Genesius

Genesius ST., a comedian of the time of Dioclesian, of whose conversion the following marvelous but doubtful story is told. He was playing, before the emperor, the part of a candidate for Christian baptism, robed in the habit of a catechumen. But at the moment in the farce when the emperor was to judge the new convert, be was suddenly convinced by the Holy Spirit, and declared himself really a convert. He was scourged and tortured but nothing, could shake his fidelity, and he was decapitated. Different dates are assigned for his death: Tillemont and Ruinart fix it at A.D. 286; Baronius and Fleury at A.D. 303. His day in the Roman Catholic calendar is Aug. 25. Rotrou has made this apocryphal history the subject of a tragedy. See Acta Sanctorum, August, volume 5; Ruinart, Acta Sincera, page 269; Butler, Lives of the Saints, August 25.