Saint
Aemilius of Benevento
Bishop of Benevento
Bishop of Benevento, venerated in the Western Church.
Uncertain source. We are looking to verify this information as soon as we can.
- Era
- 5th century
- Order
- Hierarchs
Life
Aemilius of Benevento (also called Aemilianus) was bishop of Benevento between the 4th and 5th centuries. We know of him from three sources: Palladius's Dialogue on the Life of Chrysostom, three letters of Saint John Chrysostom, and poem 25 of Saint Paulinus of Nola.
In the spring of 406 he was one of the five bishops sent to Constantinople by Pope Innocent I, at the command of the emperor Honorius, to ask for a council in defence of John Chrysostom, driven from his see. The embassy was not received, and Chrysostom afterwards wrote to them, praising their zeal for the faith. Paulinus of Nola mentions him as a close friend, at the wedding of his daughter, and invites him to Nola for the feast of Saint Felix.
His sainthood is uncertain. Only some 17th-century writers call him a saint, with a commemoration on 12 May. The Bollandists found no trace of a cult in the liturgical sources of Benevento, and he does not appear in the service books of 1729. He can therefore be spoken of as a respected bishop without a sure cult.