Pope Damian of Alexandria

Damian of Alexandria (Greek: Δαμιανός; died 605) was the Coptic pope and patriarch of Alexandria from 576.

Originally from Syria, where his brother was a prefect in Edessa, the bishops unanimously agreed to ordain him a patriarch. In addition to pastoring the church, he wrote many epistles and discourses, including a reaffirmation of the miaphysite and non-Chalcedonian views.

The first involved some Melitians who drank wine before Communion, claiming that Jesus had given the disciples two cups at the Last Supper and that only for the second did he say "This is My Blood." Damian explained that the first cup was the cup of the Jewish passover, which Jesus nullified with the second cup. Damian also informed them that the church canons ban those that eat before communion from partaking of the Eucharist. Damian's counsel persuaded some, but those who rejected his teaching were driven away. The second involves Damian's dialogue with Patriarch Peter of Antioch, in which Damian accused his colleague of tritheism and was in turn accused of Sabellianism. Although Damian pulled support for his understanding of the Trinity from the Bible and from the teaching of the early Church Fathers, he was never able to persuade Peter and, as a result, he ordered that Peter's name not be mentioned in the Divine Liturgy while Peter remained alive. The schism between the Alexandrian and Antiochene churches lasted for almost a decade after Damian's death.

Damian was very active in fighting views that he considered heretical, including not only tritheism, but also the Chalcedonians, Pope Leo's Tome, Bishop Julian of Halicarnassus, the Agnoetae, the Melitians, the Acephali, the Gaianites (supporters of a rival to Theodosius I), Stephen of Alexandria and Paul of Beth Ukame. Although most of Damian's writings are lost, he did influence many writers in his own time, such as John of Parallos, who, like Damian, focused on combating heresy.