Saint Pope Sylvester

 

On the second day of the old New Year, the Orthodox Church commemorates Saint Sylvester of Rome. He was a Pope of Rome, and his pontificate was one of the longest in history, from 314 to 335. In Germany, Switzerland, Poland, and other countries, the New Year celebration is named after Sylvester. This is connected to the fact that he died on December 31, which became the day of his commemoration. 

In Orthodoxy, the day of his remembrance is observed two days later. It was moved so as not to coincide with the feast of Basil the Great, the Apodosis of the Nativity, and the Feast of the Circumcision of the Lord, and possibly also because news of his death may have reached Constantinople with a delay. Saint Sylvester did not personally take part in the Council of Nicaea, but he sent his legates. This established a tradition according to which the bishops of Rome did not personally participate in the Ecumenical Councils in antiquity. Contrary to later interpretations, this was not due to any special “supreme authority” of the Roman bishop, but rather because of Sylvester’s advanced age, logistical considerations, and the fact that for the “West” the early Ecumenical Councils were “Eastern” ecclesiastical events.

Saint Sylvester was a contemporary of Nicholas the Wonderworker, Spyridon of Trimythous, and another great popular saint of that time, Bishop Jacob of Nisibis, whom Ephrem the Syrian regarded as his spiritual teacher. Sylvester lived through the persecutions of Christians by pagans and became one of the first non-martyr bishops to be canonized as a saint.

Many miracles are associated with his name, as well as the tradition of a special friendly relationship with Emperor Constantine. Sylvester is said to have healed him of leprosy and received Rome as a gift in order to establish a theocratic state there. In modern times, the Roman Church, since the 1920s called the Vatican in its legal sense, is one of the oldest continuously existing states in the Western world. Thus, through the pen of hagiographers, like Nicholas of Myra and Basil the Great, Sylvester became one of the culturally formative saints. Unlike them, he does not bring gifts to children, but he himself received an entire country as a gift — or, as it is said in fairy tales, “half of the kingdom.”