Feastday: December 6
Birth: 1227
Death: 1300
Bishop and preacher. A native of Valencia, Spain, he entered the priesthood and was ordained about 1250. Known for his intelligence, he was named tutor to the son of the king of Aragon. Later he became bishop of Jaen, although the diocese was technically under the dominion of the Moors. Nevertheless, he preached extensively to promote the Christian faith in Islamic communities and sought to ransom Christian captives being held by Moorish captors. He was martyred in Granada.
Saint Peter Pascual, by Francisco de Solís
Peter Pascual (c. 1227 – 1299/1300), in Latin originally Petrus Paschasius (Spanish: Pedro Pascual, Valencian : Pere Pasqual), was a supposed Mozarabic theologian, bishop, and martyr. His very existence has been called into question by recent scholarship.
Born in Valencia under the Almohads, he went to the University of Paris in 1238, shortly before Valencia fell to James I of Aragon. He may have held a canonry at the Cathedral of Saint Mary in Valencia before 1250, when he resigned it to join the Mercedarians at Rome. He later served James I as a tutor to his son Sancho, whom he also served as an assistant during the latter's archiepiscopate at Toledo. He became a wide-ranging preacher, delivering sermons in Tuscany and Andalusia, and writing tracts on various theological controversies. The authenticity of many works attributed to him is suspect, and it is possible that there were two writers of the same name.
In 1296 he was appointed Bishop of Jaén, but was captured by the Kingdom of Granada and held captive for three years before being beheaded at Granada. He is listed in the Roman Martyrology on October 23.
