Sarah of Antioch

Who they were

According to the ancient Alexandrian Synaxarion, Saint Sarah of Antioch was the wife of a high officer of the Emperor Diocletian. Forbidden to have her children baptised, she set out by sea for Alexandria to do so there; when a storm threatened to sink the ship, she cut her own breast and, with her blood, marked a cross on her children's foreheads, then immersed them three times in the sea invoking the Trinity. The storm calmed, and on reaching Alexandria the bishop assured her that the baptism she had performed at sea was valid and need not be repeated.

Her husband, out of fear, had renounced the Christian faith; when Sarah told him what had happened, he reported it to Diocletian, who had her questioned so harshly that after a single answer she fell silent, and in his anger condemned her and her two children to be burned alive. Hers is the only entry for a saint of this name, and she is commemorated on 20 April.

The miracles

There was never a formal cause: she has been honoured as a saint since before the Church's formal processes began.

Why that counted as sanctity

Martyred with her two children under Diocletian for having them baptised at sea; feast 20 April, known only from the Alexandrian Synaxarion.