January 20 - St. Sebastian

Here he is.  St. Sebastian.  The guy with the arrows.  You can’t miss seeing him in any great art museum.  Renaissance painters loved him because he provided a socially acceptable opportunity to paint a nude male torso with arrows sticking out of it. 

 

Plus, his story is fantastic.

 

Sebastian (lived approximately 257-288) joined the army in Rome around the year 283 to provide secret protection and support to fellow Christians who were being persecuted.  Once, twin brothers Marcus and Marcellinus were in prison awaiting execution for their faith, and their non-Christian family was pleading for them to renounce the faith and stay alive.  Sebastian intervened, preaching so fervently about the eternal glory that awaited them in heaven that not only did Marcus and Marcellinus remain firm in their faith until the end, but their family converted as well.  When Chancellor Nicostratus, who was in charge of the prisoners, caught wind of this, Sebastian made the sign of the cross over the lips of Zoe, his deaf-mute wife, and healed her.  She began to speak and professed her faith in Jesus as Lord.  Nicostratus then brought in the other 16 prisoners to be converted.

 

Marcus, Marcellinus, Nicostratus, and Zoe were all martyred.

 

Sebastian also cured Chromatius, the prefect of Rome, from gout.  He and his son converted.  Chromatius freed all of the prisoners under him, freed his slaves, and retired to the countryside.  His son was martyred.

 

Meanwhile, Sebastian was appointed captain of the Praetorian Guard by Emperors Diocletian and Maximian, who were unaware that he was Christian.  When Diocletian found out, he sentenced Sebastian to death by firing squad.  Sebastian was tied to a stake and shot by archers “till he was full of arrows as a hedgehog.”

 

Miraculously, he survived.

 

When a Christian widow went to retrieve his body, she found him still alive.  She secretly nursed him back to health.  As soon as he was able, Sebastian went out into the street and taunted Diocletian as he passed by.  The astonished emperor, taking no chances, ordered him clubbed to death on the spot.

 

He was a very popular saint in his own time and become even more popular in the Middle Ages, when he was known as the patron saint of plague sufferers.  Everyone admired the heroism of Sebastian, the saint who was martyred twice.