21 January: Saint Agnes, Martyr

Like a lamb sacrificed for Christ
Saint Agnes was a 13-year-old girl from Rome, who did not hesitate to sacrifice her life to bear witness to her faith in Christ. Saint Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, wrote that her witness to Christ was twofold: her chastity and her faith (De Virginitate II. 5-9). Pope Damasus wrote an epitaph in her honour.
Agnes’ great beauty attracted the attention of Diocletian’s nephew, but she had made a vow of chastity and consecrated herself to God. When the young man tried to be violent with her, Agnes rejected him, prompting him to seek revenge. He sought the help of Diocletian, who had Agnes arrested and imprisoned in a brothel, where it would have been easier for Diocletian’s nephew to be violent with her. According to tradition in the West, Agnes was decapitated, while Eastern tradition holds that she was burned alive.
In the end, Agnes’ throat was slit by a soldier’s sword, like a sacrificial lamb. The Crypt of Agnese in Agone in Rome’s Piazza Navona, is the site of her martyrdom, which took place in 305 A.D.
Her body was laid to rest in the family tomb on Via Nomentana, where the daughter of Emperor Constantine had a Basilica built in her honour. In the ninth century, Agnes’ head was moved to the Popes’ private chapel, until Pius X donated it to the Church in Piazza Navona in 1900, where it is held in a case in the Chapel of the Holy Head. On her feast day, lambs whose wool will be used to weave the Pallia of the Popes and of the Metropolitan Archbishops, are blessed in the Church.