Clemens Romanus (abt. 35 - 99)

Born about 0035 in Roma, Roman Empire

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Biography

Pope St Clement Romanus is Notable.

Clemens Romanus, Clement of Rome, was a Jew born in Rome and converted the Christianity.^[1]

Irenaeus and Tertullian write that he was consecrated by Peter the Apostle and was Bishop of Rome from 88 AD to his death in 99 AD, and he is the first Apostolic Father of the Church, together with Polycarp and Ignatius of Antioch.^[2][3]

Clement was imprisoned under the Emperor Trajan; during this time he is recorded to have led a ministry among fellow prisoners. Thereafter he was executed by being tied to an anchor and thrown into the sea. He is the patron saint of mariners.^[3]

Flocknote Popes in a Year ^[4] tells us:

Like Linus & Cletus before him, Clement I is identified by St. Irenaeus in Adversus haeresis ("Against Heresy") as the fourth pope and third successor of St. Peter. Ancient writers Eusebius and St. Jerome also put Clement I fourth in line.

He was Jewish by birth, and tradition suggests that he's the same Clement mentioned by St. Paul in Philippians 4:3 ("...along with Clement and my other co-workers..."). St. Clement is traditionally remembered as having been martyred for the faith.

St. Clement's letter to the Corinthians is understood to be the oldest ancient Christian writing in existence after the Sacred Scriptures. Clement's letter taught, among other things, that the Christian faith was one, holy, catholic, and apostolic (sound familiar?), that Christians should worship in sacred spaces, and that the offices of bishop, priest, and deacon were completely legit and willed by Christ.

His letter was even read at Mass in many parts of the early Church, according to Eusebius' History of the Church (written in the early 300s A.D.), and was written within a few years of when the Gospel of John was put to paper. Or, should we say, papyrus.

St. Clement actually knew some of the Apostles, namely St. Peter (by whom he was ordained) and St. Paul. St. Irenaeus, in the same Adversus haeresis, wrote, "[Clement], as he had seen the blessed apostles, and had been conversant with them, might be said to have the preaching of the apostles still echoing [in his ears], and their traditions before his eyes."

Jewish historian Josephus died around the year 100 A.D., near the end of Clement's papacy. Josephus was the guy who said, "yep, they were real" in affirming the existences of both Jesus and John the Baptist, thus giving a valuable non-Christian historical insight into the facts of the early Church.

Sources

1. ↑ Vatican
2. ↑ Chapman, Henry Palmer (1908). "Pope St. Clement I" . In Herbermann, Charles (ed.). Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 4. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
3. ↑ ^{3.0 3.1} Wikipedia Clement of Rome
4. ↑ Flocknote Popes in a Year
   SOURCES (and further reading)
   http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/11/st-clement-of-rome-soteriology-and-ecclesiology/
   http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1010.htm
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Clement_I
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostolic_Fathers
   http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04012c.htm