Saint Asyncritus is remembered in the Church’s calendar as a lay Catholic in the 1st century in Italy. The Church continues to keep this saint’s memory in its liturgical calendar.

Saint Asyncritus is remembered as a lay Catholic. The record places this life in Italy, with death in the 1st century. No formal canonization process is recorded; veneration rests on ancient local tradition received into the Church’s liturgical memory. Though the surviving record is brief, the Church has preserved Asyncritus’s name and continues to commemorate this life of faith.

Quick Facts

• Died: the 1st century, Roma, Italy
• Venerated as: Layperson
• Region: Italy

Who Was Saint Asyncritus?

Saint Asyncritus enters the Church’s memory as a lay Catholic. The record places this life in Italy. The surviving source material additionally preserves this detail: Disciple of Saint Paul of Tarsus (Romans 16:14). The record is thin, as it is for a great many saints of this period: what has come down is a name, a place, and the fact of the death itself, rather than a connected life story.

Historical Setting

Saint Asyncritus is placed in the 1st century, in Italy. Beyond the bare date and place, the wider circumstances of this particular life are not preserved in the surviving record, though the general shape of the Church’s life in this period and region is well documented from other sources.

Why the Church Remembers Saint Asyncritus

Saint Asyncritus is remembered as a lay Catholic. Even where the record preserves little more than this bare description, the Church has judged such a life worth commemorating, trusting that sanctity is not confined to the well-documented or the famous.

Canonization and Feast Day

The sources record no formal beatification or canonization date for Saint Asyncritus. As with the great majority of ancient saints, the cause was never formally opened; the veneration instead rests on immemorial local tradition, carried forward through liturgical commemoration rather than through a documented juridical process.

What Catholics Can Learn Today

What the Church preserves of Saint Asyncritus is less a set of dramatic events than a pattern of quiet fidelity to a particular calling. That pattern, more than any singular episode, is what later generations have tried to imitate.

A Prayer to Saint Asyncritus

Saint Asyncritus, whose faithfulness the Church still remembers, pray for us. Help us to live our own ordinary days with the same quiet fidelity that brought you to God. Amen.

Sources

• Roman Martyrology
• EWTN Catholic Encyclopedia entries for saints of this period