“What are you doing on New Year’s Eve?” It is a secularized rhetorical question that we are repeatedly asked at this time of year. In an era marked by the return of the religious phenomenon and Rosalía-like ecstasy, the more appropriate question should be: “What are you doing for Saint Sylvester?” This figure, who is not legendary but a fourth-century pope, is one of the main personalities of the early centuries of Christianity and is now remembered in the world of athletics through the races known as the “Saint Sylvester Run”.
With a long pontificate (from 314 to 335), Sylvester carries considerable historical weight: he was the first pope after the Edict of Milan, that is, after the persecution of Christianity ended, when Emperor Constantine proclaimed freedom of worship and the hunt for Christians ceased—a triumph for religious freedom and freedom of conscience, now known as ForB (freedom of religion and belief).
On 31 December, Saint Sylvester is commemorated, a pope to whom the conversion of Emperor Constantine to Christianity is attributed, as well as the suppression of Donatism, a heretical movement that argued that priests had to be irreproachable and without sin for the sacraments they administered to be valid. This schismatic movement claimed that the Church should be exclusively a society of the chosen and the holy. So much so that, if you had received a sacrament administered by a sinner, you had to receive it again from holy and pure hands. Donatism was condemned at the Council of Arles in 314. Because he is the saint of 31 December, Sylvester has inadvertently come to be seen as the patron saint of athletic races.
This is no minor detail: he was the first pope to die without being a martyr. He died of old age on the last day of the year. If we enter a church where he is depicted on an altar, we will see him with a bull at his feet, or a dragon he also subdued, for he is credited with many wonders, including even the resurrection of a wild bull. The conversion of Constantine, however, is the most cinematic of all: the emperor suffered from leprosy and could only be cured with the blood of children. He then had a vision in which Peter and Paul told him that if he baptized Pope Sylvester, the baptismal water would heal him. And so it happened. In gratitude, Constantine became a Christian and gave the city of Rome to the pope. The saint is also depicted with a baptismal font, in memory of Constantine.
The day and night of Saint Sylvester have come to be crowned with grapes, pomegranates, or lentils (symbols of prosperity), as well as green vegetables such as cabbage and chard, also considered bearers of good fortune. Superstitions blend with tradition and, for example, in some places people avoid eating animals such as prawns or crabs because they are said to walk backwards, which would bring bad omens. On the night of Pope Sylvester, people also throw old belongings out of windows to get rid of the past, and fireworks are set off to drive away evil spirits or to light up the darkness, depending on how one sees it.
In 1963, at the Bella Luz bar in Vallecas, a group of friends decided it was a good day to go out and run, and they inaugurated the San Silvestre Vallecana race. Today it is held in many places, but they claim its invention, which now features a 10-kilometre course. In the Basque Country, in Galdakao, people have also been running since 1961, and in Paris the race has been held on 1 January since 1924. In Catalonia we call it “la cursa dels nassos,” a popular athletic race held annually in Barcelona on 31 December and dedicated to the Home of the Big Nose, a Catalan mythological character. Poor Saint Sylvester—we have written him out of the equation in Catalan.
In the early editions, people ran in shorts; today they dress up in costumes. The connection with Pope Saint Sylvester is not linked to any interest he may have had in sport—an interest that, incidentally, Pope Leo XIV does have, as he not only speaks positively about the benefits of sport but also practices it himself.
Saint Sylvester’s Day is a high-voltage occasion. If you want to be alone, it may be difficult due to social pressures. If you want to run—or watch it on television—you have races available that allow for a collective and symbolic farewell to the year that is ending. And if you prefer to give thanks, you have the Te Deum and liturgical celebrations of thanksgiving.