St. Irenaeus

Who they were

Irenaeus grew up in Smyrna listening. His own letter, quoted by the historian Eusebius, describes how vividly he remembered the aged Polycarp's preaching, where he sat, how he came in and went out, and Polycarp's accounts of his conversations with John and the others who had seen the Lord.

That memory is the Church's clearest documented chain of custody, and Irenaeus spent his life defending what came down it. A presbyter of Lyons who became its bishop after the persecution of 177 killed his predecessor, he wrote Against Heresies, five books dismantling the Gnostic systems by the simple, devastating method of stating what the apostolic churches everywhere actually taught. His most quoted sentence belongs here in full: the glory of God is a living man, and the life of man consists in beholding God. True to his name, which means peaceable, he talked pope and Eastern churches back from schism over the dating of Easter. In 2022 Francis declared him a Doctor of the Church with a new title, Doctor of Unity.

Why people turn to St. Irenaeus

Catechists, godparents, and grandparents: everyone who is a link in the chain. Peacemakers in church disputes, by his name and his record. And converts wanting the receipts, since his whole method was showing the paper trail.

How to ask their intercession

For the person you are handing the faith to, by name.