Agnes of Rome
d. c. 304
Feast: January 21
You may be quiet, but when it comes to what you hold sacred, you cannot be bought and you cannot be frightened. That is Agnes: a girl in Rome, twelve years old according to tradition, courted by the most powerful men in the city. Her answer: I already belong to another. Around the year 304 she dies a martyr while still a child, and becomes one of the oldest saints of Rome. To this day the Church speaks her name day after day in the Roman Canon, and lambs are blessed on her feast. Her purity was not weakness, it was her whole strength. So tell me: what do you hold so sacred that it is not up for negotiation?
From her life
- martyred as a child
- one of the oldest Roman saints
- named daily in the Roman Canon
- blessing of lambs on her feast day
The bridge to tradition
Purity as strength, not as weakness.