Conversion and Confession
Christina was born in Tyre in the third century into a wealthy family. Her father, Urban, was a governor (described in some accounts as a general). When her beauty drew many suitors, he resolved that she should become a pagan priestess and shut her in a tower stocked with gold and silver idols, commanding her to offer incense before them, with servants attending her.
By tradition she came to recognize the futility of the idols through contemplation of the beauty of creation and the heavens. An angel is said to have visited her, instructing her in the Christian faith and calling her a bride of Christ. She broke all the idols in her chamber; by the anchor account she gave the pieces to the poor, while other accounts say she threw them from the window. When the servants disclosed what she had done, her father turned against her.
Martyrdom
Her father subjected her to severe punishment. Tradition records that he had her bound to an iron wheel with fire set beneath it, and later attempted to drown her in the sea weighted with a stone; by these accounts she survived both, and her father died soon afterward.
Under his successors the torments continued. The governor Dion is said to have inflicted further tortures upon her, during which, while imprisoned, she is reported to have brought many people to the faith. A governor named Julian is said to have ordered her shut in a heated furnace for several days, from which she emerged unharmed. Accounts of her death vary: she is described as having been pierced with arrows or with soldiers' lances, the attribute of three arrows being associated with her in Western iconography.
Relics & Shrines
In the Western tradition Christina is venerated as Christina of Bolsena, and her principal shrine is the Basilica of Santa Cristina in Bolsena, Italy. Archaeological evidence from the catacombs at Bolsena attests to her veneration by the fourth century.
Relics associated with her are also reported at Toffia in the Province of Rieti, at Santa Cristina Gela near Palermo, and at the Maronite Cathedral in Tyre, Lebanon.
