Emperor Valerian commanded the execution of Roman Christian leaders. Tradition says Lawrence, a deacon, faced the Roman prefect. The prefect knew Lawrence managed the church funds. He offered Deacon Lawrence freedom for the church’s riches.

Lawrence agreed to present the church’s wealth. He stated it would take days. He explained the church held much treasure.

In reality, Lawrence gave church goods to the poor. On day three, he met the prefect again. He invited the prefect to see God’s riches.

The prefect saw not gold, but Rome’s poor. He saw crippled, blind, and needy people. He asked Lawrence the meaning of the crowd. Lawrence explained that these people would gain glorious bodies in Heaven. He called them jars holding the Holy Spirit’s treasure.

The prefect grew angry. He feared Rome would mock him. He decided to give Lawrence a slow, painful death. On August 10, 258, the story says, torturers broke Lawrence’s arms. They tied him to a grill, roasting him alive. He reportedly asked to be flipped, saying he was cooked on one side. His calm demeanor amazed the watchers.

Emperor Constantine and popes honored Lawrence within a century, had erected memorials to Lawrence. A hundred years after his death, his martyrdom was still so well known that the famous Bishop Ambrose of Milan wrote about him. Rome’s Church of San Lorenzo is named for the martyr. Rome’s San Lorenzo church bears his name.

ALSO ON THIS DAY

20 AD – The Romans, using catapults and battering rams, finally broke through the walls of Jerusalem. The Jews streamed into the temple. Titus had reportedly wanted to spare the edifice, but his soldiers would not be restrained. A firebrand was hurled through the Golden Gate and exploded like a bomb. The temple became an ocean of fire. It was August 10, 70, the same day of the year, it was said, in which Solomon’s earlier temple had been destroyed by Babylon. This, and the subsequent fall of Masada, extinguished Israel as a nation until its rebirth in the twentieth century. (From The Fall of Jerusalem)

1815 – Samuel Leigh arrived in Sydney, Australia. He had sailed in a convoy from England as a Wesleyan missionary, leaving behind his elderly mother and a dying sister. Throughout the voyage, he won souls and showed courage in the face of heavy storms that separated and destroyed part of the convoy. Imagine his shock upon disembarking from The Hebe to learn that Australia’s governor might not let him stay in the country.

Accessed ChristianHistoryInstitute.org 10 August 2025.

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