Interesting, Paula. Do you have a documentary source for what you give as the _official_ reason for Valentine's removal from the general calendar of the Roman Catholic Church? The reason given was current at the time (it's voiced, for example, in Agostino Amore's entry on V. in the _Bibliotheca Sanctorum_). But how do we know that that was the official reason?

It's interesting to note that the revision of the _Roman Martyrology_ (which is based on the general Roman Calendar) promulgated in 2001 retains one V., listing him as a martyr of Rome. There's an Italian-language text (with typos) online at:
http://tinyurl.com/2g5jyt

Finally, one could infer from that the "bevy of 31 lesser saints" you say were left behind were left behind on the Roman Calendar. But the document to which you link does not claim to reproduce the Roman Calendar and the number 31 is greater than the number of saints listed for 14 February in either the 2001 version of the Roman Martyrology (19) or in its immediate pre-Vatican II predecessor (23) and includes saints listed in neither. None of these listings is restricted to the much smaller number of saints for whom the Roman Catholic Church mandates liturgical ceremonies called "feasts" (as opposed to other sorts of commemoration) world-wide. The (old) _Catholic Encyclopedia_ has a useful discussion of these at:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06021b.htm

Within the Roman Catholic Church, V. of Rome still has a feast on at least two particular (i.e., non-universal) calendars, those of the Italian diocese of Rome and of the Irish Province of the Order of Carmelites. The latter, at least, has relics said to be his. In other churches, V. is still listed for today in the Church of England's _Book of Common Prayer_. Is he also so listed in the 1979 version of the the _Book of Common Prayer_ of the Episcopal Church in the United States?

Best wishes to your blog in its new home!
--John Dillon

In my earlier response I garbled the first two sentences of the 3d paragraph. They will be less confusing if put this way:

Finally, one could infer from your wording that the venue from which the "bevy of 31 lesser saints" you say were left behind was the Roman Calendar. But the document to which you link does not claim to reproduce the Roman Calendar, 31 is greater than the number of saints listed for 14 February in either the 2001 version of the Roman Martyrology (19) or in its immediate pre-Vatican II predecessor (23), and the document includes saints listed in neither of these versions of the RM.

Apologies for whatever confusion my early-morning inattentiveness may have caused.
--John Dillon

Hi John. Welcome to the blog.

Ahh, locating just what, exactly, the Roman Church endorses is a headache, isn't it?

I went with the Catholic Encyclopedia ref because it follows the general official Church line in its entries. By "official", however, I really meant that it's the reason always given for Valentine's being dropped from the saints' calendar in 1969, yet Valentinus the Gnostic always seems to rate a mention immediately afterward. Which does make you wonder if he had something to do with the decision.

As for the "bevy", you're right; I probably shouldn't have numbered them, especially since the presence of Cyril indicates that the list that I cited is a combination of Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox saints, along with a smattering of popular saints who were never canonized.

One problem that I have run into in the past with discussing saints is the question of authority--who decides about saints and saints' days? The Roman Catholics? The Eastern Orthodox? The Protestants (including the Episcopalians) who have little official use for the saints' calendars in the first place, but have their own martyrs? Various sects? There seems to be no ready answer.
--Paula R. Stiles

Hi John again,

Apologies for the rather flip response. You are, of course, absolutely right that my evaluation of Valentine's status as a saint was too casual. My main point was intended to be that popularly known reasons for removing a saint from a calendar often mask other reasons that do not comfortably match the intended mythology of the Church as the only true Christian Church that only vets and promotes real saints. Yet those underlying reasons may be just as valid.

Unfortunately, I went rather casually with the idea that as the Church had been the one to put him in, it was also the one with the right to take him out. I neglected to address the fact that since Valentine's inclusion on the calendar, the Church has split into many different sects, some of them major and not all of them in agreement on who is or isn't a saint. Not even all Roman Catholics have agreed with the decision to prune "imaginary" saints like Valentine from the calendar.

Valentinus the Gnostic makes a rather good example of this. Clearly, he was a saint to his sect and continues to be a saint to modern Gnostics. Is it therefore appropriate in this pluralistic age to continue to call him a heretic just because he disagreed with what later became orthodox theology and his sect has not survived continuously to the present day?

--Paula R. Stiles

Hi. I don't have much to contribute in the way of commentary, but I was intrigued by your suggestion that Valentinus was "pruned" from the Saint's Calendar because he was a Gnostic. I hadn't heard that before. I *had* heard that St. Nicholas had been so pruned, then was told he hadn't been. But I don't think Bishop Nicholas of Myra was a Gnostic, though I really don't know a whole lot about such things.
Anne Gilbert
--Anne Gilbert
<mailto:[email protected]>

Hi Anne,

No, I don't think that Valentinus was ever put in the saints' calendar, since he was controversial even in his lifetime and the Gnostics were deemed heretical quite early on. However, he is the only major Christian figure from this period of that name whose historical existence is confirmed. The other three are legendary martyrs from much later sources. I suspect that there may well have been an actual martyr named Valens or Valentinus from the second or third century, but I'm skeptical about there being three of them all living before the Constantinian period. Sounds repetitive.

When I did my piece on the medieval origins of Christmas, I was under the impression that Nicholas of Myra had been pruned, too, but he has not been (likely because he was never declared heretical and his historical existence has been confirmed, although some aspects of his life do remain legendary). However, he is more important in the Eastern Orthodox Church than in the Catholic calendar.

This is just off the top of my head, but isn't Nicholas remembered for being an opponent of the Gnostics?
--Paula R. Stiles

Hi, Paula

With all respect, it's quite possible (to put it mildly) that Valentine the heretic had zero influence on Paul VI's decision to restrict liturgical celebration of St. Valentine of Rome to particular calendars only. The pruning of 1969 was clearly designed to create space for saints of major current importance in parts of the world poorly represented on the festal calendar. Local saints of western Europe (especially Italians, as they were overrepresented in the first place) were the obvious candidates for demotion. The vast majority of these (even some very poorly attested ones) were retained as saints but had their cults restricted to particular calendars. Which is what happened to Valentine of Rome. At that level, there are lots of saints, not a few of whom besides V. share their names with prominent heretics. Taking as examples a couple of heretics whose names are familiar from the writings of St. Augustine, Donatus and Pelagius, there are several Sts. Donatus (the big one being Donatus of Arezzo) and at least two Sts. Pelagius (the big one being the child-martyr celebrated on 26. July). Homonymy with a well known heretic doesn't seem to be a major problem within the Roman Catholic Church.

Nick of Myra is an example of someone who's more important culturally than liturgically for Roman Catholics. Kids still get named for him all the time. And I would guess that in places in the "west" where his cult is especially strong (e.g. mainland southern Italy and in Sicily) he still gets his share of dedications of new churches.

BTW, it's a misconception that the pruning of 1969 restricted the Roman Catholic Church's roster of saints with permitted cults to to persons with confirmed historical existence. Most of the purely mythic saints who were dropped altogether ("cult suppressed" is the technical term) were ancillary figures, presumably fictional, found only in imaginative writings about other saints and subsequently given altars and minor feasts in areas where these other saints had major cults. But a large number of saints who could well be purely mythical -- but no one knows for sure -- were retained because they were traditionally venerated long before the Roman Catholic Church in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries tightened up its qualifications for being declared a saint. After all, the traditional saint of place X may have existed even if her/his biographical documentation is suspect or even obviously phony. What counts for these earlier saints is the documented existence of a cult.

Finally, some of this retention is notional only. Restriction to a particular calendar means that whoever's in charge of that calendar gets to decide whether or not to allow liturgical commemoration of the saint in question. Assuming that Valentine of Terni was retained because he had a cult at Terni that was distinguishable from that of V. of Rome (I don't know that he did, but let's suppose so for now) and his cult is permitted for the diocese of Terni-Narni-Amelia, the latter's bishop could still decide not to bother with him. Over time, that would effectively end a local cult.
--John Dillon

Hi, Paula

One other thing: Cyril and Methodius are saints of the Roman Catholic Church too. In fact, their stock went up when Valentine's went down. They have the liturgical feast on 14. February and John Paul II declared them co-patrons of Europe (along with Benedict of-Nursia-or-of-Montecassino). Cyril, who predeceased his bother by many years (which is why he's traditionally depicted with a dark beard) actually died in Rome and is said to have been buried in San Clemente (there's a memorial to him near the putative grave site in the lower church).
--John Dillon

Oops! On saints named Pelagius, the one I gave as celebrated on 26. July is actually celebrated on 26. June (my bad!). He's very big in Spain and thus perhaps more familiar as San Pelayo.

The other St. Pelagius I was thinking of was P. of Laodicea in Syria, an influential fourth-century theologian and ascetic. Another that has occurred to me since is the patron saint of Konstanz in southern Germany (said to be a martyr of late antique Pannonia -- a large area including not only ancient Pannonia proper but also much of the Balkans -- whose putative relics were translated to Konstanz from Istria in the Carolingian period).
--John Dillon

Hi John,

Yes, there are other famous heretics who share names with saints. But how many of those saints are as famous as the Valentines and how many of them have a highly popular secular festival dedicated to profane love celebrated on their name day (and in their name) for at least the past six and a half centuries or so?

Further, I'd like to see the actual criteria used for determining saints for the calendar in 1969, since in some cases, it seems a bit arbitrary. Take, for example, Cyril of Alexandria (R.C. feast day June 27, E.O. feast day June 6). This early 4th century bishop and Doctor of the Church appears to have been retained on the saints' calendar for his theological work and advocacy of Christ's dual nature, despite being an antisemite, mysogynist, rabblerouser, schismatic, possible murderer and leader of an unruly crew that kicked in the heads of his rivals during his lifetime and turned to heresy after his death. Also, if he inspired any miracles after his demise (save for the blessed peace afforded his contemporaries by his passing), I've so far missed them.

A less apt follower of the apostolic life one would be hard-pressed to name, at least until the Reformation. But he's still on the calendar.
--Paula R. Stiles

Hi, Paula

I don't think you'll ever see the criteria employed in individual cases. But of course it was arbitrary: it always has been so. There are patterns that relate to specific seasons or themes of the liturgical year but around those the guiding principle seems to have been to bump people in order to make room for others who were more favored (whether these were new additions, promotions, or saints who were moved either because of the decision to have fewer major feasts in Lent or because someone else more favored had gotten what had been their day). As a guess they probably had categories: if you got bumped and your category was already well represented, you got demoted. No doubt with some satisfaction in the case of Valentine, though I doubt that his secular interpretation was determinative in this instance. It was just easier to give the favored Cyril and Methodius _the_ feast for the day (multiple feasts on one day are exceptional) and to demote V. (since finding a new day for him, of all people, would have been very radical indeed).

Before the early modern establishment of criteria for canonization, miracles (while often persuasive) were not required. Cyril of Alexandria was a saint for theological reasons long before then. Having been grandfathered in, he's in, even with no miracles and lots of defects that would probably keep him out were he to be considered now. As you've probably noticed, he's not unique among saints for either his misogyny or his antisemitism. I'm not too keen on either Romuald or Bernardino of Siena, both of whom are also still on the general Roman Calendar.
--John Dillon

Hi John,

No arguments about antisemitic saints (and misogynists were almost de rigeur in some periods). And it's true that miracles (or, for that matter, decent behavior) were not mandatory for Church fathers. Didn't they almost have to pay out to get some for Thomas Aquinas' canonization process?

What I find interesting about Cyril is that his doctrinal approach became set in stone after his death. He's considered orthodox now, but his rivalry with Nestorius was hardfought, extremely dirty and uncertain for a long time. Though Cyril won before his death, he had obviously made a lot of enemies who would not have necessarily wanted to promote him posthumously.

What's interesting is that his theological victory persisted after his death, even after his very mortal tactics of bullying, rabblerousing, favor-currying in the imperial court and inundating his enemies with prodigious writing ceased to be relevant. Obviously, he was able to tap into the prevailing Christian zeitgeist of the time involving the unease about the basic nature of Christ and help shape it for the next millennium and a half. I also wonder if part of his undeniable genius was an ability to coopt his rivals' more popular ideas and using them to make his enemies seem more heterodox than they really were while enhancing his own orthodox image (this being a period when what we now call "orthodox" was still being formed).

It's such a shame, considering his theological genius, that the man himself was so far from the apostolic ideal. Saints like him seem to reflect the ongoing tension between propagating the potential for individual and communal change in Christian philosophy and promoting the wordly power of the Christian community through enforced unity, even at the cost of the original message.
--Paula R. Stiles

Hi, Paula

I should have said that miracles were not yet _formally_ a requirement. But A) miracles seem to have become a regular component of saint's Lives even before the late eleventh- and twelfth-century centralization of canonization in the Latin church and B) by the time of Thomas Aquinas' canonization process in the early fourteenth century whole collections of miracles had become almost _de rigeur.

I'm not really familiar with the ins and outs of T.'s delayed canonization. But I do know that he had one miracle commonly accepted back then as proof of sanctity: an incorrupt body years after his death.

If you have the time, you might want to read William of Tocco's Life of T. William, who kept revising the Life even after T. had been canonized, was _not_ a misogynist: there are very sympathetic utterances about T.'s sisters, especially about T(h)eodora, that I don't think are there just because she was married to one of the great lords of the realm.

Another non-misogynist churchman is the tenth-century Neapolitan hagiographer Peter the Subdeacon. His _Passio sanctae Iulianes_, which I skimmed through recently because 16. February is the feast day of Juliana "of Nicomedia" (seemingly in origin a saint of Cumae), has a delicious passage in which the pagan prefect interviewing her before her first round of official torture (Daddy had already begun the job privately) lets fly a few verse saws of the _femina semper malum_ type and J. responds very coolly that a) he's letting his emotions get the better of him and b) observation tells one that this is a crock: there are ethically good women and ethically bad women, just as there ethically good men and ethically bad ones.

Returning to your last point, enforced unity trumps other values so regularly in the history of organized Christianity that it's really not surprising to find systematic oppressors of others among rosters of saints. (And when I mentioned Romuald the other day, the narrow-minded person I was really thinking of was his biographer Peter Damian, who also has a place on the general Roman Calendar).
--John Dillon

Paula, most cults seem to take the (current) RC list
of saints and days, to the degree that they pay
attention to saints at all. But not so in the Anglican
Communion (I recentoy taught a course on Anglicn Saints for
my local (St. Paul's) Episcopakl Cathedral here in
Sprongfield (IL0. In fqact, various parts of the
Anglican Communion have varying lists (as one might suppose
from the general Hoorah in differing parts of the
Ang. Com today). The Brits, for instance, have
Charles I in their canon,, while The Episcopal
Church (formerly known as The Episcopal Church of
the USA) refused Charles for the 2nd or 3rd time
in their last General Convention, as 'just another
dead white guy'. Similarly, we (The Episcopal Church)
ahse a number of Ameri9can Indian saints whom the
Brits just ignore. In TEC, nominees for inclusion in
the Episcop. Canon aer considered by a Committee and those
whoemake it through are presented to the General
Convention, who vote them in or out. (The General
Conention is teh governing body of TEC,the one that
caused all the ongoing trouble by naming Gene
Robinson as Bishop of Vermont.)

Did you know that John Paul, the recent RC pope, named
named more saints than had been so designated in the
whole history of Christianity up to his reign ?

--Norman Hinton
<mailto:[email protected]>

p.s. " Further, I'd like to see the actual criteria used for determining saints for the calendar in 1969,
since in some cases, it seems a bit arbitrary."

Though popular, an accurate book about the RC process in the
past and now is Kenneth L. Woodward, _Making Saints_ Simon &
Schuster, 1996.