Pope Lucius I

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Saint Lucius I
Birth name	Lucius
Papacy began	June 25, 253
Papacy ended	March 5, 254
Predecessor	Cornelius
Successor	Stephen I
Born	??? Rome, Italy
Died	March 5, 254 Rome, Italy
Other popes named Lucius

Styles of Pope Lucius I
Reference style	His Holiness
Spoken style	Your Holiness
Religious style	Holy Father
Posthumous style	Saint

Pope Saint Lucius I was Pope from June 25, 253 to March 5, 254.

St. Lucius was born in Rome at an unknown date, nothing is known about his family except his father's name, Porphyrianus. He was elected probably on June 25, 253, and died on March 5, 254. His election took place during the persecution which caused the banishment of his predecessor Pope Cornelius, and he also was banished soon after his consecration, but succeeded in gaining permission to return.

He is praised in several letters of St. Cyprian (see Epist. lxviii. 5) for condemning the Novationists for their refusal to readmit to communion Christians who repented for having lapsed under persecution.

His feast day is on 5 March, on which date he is commemorated in the Roman Martyrology in the following terms: "In the cemetery of Callistus on the Via Appia, Rome, burial of Saint Lucius, Pope, successor of Saint Cornelius. For his faith in Christ he suffered exile and acted as an outstanding confessor of the faith, with moderation and prudence, in the difficult times that were his."^[1]

From 1602 to 1969 the calendar of saints for use wherever the Roman Rite is celebrated included a commemoration of him as Pope and Martyr in the 4 March Mass of Saint Casimir. Traditionalist Catholics continue to observe this usage.

In spite of what is mistakenly stated in the Liber Pontificalis, he did not in fact suffer martyrdom.^[2] The persecution of Valerian in which he was said to have been martyred is known to have started later than March 254, when Pope Lucius died.

His tombstone is still extant in the cemetery of St. Callixtus. His relics were later brought to the church of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere, along with the relics of St. Cecilia and others. His head is preserved in a reliquary in St. Ansgar Catholic Cathedral in Copenhagen, Denmark. This relic was brought to Roskilde around the year 1100, after St. Lucius had been declared patron of the Danish region Zealand. Pope St. Lucius' head is among the few relics to have survived the Reformation in Denmark.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Catholic Encyclopedia Link
• Opera Omnia

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• This article includes content derived from the Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, 1914, which is in the public domain.

Roman Catholic Church titles
Preceded by Cornelius	Bishop of Rome Pope June 25, 253– March 5, 254	Succeeded by Stephen I

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