While many people give candy, flowers and cards to each other on February 14, few know the connection between “Valentine’s Day” and the Catholic Church. Until the most recent revision of the Roman Calendar in 1969, February 14 was the Feast of St. Valentine. Little is known of the Saint except his name and that he was buried at the Via Flaminia north of Rome on February 14. It is even uncertain whether the feast celebrates only one saint or more saints of the same name. However, "Martyr Valentinus the Presbyter and those with him at Rome" remains in the list of saints proposed for veneration by all Catholics.

The Feast of St. Valentine was first established in 496 by Pope Gelasius I, who included Valentine among those “... whose names are justly reverenced among men, but whose acts are known only to God.” As Gelasius implied, nothing was known, even then, about the lives of any of these martyrs. The St. Valentine that appears in various martyrologies in connection with February 14 is described either as a priest in Rome, a bishop of Interamna, or a martyr in the Roman province of Africa.

The first artistic representation of Saint Valentine appeared in the Nuremberg Chronicle, (1493), one of the earliest printed books in the world. The text alongside a woodcut portrait of Valentine states that he was a Roman priest martyred during the reign of the Roman Emperor Claudius (268-270). Once Valentine had been arrested and imprisoned, Claudius took a liking to the holy man. This friendship changed when Valentinus tried to convert Claudius, and the Emperor condemned him to death. Initially, he was beaten with clubs and stoned. When he didn’t immediately die, he was beheaded outside the Flaminian Gate, and buried at the site.

While many people give candy, flowers and cards to each other on February 14, few know the connection between “Valentine’s Day” and the Catholic Church. Until the most recent revision of the Roman Calendar in 1969, February 14 was the Feast of St. Valentine. Little is known of the Saint except his name and that he was buried at the Via Flaminia north of Rome on February 14. It is even uncertain whether the feast celebrates only one saint or more saints of the same name. However, "Martyr Valentinus the Presbyter and those with him at Rome" remains in the list of saints proposed for veneration by all Catholics.

The Feast of St. Valentine was first established in 496 by Pope Gelasius I, who included Valentine among those “... whose names are justly reverenced among men, but whose acts are known only to God.” As Gelasius implied, nothing was known, even then, about the lives of any of these martyrs. The St. Valentine that appears in various martyrologies in connection with February 14 is described either as a priest in Rome, a bishop of Interamna, or a martyr in the Roman province of Africa.

The first artistic representation of Saint Valentine appeared in the Nuremberg Chronicle, (1493), one of the earliest printed books in the world. The text alongside a woodcut portrait of Valentine states that he was a Roman priest martyred during the reign of the Roman Emperor Claudius (268-270). Once Valentine had been arrested and imprisoned, Claudius took a liking to the holy man. This friendship changed when Valentinus tried to convert Claudius, and the Emperor condemned him to death. Initially, he was beaten with clubs and stoned. When he didn’t immediately die, he was beheaded outside the Flaminian Gate, and buried at the site.

Although there are no early connections between Valentine and sentimental love, modern portrayals describe a priest who disobeyed an unattested law attributed to Roman Emperor Claudius II, allegedly ordering that young men remain single. The emperor’s supposed intention was to grow the army, since he believed that married men did not make good soldiers. The priest Valentine, however, secretly performed marriage ceremonies for young Christian men. The imprisoned Valentine, on the evening before his execution, allegedly wrote the first “valentine” himself, addressed to a young girl. It was a note that read “From your Valentine.”

Most of the popular customs associated with Saint Valentine's Day arose during the Middle Ages. The earliest reference to the day is in a poem written in 1483 by Geoffrey Chaucer entitled “Parliament of Foules (“Fowls”) where we read:

For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne's day
Whan every foul cometh ther to choose his mate.

The poem references a commonly held belief in England and France that birds began to pair at a time halfway through the second month of the year, i.e. February 14th. For this reason, the day was looked upon as specially consecrated to lovers and as a proper occasion for writing love letters and sending lovers' tokens. Both the French and English literatures of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries contain allusions to the practice. Perhaps the earliest is in the 34th and 35th Ballades of the bilingual poet, John Gower, written in French. Those who chose each other under these circumstances seem to have called each other their “Valentines.” In the Paston Letters, written in the late 1400’s, Dame Elizabeth Brews writes about a match she hopes to make for her daughter addressing the intended suitor:

And, cousin mine, upon Monday is Saint Valentine's Day and every bird chooses himself a mate, and if it like you to come on Thursday night, and make provision that you may abide till then, I trust to God that ye shall speak to my husband and I shall pray that we may bring the matter to a conclusion.

Shortly after the young lady herself wrote a letter to the same man addressing it “Unto my right well beloved Valentine, John Paston Esquire.”

Modern Valentine symbols include the heart-shaped outline, doves, and Cupid. Since the 19th century, handwritten notes have largely given way to mass-produced greeting cards. The sending of Valentines was a fashion in nineteenth-century Great Britain, and, in 1847, Esther Howland developed a successful business in her Worcester, Massachusetts home with hand-made Valentine cards based on British models. The popularity of Valentine cards in 19th-century America was a harbinger of the future commercialization of holidays in the United States.

The U.S. Greeting Card Association estimates that approximately one billion valentines are sent each year worldwide, making the day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year, behind Christmas! Although it seems that the Roman Martyr Valentine has become the patron saint of chocolate, roses, and sentimental cards, let us never forget that the first love of Valentine was Jesus Christ and the faith, for which he gladly gave up his life.