Saints of the Day & More

Around the year 320 in Constantinople by the Empress Helena found the True Cross , the cross that killed Jesus Christ, The Empress and her son Constantine were built on the site of the discovery of the Holy Sepulchre Basilica , which kept the relic. Years later, King Chosroes II of Persia, in 614 invaded and conquered Jerusalem and carried the cross , putting it under the feet of his throne as a sign of his contempt for Christianity. But in 628 the emperor Heraclius managed to beat him and recovered the Cross and took her back to Jerusalem on 14 September that year. This ceremony was performed in which the cross was taken in person by the emperor through the city. Since then, the day was noted in the liturgical calendars as that of the Exaltation of the True Cross. Christianity is a message of love . Why then exalt the Cross? In addition, the Resurrection , rather than the Cross, gives meaning to our lives. But that is the Cross , the scandal of the Cross , St. Paul. We would not have ...

St. Helena was the mother of Constantine the Great. This made her the Queen to the Roman Empire, it was because of Helena that Constantine converted to Christianity and thus creating the Holy Roman Empire. According to St. Ambrose, Helena was an inn-keeper when Constantius lifted her from her lowly position and made her his consort. There exists a legend that she was the daughter of a British king, but there is no historical foundation for this. It is, however, true that Constantius spent some time in Britain putting down a rebellion among the Picts and Scots, and died at York, but it is thought that he had cast off Helena and taken a new wife long before this time. On the death of his father, the young Constantine brought his mother to live at court at Byzantium, the capital of the Eastern Empire. He honored her by giving her the Roman title of Augusta and also had coins struck bearing her image. Everyone knows the story of Constantine's dramatic conversion. The Church historian...

The principal patron of Ancona, St. Judas Cyriacus, may possibly have been a local bishop who died or was killed during a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. On the other hand, he has been conjecturally identified with Judas, bishop of Jerusalem, who was slain during a riot in the year 133. The local tradition of Ancona, however, connects its patron with Judas Quiriacus, a legendary Jew who is supposed to have revealed to the Empress Helen, the place in which the Holy Cross lay hidden, and after being baptized and made bishop of Jerusalem, to have suffered martyrdom under Julian the Apostate. A fantastic account of his dialogue with the emperor Julian, and of the torments endured by him and his mother Anna, is furnished in the so-called "Acts" of his martyrdom. Ancona is said to owe to the Empress Galla Placidia the relics of its patron, but the saint's head was brought over from Jerusalem by Henry, Count of Champagne, who built a church in the town of Provins to contain it.