Hieromartyr
Hieromartyr Marcellus I of Rome
епископ Римский 308 — † 309
Also known as: Маркелл, папа Римский
Hieromartyr Marcellus, Pope of Rome — bishop of Rome 308–309, exiled by Emperor Maxentius for denouncing his cruelty toward Christians, and who died from hunger and hardship under forced labor.
Hieromartyr Marcellus was elected Bishop of Rome in 308, shortly after the end of the Diocletianic persecution. He faced the acute controversy over readmitting the "lapsi" — Christians who had renounced the faith under torture — insisting on strict penance before reconciliation, which provoked unrest among part of his flock.
According to the tradition most widespread in Russian sources, Marcellus openly denounced Emperor Maxentius for his cruelty toward Christians, for which he was scourged and sentenced to lifelong forced labor tending livestock in a former church that had been confiscated from the Christian women Priscilla and Lucina and turned into a stable. He also arranged for the reburial of the remains of the martyrs Cyriacus, Smaragdus, and Largus.
Worn down by hunger and cold, he fell ill and died in 309 or 310. Pope Damasus I later composed a verse epitaph in his honor. (An older theory identifying Marcellus with his predecessor Marcellinus has since been abandoned by historians.)
His feast is kept on June 7/20. Although he died not by direct execution but from exhaustion under forced labor, enduring church tradition venerates him as a hieromartyr.