ON S. POTAMION, BISHOP OF AGRIGENTO IN SICILY.
CommentaryPotamion, Bishop of Agrigento in Sicily (S.)
From various sources.
[1] Agrigentum is a maritime city of Sicily, on the River Acragas, whence it derived its name. Here, toward the end of either the sixth or seventh century, The feast of S. Potamion, S. Gregory was Bishop, whose Life, published by Metaphrastes, we shall give on 23 November. The Bishop S. Potamion, who is himself also enrolled in the catalogue of the Saints, admitted this very young man to the clergy. Thus our Octavius Caietanus in his Plan of the work On the Saints of Sicily, at 29 January: "At Agrigento, of S. Potamion, Bishop and Confessor." He cites in the margin the Calendar of Agrigento and Leontius in the Life of Gregory of Agrigento. Ferrarius writes the same.
[2] Concerning S. Potamion these things are narrated in the Life of Gregory: "This man" (Gregory), "Potamion, a man distinguished in virtue, he receives S. Gregory of Agrigento from the baptismal font, who at that time presided over the sacred rites and religion of the city of Agrigento, received from the sacred baptism. Afterward, when the boy had reached his eighth year, his parents brought him to the divine Potamion, that he might pray for all good things for the boy, and moreover entrust him to a teacher to be educated. Having prayed to the Lord, as was fitting, for the boy's welfare, he committed him to the care of a certain grammarian named Damian, he sees to his instruction, and commanded him to devote himself to his studies carefully and diligently..."
[3] "When he had passed his twelfth year, his parents again approached the Bishop and the other ministers of the Church, He ordains him a cleric, and with many prayers entreated that he be admitted to their number. When the Bishop had heard their request with equanimity (for already with his inner mental eye he perceived what a splendid and luminous eye he was about to set over the governance of the Church), he admitted him to the sacred body; and foretold that he would be a most excellent instrument, he predicts the future, and whatever he would be in the future."
[4] When Gregory was in his twelfth year, he set out for Jerusalem with Marcus, Serapion, and Leontius, Roman monks, and was kindly received by Bishop Macarius. Marcus, having left Gregory there at Jerusalem, went first to Tripoli, then by ship came to Sicily with his companions: and visiting the monastery which is nearest to the city of Agrigento, they stayed with its Superior; whom Marcus, foreknowing the future, though he had never seen him, astonished by calling him by his proper name, Paul. And asking about the aforesaid S. Potamion, whom he judged had never before been known to the man, he caused no less admiration. And so, when a table had been set before them and they had mutually shared bread and water (as is their custom), the Superior reveals the men to the Bishop, and how Marcus had called by name a man he had never seen. He kindly receives the pilgrims. At this news the Bishop was wonderfully delighted, and counting it an unexpected gain, he hastened immediately to them. Having met them and embraced them, and learning through them what was being done among them, who they were, and where they were bound on this pilgrimage, and again for what reason they were making the voyage, having stayed with them briefly and discussed certain divine matters, he set out for the church to celebrate the mystic sacrifice; for it was the feast day of Peter and Paul, the greatest Apostles.
[5] On the following day after matins, when the Bishop was present with them he discourses on divine things and was speaking with them familiarly about divine and saving matters, suddenly the parents of Gregory entered the city. The writer of the Life next relates how Marcus explained to the Bishop and parents what had happened to Gregory, and returned to Rome: and finally he records that Theodore succeeded Potamion, and Gregory succeeded Theodore in the episcopate.
[6] When S. Potamion lived must be inferred from the age of Bishop S. Gregory, which we shall discuss in its proper place: Whether he lived in the sixth century, for it is established that two Gregorys presided over that Church, one in the times of the Emperor Maurice and Pope S. Gregory, the other in those of Constantine Pogonatus and Pope S. Agatho. Baronius believes the first to be the one venerated on 23 November, and argues that he is said to have been kindly received by Macarius of Jerusalem and ordained a Deacon, and that Macarius was expelled from that See in the year 548, having governed it for two years: nor does it seem that in the time of Pogonatus Carthage could have been so freely visited by Roman monks, and a journey thence toward Jerusalem undertaken. But the Greeks in their Menaea expressly assert that he flourished under the reign of Justinian Rhinotmetus.
[7] The same Menaea report that Gregory, at the age of eighteen, had his hair first duly tonsured by S. Potamion, or in the seventh century, was enrolled in the class of clerics, and discharged the office of Reader with the distinguished pleasantness and clarity of his voice: then, by heavenly admonition, he made a pilgrimage to Carthage, thence to Antioch, afterward to Jerusalem, and finally went to Constantinople and was present at the sixth Ecumenical Council, and confuted the Monothelites with keen disputation.
[8] A Gregory older than either of these is celebrated in the Menaea on 19 December, who is also said to have been sent by Proterius, Patriarch of Alexandria, to S. Elesbaan, King of the Ethiopians, to have consecrated many churches in Arabia, and to have won many of the Jews to Christ. If S. Potamion, as Baronius would have it, lived in the sixth century, it is probable that that Gregory was his predecessor.