Saint of the Day Online - St Leo the Great

Saint of the day online, Friday, November 10, 2017

Pope Saint Leo who was born on 400 is known as Saint Leo the Great and he was Pope from 29 September 440 to his death in 461. He was undoubtedly one of the most important in the Church's history.

According to the Liber Pontificalis, he was a native of Tuscany. By 431, as a deacon, he was sufficiently well known outside of Rome that John Cassian dedicated to him the treatise against Nestorius written at Leo's suggestion.

About this time Cyril of Alexandria appealed to Rome regarding a jurisdictional dispute Juvenal of Jerusalem, but it is not entirely clear whether the letter was intended for Leo, in his capacity of deacon, or for Pope Celestine I directly. Near the end of the reign of Pope Sixtus III, Leo was dispatched at the request of Emperor Valentinian III to settle a dispute between Aëtius, one of Gaul's chief military commanders, and the chief magistrate Caecina Decius Aginatius Albinus. Johann Peter Kirsch sees this commission as a proof of the confidence placed in the able deacon by the Imperial Court.

All secular historical treatises eulogize his efforts during the upheaval of the fifth century barbarian invasion. His encounter with Attila the Hun, at the very gates of Rome persuading him to turn back, remains a historical memorial to his great eloquence. When the Vandals under Genseric occupied the city of Rome, he persuaded the invaders to desist from pillaging the city and harming its inhabitants. He died in 461, leaving many letters and writings of great historical value. His feast day is November 10th.