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Fourth-century Christian burial depicted in relief at the Shrine of San Vittore in ciel d'oro, Basilica of Sant'Ambrogio, Milan. The Greeks and Romans practiced both burial and cremation, with Roman funerary practices distinctly favoring cremation by the time Christianity arose during the Principate. However, the Jews only ever
The military saints, warrior saints and soldier saints are patron saints, martyrs and other saints associated with the military. They were originally composed of the early Christians who were soldiers in the Roman army during the persecution of Christians , especially the Diocletianic Persecution of AD 303–313.
In Philippians 2:25 [1] and Philemon 1:2, [2] Paul describes fellow Christians as "fellow soldiers" (in Greek, συστρατιώτῃ, sustratiōtē). [3] The image of a soldier is also used in 2 Timothy 2:3–4 [ 4 ] as a metaphor for courage, loyalty and dedication; [ 5 ] this is followed by the metaphor of an athlete , emphasising hard work.
The main reason for this was that Christianity was seen as a religion of love and peace; therefore war and killing was seen as being in opposition to a Christian life. However, other aspects of army life, such as arresting Christians and taking part in mandatory pagan practices and sacrifices, would also have been at odds with Christianity. [4]
This is in line with the Greek idea that even the gods could be polluted by death, and hence anything related to the sacred had to be kept away from death and dead bodies. Hence, many inscriptions in Greek temples banned those who had recent contact with dead bodies. [8] After the body was prepared, it was laid out for viewing on the second day.
A memorial service (Greek: μνημόσυνον, mnemósynon, "memorial"; [1] Slavonic: панихида, panikhída, from Greek παννυχίς, pannychis, "vigil" (etymologically "all-nighter"); [2] [3] Romanian: parastas and Serbian парастос, parastos, from Greek παράστασις, parástasis) [4] is a liturgical solemn service for the repose of the departed in the Eastern ...
Our Lady of the Holy Death (Santa Muerte) is a female deity or folk saint of Mexican folk religion, whose popularity has been growing in Mexico and the United States in recent years. Since the pre-Columbian era, Mexican culture has maintained a certain reverence towards death, as seen in the widespread commemoration of the Day of the Dead.
From this stage the transition was easy to the ordinary meaning of the term, as used ever since in Christian literature: a martyr, or witness of Christ, is a person who suffers death rather than deny his faith. Saint John, at the end of the first century, employs the word with this meaning. [6]