Severian of Sebaste

Holy Martyr Severian of Sebaste suffered at Sebaste in Armenia around the year 320, in the time of Emperor Licinius, after comforting the forty martyr soldiers in prison. He is a different commemoration from the Severian counted among the forty.

A confessor of Christ, Severian showed sincere compassion for the forty Christian soldiers who suffered for the Name of Christ. He visited them in prison, strengthened their spirit and called them to courage and steadfastness. Half a year after their martyrdom on the lake of Sebaste (their commemoration is 9 March), Severian too was brought to trial before the governor Lysias, for confessing the Christian faith, and was subjected to cruel tortures. Throughout them he called on the Lord, asking for strength to carry his struggle to the end. After refined tortures, unbroken in his faith, he was hung head downward, with a stone on his neck, on the wall of the city, and so he departed.

The Christians of Sebaste carried his body to his house, where the townspeople came to take leave of him and to ask for his prayers. Then the saint's servant, who had died and not yet been buried, came back to life, rose from his bed and came to accompany his master on the last journey. He lived for fifteen years more, never leaving the place where the holy martyr was buried. Severian is commemorated on 22 September, in the new style.