Died c. 303
Mother of the Great Martyr Procopius of Caesarea; a pagan who at first denounced her son but, moved by the constancy of his sufferings, confessed Christ and was herself beheaded.
The Holy Martyr Theodosia, Mother of the Great-Martyr Procopius
Theodosia was the mother of the Great Martyr Procopius of Caesarea (born Neanius), one of the early victims of the Diocletianic persecution in Palestine. Married to a Christian named Christopher, she herself remained a pagan, and when her son embraced Christianity and abandoned the worship of the ancestral gods, she is said to have denounced him to the imperial authorities.
According to the tradition preserved in the synaxaria, Theodosia's opposition gave way to faith after she witnessed the constancy of her son under repeated tortures at Caesarea of Palestine. Moved by the endurance of the Christians, she confessed Christ, took her place among the confessors, and was beheaded together with her son around the year 303.
Theodosia's death belongs to the Diocletianic persecution, the last and most severe of the imperial campaigns against the Church. Her son Procopius, originally named Neanius, was born in Jerusalem and served the Church at Scythopolis before being sent to Caesarea Maritima, where he was executed by beheading. The historian Eusebius of Caesarea documented Procopius's death, describing it as the first martyrdom to take place at Caesarea.
The synaxarion relates that Theodosia, the pagan mother of Procopius, at first opposed her son's Christian faith and complained of him to the emperor. Her hostility reversed when she observed the great faith and courage of the Christians and the constancy of her son under torture. Repenting, she stood in the line of the confessors and was put to death together with him.
The broader account of the martyrdom records that twelve Christian women received martyrs' crowns at the gates of the Caesarea praetorium, and that many Roman soldiers, together with their tribunes Nikostratos and Antiochos, went to execution for their confession of Christ.
The historical record of Eusebius concerns the martyrdom of Procopius himself. The identification of his mother by the name Theodosia, and her role first as accuser and then as fellow-martyr, derives from later hagiographical accounts rather than from the earliest historical notice. Her commemoration is kept on July 8 alongside that of her son.
This Theodosia is distinct from the Virgin Martyr Theodosia of Tyre and from Theodosia of Constantinople.
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