Patronage
6 saints are venerated as patrons of Rome, led by Peter the Apostle (feast day June 29).
1 — 64 · Feast day: June 29
Simon Peter, a fisherman from Bethsaida in Galilee, was called by Christ and named the 'Rock' on which the Church stands — given the Keys of the Kingdom at Caesarea Philippi. Though he denied his Lord three times on the night of the Passion, he repented bitterly and was restored by the Risen Christ, going on to lead the early Church, preach at Pentecost, and die by crucifixion upside down in Rome under Nero.
1347 — 1380 · Feast day: April 29
A lay Dominican mystic, political counselor, and Doctor of the Church, Catherine of Siena persuaded Pope Gregory XI to return the papacy to Rome from Avignon after nearly seventy years in France. She dictated her theological masterpiece 'The Dialogue of Divine Providence' and left nearly 400 letters to popes, rulers, and ordinary sinners alike.
391 — 461 · Feast day: November 10
A Roman aristocrat who became Pope in 440 while on a diplomatic mission to Gaul, Leo shaped the theology and authority of the Roman see more than any pope before him. He wrote the Tome to Flavian in 449, whose definition of Christ's two natures in one person was acclaimed at the Council of Chalcedon. In 452 he rode out to the Mincio River to meet Attila the Hun, who turned back without sacking Rome — an outcome historians debate but tradition credits to Leo's personal authority.
c. 255 AD — c. 288 AD · Feast day: January 20
Saint Sebastian concealed his Christianity while serving as captain of the Praetorian Guard under Diocletian and Maximian, using that access to strengthen imprisoned Christians. Shot with arrows and left for dead on the Field of Mars, he survived — nursed back by Irene of Rome — and returned to rebuke Diocletian to his face. The emperor had him clubbed to death, earning Sebastian the name 'the twice-martyred saint.'
c. 225 AD — 258 AD · Feast day: August 10
Lawrence served as Archdeacon of Rome under Pope Sixtus II, overseeing the Church's treasury and care of the poor. When the Roman prefect demanded he surrender the Church's wealth, he assembled the sick, the crippled, and the destitute and declared, 'These are the treasures of the Church.' Condemned to be roasted alive on a gridiron in 258 AD, he reportedly told his executioners, 'Turn me over — I am done on this side.'
July 22, 1515 — May 26, 1595 · Feast day: May 26
Philip Neri transformed the Counter-Reformation through laughter, friendship, and reckless joy, gathering cardinals and street sweepers alike in his Roman Oratory. A mystical experience enlarged his heart permanently, and he died on May 26, 1595 — the night he had predicted — after hearing confessions.