Traditionally numbered among the Seventy Disciples sent out by Christ in the Gospel of Luke, later remembered as a first-century bishop in Italy.

Saint Parrobus of Pottole is traditionally counted among the Seventy (or Seventy-Two) Disciples whom Jesus sent out ahead of himself, as recorded in Luke 10:1, and identified in later Church tradition as a name found among the greetings of Saint Paul’s Letter to the Romans, chapter sixteen. He is venerated as a first-century bishop in Italy, though the specific circumstances of his episcopate and death are not preserved in any detail beyond this identification.

Quick Facts

• Died: I century, Italy
• Venerated as: Bishop
• Tradition: Counted among the Seventy Disciples (Luke 10)
• Scriptural link: Associated with Romans 16:14

Who Was Saint Parrobus of Pottole?

Parrobus belongs to the group of early figures whom later Christian tradition, beginning in the patristic era, worked to identify with the Seventy Disciples Christ sent out in pairs during his ministry, as described in Luke’s Gospel. He is further linked by tradition to a name greeted by Saint Paul in Romans 16:14, and is remembered as having served as a bishop somewhere in Italy during the apostolic age.

Historical Setting

The identification of specific individuals with the Seventy Disciples is a project of later Christian memory rather than the New Testament text itself, which names very few of them directly; early Christian writers sought to connect names surviving in Paul’s epistles and other early sources with this apostolic-era company of missionary disciples. Bishops of the first century, operating in the earliest decades after the apostles, generally left behind little independent documentation, and Parrobus is no exception.

Why the Church Remembers Saint Parrobus

Parrobus is remembered chiefly for his place, however traditionally reconstructed, within the company of those Christ himself sent out to prepare the way for the Gospel, and for the pastoral office he is said to have exercised as a bishop in the generation immediately following the apostles. That double connection, to Christ’s own ministry and to the church-planting work of the apostolic age, is the substance of his veneration.

Canonization and Feast Day

As with the other Seventy Disciples individually honored across various local traditions, Parrobus’s veneration reaches back to the apostolic age itself, long before any formal papal process of canonization existed, and rests on ancient identification and liturgical memory alone.

What Catholics Can Learn Today

To be sent out, as the Seventy were, ahead of Christ into places not yet prepared for him, and later to shepherd a young and untested community as bishop, required the same readiness to go first into uncertain ground. Parrobus’s brief and traditional record still points to that readiness as a model for missionary and pastoral service alike.

A Prayer to Saint Parrobus

Saint Parrobus, sent out among the Seventy and entrusted with a bishop’s care, pray that we too may go willingly wherever Christ sends us. Amen.

Sources

• Luke 10:1
• Romans 16:14
• Roman Martyrology