Theodulus and Agathopodes

Holy Martyrs Theodulus and Agathopodes were ministers of the Church of Thessalonica, put to death around 303, in the Great Persecution of Diocletian and Maximian. Agathopodes (the name means good foot) was a deacon, an old man, and Theodulus (servant of God) was a reader, a young man. They are commemorated on 4 April in the Catholic Church and in the Church of Greece, and the Serbian source gives 5 April by the old calendar (18 April by the new).

They served together in the church of Thessalonica. Theodulus had a vision and, in a wonderful way, received a ring with the image of the Cross, with which he healed people and turned pagans to Christianity. At the beginning of the Great Persecution, in 303, by order of the governor of the city, Faustinus, they were brought to trial, tortured and thrown into the sea with stones tied to their necks. The Serbian source says that, coming to the trial with joy, they held each other by the hand and cried out that they were Christians; all the judge's counsels to renounce Christ and bow to idols were in vain. After a long imprisonment and hunger, they were condemned to be drowned: their hands were bound behind them and a heavy stone hung round each neck. When Agathopodes was pushed first into the deep, he cried out that by this second baptism they were washed of all their sins and were going pure to Christ.

In that hour their bodies were cast up on the shore. The Christians who knew them buried their bodies, and had a vision of Saint Theodulus, who commanded them to distribute his property to the poor, orphans and widows. According to the Greek source, the martyrdom by drowning took place west of the Roman port of Constantine the Great, in the time of the Caesar Maximian Galerius (285 to 305) and of the governor Faustinus. According to their synaxarion, their chains were loosed and the waves carried the bodies of the two saints to the shore. They were buried with honour by the faithful in the west of the city, in the districts of today's Xirokrini, Palaios Stathmos and Bechtsinari. The martyrium preserved to this day in the basement of a building at 25 Kallitheas Street, outside the northwest wall of Thessalonica, is most probably linked with Saints Theodulus and Agathopodes; it may be the church built in their honour, known from historical sources. The site where the Holocaust Museum and the cultural centre Mylos stand is regarded as the place of their martyrdom and burial.