Desiderius

Holy Martyr Desiderius was a lector of Bishop Januarius of Benevento and was martyred at Pozzuoli in the year 305, together with the deacon Festus.

Festus was a deacon and Desiderius a lector of Bishop Januarius. When the deacon Sossius of Miseno, a friend of Januarius, was arrested, Festus, Desiderius and the bishop hurried to help and comfort him. When it was discovered that they too were Christians, they were arrested and tried; the judge urged them in vain to sacrifice to the gods. They were condemned to beheading, carried out near the Forum Vulcani, the solfatara of Pozzuoli. Their veneration is very old: they appear in the Hieronymian Martyrology of the fifth century, on 19 October, with the martyrs Sossius, Januarius and Acutius. Their relics were moved in antiquity to Benevento, then to the cathedral around 824, and finally to the sanctuary of Montevergine. In the sixteenth century Caesar Baronius entered the commemoration of all the martyrs of Pozzuoli on 19 September, and after the reform of the Second Vatican Council the commemoration of Festus and Desiderius was moved to 7 September. They are saints of the undivided Church, honoured in the Catholic Church.