Holy Martyr Agatha

Life

This glorious virgin and martyr of Christ was born in the Sicilian city of Palermo of noble and wealthy parents. When Emperor Decius raised persecution against Christians, Saint Agatha too was seized and brought to trial before the judge Quintianus. The judge saw Agatha, beautiful in face, and desired to have her for his wife. When he proposed this to Agatha, Agatha answered him that she was the bride of Christ, and that she could not be unfaithful to her Bridegroom. The judge subjected her to severe torments: Agatha was flogged, mocked, bound to a tree and beaten until bloody. After this the judge again advised her to renounce Christ, and thus avoid further torments, to which the bride of Christ answered: "These torments are very beneficial to me, just as wheat cannot come into the granaries before it is cleansed from chaff, so neither can my soul enter Paradise if my body is not first crushed by torments." Then the torturer ordered that her female breasts be cut off, and then cast her into prison. In prison Saint Apostle Peter appeared to her and restored her bodily wholeness and health. Again she was brought out for torture, and again cast into prison where she gave up her soul to God, in the year 251 in the city of Catania, during the time of Emperor Decius. After Agatha's death her torturer Quintianus set off to seize her property. But along the way the horses under him and under the soldiers went mad, and gnawed him all over his face, threw him to the ground and trampled him to death with their hooves. Thus God's punishment quickly overtook him for the savage crime against Saint Agatha.

From the Hymn of Praise

Dark is the dungeon, bright the martyr,In the darkness shines Saint Agatha,Above the dungeon palaces, bathed in light,There the torturer lives, covered with shame,