The life of St Cyriacus of Jerusalem
His life afterward was marked by such holiness that he was chosen bishop of Jerusalem.
When the emperor Julian the Apostate passed through Palestine on his way to campaign against Persia, Cyriacus was seized and pressed to renounce his faith. He would not, and Julian had his right hand cut off for the many letters it had written in service of the Gospel, then had molten lead poured into his mouth and his body laid upon a heated bed of bronze. His mother Anna ran to embrace her son in his suffering and was seized as well, burned to death with torches for her own confession of Christ. Cyriacus himself was finally put to death, impaled and cast into boiling oil. Some traditions identify Cyriacus with a man named Judas connected to the finding of the Cross, though it is possible these were originally two distinct people whose stories became joined over time.
