The feast of Lupercalia was celebrated by Roman citizens as early as the fourth century BC on every February 15th. And just like any other celebration, where the eve of the day of celebration or the day of celebration itself is declared a holiday to honour the queen of the Roman goddesses known as Juno. She was also known as the goddess of women and marriage.

On the eve of the festival of Lupercalia, “name drawing” which was one of the customs of the young people was had. Each young man would draw a girl’s name from a jar containing the names of Roman girls written on slip of paper. The young man and the girl whose name he had chosen became partners for the duration of the festival, and sometimes lasted an entire year where they even fell in love and got married.

In the third century, lived Emperor Claudius II of Rome. He was such a cruel emperor with crazy and inhuman ideas that his real name was buried and replaced with emperor “Claudius the Cruel”. He had a difficult time getting soldiers to join his military leagues. His belief, was that Roman men were not ready to live their loves or families to join the military. He therefore outlawed marriage with exquisite logic, that is, he cancelled all marriages and engagements in Rome.

St. Valentine, who was then a Priest together with his friend St. Marius and few others saw this law of the emperor as preposterous. St. Valentine, therefore, performed marriage ceremonies secretly until the emperor laid hands on him. He was apprehended and dragged before the prefect of Rome, who ordered his imprisonment, later to be clubbed, stoned to death and beheaded.

Many young people paid him visits while in jail. To show their love for him, they threw flowers and notes up to his window. One of these young people was the jailer’s daughter called Julia, who had been blind from birth. Clutching his blind daughter Julia, in his arms, the jailer appealed to St. Valentine’s medical and spiritual healing abilities. The little girl was examined, given an ointment for her eyes with the scheduling of a series of re-visits. Julia, saw the world through the eyes of St. Valentine, trusted in his wisdom and found comfort in his quiet strength.

Knowing his execution was imminent; St. Valentine wrote a farewell note to Julia through her father (the jailer) on the eve of his death. In his notes, he urged Julia to stay close to God, and he signed it “From Your Valentine”. This was carried out the next day, February 14h AD 270, near a gate that was later named Porta Valentini in his memory.

As Julia, opened the note, she discovered a yellow crocus inside, and as she looked down upon the crocus that spilled into he palm, she saw for the first time in her life. A miracle!

Simply for refusing to give up his faith, St. Valentine (then the Bishop of Interamna), was executed and buried at the church of Praxedes in Rome, where Julia, had planted a pink-blossomed almond three symbolizing abiding love and friendship, near his grave.

When Rome became the center of the early Christian church, Pope Galasius I outlawed the festival of Lupercalia centuries later. He issued a decree in AD 496, which forbade the celebrations of the festival. It was not banned outright; it was merely “overwritten” with a Christian agenda. The Pope retained the lottery and the notion of a special day – only instead of the name of a woman; citizens reaching into the box pulled out the name of a saint and were expected to emulate the life of their chosen saint for the rest of their life. The disappointment of Roman youth can only be imagined.

The church still needed a “hook”, a saint or martyr in whose honour this revised festival could be held. It found an ideal candidate in the Bishop of Interamna, who had been executed by Emperor Claudius II some two hundred years previously – becoming, in the process, St. Valentine. The Pope then named February 14th as St. Valentine’s Day and made St. Valentine the saintly overseer of his newly invented festival in the year AD 496.

In the 1700s, Valentine messages were placed on friends’ doorsteps and given to men and women in England. Children sung valentine carols. But when Oliver Cromwell, came to power, he declared Valentine celebrations immoral, and had them banned. By 1660 St. Valentine’s Day was restored. And by 1800 commercial valentines became available.

On each St. Valentine’s Day, messages of affection, love and devotion are still exchanged around the world. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to spread the love of Christ on this day. For Paul says;”you should owe nothing to anyone, except so as to love one another. For whoever loves his neighbour has fulfilled the law” Rom. 13 :8 Happy St. Valentine’s Day.