Pontius Pilate a saint?

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Formosus said:
As I said, as Ethiopian Orthodox and Catholics hold the same liturgical calender, then they[Ethiopian Catholics] do indeed venerate Pilate as a saint much as the Byzantine Churches venerate Saints which are not on western Calenders.
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Do you have any documentation from the Catholic Church? I think I documented pretty well he is definitely not a Catholic Saint.

All Catholic Saints, of any Rite, still must be canonized by the Catholic Church as a whole. We are still one Church.
 
pnewton said:
Do you have any documentation from the Catholic Church? I think I documented pretty well he is definitely not a Catholic Saint.

All Catholic Saints, of any Rite, still must be canonized by the Catholic Church as a whole. We are still one Church.
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Wrong. The various acts of union permit the calendar to be retained, and the commemoration of all the saints upon it, for a number of churches. I suspect the Ethiopian Catholic Church is no different on that score.
 
Aramis said:
Wrong. The various acts of union permit the calendar to be retained, and the commemoration of all the saints upon it, for a number of churches. I suspect the Ethiopian Catholic Church is no different on that score.
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I understand, but the calendar is not what I was referring to. Is there any evidence that Pilate was canonized in the Catholic Church. Canonization is considered an infallible statement and must be rooted in the Chair of Peter, regardless of Rite. Then, once canonized, they a saint may indeed by on one calendar and not the other. So far the only evidence offered to support his sainthood is either Orthodox or Gnostic. The only Catholic evidence has him committing suicide, not exactly an act of heroic virtue.
 
There are plenty of saints on the Byzantine Calender never formally canonized by the western church, some of them were canonized in the East post 1054 (Gregory Palamas, Seraphim of Sarov, etc). I imagine that the Ethiopian church retained all her particular saints including Pontius Pilate. The sacred liturgy is the Faith of the Eastern churches. When the VII council says we are to return to our theology and traditions, the liturgical calender and all its saints’ feast days are inseparable from that.
 
pnewton said:
I understand, but the calendar is not what I was referring to. Is there any evidence that Pilate was canonized in the Catholic Church. Canonization is considered an infallible statement and must be rooted in the Chair of Peter, regardless of Rite. Then, once canonized, they a saint may indeed by on one calendar and not the other. So far the only evidence offered to support his sainthood is either Orthodox or Gnostic. The only Catholic evidence has him committing suicide, not exactly an act of heroic virtue.
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This is totally unproven. Most canonizations were done locally, the Bishop of Rome simply refrained from objecting.
 
Formosus said:
There are plenty of saints on the Byzantine Calender never formally canonized by the western church, some of them were canonized in the East post 1054 (Gregory Palamas, Seraphim of Sarov, etc). I imagine that the Ethiopian church retained all her particular saints including Pontius Pilate. The sacred liturgy is the Faith of the Eastern churches. When the VII council says we are to return to our theology and traditions, the liturgical calender and all its saints’ feast days are inseparable from that.
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While you are, no doubt, correct, it seems that the Ethiopian Church had formally accepted the request to expunge Pontius Pilate from its Calendar – anyone know any Ethiopian Catholics personally to ask them their opinion and the theology behind it?
 
SyroMalankara said:
This is totally unproven. Most canonizations were done locally, the Bishop of Rome simply refrained from objecting.
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Yes, by popular acclaim. That is the way early sainthood was bestowed. In such cases, there is not guarantee that the Saint is a saint or even in heaven…, or even existed. I personally do not see how a man who commits suicide could go straight into the beatific vision, if that account is correct.
 
pnewton said:
Yes, by popular acclaim. That is the way early sainthood was bestowed. In such cases, there is not guarantee that the Saint is a saint or even in heaven…, or even existed. I personally do not see how a man who commits suicide could go straight into the beatific vision, if that account is correct.
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There’s no reliable source for him having committed suicide.

Being on the EOT Calendar and the Eth.CC calendar is all the evidence of sainthood I need.
 
Interestingly, there’s a Medieval (I believe) play called The Death of Pilate, in which the earth itself spits up his corpse. If I recall correctly, it ends up being carried off by the Tiber River.

Peace,
Dante
 
Aramis said:
There’s no reliable source for him having committed suicide.

Being on the EOT Calendar and the Eth.CC calendar is all the evidence of sainthood I need.
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I am happy for you. I do not consider calendars documentation. I did link Eusebius, the Father of Church History. I will believe him over gnostic tradition. I have yet to see anyone link anything showing he is considered a saint by the Catholic Church.

Eusebius could surely be wrong, but I see no evidence to the contrary. In fact, there has been not evidence that Pilate was a Saint on the Ethiopian Catholic calendar. Some one said that he was, but I have yet to find it. Wiki only has him listed as a Saint for the Orthodox there.
 
IN addition to no solid ecclesial evidence of Pilate having committed suicide, there is also no historical evidence - in fact, I think historically the evidence is to the contrary. I will admit that some fathers have speculated that this did happen, but I see no evidence to support this pious opinion.
 
SyroMalankara said:
  • in fact, I think historically the evidence is to the contrary…
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What evidence? I have been asking and have yet to see anything except a legend that extends from the gnostic tradition. I know the evidence is thin either way, but Sainthood?
 
Good posts, pnewton, in my opinion. I’ve enjoyed reading them. I appreciate how you’ve used sources to show more precisely where the facts stand.
 
pnewton said:
What evidence? I have been asking and have yet to see anything except a legend that extends from the gnostic tradition. I know the evidence is thin either way, but Sainthood?
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Tertullian speculated in Apologeticus that Pilate was already Christian in his conscience.

Eusebius, on the other hand, cites some apocryphal sources regarding Pilates suicide.

Another version of the story: lcms.org/pages/wPage.asp?ContentID=47&IssueID=9

This one claims he stabbed himself: newadvent.org/fathers/0812.htm

This one claims he moved to another position: ecole.evansville.edu/articles/pilate.html
 
Looks to me like the consensus is: Nobody really knows for sure what eventually became of Pontius Pilate, but there’s no shortage of speculation 🤷
 
I found a passing reference to Pilate’s conversion, though it neither supports or contradicts Eusebius or the Orthodox claim of sainthood. From Tertullian:
All these things Pilate did to Christ; and now in fact a Christian in his own convictions, he sent word of Him to the reigning Caesar, who was at the time Tiberius.
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No more context. That’s it.

earlychristianwritings.com/text/tertullian01.html
 
pnewton said:
What evidence? I have been asking and have yet to see anything except a legend that extends from the gnostic tradition. I know the evidence is thin either way, but Sainthood?
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And the legend that stems from the Catholic tradition - namely, the Ethiopian calendar (the Ethiopians began as Catholics and did not consciously reject Rome until the Jesuits tried to impose Latinization on them) - which both the Ethiopian Catholics and Orthodox use. The tradition of the church calendar is quite compelling evidence in my eyes - and Pontius Pilate ended up on the calendar the same way St. Patrick, St. Cecilia, Sts. Peter and Paul, and all the Roman martyrs did, simply by the practice of the Church without official canonization.
 
Cecilianus said:
And the legend that stems from the Catholic tradition - namely, the Ethiopian calendar (the Ethiopians began as Catholics and did not consciously reject Rome until the Jesuits tried to impose Latinization on them) - which both the Ethiopian Catholics and Orthodox use.
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I have heard that claim, but everything I have read does and linked does not have him as a Saint by Ethiopian Catholics. I will ask once more. Does anyone have a link where is is a* Catholic* Saint?
 
pnewton said:
I have heard that claim, but everything I have read does and linked does not have him as a Saint by Ethiopian Catholics. I will ask once more. Does anyone have a link where is is a* Catholic* Saint?
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Eastern Catholics always use the same calendar for pre-schism saints as their Orthodox or Oriental Orthodox counterparts, including for saints generally not venerated in the West (such as St. Constantine the Great).

For the general claim that the Ethiopian Catholics venerate “the same devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary and the angels and the saints” as the Ethiopian Orthodox, sharing “the same doctrine and liturgical tradition” and that there is difference in faith between the two,
ecs.org.et/Church.htm
 
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