[3] Gregory was born around AD 213 to a wealthy pagan family in Neocaesarea (modern Niksar, then the capital of the area of Pontus in Asia Minor).

This lack of knowledge partially obscures his personality, despite his historical importance, and his immemorial title Thaumaturgus, "the wonder-worker" in Latinized Greek, casts an air of legend about him.

He had a brother Athenodorus, and on the advice of one of their tutors, the young men were eager to study at the Berytus in Beirut, then one of the four or five famous schools in the Hellenic world.

In his panegyric on Origen, Gregory describes the method employed by that master to win the confidence and esteem of those he wished to convert; how he mingled a persuasive candour with outbursts of temper and theological argument put cleverly at once and unexpectedly.

[5] There is no reason to believe that his studies were interrupted by the persecutions of Maximinus of Thrace; his alleged journey to Alexandria, at this time, may therefore be considered at least doubtful, and probably never occurred.

[4] This fact illustrates in an interesting way the growth of the hierarchy in the primitive Church; the Christian community at Caesarea was very small, being only seventeen souls, and yet it was given a bishop.

They are: Drawing on family traditions and a knowledge of the neighbourhood, the account by Gregory of Nyssa is more reliably historical than other known versions of the Thaumaturge's life.

[4] To attract the people to the festivals in honour of the martyrs, Gregory organized profane amusements that might appeal to pagans, who were accustomed to religious ceremonies that combined solemnity with pleasure and merrymaking.

This youthful work is full of enthusiasm and genuine talent; moreover, it proves how fully Origen had won the admiration of his pupils, and how the training Gregory received influenced the remainder of a long and well spent life.

From this reading of the old philosophers he learned to insist frequently on the unity of God; and his long experience of pagan or crudely Christian populations taught him how necessary this was.

Traces of this insistence are to be met with in the Tractatus ad Theopompum, concerning the passability and impassibility of God; this work seems to belong to Gregory, though in its general arrangement it reminds us of Methodius.

xxviii, 1, 2; cciv, 2; ccvii, 4) and even defends him against the Sabellians, who claimed him for their teaching and quoted as his formula: patera kai ouion epinoia men einai duo, hypostasei de en (that the Father and the Son were two in intelligence, but one in substance) from the aforesaid Dialogus cum Aeliano.

Basil replied that Gregory was arguing against a pagan, and used the words agonistikos not dogmatikos, i.e. in the heat of combat, not in calm exposition; in this case he was insisting, and rightly, on the Divine unity.

Such a formula, stating clearly the distinction between the Persons in the Trinity, and emphasizing the eternity, equality, immortality, and perfection, not only of the Father, but of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, proclaims a marked advance on the theories of Origen.

A Metaphrasis eis ton Ekklesiasten tou Solomontos, or paraphrase of Ecclesiastes, is attributed to him by some manuscripts; others ascribe it to Gregory of Nazianzus; St. Jerome (De vir.

[7] The brief Treatise on the Soul addressed to one Tatian, in favour of which may be cited the testimony of Nicholas of Methone (probably from Procopius of Gaza), is now claimed for Gregory.

St. Gregory has been the patron saint of Bosnia and Herzegovina from the medieval times until 26 August 1752, when he was replaced by St. Elijah, and confirmed by papacy, at the request of a Bosnian Franciscan friar, Bishop Pavao Dragičević.