ON S. ARIUS OR MACARIUS AND SAINT ASTERIUS, BISHOPS
OF PETRA IN PALESTINE AND OF PETRA IN ARABIA.
Sylloge on their Acts from S. Athanasius, and their cultus in today's Roman.
ABOUT CCCL.
CommentaryArius or Macarius, Bishop of both Petras in Palestine and Arabia (S.)
Asterius, Bishop of both Petras in Palestine and Arabia (S.)
D. P.
The Fathers of the Sardican Council in the year CCCXLVII gathered in the cause of S. Athanasius, Coming to the Synod of Sardica, they defect from the Eusebians. giving an account of the proceedings through an Epistle, to all
Bishops of the Catholic Church, written, just as S. Athanasius himself inserted it entirely into his own Apology; the sycophancies of the Eusebians coming there having been set forth, "It was permitted us to learn," they say, "that the matter was carried out as they had related, through our fellow ministers Macarius the Palestinian and Asterius the Arab, who were together with them on the journey, and who departed from their infidelity: who when they had come to the holy Synod, both complained of the violence they had suffered, and indicated with what great wickedness the Eusebians had behaved in the conduct of affairs." and they uncover their sycophancies; Meanwhile, in naming the Bishops province by province who were present, at the end of the Epistle, among the Bishops of Palestine no Macarius, but only Arius is named, and that in the third place, as one of the elders: in which way also the same Arius is named third again by S. Athanasius, in the same place after the Epistle which the holy Hierosolymitan Synod wrote in the year CCCL to all his fellow ministers in the sacred things in Africa and Egypt.
[2] That one and the same is to be understood under each name, Baronius rightly recognized, and in the Notes from his own conjecture added, whence dismayed they, that Arius was changed into Macarius, namely on account of hatred of the unlucky name: it certainly appears that one and the same is meant from the Epistle of S. Athanasius himself to the Solitaries; where he explains how greatly dismayed the Eusebians who had been brought to Sardica were, seeing there Arius and Asterius venerable Bishops, having indeed set out with them from the East, but having entered by a different route, and become our (Athanasius and the orthodox companions) comrades in being found; and recalling their cunning, and they take care to send them off to Africa. and how much they mistrusted their own affairs, and feared judgment. And a little after; But the Emperor Constantius, prompt to all things which they wished… Arius and Asterius, the one Bishop in Petra of Palestine, the other in Petra of Arabia, who had defected from them, not only relegated to upper Africa, but took pains that they should suffer outrages.
[3] Whether they returned from that exile, or, undone by hardships in Africa, deserved to be numbered among the Saints, I cannot define; The same are presumed to have died holily; Athanasius writing nothing further about them, and the Synaxaries of the Greeks nowhere on any day making memory of them, much less the ancient Martyrologies of the Latins. But to the Revisers of the Gregorian Roman, instructed with a certain peculiar authority, to inscribe in the Fasti all those whose virtue they should have found commended among the Holy Fathers, it pleased on this XX of June to prescribe to be read thus: At Petra in Palestine, of S. Macarius Bishop and Confessor (this last title is found later omitted in other editions) who having suffered many things from the Arians, & so they have been inscribed in today's Roman; relegated to Africa, rested in the Lord. The same on the X of June, similarly arbitrarily assumed, wrote of the other thus: At Petra in Arabia, of S. Asterius the Bishop, who for the Catholic faith having endured many things from the Arians, and by the Emperor Constantius relegated to Africa, fell a glorious Confessor. Hither in the Annals Baronius looked back when at year 348 number 3 he wrote, that of Macarius, who is otherwise found called Arius, days arbitrarily chosen, the Natalis day annual memory is venerated on the twelfth Kalends of July in the Church; likewise of Asterius, on the fourth Ides of June the anniversary Natalis recurs, inscribed in Ecclesiastical monuments: namely monuments, not ancient, but then plainly recent, and on the day, which he himself with his Colleagues first defined to be held as Natalis.
[4] It is not for me to call into examination the power which those Revisers had, to inscribe in that new Martyrology, wherever it pleased them, those whose names had never been inscribed in any Fasti of the Churches, much less was a certain day established. yet greater certainty would be desirable. I confess however that it can be doubted whether Gregory was sufficiently conscious of a thing thus to be done or done; who before the Martyrology emended by his order prefaces that he took care that it, faulty in some places by the negligence of copyists and printers, should be corrected through learned men according to the faith of history (which is contained in the truth of deeds, persons, places, times), older and more correct codices having also been employed, and that it should be proposed corrected and in many places increased to be read in the choir. But whether Gregory knew and willed it to be thus increased, or not; it pleased him at least to stand by the judgment of those who did it, which both successor Pontiffs approved, and it is fair that we reverently undertake, until otherwise it shall have seemed good at Rome. It is however permitted to desire concerning Saints whose memory no evident error is detected to have crept into, that as certain notice be found of death, in exile or in their fatherland holily undergone; as it is certain that they about the time of the Council of Sardica from the Eusebians and their patron Constantius suffered many grievous things, in whatever way at last they finished life.