Pope Alexander I

Lore & Background

According to the Liber Pontificalis, Alexander I inserted the narration of the Last Supper (the Qui pridie) into the liturgy of the Mass. However, the 1907 Catholic Encyclopedia, written by Thomas Shahan, judges this tradition to be inaccurate, a view shared by Roman Catholic and non-Roman Catholic experts alike. It is viewed as a product of the agenda of Liber Pontificalis—this section of the book was probably written in the late 5th century—to show an ancient pattern of the earliest bishops of Rome ruling the church by papal decree.

The chronology of his pontificate is disputed, but he probably assumed office around 108/109 AD and died around 118/119 AD, after a tenure of 10 years. The introduction of the customs of using blessed water mixed with salt for the purification of Christian homes from evil influences, as well as that of mixing water with the sacramental wine, are attributed to Pope Alexander I. Some sources consider these attributions unlikely. It is certainly possible, however, that Alexander played an important part in the early development of the Church of Rome's emerging liturgical and administrative traditions. A later tradition holds that in the reign of the emperor Hadrian, Alexander I converted the Roman governor Hermes by miraculous means, together with his entire household of 1,500 people.

Quirinus of Neuss, who was Alexander's supposed jailer, and Quirinus' daughter Balbina of Rome were also among his converts. Alexander is said to have seen a vision of the infant Jesus. His remains are said to have been transferred to Freising in Bavaria, Germany in AD 834.

Reader's Guide

Pope Alexander I's significance lies primarily in the contested traditions that surround his pontificate, which reflect later efforts to establish an ancient precedent for papal authority. The Liber Pontificalis attributes to him key liturgical innovations, such as the insertion of the Last Supper narrative into the Mass, but modern scholarship—both Catholic and non-Catholic—considers these attributions inaccurate, viewing them as products of a late 5th-century agenda. Similarly, the customs of blessed water mixed with salt and mixing water with sacramental wine are doubted by some experts. Despite these uncertainties, Alexander I likely contributed to the early development of Rome's liturgical and administrative traditions.

Later legends, such as his conversion of the Roman governor Hermes and his entire household of 1,500 people, as well as his supposed vision of the infant Jesus, are not historically verifiable. His identification with a martyr named Alexander, commemorated together with Eventius and Theodulus on 3 May, was removed from the Roman calendar in 1960, as nothing is known of those three saints beyond their names, the fact that they were martyred, and that they were buried at the seventh milestone of the Via Nomentana on 3 May of some year. The Roman Martyrology lists them as Eventius, Alexander and Theodulus, the order in which their names are given in historical documents. Thus, Alexander I remains a shadowy figure whose legacy is more a reflection of later ecclesiastical politics than of reliable historical record.