Saint Liberius

The testimonies cited from Saint Athanasius, Saint Jerome, Saint Hilary, and Liberius himself, which would be damning if they were authentic, lose all their force in the face of sound historical criticism. Saint Athanasius speaks of the fall of Liberius in his *Apology Against the Arians* and in his *History of the Arians*. However, the *Apology* was written at the latest in 350, that is to say, two years before Liberius was pope; it is therefore evident that there was a later interposition, and one made by an unskilled hand, for this addition renders the *Apology* inept and ridiculous. The *History of the Arians* was also written before the time when the fall of Liberius is placed, that is to say, in 357 or 358, and the passage where it is mentioned can only be an addition made after the fact. The Arians did for Liberius what the Donatists did for Pope Saint Marcellinus. Moreover, one sees the beginnings of the slander appearing only fifty years later. Finally, the Priest of Aquileia, who could have known Liberius in his youth, and who had certainly known Fortunatianus, the alleged author of the alleged fall of Liberius, writes half a century after this event: "Liberius, bishop of Rome, had returned during the lifetime of Co nstantius Constance Roman emperor who exiled Eusebius for his opposition to Arianism. ; but I do not know exactly whether the emperor granted it to him, or because he had consented to subscribe, or to please the Roman people, who had begged him for it before his departure." Thus, finally, he knows of the rumor spread about the memory of Liberius, and he remains in doubt, he who had been in a position to know the fact from the very mouth of Fortunatianus! Would this doubt be possible if Liberius had really subscribed to an Arian formula?

The testimony of Saint Athanasius against Liberius therefore does not exist. That of Saint Hilary does not exist either, for the passages cited have no authenticity, any more than the letters of Liberius found in the *Fragments* attributed to Saint Hilary, and it is recognized that these *Fragments* have been the subject of bold and numerous falsifications. Saint J erome wrote Saint Jérôme Father of the Church and biographical source for Amand. these words in his *Chronicle*: 'Liberius, overcome by the troubles of exile, subscribed to heresy, and entered Rome as a conqueror'. This testimony, which appears to have great force, has none at all when one considers that the *Chronicle* was written more than thirty years after the exile of Liberius, and in the East, where the most slanderous rumors were spread about this Pope. It is further proven that the *Chronicle* has been extraordinarily altered in its text; finally, says Doctor Thomas Menochius, 'there is no trace of the fall of Liberius in the manuscript of the *Chronicles* of Saint Jerome, which is kept in the Vatican, and which was given to the Pope by the Queen of Sweden; a manuscript which Holstenius maintains is of very great antiquity, and which scholars believe to have been written in the 6th or 7th century'. It is therefore again a matter of an addition made after the fact.

Another passage taken from the *Ecclesiastical Writers* of Saint Jerome is no more authentic. Nothing that is charged against Liberius remains, while the testimonies in his defense are numerous and magnificent. First, there are all the bishops of the Catholic world who continued to communicate with Liberius after his return just as before; they sent him the acts of the synods they celebrated and consulted him on the major difficulties they encountered. Then, from all sides, the greatest saints, the best-informed men, paid homage to his virtues and his courage: Saint Siricius regarded him as one of his most illustrious predecessors; Saint Basil called him most blessed; Saint Epiphanius called him a Pontiff of happy memory; Cassiodorus said: the great Liberius, the most holy bishop who surpasses all others in merit and is in every way one of the most famous; Theodoret regarded him as an illustrious and victorious athlete of the truth; Sozomen, as a rare man in whatever respect one considers him; Saint Ambrose said of him that he was a Saint and most holy bishop: "It is time," he said to his sister Marcellina, "to recall the instructions of Liberius, that Pontiff of holy memory, the words of an orator all the more pleasing as his virtues are greater." Finally, the Menologion of the Greeks, which cannot be suspect, announces the feast of Saint Liberius in these terms: "September 27, me mory of our saint Libère Pope whose name is associated with the papal catalogue compiled by Philocalus. holy Father Liberius. The blessed Liberius, defender of the truth, was bishop of Rome under the reign of Constantius; the zeal with which he burned for the orthodox faith led him to take up the defense of the great Athanasius, persecuted by t he heretics an grand Athanase Father of the Church who cited Leontius among the Catholic luminaries. d expelled from his see of Alexandria, because of the attachment he professed for the truth. As long as Constantine and Constans, the first two sons of Constantine the Great, lived, the orthodox faith triumphed; but, after the death of these princes, Constantius, the youngest, who was an Arian, was sole master of the empire, and heresy prevailed. It was then that Liberius, who fought with all his strength against the impiety of the heretics, was relegated to Beroea, a ci ty of Bérée Birthplace and site of the saints' first retreat. Thrace; but the Romans, whose love and esteem he possessed, remained faithful to him and requested his return from the emperor. Liberius returned to Rome, where he died, after having wisely governed his flock."

After all these testimonies, one can boldly conclude that the fall of Liberius is a historical lie. If a courageous pontiff signed a formula of faith other than that of Nicaea, he certainly only signed an orthodox formula of faith, expressing the consubstantiality of the Word, and all the authentic acts of the holy Pope show him to be the intrepid and constant defender of the Catholic religion.

We have drawn the life of this holy pope, whom we wished to rehabilitate in the opinion of the faithful, from the General History of the Church, by Abbé Durnas; and from the Popular History of the Popes, by Chantret, two authors of the school of sound criticism. — Cf. Review of Historical Questions; and the History and Infallibility of the Popes, by Abbé Constant. The question of the fall of Liberius is studied there on all its foundations, and the result of this study is the complete justification of the holy Pontiff.