Deepertruth: Stand in the Gap With Us and Saint Cornelius

Stand in the Gap With Us and Saint Cornelius 9/16/2023

Saint Cornelius was the bishop of Rome from 6th or 13th March 251 until his martyrdom in June 253. He was pope during and following a period of persecution of the church, while a schism occurred over how repentanct church members who had practiced pagan sacrifices to protect themselves could be readmitted to the church. He agreed with Cyprian of Carthage that those who had lapsed could be restored to communion after varying forms of Reconciliation and Penance.

St. Cornelius was a Priest that strongly believed in the gift of confession. In his time there were many Christians who denounced Christianity to Emperor Decius in order to be spared their lives. The Church leaders of their time thought they could never be brought back into the church after such behavior.

Cornelius's saintly name means "battle horn", and he is represented in icons by a pope either holding some form of cow's horn or with a cow nearby.

But Cyprian called him a martyr and later accounts said that Cornelius had been beheaded. He was buried at Rome in the crypt of Lucina, where his tomb can still be seen with the inscription Cornelius Martyr.

Cornelius is the patron saint of earache sufferers (perhaps because of his arguments with Novatian), domestic animals, cattle and, unsurprisingly, the town of Kornelimünster.

The greatest problem of Cornelius’s two-year term as pope had to do with the Sacrament of Penance and centered on the readmission of Christians who had denied their faith during the time of persecution. Two extremes were finally both condemned. Cyprian, primate of North Africa, appealed to the pope to confirm his stand that the relapsed could be reconciled only by the decision of the bishop.