of high rank in the Imperial Guard. Owing to his virtue and courage, he was much esteemed by the Emperor Diocletian, and was enabled by the influence thus acquired to protect numbers of his persecuted fellow-Christians. He was beaten to death with clubs about the year 288.