March 7 -- Feast of Saints Perpetua and Felicitas

The Many Shades of the Martyrs

Perpetua, a woman living in Roman Carthage at the turn to the third century AD, was the daughter of a mixed marriage.  Dad was a polytheist but Mom was apparently a Christian  [There's some confusion about whether little Dinocrates, was ever baptized.  Saint Augustine of Hippo weighs in on the matter here.] 

A little lighter, if you please

Anyway, Perpetua was around twenty-two years old and a nursing mother when she was busted for Christianity.  No mention is made of her husband, though brothers and sisters are noted.  Widow?  Unwed mom?  We're left to speculate.

How about more contrast?

The persecution of Septimus Severus was a peculiar one.  No Roman subject was allowed to convert to Christianity (or Judaism), though long-standing Christians got a pass.  As a bust, this one must have felt pretty good.  Along with Perpetua and her pregnant slave Felicity, a slave named Revocatus and two free Romans, Saturninus and Secundulus, were also arrested.  All were catechumens -- students receiving Christian instruction -- and as such fell afoul of the Emperor's decree.  Their catechist (instructor), Saturus, surrendered himself so that he could encourage them to hold fast until their martyrdom rather than caving in and sacrificing.  March 7 is actually the feast of all of them in the some of the traditions (Lutheran, Episcopal, new Roman Catholic).

Warrior Princess

There are lots of cool elements in Felicity's Acta (account of the events leading to her martyrdom).  She and her dad quarreled about Christianity; he made the very practical argument that she needed to think about her infant son's welfare.  Dad was actually brought to her trial to again plead for her to apostatize, and when his arguments failed, he was beaten with a rod in front of her.  She was emotionally distressed, but didn't cave.

Mmmmm, caramel.

She she discussed the dreams she had while she was in prison.  In one, she saw little Dinocrates suffering the torments of Hell since he died unbaptized.  She prayed for his relief and saw him in light and comfort, with only a scar to show that he had suffered.  She also dreamt of a dragon at the base of a narrow bronze ladder that reached all the way to heaven.  On each side of the ladder were razors and swords and implements of destruction.  Saturus the Catechist climbed the ladder first and urged Perpetua to follow him to heaven.  The dragon raised his head, threatening Perpetua as she approached, but she used his head as a step to reach the first rung of the ladder.  In a third dream, she fought a gladiatorial battle with an Egyptian, whom she equated with the Devil, and she thumped him mightily.

The Rainbow Martyr Squad

The condemned martyrs were imprisoned by a man named Pudens.  Prisons could be lucrative if you got the right internees -- you could charge bribes for everything.  They were thrown into an overcrowded little room and given nothing until the local deacons came by and offered some bribes.  Move them to a better spot? Ka-ching!  You want to visit? Ka-ching!  Bring food to them?  Ka-ching!  Over time, however, Pudens began to be impressed with his prisoners' stalwart devotion to the Lord.  His treatment of them improved.  The story predictably notes that Pudens secretly became a Christian before his charges were executed. In fact, in the arena, as he lay dying, Saturus took Pudens' ring and bathed it in the blood of his wounds to seal the jailer's faith. 

The account of the children has a touch of the miraculous to it, or perhaps just rationalization.  Perpetua's baby is with her in prison, unwell while she is unwell, but then he thrives when their treatment improves.  He is taken to his grandfather's house, and when she asks that the child be returned to prison with her, he refuses.  Instead, the old man comes to beg Perpetua to apostatize for the little one's sake.  He goes so far as to say that the child will die without her.  This time, she refuses.  (Stubborn family.)  Instead, she and the others pray; the child is weaned and she suffers no engorgement.  Similarly, poor Felicity is eight months pregnant and worried that if she doesn't deliver in time, she'll miss the big execution date.  No one wants to be left behind, right?  The martyrs all pray again and she delivers early, right there in jail.  The baby daughter is taken from her and sent to her aunt to be raised.  Felicity, meanwhile, is cleared for take-off. 

Euro-Style!

The big day comes and they are all brought to the arena to be thrown to the wild beasts.  The military tribune in charge of them was treating them rather harshly until Perpetua pointed out that you could hardly impress the crowd and honor the Emperor by executing some battered, broken prisoners who already looked more dead than alive.  He agreed.  Then he tried to dress them in sacrificial robes: Saturn for the men and Ceres for the women.  Again, Perpetua was not having it, arguing that they had confessed in court of their own free will and deserved to die in their own clothes.  Somehow that argument worked (at least for the men).

The men were pitted against leopards, bears, and boars.  At least one bear refused to attack, preferring the cool and (relative) quiet of its cage, but the others made a pretty good show.  In fact the gladiator who tied Saturus to a boar was gored and died of his wounds, but Saturus himself survived being dragged by the frenzied animal and was -- as he predicted -- killed by a leopard.

The two women were stripped naked and sent into the arena with a maddened heifer.  The crowd disapproved of their nakedness; the Acta mentions that Felicity was still leaking milk from her breasts.  So the tribune ordered them to be given their clothes again before they died.  The heifer tossed Perpetua, who sat up and held together the tear in her tunic so that he thigh would not be exposed.  Then she asked for a pin to put her hair back up so that he did not look slatternly at her death.  It's always good to keep up appearances. Somehow the fight went out of the heifer and so the throats of the surviving martyrs were cut by gladiators.

Even in this, Perpetua's courage and resolution did not fail.  The gladiator made the first nervous hack at her throat, but struck her collarbone instead.  After screaming in pain, she regained her self-control and placed her hand on his.  Then she guided the blade up to her throat where he could dispatch her with a quick plunge.

Now that's a story worth hearing on Sunday morning.  If there had been more of this stuff, and fewer epistles, I might have been more attentive.