Feast day: April 18
St. Apollonius the Apologist
A learned Roman, perhaps a senator, who when denounced as a Christian made a bold reasoned defense of the faith before the Senate itself, and was beheaded for it.
Apollonius, sometimes called Apollonius the Apologist, was a Roman of senatorial rank — a man of learning and standing — who was put to death for his Christian faith about the year 185, under the emperor Commodus. His story is preserved by the historian Eusebius and in an ancient account of his trial.
He was denounced as a Christian by one of his own household slaves. Brought before the Roman Senate and the prefect, he was offered the chance to save himself by renouncing Christ, but instead delivered before that body a reasoned defence of the Christian faith — an 'apology' from which he takes his title.
Even after his eloquent defence, the law condemned him, and he was sentenced to death. He met it calmly, having borne witness before educated Romans that Christianity was not the creed of the ignorant but a faith that could be defended by reason.
Apollonius was beheaded about 185. He stands as an early example of the Christian intellectual martyr — a senator who used the highest forum of the empire to argue, and then to die, for his faith.
Given the chance to recant before the Roman Senate, he instead delivered a philosophical defense of Christianity — and was executed for refusing to yield.
Image: Authors of Menologion of Basil II (circa 985 AC, Constantinople), Byzantine manuscript illuminators[1]: Pantoleon with G (Public domain), via Wikimedia Commons.
Source: newadvent.org/cathen/04166a.htm
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