St. Damian

St. Damian is venerated together with his twin brother St. Cosmas as one of the most beloved martyrs of the early Church. According to tradition, the brothers were born in Arabia and practiced medicine in the region of Cilicia in Asia Minor, in the coastal city of Aegeae. Because they treated the sick without ever accepting payment, the Christian East honored them with the title 'anargyroi'—the 'moneyless ones' or unmercenary physicians—and their charity is said to have drawn many to the Christian faith. Hagiographical accounts relate that during the persecution of Diocletian, around the year 287, Cosmas and Damian were arrested by the prefect Lysias, tortured, and finally beheaded for refusing to renounce Christ. The historical record of their lives is thin, and the details of the traditional accounts cannot be verified; what is certain is that their veneration arose very early and spread with remarkable speed through both East and West. Churches were dedicated to the twin physicians in Jerusalem, Constantinople, and throughout Syria and Asia Minor within a century or two of their deaths. In Rome, Pope Felix IV converted a building on the Roman Forum into the basilica of Santi Cosma e Damiano in the sixth century, where its celebrated apse mosaic still draws pilgrims. The brothers were also inscribed in the Roman Canon of the Mass, where they are named to this day. Sts. Cosmas and Damian are honored in the General Roman Calendar with a memorial on September 26. They are the patrons of physicians, surgeons, and pharmacists, and their example of medicine practiced freely as an act of Christian mercy has made them enduring models for all who care for the sick.