Pope St. Fabian

A Roman layman who happened to be in the city when the cardinals were choosing a new pope; tradition says a dove landed on his head, and he was elected on the spot. He governed the Church for fourteen peaceful years, organized the seven deacons of Rome, and was the first prominent victim of the persecution of Decius in 250.

During his pontificate the Church enjoyed a rare period of calm, and Fabian used it wisely. He divided Rome into seven ecclesiastical regions, each served by a deacon, and sent missionaries into Gaul to plant the faith in cities like Paris and Tours. He also had the bodies of Pope Pontian and the priest Hippolytus brought back from the Sardinian mines where they had died.

When the emperor Decius unleashed the first empire-wide persecution in January 250, Fabian was among the very first to be seized and killed. St. Cyprian of Carthage wrote that he died "an illustrious death," and his tombstone — inscribed simply FABIAN, BISHOP, MARTYR — was found in the catacombs of San Callisto, where it remains today.