[celt-saints] 28 February #2
Celtic and Old English Saints 29 February (observed this year on 28 February) =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * St. John Cassian the Roman =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= St John Cassian the Roman (435) --- The Synaxarion calls him "Our Father Cassian, chosen by God to bring the illumination of Eastern monasticism to the West". He was born in Scythia of noble parents, and was well educated in secular things. But, thirsting for perfection, he left all behind and travelled with his friend Germanus to the Holy Land, where he became a monk in Bethlehem. After becoming established in the monastic life for several years, St John felt a desire for greater perfection, and sought out the Fathers of the Egyptian Desert. He spent seven years in the Desert, learning from such Fathers as Moses, Serapion, Theonas, Isaac and Paphnutius. Through long struggles in his cell, St John developed from personal experience a divinely-inspired doctrine of spiritual combat. Many say that it was he who first listed the eight basic passions: gluttony, fornication, avarice, anger, sadness, acedia, vainglory and pride. In time, struggles in the Alexandrian Church made life so difficult for the Egyptian monks that St John (still accompanied by his friend Germanus), sought refuge in Constantinople, where they came under the care and protection of St John Chrysostom. When the holy Archbishop was exiled, St John once again fled, this time to Rome, where he came under the protection of Pope Innocent I. This proved to be providential for the Western Church, for it was St John who brought the treasures of Desert spirituality to the monasteries of the West. He founded the monastery of St Victor in Marseilles, then, at the request of his bishop, wrote the Cenobitic Institutions, in which he adapted the austere practices of the Egyptian Fathers to the conditions of life in Gaul. He went on to write his famous Conferences, which became the main channel by which the wisdom of the desert East was passed to the monastics of the West. Saint Benedict developed much of his Rule (which at one time governed most monasteries in the Latin world) from St John's Institutions,, and ordered that the Conferences be read in all monasteries. Saint John reposed in peace in 435, and has been venerated by the monks of the West as their Father and one of their wisest teachers. His relics are still venerated at the Abbey of St Victor in Marseilles. St John's writings were soon attacked by extreme Augustinians and, as Augustinianism became the official doctrine of the Latin Church, his veneration fell out of favour in the West. Outside the Orthodox Church, his commemoration is now limited to the diocese of Marseilles. http://www.abbamoses.com/months/february.html -oOo- ...Returning to the contemporary British Church, we find that in the province of Valentia, which comprised that portion of North Britain situated between the walls of Antonine and Hadrian, there was born about the year 360, one whose personality, amid much that is vague and legendary, seems to stand out clear and distinct before the modern historic vision. This is Nynias or Ninian, who was the son of a Christian Celtic prince or chief. S. Ninian was baptized and educated a Christian. Filled with religious zeal, he resolved to visit the great city "whose ancient glory was still the pride of the world's dominant empire," and, circumstances being favourable to the accomplishment of his wish, he set out from his home and reached Rome in due course. Here he studied for some time, and in 397 he was consecrated as Bishop, and sent back to his native country. On his way he passed through Gaul, and turned aside for some time to the city of Tours on the Loire, where S. Martin, commonly known as "the soldier saint" and now in his eightieth year, presided over a monastery which he had founded on the Eastern model, the fame of which was known to S. Ninian. As the latter's sojourn with the aged S. Martin, to whom he is said to have been related, was destined to bear much fruit, and to have far-reaching consequences later in the Celtic Church, it will be well that we should pause here for a little, and endeavour to examine briefly the nature and general characteristics of the Church of ancient Gaul, many features of which were afterwards to be incorporated into that of the Celt.. ...of this monasticism [the type obtaining in Gaul], S. Anthony, the Coptic Saint, was the founder. Anthony was an Egyptian of noble birth, who was born in Corma, situated near the boundary between Lower and Upper Egypt, in 251 AD. He early became imbued with zeal for the ascetic life. At first he was a solitary or eremite, but later he advocated the coenobitic life. Later, this idea was merged in that of the monastery in which the brethren dwelt under one roof. Pachomius, the successor to
[celt-saints] 28 February
Celtic and Old English Saints 28 February =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * St. Sillian of Bangor * St. Ermina * St. Llibio * St. Maidoc * St. Oswald of Worcester =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= St. Sillian (Sillan, Silvanus) of Bangor, Abbot --- Died c. 610. A disciple of St. Comgall (f.d. May 11) of Bangor, County Down, and his second successor as abbot of that monastery (Benedictines). A site with a brief history of Bangor Abbey and a timeline of its Abbots up to 1170: http://web.archive.org/web/20030215020700/http://ourworld.compuserve.com/hom epages/martin_sloan/abbey.htm or http://tinyurl.com/2vh4s Troparion of St Sillan tone 7 Under thy God-pleasing rule, O Father Sillan,/ Bangor's monastery became a power-house of the true Faith./ As thou wast a bright beacon,/ guiding men on their journey to God,/ we beseech thee to be also a beacon for us,/ bringing us safely into the way of salvation. Kontakion of St Sillan tone 2 Righteous Father Sillan, Road to our Saviour,/ Crown of Bangor's saints and joy of all monastics,/ we keep festival in thy honour, ever blessing thy name/ and imploring thy prayers for us sinners. * * * The Irish Monastery of Bangor was situated in the County Down, on the southern shore of Belfast Lough. Its founder is Saint Comgall (Feastday 10 May, sometimes 11 May.) Sometimes the name was written "Beannchor", from the Irish word beann, a horn. According to Keating, a king of Leinster once had cattle killed there, the horns being scattered round, hence the name. The place was also called the Vale of Angels, because, says Jocelin, St. Patrick once rested there and saw the valley filled with angels. The founder of the abbey was St. Comgall, born in Antrim in 517, and educated at Clooneenagh and Clonmacnoise. The spirit of monasticism was then strong in Ireland. Many sought solitude the better to serve God, and with this object Comgall retired to a lonely island. The persuasions of his friends drew him from his retreat; later on he founded the monastery of Bangor, in 559. Under his rule, which was rigid, prayer and fasting were incessant. But these austerities attracted rather than repelled; crowds came to share his penances and his vigils; they also came for learning, for Bangor soon became the greatest monastic school in Ulster. Within the extensive rampart which encircled its monastic buildings, the Scriptures were expounded, theology and logic taught, and geometry, and arithmetic, and music; the beauties of the pagan classics were appreciated, and two at least of its students wrote good Latin verse. Such was its rapid rise that its pupils soon went forth to found new monasteries, and when, in 601, St. Comgall died, 3,000 monks looked up for light and guidance to the Abbot of Bangor. With the Danes came a disastrous change. Easily accessible from the sea, Bangor invited attack, and in 824 these pirates plundered it, killed 900 of its monks, treated with indignity the relics of St. Comgall, and then carried away his shrine. A succession of abbots continued, but they were abbots only in name. The lands passed into the hands of laymen, the buildings crumbled. Among the Abbots of Bangor few acquired fame, but many of the students did. Findchua has his life written in the Book of Lismore; Luanus founded 100 monasteries and St. Carthage founded the great School of Lismore. From Bangor Saint Columbanus and Saint Gall crossed the sea, the former to found Luxeuil and Bobbio, the latter to evangelize Switzerland. In the ninth century a Bangor student, Dungal, defended orthodoxy against the Western iconoclasts. The present town of Bangor is a thriving little place, popular as a seaside resort. Local tradition has it that some ruined walls near the Protestant church mark the site of the ancient abbey; nothing else is left of the place hallowed by the prayers and penances of St. Comgall and St Sillian. St. Ermina (Febaria) --- 6th century. Discreet Irish virgin (Encyclopaedia). St. Llibio --- 6th century. Llibio is the patron of Llanllibio in the isle of Anglesey (Benedictines). St. Maidoc (Madoc), Bishop --- 6th century. There are several Welsh and Irish saints with this name and many variations of the name. Their histories are somewhat difficult to untangle. Today's Maidoc may be the abbot-bishop after whom Llanmadog in Glamorganshire is named (Benedictines). St. Oswald of Worcester, Bishop --- Born in England c. 925; died at Worcester, England, February 29, 992. St. Oswald was born of a Danish family that settled in England. He was the nephew of St. Odo (f.d. July 4), bishop of Canterbury, and Oskitell, first bishop of Dorchester and later York. He was educated by Odo, was appointed dean of W
[celt-saints] 27 February
Celtic and Old English Saints 27 February =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= * St. Comgan, Abbot in Ireland * St. Alnoth of Stowe * St. Herefrith, Bishop of Lincolnshire =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= St. Comgan, Abbot in Ireland (Cowan) Died c, 565. Abbot of Glenthsen or Killeshin in Ireland. St. Alnoth, Hermit and Martyr of Stowe 700 AD. Mercia was the central Kingdom of the Anglo Saxon heptarchy and Weedon is usually considered to be the place nearest to the centre of England. King Wulfere had reluctantly given his only daughter Werburgh permission to enter the convent at Ely to be trained for the religious life, and King Ethelred, who succeeded his brother, thought she would be just the person to oversee the nuns of all the monasteries in the Kingdom of Mercia. He gave his niece lands at Weedon, Trentham and Hanbury on which to build convents. At Weedon, among the servants of the monastery, there was a herdsman named Alnoth. According to Goscelin in his 11th Century Life of St. Werburgh, he was a man of great piety and, although he was an unlettered serf, he practised his religion with simple devotion. Such men tend to attract to themselves bullying persecution by the more worldly and one day St. Werburgh saw her steward in a violent rage beating Alnoth for some supposed fault or neglect. She was convinced by God that the herdsman was innocent, but instead of using the authority of her birth and position she fell at the feet of the steward pleading with him to be merciful and so shamed him into more Christian and just behaviour. Alnoth led the life of a hermit in the woods of Stowe near Bugbrooke and there in his solitude he was murdered by some robbers, who infested the wooded country. They could not have killed Alnoth for his wealth because he had none, and the local people were sure that it was hatred of his faith and holiness of life that had motivated his murderers. He was regarded as a martyr and his tomb was a place of pilgrimage for centuries, those visiting it attesting to miracles and answered petitions. Suppliers of Icons of Celtic Saints for the church or the prayer corner at home. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/celt-saints/message/2875 * Sources Stanton, R A., Menology of England and Wales (Burns & Oates, 1887) These Lives are archived at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/celt-saints *
