St. Boniface, Pope, Confessor 422 A.D. October 25      Boniface was a priest of an unblemished character, well versed in the discipline of the church, and advanced in years when he succeeded Zosimus in the pontificate on the 29th of December in 418. His election was much against his will. The choice of Boniface was sent by the clergy and people of Rome and by the neighboring bishops to the emperor Honorius, who resided at Ravenna. To it concurred seventy priests, some bishops, and the greatest part of the people, but three bishops and some others chose one Eulalius, an ambitious and intriguing man. Symmachus, prefect of Rome, sent an account of this division or schism to the emperor, who ordered that a synod should be assembled to settle the debate. The council which met desired that a greater number of prelates should be called, and it made certain provisional decrees to which Eulalius refused to submit, whereupon he was condemned by a sentence of the council, and the election of Boniface was ratified. This pope was a lover of peace and remarkable for his mildness, yet he would not suffer the bishops of Constantinople to extend their patriarchate into Illyricum or the other western provinces which were then subject to the eastern empire but had always belonged to the western patriarchate. He strenuously maintained the rights of Rufus, Bishop of Thessalonica, who was his vicar in Thessaly and Greece, and, according to the ancient discipline, he would allow no election of bishops to be made in those countries unless they were confirmed by him. In Gaul, he restored certain privileges to the metropolitical sees of Narbonne and Vienna, exempting them from any subjection to the primacy of Arles. This holy pope exerted his zeal against the Pelagians and testified the highest esteem for the great St. Austin, who addressed to him four books against the Pelagians. St. Boniface, in his third letter to Rufus, says, "The blessed apostle Peter received by our Lord's sentence and commission the care of the whole church which was founded upon him." St. Boniface died towards the end of the year 433, having sat a little more than three years and nine months, and he was buried in the cemetery of St. Felicitas on the Salarian Way, which cemetery he had adorned. He had made many rich presents of silver patens, chalices, and other holy vessels to the churches in Rome. St. Bede quotes a book of his miracles, and the Roman Martyrology commemorates his name on this day. from Lives of the Saints by Rev. Alban Butler, 1895

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