S. ONESIMUS.
(A.D. 95.)
[There is much confusion between the S. Onesimus, disciple of St. Paul, and his namesake, bishop of Ephesus. Indeed, by many it is supposed that there was only one Onesimus, and that the runaway slave spoken of by S. Paul was afterwards bishop of Ephesus. The Greeks commemorate the first on Feb. 15th, and the second on December 1st.]
ONESIMUS was a Phrygian by birth, slave to Philemon, a person of note of the city of Colossæ, converted to the faith by S. Paul. Having run away from his master, he providentially met with S. Paul, then a prisoner at Rome, who there converted and baptized him, and sent him, with his canonical letter of recommendation, to Philemon, by whom he was pardoned, set at liberty, and sent back to his spiritual father, whom he afterwards faithfully served. The apostle made him, with Tychicus, the bearer of his Epistle to the Colossians,[44] and afterwards, as S. Jerome[45] and other fathers witness, a preacher of the gospel and a bishop. The Greeks say he suffered under Domitian. There was a bishop of Ephesus, after S. Timothy, of the same name, who showed great respect for S. Ignatius, when on his journey to Rome, in 107, and is highly commended by him.[46] He was conducted to Rome two years after, and was stoned to death.
S. HONESTUS, P. M.
(ABOUT A.D. 270.)
[Commemorated at Pampeluna, as the apostle of that place, and at Amiens with nine lections, and at Toulouse, where his head is preserved. Besides being mentioned in these Breviaries, his name occurs in the Anglican Martyrology of Wytford, and in the additions to Usuardus, by Molanus. All that is known of him is found in the Acts of S. Firmin, B. M. See Sept. 25th.]
Honestus, a native of Nismes, was found by S. Saturninus, as he passed through that city, to be of so pious and zealous a disposition that he called him to follow him, as a disciple, and after he had fully instructed him, he ordained him priest, and sent him into Spain. He preached with great effect at Pampeluna, where he converted one Firmus, a senator, with all his house, and his son, Firmin, became his most devoted pupil. He so completely succeeded in the destruction of superstition in the minds of the people of Pampeluna, that he persuaded them to entirely overthrow a temple of Diana, which adorned their town. In some martyrologies he is called a martyr, but nothing is known of the place or manner of his death.
S. CORNELIUS, M.
(DATE UNKNOWN.)
The relics of this martyr, found in one of the Roman catacombs, were given by Pope Innocent X., in 1649, to the Jesuit church at Ghent, where they are enshrined in a silver reliquary, and are exhibited on Feb. 16th.