Saint Leo the Great
Pope (398-461)
Feast – April 11
Constantine the Great was the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity. He was the man behind the Edict of Milan in 313, which declared tolerance for Christianity in the Roman empire. He also enacted administrative, financial, social and military reforms to strengthen the empire, restructured the government, separating civil and military authorities. To combat inflation he introduced the solidus, a new gold coin that became the standard for Byzantine and European currencies for more than a thousand years. The Roman army was reorganized to consist of mobile units (comitatenses) and garrison troops (limitanei) capable of countering internal and external threats. These changes brought prosperity and security into the Empire. A lack of appreciation for such great blessings would cause the collapse of the Roman Empire a hundred years later. The Vandals and Huns were ravaging Roman provinces. At the same time numerous heresies threatened the Church; among them was Pelagianism which denied Original Sin based on the mistaken notion that we can perfect ourselves and reach salvation without God’s grace. Manichaeism rejected the very teachings of the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament and proclaiming everything material as evil. In the east, Nestorianism was gaining followers, a heresy initiated by Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople, denied Mary the title of Theotokos (Greek: “God-bearer” or, “Mother of God”) and claimed that she only bore Christ’s human nature in her womb. He proposed the alternative title Christotokos (“Christ-bearer” or “Mother of Christ”) thus fracturing Christ into two separate persons, one human and one divine. creating Nestorianism which.
At a time when the Church was experiencing great obstacles to her growth, on August 11th, 440 AD, Pope Sixtus III died.
On September 29th, an Archdeacon of the Roman Church under Popes Saint Celestine, and Saint Sixtus III, was unanimously elected to be the new pope. Today he is known as St. Leo the Great and was consecrated on Saint Michael’s day, April 11th, 440. The election happened while he was absent, visiting Gaul at the request of Emperor Valentinian III to bring peace between Aëtius, one of Gaul’s chief military commanders, and the chief magistrate Caecina Decius Aginatius Albinus.
St. Leo the Great’s origins are obscure, so nothing is known with certainty of his early life beside that He was born in 398 into a Roman aristocratic family, native of Tuscany and his father’s name was Quintianus.
He was ordained into Holy Orders and rose to prominence and became widely respected for his love for the Lord, intelligence, persuasive nature and gift of bringing reconciliation between disputing groups of Christians. He became a very well-known deacon of the Church. In 431 St. John Cassian dedicated to him the treatise against Nestorius.
His response to the call of the Lord transformed him into one of the greatest popes of Christian history. In fact, he was the first pope to be given the title “the Great.” His swift election reflected the respect he had garnered among the people and their affection for this pastoral and wise servant of the Lord.
He assumed the papacy at a time of increasing barbarian invasions; this was coupled with decreasing imperial authority, which forced the Bishop of Rome to take a more active part in civic and political affairs. During his reign, he tirelessly fought to preserve the unity of the Church and its faith; and to ensure the safety of his people against invasions from armies which sought to destroy the Church and the Christian influence on culture which she brought to bear.
Over time, St. Leo the Great became known as one of the best administrative popes of the ancient Church. But he was so much more. Always humble, he saw himself as the servant of the servants of God and felt privileged to sit in the Chair of St. Peter. He was one of the first bishops of Rome to promote papal primacy based on succession from St. Peter the Apostle; and he did so as a means of maintaining unity among the church.
In conception of his duties as supreme pastor, the maintenance of strict ecclesiastical discipline occupied a prominent place. This was particularly important at a time when the continual ravages of the barbarians were introducing disorder into all conditions of life, and the rules of morality were being seriously violated. Feeling that the primatial rights of the bishop of Rome were threatened, he appealed to the civil power for support and obtained, from Valentinian III, a decree on the 6th of June 445, which recognized the primacy of the bishop of Rome based on the merits of St. Peter, the dignity of the city, and the legislation of the First Council of Nicaea; and provided for the forcible extradition by provincial governors of any bishop who refused to answer a summons to Rome.
In Gaul Patroclus, bishop of Arles (d. 426) had received from Pope Zosimus the recognition of a subordinate primacy over the Gallican Church which was strongly asserted by his successor Hilary. An appeal from Chelidonius of Besançon gave St. Leo the opportunity to assert the pope’s authority over Hilary.
In 445, Leo disputed with Patriarch Dioscorus, Cyril of Alexandria’s successor as Patriarch of Alexandria, insisting that the ecclesiastical practice of his see should follow that of Rome on the basis that St. Mark the Evangelist, the disciple of St. Peter the Apostle and the founder of the Alexandrian Church, could have had no other tradition than that of the prince of the apostles.
Meanwhile, the African province of Mauretania Caesariensis had been preserved to the empire and thus to the Nicene faith during the Vandal invasion. In its isolation, it was disposed to rely on outside support, and the Pope saw an opportunity to assert his authority there.
St. Leo used his utmost energy in maintaining discipline, insisted on the exact observance of the ecclesiastical precepts, and did not hesitate to rebuke when necessary. Letters relative to these and other matters were sent to the bishops who had tolerated deviations.
St. Leo was a great defender of the orthodox teaching of the Catholic Church and protected the full deposit of faith. Not long after his elevation to the Chair of Peter, he saw himself compelled to combat energetically the heresies which seriously threatened church unity even in the West. St. Leo had ascertained through Bishop Septimus of Altinum, that in Aquileia the priests, deacons, and clerics, who had been adherents of Pelagius, were admitted to communion without an explicit abjuration of their heresy. The pope sharply censured this procedure, and directed that a provincial synod should be assembled in Aquileia, at which such persons were to be required to abjure Pelagianism publicly and to subscribe to an unequivocal confession of Faith. This zealous pastor waged war even more strenuously against Manichæism, inasmuch as its adherents, who had been driven from Africa by the Vandals, had settled in Rome, and had succeeded in establishing a secret Manichæan community there. The pope ordered the faithful to point out these heretics to the priests, and in 443, together with the senators and presbyters, conducted in person an investigation, in the course of which the leaders of the community were examined. A number of Manichæans in Rome were converted and admitted to confession; others, who remained obdurate, were in obedience to imperial decrees banished from Rome by the civil magistrates. On 30 January, 444, the pope sent a letter to all the bishops of Italy, to which he appended the documents containing his proceedings against the Manichæans in Rome, and warned them to be on their guard and to take action against the followers of the sect.
In 451 at the Council of Chalcedon the theological issue at stake concerned Christ’s divinity. Some theologians in the East were espousing the Monophysite heresy, which argued that Christ had only one divine nature. The Council consisted of six hundred bishops from the Eastern Roman Empire, with a handful from Africa. Pope Leo sent three legates from Italy who were treated with all honor and respect as representatives of Peter’s successor. They read out loud to the Council Fathers the “Tome of Leo” on the Incarnation. The pope’s words laid out, with force, clarity, and eloquence, that Jesus Christ had both a divine and a human nature. When the legates finished reading, the bishops’ common response to the pope’s words was “This is the faith of the fathers; this is the faith of the apostles…Let anyone who believes otherwise be anathema. Peter has spoken through the mouth of Leo.” To this day, Leo’s letter is heralded and praised, not only for bringing peace, but for preserving the fullness of Christian truth and doctrine. It helped the whole Church enter more fully into the heart of the Gospel message of who Jesus is – and who we can become in Him, as we cooperate with grace.
St. Leo’s writings (both the sermons and the letters) are mostly concerned with theological questions concerning the person of Jesus Christ (Christology) and his role as mediator and savior (Soteriology), which is partially connected to the Council of Chalcedon in which Roman legates participated in Leo’s name. Subsequently, through numerous letters addressed to bishops and members of the imperial family, St. Leo incessantly worked for the propagation and universal reception of the faith in Christ as defined by Chalcedon, also in the eastern part of the Roman empire.
In his far-reaching pastoral care of the Universal Church, in the West and in the East, the pope never neglected the domestic interests of the Church at Rome. He focused heavily on the pastoral care of his people, he galvanized charitable works in a Rome beset by famines, an influx of refugees, and poverty. To him, being a Christian was not only about embracing the fullness of the Gospel theologically but living it out in a world filled with hurt, suffering and needs. He further associated the practice of fasting with charity and almsgiving particularly on the Ember days. Pope Leo I was renowned for his profoundly spiritual sermons. With his words, could reach the everyday needs of his people. It was his reputation as an “instrument of the call to holiness, well-versed in Scripture and ecclesiastical awareness” that helped him become one of the greatest popes in the history of the Church.
Along with his dynamic faith and outstanding theological wisdom, Pope Leo I was also courageous.
In 452 Pope Leo entered the history books when he rendezvoused with Attila the Hun in Northern Italy, convincing him not to sack Rome. At the emperor’s wish, accompanied by the Consul Avienus and the Prefect Trigetius, he went in 452 to Upper Italy, and met Attila at Mincio in the vicinity of Mantua, obtaining from him the promise that he would withdraw from Italy and negotiate peace with the emperor. Attilas chieftains were astonished to see the terrible Attila, the Scourge of God, fresh from the sack of Aquileia, Milan and Pavia and with the rich prize of Rome within his grasp, turn his great host back to the Danube at the Saint’s word. They asked him why he had acted so strangely. He told them he had seen two venerable personages — who are generally supposed to be Saints Peter and Paul — standing behind Saint Leo.
Pope Leo’s intercession could not prevent the sack of the city by the Vandal King Genseric in 455, but murder and arson were repressed by his influence. The Pope and members of his clergy went to meet the invader to implore him to desist. While the Vandals plundered the city, the gesture nevertheless prevented Rome from being burned and assured that the Basilicas of St Peter, St Paul and St John, in which part of the terrified population sought refuge, were spared. Pope Leo afterwards assisted in rebuilding the city of Rome.
He died on November 10, 461 after having ruled the Church for a little over twenty years.
Pope Leo I’s papacy has been described as one of the most important in the Church’s history. Nearly 100 sermons and 150 letters of St. Leo I, known for the concision, depth, and clarity, have been preserved; one of them is still, to this day, used in the Office of Readings on Christmas.
He was declared a Doctor of the Church in 1754. by Pope Benedict XIV.
Patron Saint of popes and confessors.
References and Excerpts:
[1] C. Online, “St. Leo the Great – Saints & Angels,” Catholic Online. https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=299 (accessed Apr. 11, 2020).
[2] “Saint Leo the Great, Pope.” https://sanctoral.com/en/saints/saint_leo_the_great.html (accessed Apr. 11, 2020).
[3] “CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Pope St. Leo I (The Great).” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09154b.htm (accessed Apr. 11, 2020).
[4] “Memorial of St. Leo the Great,” My Catholic Life! https://mycatholic.life/saints/saints-of-the-liturgical-year/november-10-st-leo-the-great/ (accessed Apr. 11, 2020).
[5] “Pope Leo I,” Wikipedia. Apr. 10, 2020, Accessed: Apr. 11, 2020. [Online]. Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pope_Leo_I&oldid=950120953.