Augustine of Hippo preaches a sermon for the feast of the *Volitan Martyrs (S00037). Sermon 156, delivered in Latin in Carthage (central North Africa), in the basilica of Gratianus, most probably in 417.
Evidence ID
E08139
Type of Evidence
Literary - Sermons/Homilies
Major author/Major anonymous work
Augustine of Hippo
Augustine of Hippo, Sermon 156
[Habitus in basilica Gratiani, die natali Martyrum Bolitanorum.
'Preached in the basilica of Gratianus, on the feast day of the Volitan martyrs']
The sermon comments on the passage from Romans 8: 12-17, and has an anti-Pelagian character. Augustine does not mention the Volitan martyrs in it.
Text: Patrologia Latina 38, 1082.
Translation and summary: Stanisław Adamiak.
Liturgical ActivitiesSermon/homily
Festivals
Sermon/homily
Eucharist associated with cult
FestivalsSaint’s feast
Source
Augustine of Hippo was born in 354 in the north African city of Thagaste. He received an education in rhetoric at Carthage, and after a period teaching there moved to Rome, and then in 384 to a public professorship of rhetoric in Milan. In these early years of adulthood Augustine was a Manichaean, but then got disillusioned with this religion, and in Milan in 386, largely under the influence of Ambrose, bishop of the city, he converted to Christianity, and was baptised by Ambrose in 387. Returning to Africa in 388, he was ordained a priest in 391 at Hippo Regius (in the province of Numidia), and rapidly acquired a reputation as a preacher. In 395 he became bishop of Hippo, which he remained until his death in 430. Details of his early life were recorded by Augustine himself in his Confessions, and shortly after his death a pupil and long-time friend, Possidius, wrote his Life, focused on Augustine as an effective Christian writer, polemicist and bishop (E00073).Amongst his many writings, the most informative on the cult of saints are his numerous Sermons, the City of God, and a treatise On the Care of the Dead. The Sermons tell us which saints (primarily African, but with some from abroad) received attention in Hippo, Carthage and elsewhere, and provide occasional details of miracles and cult practices. The City of God records the distribution, and subsequent miracles, of the relics of saint Stephen, after they arrived in Africa from Palestine in around 420. On the Care of the Dead, discusses the possible advantages of burial ad sanctos (in other words, close to a saint), and theorises on the link between the saints who dwell in heaven and their corporeal remains buried in their graves. In these works, and others, Augustine reveals his own particular beliefs about the saints, their relics and their miracles.
This sermon is dated to 417 by La Bonnardière on the basis of its place in the chronology of the Pelagian controversy.
Discussion
The Volitan martyrs are commemorated in the Calendar of Carthage on the 17 October (E02201). They are probably named after a place, otherwise unknown to us.Bibliography
La Bonnardière, A.M., "La date des sermons 151 à 156 de saint Augustin," Revue des études augustinniennes 27 (1981), 129-136.Record Created By
Robert Wiśniewski / Stanisław Adamiak
Date of Entry
07/04/2021
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S02909 | Volitan Martyrs, martyrs of North Africa | Bolitani | Certain |
|---|
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Robert Wiśniewski / Stanisław Adamiak, Cult of Saints, E08139 - http://csla.history.ox.ac.uk/record.php?recid=E08139