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Saint Zosimus, Pope from 18 March 417 until his death on 26 December 418, was a Greek by origin who succeeded Innocent I and labored to uphold the authority of the Apostolic See in Gaul, Africa, and Italy. Though his brief pontificate was marked by sharp controversies over metropolitan rights and the Pelagian heresy, he finally condemned Pelagianism in his Tractoria and sought the good order of the clergy. He is venerated as a saint of the Church; his feast is kept on 28 September.
According to the Liber Pontificalis, Zosimus was a Greek whose father was named Abramius. Nothing certain is known of his life before he was chosen bishop of Rome. He was consecrated on 18 March 417 as successor to Pope Innocent I.
From the outset he took a firm hand in the long dispute in Gaul concerning the jurisdiction of the See of Arles. Bishop Patroclus of Arles, who had replaced the deposed Heros and enjoyed imperial favor, quickly gained the new pope's confidence. As early as 22 March 417 Zosimus conferred on him metropolitan rights over the bishops of Viennensis and Narbonensis I and II and made him a kind of papal vicar for all Gaul, so that no Gallic cleric might travel to Rome without a letter of identity from Patroclus. The bishops of Vienne, Narbonne, and Marseille protested this elevation as an infringement of their ancient rights. Zosimus answered with energetic letters in favor of Arles, yet the controversy was not finally settled until the time of Pope Leo I.
Zosimus also faced the lingering crisis of Pelagianism. Caelestius, already condemned under Innocent I, came to Rome to appeal. In the summer of 418 the pope held a meeting of the Roman clergy in the Basilica of St. Clement. Caelestius refused to anathematize the propositions condemned at Carthage in 411, yet offered a general profession of faith that seemed orthodox. Judging the African proceedings hasty, Zosimus wrote to the African bishops and allowed two months for further charges. After receiving from Pelagius a confession of faith and a treatise on free will, another Roman synod found the statements acceptable, and Zosimus again defended the accused and rebuked their accusers. Archbishop Aurelius of Carthage and the African bishops replied that the pope had been deceived. When the African council of 1 May 418 and the measures of the emperor Honorius against the Pelagians made the danger plain, Zosimus issued his Tractoria, in which Pelagianism and its authors were finally and solemnly condemned.
A further conflict arose when the priest Apiarius of Sicca, excommunicated by his own bishop, appealed directly to Rome. Zosimus accepted the appeal and sent legates to Africa, basing his action on a canon he believed to be of Nicaea but which was in fact from the Council of Sardica. The resulting disagreement over appellate procedure continued after his death.
Besides these major affairs, letters of Zosimus survive addressed to bishops in Africa, Gaul, and Spain concerning discipline, Priscillianism, and the grades of holy orders. The Liber Pontificalis attributes to him decrees on the wearing of the maniple by deacons, the blessing of Easter candles in country churches, and a prohibition forbidding clerics to enter taverns.
Zosimus died on 26 December 418. He was buried in the sepulchral Basilica of Saint Lawrence outside the Walls. At his death the Roman clergy were deeply divided, yet the Church remembers him as a pope who, after trial and correction, defended the faith against Pelagian error and asserted the pastoral care of Peter's See.
May Saint Zosimus obtain for us a steadfast love of Catholic truth and the humility to correct our judgments when the good of souls requires it.
OCTOBER 25 — ST. BONIFACE I., POPE, C
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 made much against his will, as the relation of it, which was sent by the clergy and people of Rome, and by the neighboring bishops to the emperor Honorius, who resided at Ravenna, testifies. 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 determine the debate. The council which met desired that a greater number of prelates should be called, and 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 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 would allow no election of bishops to be made in those countries which were not confirmed by him, according to the ancient discipline. In Gaul he restored certain privileges to the metropolitical sees of Narbonne and Vienne, 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:1 “The blessed apostle Peter received by our Lord’s sentence and commission the care of the whole chur
Sources: Wikidata Wikipedia Causes of Saints Alban Butler, Lives of the Saints Also listed Wikidata GCatholic
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