Saints Pontian and Hippolytus

Saints Pontian and Hippolytus were martyrs of the Roman Church in the third century: Pontian was a pope, and Hippolytus a learned Roman priest. According to a common view, for years they stood on opposite sides of a dispute that divided the community of Rome, and they ended their lives together in exile in Sardinia. The Church commemorates them together on August 13.

The dates of their birth are unknown. According to the Liber Pontificalis, an old collection of the lives of the popes, Pontian was a Roman, the son of Calpurnius. He became bishop of Rome in 230, in a time of relative peace under Emperor Alexander Severus.

Hippolytus was the most learned theologian of the Roman Church of his day, and he wrote in Greek. Many works are traditionally attributed to him, among them a commentary on the Book of Daniel, the “Refutation of All Heresies,” and the “Apostolic Tradition,” from whose eucharistic prayer passages of today’s Eucharistic Prayer II were drawn. Some scholars, however, hold that they were written by different authors. The author of the “Refutation” sharply criticized Pope Zephyrinus and above all Callistus, whom he accused of errors in his teaching about God and of excessive leniency toward sinners readmitted after penance. It is held that when Callistus became bishop of Rome, part of the community recognized Hippolytus as its bishop, and that the split lasted until the time of Pontian.

In 235 Emperor Maximinus Thrax began a persecution aimed above all at the leaders of the Church. Pontian and Hippolytus were condemned to labor in the mines of Sardinia, an island that a fourth-century catalogue of the popes calls unhealthy. There, on September 28, 235, Pontian resigned his office so that a new bishop could be elected in Rome; his successor was Anterus. This is regarded as the first known resignation of a pope.

Both died on the island as a result of harsh treatment, and the exact date of their death is unknown. The Roman Martyrology says that they were crowned with a common sentence and, it seems, with one crown. In 1985 in Cagliari, John Paul II said that they died there reconciled. In the fourth century Pope Damasus placed an inscription on the tomb of Hippolytus, according to which before his death he called on his followers to be united with the Catholic Church.

Pope Fabian brought their bodies back to Rome. They were buried on the same day, August 13: Pontian in the Crypt of the Popes in the Catacombs of Saint Callistus, and Hippolytus in the cemetery on the Via Tiburtina. The oldest Roman calendar of martyrs, from the fourth century, records them under that date. They have been venerated as martyrs since antiquity, without a formal canonization. In Sardinia in 2008, Benedict XVI recalled that it was in the island’s mines that the Good News first resounded, thanks to Pope Pontian, the priest Hippolytus, and many others condemned for their faith.