medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (25. November) is the feast day of:
>
> Mercurius of Caesarea (d. c. 250) There are two
> legends about Mercurius.
> The first is that he was a Scythian officer in the
> Roman army, who led the
> army to victory against barbarians attacking
> Rome---using a sword given him
> by an angel. He caught the emperor's eye, but also
> the emperor's wrath
> when he refused to join in the thanksgiving
> sacrifice. So he was tortured
> and beheaded. The other legend tells that Mercurius
> was sent by God to
> kill Emperor Julian the Apostate in 363. Mercurius
> appeared with Sts.
> George and Demetrius to the crusaders at Antioch
> during the first crusade.
>
> Moses of Rome (d. c. 250) Moses was a Roman priest,
> one of the first
> victims of Decius' persecution. He was imprisoned
> 11 months and 11 days,
> during which he exchanged letters of encouragement
> with Cyprian of
> Carthage, before being executed.
>
> Catherine of Alexandria ("supposedly 4th cent." as
> Farmer says in the
> Oxford Dict. of Sts) The cult of Catherine began at
> Mt. Sinai in the ninth
> century, where her body had been transported by
> angels. Clearly the
> legend/myth of Catherine was off to a good start.
> Her legend reports that
> she was a noble girl, persecuted as a Christian, who
> refused to marry the
> emperor and defeated 50 philosophers in a debate
> about the veracity of
> Christianity. She was then sentenced to be broken
> on a wheel---which
> exploded, injuring several bystanders---so C. was
> beheaded. The cult of
> Catherine became extremely popular in the later
> Middle Ages, when she
> became the patron of young girls, of students, of
> nurses (milk instead of
> blood flowed from her neck when her head was cut
> off), and of craftsmen
> whose work includes wheels. Her feast was
> suppressed in 1969.
>
> Elisabeth the Good (blessed) (d. 1420) Elisabeth,
> born in 1386, spent her
> whole life in the small community of Franciscan
> tertiaries in her home town
> of Waldsee (Germany). She had a rich mystical life,
> including receiving
> the stigmata, and living for long periods without
> "natural" food (so my
> source says; I'm assuming she's one of those mystics
> who lived on nothing
> but the eucharist). Her cult won formal approval in
> 1766.
>
> Dr. Phyllis G. Jestice
> [log in to unmask]
>
>
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