Sossius of Puteoli

Holy Martyr Sossius of Puteoli was a deacon and died a martyr around the year 305, in the time of Diocletian, together with Bishop Januarius and five other companions.

The holy hieromartyr Januarius, bishop, together with the martyrs Proculus, Sossius and Faustus, deacons, Desiderius, reader, Eutychius and Acutius, suffered death for Christ. Januarius was seized and brought to trial before the governor of Campania, Timothy. For firmly confessing the faith he was thrown into a heated furnace, but like the youths of Babylon came out unharmed; then, at Timothy's order, he was stretched on a frame and beaten with iron rods until his bones were bared. In the crowd were the deacon Faustus and the reader Desiderius, who wept at the sight of their bishop's suffering; the pagans guessed they were Christians and threw them into the prison of Puteoli with Januarius. There were already, imprisoned earlier for confessing Christ, two deacons, Sossius and Proculus, and two laymen, Eutychius and Acutius.

The next morning the martyrs were led out into the circus and given to wild beasts, but the beasts did not touch them. Timothy said that the wonders came from the sorcery of the Christians, but he went blind and began to cry for help. The gentle Januarius prayed for his healing and Timothy saw again. The blindness of his soul did not leave him, though, and he, accusing the Christians with still greater anger of sorcery, ordered their heads cut off outside the walls († 305). The Christians of the neighbouring cities took the bodies for burial, each city taking one, so as to have an intercessor before God. The Neapolitans took the body of Januarius and gathered from the ground his clotted blood. When the vessel with the blood was set on the relics of the saint in the church of Naples, the blood dissolved and became hot, as though freshly shed. Many miracles came from the relics of Januarius: at the eruption of Vesuvius, when the inhabitants prayed to Januarius, the lava stopped before the city; a pious woman laid an icon of the saint on her dead son and he came back to life.

Sossius is commemorated on 4 May, in the new style.