Saint Cletus

We may add, by way of commentary, that the date of Saint Clet's election in 77 coincides with the departure of Saint Clement, his predecessor, into exile.

The pontificate of Saint Clet was marked by the inauguration of the Colosseum, from which so many martyrs were to ascend to heaven; by that famous eruption of Vesuv éruption du Vésuve Natural disaster that destroyed Pompeii during the pontificate of Cletus. ius which engulfed the two cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum; by a formidable fire that broke out in Rome and lasted for three days and three nights; and finally by a terrible plague that depopulated several provinces of Italy.

This invasion of the plague made the organization, or at the very least the reorganization, of the twenty-five parish titles all the more opportune. According to the instructions of Saint Peter, these were to divide Rome among themselves and form as many distinct dioceses for the administration of baptism and penance, for the benefit of pagans converted to the faith. The Popes have always advanced spiritual aid and temporal aid, demanded by the miseries and infirmities of our poor humanity, side by side. Barely a few years after the death of Saint Peter, Clet transformed the house where he was born into a church and added to it a hospice where the victims of the plague were received. Such was the origin of the first Christian hospital: it dates back far, as one can see.

However, Titus, the delight of the human race, who did not shed a drop of Christian blood, had been succeeded by Domitian, the second Nero. He was worthy, says Eusebius, to sign the edict of the second general persecution against the Christia ns: Saint saint Clet Roman pope often confused with Anacletus. Clet was its first victim. He was martyred in Rome on April 26, 83, and his precious remains were deposited in the Vatican, near those of Saint Peter, where they still rest.

The tenure of Saint Clet on the pontifical chair left a luminous and deep furrow in the history of the Roman Church. This did not prevent French historians and hagiographers from barely mentioning his name and leaving his works in the shadows—works that survived until the last century. Indeed, the church and hospital founded by him in the year 79, after having been ruined and rebuilt several times, were only definitively suppressed in the 18th century. And the memory of his charity had been preserved so faithfully in the minds of the Romans that the Institute of the Cruci fers or Cross-Bearers a Institut des Crucifères Hospitaller order attached to the hospice founded by Clet. ttached to this hospice traced its origin back to this holy Pontiff.

That is not all: the various Popes who had to reconstitute the parishes of Rome or establishments intended for the administration of baptism and penance constantly showed themselves faithful to the apostolic tradition of Saint Clet; they maintained the number of twenty-five: thus did Saint Marcellus in 308, and Pius V, fifteen hundred years later. Was this number, determined by Saint Peter himself, not a reminder of the twenty-four priestly series which, in Jerusalem, shared the sacred ministry of the te Jérusalem Holy city where the Cross was lost and subsequently recovered. mple under the direction of the high priest? Was this not an indication that the Roman pontificate succeeded the destroyed pontificate of Aaron?

It is known, moreover, that until the destruction of the temple, or the year 70, Christians converted from Judaism went to sacrifice in Jerusalem. Saint Paul himself offered a bloody sacrifice at the temple during one of his visits to the holy city: it was so as long as the prophecy of Jesus Christ was not fulfilled and the abomination had not entered the Holy of Holies. Now, Saint Peter, not having seen the destruction of the temple, would have ordered his successors to await it and, when it had taken place, to adopt for Rome the priestly organization of Jerusalem.

This is what the *Liber Pontificalis* seems to indicate when it traces back to Saint Peter himself the idea of dividing Rome into twenty-five parochial titles.

Saint Clet was, it is said, the first to use these words in his letters: "Salutation and apostolic blessing"; but this detail is contested and we record it only for the record.

He is one of the patrons of Ruvo in the kin gdom Ruvo City of which Saint Cletus is the patron and traditional first bishop. of Naples. The tradition of this locality holds that he was its first bishop: this could very well be reconciled with the fact, established in history, that Saint Peter named him his coadjutor, outside of Rome, just as Saint Linus was within.

*Liber Pontificalis et Histoire de l'Église*, by Darrus.