Feast day: September 22

St. Maurice & the Theban Legion

Martyrs · d. c. 287

Patron of Soldiers, infantry

By tradition an entire Roman legion of Christian soldiers from Egypt who refused to massacre fellow Christians or sacrifice to the gods, and were executed to the last man rather than obey.

Maurice was, by ancient tradition, the commander of the Theban Legion — a unit of the Roman army, recruited in Egypt and composed entirely of Christians — whose mass martyrdom in the Alps became one of the most celebrated stories of the early Church. The events are placed in the late third century, under the emperor Maximian.

According to the account, the legion was marching through what is now Switzerland when the emperor ordered it to take part in the persecution of local Christians — and, some versions say, to offer pagan sacrifice. Led by Maurice and his officers, the soldiers refused, declaring that they would serve the emperor faithfully as soldiers but would not turn their swords against innocent fellow Christians or deny their God.

Enraged, Maximian ordered the legion 'decimated' — every tenth man put to death. When the survivors still held firm, he ordered a second decimation, and at last the slaughter of them all. The whole legion, the tradition says, laid down their lives rather than betray their faith, at the place in the Valais that has borne the name Saint-Maurice ever since.

Whatever the precise scale of the event beneath the legend, the cult of St. Maurice and his companions spread across Europe in the early Middle Ages. As soldiers who would not choose the emperor over God, they became patrons of armies, infantry, and soldiers who must answer to a higher law.

Ordered to turn on innocent Christians, the whole legion laid down its arms and accepted death together rather than spill innocent blood.

Image: The original uploader was Lanternix at English Wikipedia. (Public domain), via Wikimedia Commons.

Source: newadvent.org/cathen/10068c.htm