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Greek Name Days

5th century

Saint Juvenal of Jerusalem

A fifth-century Patriarch of Jerusalem, remembered for his role at the Third Ecumenical Council and for the tradition of the Theotokos's robe.

2 July

Biography

Juvenal served as bishop, and later the first patriarch, of Jerusalem for about twenty-eight years, during the reigns of Theodosius II, Pulcheria, Marcian and Leo I. He took an active part in the Third Ecumenical Council at Ephesus in 431, defending the Church's teaching on the person of Christ.

He also wrote about the Dormition and Assumption of the Theotokos, and, according to tradition, it was he who sent her burial wrappings to Constantinople, later placed in the church at Blachernae. He died in 457, after a long and widely respected patriarchate.

Sources and further reading