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Thomas, also called Didymus (which means “Twin”), was part of the small group of disciples chosen by Jesus from the very beginning of His public ministry. He was one of the Twelve Apostles, as emphasized by the Evangelist John. John also recounts several episodes that help us understand Thomas’s personality.
The center of the veneration of Saints Julius and Aaron is Caerleon, a Celtic name meaning “City of the Legions” (Quadrata Legionum). Caerleon, located in southern Wales, was a fortress permanently occupied by the Second Augustan Legion from 75 to 431 AD.
The two were likely martyred during the Diocletian persecution, around the year 304.
The memory of the First Martyrs of the Church of Rome is celebrated immediately after the feast of Saints Peter and Paul. This commemoration has always been connected to the location of the Circus built by Emperor Caligula, later known as Nero’s Circus. It stood in the Gardens of Agrippina (Caligula’s mother), on the southern slope of the Vatican Hill, from where the Via Aurelia, Via Cornelia, and Via Triumphalis began.
“Basing itself on the tradition of the fathers, knows that they did not actually suffer in the course of the same day between sunrise and sunset. So Paul suffered on Peter's birthday (natalitium), not the day he emerged from his mother's womb to join the ranks of mankind, but the one on which he was released from the bonds of the flesh and born into the light of the angels.
“We have strayed from that path of peace. We have forgotten the lesson learned from the tragedies of the last century, the sacrifice of the millions who fell in two world wars. We have disregarded the commitments we made as a community of nations. We have betrayed peoples’ dreams of peace and the hopes of the young.
"The heart of Christ, as the symbol of the deepest and most personal source of his love for us, is the very core of the initial preaching of the Gospel. It stands at the origin of our faith, as the wellspring that refreshes and enlivens our Christian beliefs.”
With these words, Pope Francis expressed himself in his encyclical Dilexit nos on the human and divine love of the Heart of Jesus Christ, dated October 24, 2024.
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