Brothers by affection: Saints Polyeuct and Nearchus

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Saints Polyeuct and Nearchus: Brothers by affection

Saints Polyeuct and Nearchus

By Brother Robert Lentz, OFM. © 1995

Courtesy of www.trinitystores.com (800.699.4482)

Collection of the Living Circle, Chicago, IL

Saints Polyeuct and Nearchus were Roman soldiers in Armenia and “brothers by affection.” They are considered a primary example of same-sex lovers in the early church. Polyeuct’s feast day is Feb. 13.

The men had a strong desire to spend eternity together, so Polyeuct converted from paganism to Christianity, the faith of his beloved Nearchus. With a convert’s zeal he attacked a pagan procession and was beheaded for his crime in the year 259. Shortly before he was executed, he spoke his last words to Nearchus: “Remember our secret vow.” Thus Polyeuct is known as a protector of vows and avenger of broken promises, in addition to his role as a probable “gay saint.”

The love story of Polyeuct and Nearchus is told with wonderful historical detail in two books, “Same Sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe” by Yale history professor John Boswell and “Passionate Holiness” by Dennis O’Neill.

O’Neill reports that French writer Robert Dartois recently took the story of Polyeuct and Nearchus from “Passionate Holiness” and turned it into a libretto, which was then set by the Swiss composer Thierry Chatelain as the oratorio “Polyeucte et Nearchus.”

O’Neill is founder of the Living Circle, the interfaith LGBT spirituality center that commissioned the icon above. It was painted by Brother Robert Lentz, a Franciscan friar and world-class iconographer known for his innovative icons. It is one of 10 Lentz icons that sparked a major controversy in 2005. Critics accused Lentz of glorifying sin and creating propaganda for a progressive sociopolitical agenda, and he temporarily gave away the copyright for the controversial images to his distributor, Trinity Stores. All 10 are now displayed there as a collection titled “Images That Challenge.”

For those wanting to research the saints on the Internet, it helps to know that there are many variations in the spellings of their names, such as Polyeuctus and Nearchos.

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This post is part of the LGBTQ Saints series by Kittredge Cherry. Traditional and alternative saints, people in the Bible, LGBTQ martyrs, authors, theologians, religious leaders, artists, deities and other figures of special interest to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender and queer (LGBTQ) people and our allies are covered.

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