ON ST. THARSICIUS, ACOLYTE AND MARTYR,
AT ROME,
From the Acts of St. Stephen the Pope, II August.
CommentaryTharsicius, acolyte, M., at Rome (S.)
J. B. S.
Among the many distinguished disciples of this holy Pontiff there is deservedly reckoned this most valiant martyr Tharsicius, praised by Ado as "a small Roman leader," and after him by Usuard and all his progeny. The occasion of his martyrdom is related by the Acts already cited on the second day of August, number 22, page 145. We here transcribe them from Peter de Natalibus, book 7, chapter 66: Tharsicius, acolyte and martyr, suffered at Rome under the persecution of the emperors Valerian and Gallienus. When he was carrying the Sacraments of the Body of Christ, the pagans, seizing him, began to press him to disclose what he was bearing. But he, judging it unworthy to cast pearls before swine, would by no means uncover the most sacred mysteries; and they beat him with clubs and stones so long that he breathed out his spirit. And when the sacrilegious examiners had rolled over his lifeless body, they could find nothing of the Sacraments of Christ in his hands or in his garments, but left the body and fled in terror; which body, taken up by the Christians, was buried on the Appian Way in the Cemetery of Calixtus on the XVIII of the Kalends of September.
That which here might give offense to the less instructed — namely, that the Sacraments should be carried by an acolyte — Baronius explains at length in an annotation: that it was customary in the Church, especially when persecutions were raging, that provision should be made for the Christians in this manner, amid the very great scarcity and want of ministers. Here we add, from Aringhi's Roma subterranea, volume 1, page 456, that Pope Damasus adorned the sepulchre of this blessed man also with these verses, as with the insignia of a noble triumph:
Whoever you are that read, learn the equal merit of the two, To whom Damasus the ruler renders titles after their rewards. The Jewish people had struck down with stones Stephen, who admonished them to better things, And he bore away the trophy from the enemy — The faithful Levite first seized martyrdom. Holy Tharsicius, bearing the Sacraments of Christ, When a frenzied band sought to divulge them to the profane, He chose rather, being struck down, to let go his soul Than to betray the heavenly members to the raging dogs.