Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ… If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honoured, every part rejoices with it.
1 Corinthians 12:12, 26
Felix and “Adauctus” (c. 304)
Shared in Suffering
Felix, a Christian leader in Rome during the reign of Emperor Diocletian, was on his way to be executed when a man in the crowd realised he was being killed for his faith. The man shouted out that he too was a Christian – an act that led to his arrest and death alongside Felix. Since his name was not known, he was referred to as “Adauctus”, which means “the additional one”. Pope Damasus wrote about them:
O how truly and rightly named Felix, happy, you who, with faith untouched and despising the prince of this world, have confessed Christ and sought the heavenly kingdom. Know ye also, brethren, the truly precious faith by which Adauctus too hastened, a victor, to heaven…
Suddenly I heard the words of Christ and understood them, and life and death ceased to seem to be evil, and instead of despair I experienced happiness and the joy of life undisturbed by death.
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910)