St. Sylvester, Pope of Rome

Sylvester was born in Rome in the second half of the third century to a noble Christian family and was ordained presbyter in his youth. He survived the Diocletianic persecution as a hidden priest, ministering to the Roman congregation in catacombs and private houses, and was elected bishop of Rome in 314 — shortly after the peace of Constantine had transformed the Church's circumstances. He would serve as bishop for twenty-one years.

The synaxarion records that Constantine the Great, in the early years of his reign, was struck with a leprosy that no physician could cure, and that his pagan advisors counseled him to bathe in the blood of three thousand children. Constantine, repelled by the proposal, prayed for guidance and dreamed of two old men — Peter and Paul — who directed him to send for Sylvester. The bishop instructed Constantine in the faith and baptized him; Constantine emerged from the baptismal font healed. (Modern scholarship dates Constantine's baptism to 337 — three years after Sylvester's death — but the Eastern synaxarion follows the older tradition.)

Sylvester was the bishop of Rome at the time of the First Ecumenical Council at Nicaea (325) and was represented there by his legates. He died at Rome on December 31, 335; the Eastern Church observes his feast on January 2, the day after his Western feast and at the head of the new calendar year.