28 June 2022
Memorial of Saint Irenaeus, Bishop and Martyr
This past January, Pope Francis declared today’s saint, Irenaeus of Lyons, to be a Doctor of the Church, with the title doctor unitatis “Doctor of Unity”. In that brief declaration, made during the week of prayer for Christian Unity, the Holy Father prayed, “May the teaching of this great Master increasingly encourage the journey of all the Lord’s disciples towards full communion.”
St. Irenaeus was one who learned the Christian faith from St. Polycarp of Smyrna, the successor of St. John the Apostle in what is now Turkey. He then moved to Lyons, was made bishop, and wrote against heresies that were arising in the early Church. There were groups that wanted to argue that only an arcane knowledge of particular secret revelations would allow one to be a true Christian. The sorts of things they presented as this “secret knowledge” were quite contradictory to the truths revealed in Scripture and taught publically in the Church by the apostles and their successors. St. Irenaeus presented that truth, universally believed by Christians, that Christ Jesus, the Son of God, had in His life, death, and resurrection given the full revelation of the love of God and the way to God. Irenaeus was killed for his faith around the year 202.
Today, we can ask this saintly bishop and doctor of the Church to pray for us that we may seek to more fully receive the faith taught by the apostles as he did, and that this faith may strengthen our unity with our brothers and sisters around the world.