Saint Lawrence Of Rome August 10 That which rendered the Viminal Hill famous for all ages is the glorious martyrdom of S. Lawrence which took place upon its site. A fierce persecution had broken out against the Christians under the Emperor Valerian. The onslaught was made mainly upon bishops and priests. The Holy Pontiff, Sixtus II., was seized, and, upon refusing to sacrifice to Mars, was condemned to death. As he was being dragged away, the holy deacon, S, Lawrence, ran to meet him, and cried out with grief: "Father, whither goest thou without thy son? Holy Priest, why doest thou depart without thy deacon? " Sixtus answered: “I am not leaving thee, my son. There awaits thee, for Christ's sake, a sterner combat than mine, Yet three days and thou shalt follow me, the deacon behind the priest. And in the meanwhile, if thou hast anything in the treasury, give it to the poor." Lawrence obeyed, and the tyrant, being baffled, both by losing the treasures of the church, as well as by failing to rob Lawrence of his faith, after having subjected him to a number of appalling tortures, finally ordered him to be taken to the imperial gardens on the Viminal Hill and there to be roasted upon a large gridiron over a slow fire. Thus, the glorious martyr rendered his beautiful soul to God, August 10, 258. His sacred remains were deposited in the catacombs of S. Cyriacus outside the city walls; and, when about sixty years later peace was restored to the church, by the conversion of the Emperor Constantine, one of the first solicitudes of Pope S. Silvester was to render the place of the martyrdom of S. Lawrence memorable by the erection of a magnificent Church upon the very ruins of the palace of the Emperor Valerian. A Monastery of Benedictine Monks was soon constructed in connection with the Church. The Benedictines inhabited the place until the thirteenth century. When they left, it was given to the daughters of S. Clare. This took place shortly after the death of the Seraphic S. Francis. Here the Poor Clares lived humble and exemplary lives. Here also, in a hospice attached to the monastery, S. Bridget of Sweden, a member of the Third Order of S. Francis, having contracted a fever upon her return from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, breathed her last, upon the 23rd day of July, in 1372. Her body was buried in the Church of San Lorenzo. When she was canonized by Pope Boniface IX, her daughter, Queen Catherine of Sweden, reclaimed her body, leaving to the Monastery the relic of her shoulder and right arm with which she had written the famous revelations. - The Princess of Poverty