Sylvester

Holy Hierarch Sylvester was bishop of Rome in the time of the emperor Constantine the Great, between 314 and 335, and is venerated as a saint of the undivided Church.

He shepherded the Church of Rome in the years when Christians ceased to be persecuted, after the Edict of Milan of 313. Pope Sylvester sent legates to the Council of Arles (314) and two priests, Vitus and Vincent, to the First Ecumenical Council at Nicaea (325), which condemned the heresy of Arius and drew up the Creed. Under his pastorate the emperor Constantine raised in Rome important churches, among them the Lateran cathedral and the old basilica of Saint Peter. Western tradition, unknown to the East, says that he baptized Constantine; according to the Eastern sources the emperor was baptized near death by Bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia.

Sylvester fell asleep in the Lord on 31 December 335 and was buried in the catacomb of Priscilla on the via Salaria. The Orthodox Church commemorates him on 2 January, according to the new calendar, and the Roman Catholic Church on 31 December.