St. John Chrysostom, Bishop and Doctor:
c. 347-407 A.D.
Feast day, September 13
Birth, education, and baptism
St. John was born about the year 347 A.D. in Antioch, Syria, the only son of Secundus, an imperial military officer. Anthusa, St. John's mother, was left a widow when she was only twenty. However, Anthusa was left with sufficient means to have St. John receive the best education available. And so, St. John studied law and rhetoric under the famous pagan rhetorician, Libanius, and took special studies in theology under the Antiochean priest Diodorus of Tarsus. John was then baptized by Bishop Meletius about 369 A.D.
Hermit, deacon and then priest
In 374 A.D., after Anthusa's death, St. John became a hermit under St. Basil and Theodore of Mopsuestia. He joined one of the communities of monks in the mountains to the south of Antioch. For four years, John led an austere life of fasting, prayer and study. The next two years he lived as a hermit in a cave. However, he overdid his austerity and weakened his health, thereby forcing him to return to the city in 381 A.D. He was ordained a deacon by Meletius in about the same year. Serving five years as deacon, he was then ordained a priest in 386 A.D. by Bishop Flavian of Antioch, whom he assisted for the next twelve years.
Chrysostom (golden-mouthed)
St. John became popular for his preaching and earned him the title Chrysostom or Golden-Mouth - on account of his eloquence. More than seven hundred of his preached sermons have come down to us, and it was mainly because of them that he was declared a Doctor of the Church. He preached a series of homilies on books of the New Testament (including eighty-eight on John, ninety on Matthew, and thirty-two on Romans). He is also called Doctor of the Eucharist for his beautiful witness to the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
Patriarch of Constantinople
Declared Bishop of Constantinople
In 398 A.D., against his wishes, St. John was named Patriarch of Constantinople and at once began to reform the Church there. His first move was to cut down all the unnecessary expenses of his predecessors and to give the money to the poor. He also took to task the reformation of the clergy by his words and example.
First exile
St. John's preaching and Christian practice gained him many enemies, both in the imperial court (the empress Eudoxia) and among less worthy bishops. In 403 A.D., Theophilus, Archbishop of Alexandria (and John's rival to the see of Constantinople), came to Constantinople to convene a council of thirty-six bishops. Here, a list of false charges was drawn up against John and handed over to the emperor, who then ordered St. John to be exiled.
Return from exile
Civil war threatened Constantinople and when an earthquake shook the city, the empress Eudoxia (whom St. John criticized for her vanity, lack of charity, and dress) revoked the banishment order - imploring the emperor to return St. John to his see. Once again returning to the see, St. John denounced the excesses of the public games held to celebrate the building of a silver statue of Eudoxia. This renewed Eudoxia's enmity against John.
Further exile and death
On June 24, 404 A.D., Emperor Arcadius ordered John into exile at Cucusus, Armenia, despite the support of the people of Constantinople, Pope Innocent I, and the whole western Church. From Cucusus, John wrote at least 238 letters that are still extant. John was then further exiled to a more distant location, Pityus, at the far end of the Black Sea, and died on the way at Comana, Pontus, on September 14 from exhaustion from the forced marches on foot in the stifling heat and inclement weather.
Doctor of the Church
St. John Chrysostom is the fourth of the four men - along with Saints Athanasius, Basil and Gregory Nazianzen - who were considered the great Doctors of the Church from the East until more were added in the sixteenth century. He was declared a Doctor of the Universal Church at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 A.D. and was named patron of preachers by Pope Pius X. His feast day is September 13.
References of this article
- Dictionary of Saints, by John J. Delaney
- Saints for Our Time, by Ed Ransom
- The Doctors of the Church vol 1, by John F. Fink
- A Year With the Saints, by Don Bosco Press, Inc.
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