Hieromartyr Ignatius the Godbearer

Ignatius, called Theophoros, the God-bearer, was the second or third bishop of Antioch after the Apostle Peter, and a disciple, with his friend Polycarp of Smyrna, of the Apostle John. Tradition holds that he was the child whom Christ set in the midst of the disciples, and that he first arranged antiphonal singing in the Church after a vision of angelic choirs. Condemned under the emperor Trajan, he was taken in chains across Asia Minor to be thrown to the beasts in Rome. On the way he wrote seven letters — to Ephesus, Magnesia, Tralles, Rome, Philadelphia, Smyrna, and to Polycarp — that are among the most precious monuments of the early Church, witnessing to the Eucharist, the office of bishop, and the divinity of Christ. Longing to be 'God's wheat, ground by the teeth of the beasts,' he was martyred in the Roman arena about 107.

Hieromartyr Ignatius the Godbearer is also one of the Church Fathers — read their biography, works, and verse-by-verse commentary.