June XXVI

SS. John and Paul, MM.

They were both officers in the army under Julian the Apostate, and received the crown of martyrdom, probably in 362, under Apronianus, prefect of Rome, a great enemy of the Christians. These saints glorified God by a double victory: they despised the honors of the world, and triumphed over its threats and torments. They saw many wicked men prosper in their impiety, but were not dazzled by their example. They considered that worldly prosperity which attends impunity in sin is the most dreadful of all judgments; and how false and short-lived was this glittering prosperity of Julian, who in a moment fell into the pit which he himself had dug! But the martyrs, by the momentary labor of their conflict, purchased an immense weight of never-fading glory: their torments were, by their heroic patience and invincible virtue and fidelity, a spectacle worthy of God, who looked down upon them from the throne of his glory, and held his arm stretched out to strengthen them, and to put on their heads immortal crowns in the happy moment of their victory. An old church in Rome, near that of SS. Peter and Paul, bore the name of SS. John and Paul, as appears by the calendar published by F. Fronto. They have a proper office and mass in the sacramentaries of St. Gelasius and St. Gregory the Great; also in the ancient Gallican Liturgy. In England the council of Oxford, in 1222, ordered their festival to be kept of the third class; that is, with an obligation of hearing mass before work. How famous the names of SS. John and Paul have been in the church ever since the fifth century, is set forth at large by Rondiuinus.¹

The saints always accounted that they had done nothing for Christ so long as they had not resisted to blood, and by pouring forth the last drop completed their sacrifice. Every action of our lives ought to spring from this fervent motive, and consecration of ourselves to the divine service with our whole strength; we must always bear in mind, that we owe to God by innumerable titles all that we are; and after all we can do, are unprofitable servants, and do only what we are bound to do. But how base is our sloth and ingratitude, who in every action fall so much short of this fervor and duty! How does the blood of the martyrs reproach our lukewarmness!

St. Maxentius, Abbot in Poitou

He was born at Agde, and christened by the name of Adjutor. He was placed by his pious parents from his infancy in the monastery of St. Severus, and formed to piety by that holy abbot, who never lost sight of him, and continually inculcated to him, that every thing on earth is full of snares and temptations, and that unless we live in continual watchfulness and circumspection, the devil besieges us so close, that it is impossible for us not to be surprised by him. The youth, by walking always in holy fear, was so happy as to preserve his soul free from whatever could defile it. He fled with great dread the applause of men, as the bane of virtue. To avoid this danger he stole away into a distant country, but after two years was found and brought back by his parents and friends. The fear of the esteem of men again forced him abroad, and going into Poitou, he changed his name into that of Maxentius, and put himself under the direction of a virtuous abbot named Agapetus. The brethren were struck with admiration to see one so perfectly disengaged from the earth, so humble, so mortified, so full of charity, and so enlightened in the paths of salvation; and they unanimously chose him their superior. In his devotions he seemed animated with the spirit of David when he composed his psalms, and in his instructions with the zeal and charity of John the Baptist. Austere towards himself, he showed in all his actions that he sought only that food which never perishes. Following the example of Agapetus, he laid down his office as soon as it was possible for him to do it, and shut himself up in a remote cell; but the monks obliged him still to continue to direct them by his counsels. Clovis, the king of the French, was then at war with Alaric, king of the Visigoths, who reigned in Spain, Languedoc, and Aquitaine. A barbarous army was stopped by the saint’s presence from plundering the monastery; and a soldier who attempted to strike him was seized with a numbness, which continued till he was cured by the saint. Nature on many occasions obeyed his voice, as St. Gregory of Tours relates. St. Maxentius died about the year 515, and is named in the Roman Martyrology.

St. Vigilius, Bishop of Trent, M.

This saint succeeded Abundantius in the episcopal see of Trent in 385. He begged of St. Ambrose, who was his metropolitan, rules for his conduct in his ministry, which that holy prelate gave him in a long letter, in which he exhorted him vigorously to oppose the practice of usury, and the custom of Christians intermarrying with infidels. There remained still many idolaters in the valleys of the diocese of Trent, who adored Saturn and other false divinities. St. Vigilius sent SS. Sisinnius, Martyrius, and Alexander, to preach the faith to them, and afterwards wrote their acts, or a narrative of their martyrdom, in a short letter to St. Simplician, St. Ambrose’s successor, and in another longer to St. Chrysostom. He looked on their glory with a holy envy, and condemned himself as a mercenary and a coward so long as he saw his own crown deferred. His labors, however, were at length recompensed with the happiness of laying down his life for Christ. The ancient calendars rank him among the martyrs, and Fortunatus tells us, that in seeking death he found life, being slain for the faith by a troop of infidel peasants. Usuardus says they murdered him by a shower of stones, and places his martyrdom in the consulship of Stillico, which happened in 100 or 405. Surius confounds this saint with another of the same name, who lived one hundred years later. See Mabill. Pref. sæc. 5, p. 60. Baillet, &c.

St. Babolen

A monk of the Order of St. Columban, whose country is not known, coming into France, was appointed first abbot of St. Peter’s des-Fosses called St. Maur’s after the relics of that holy abbot were brought thither from Anjou. This monastery was founded by Blidegisil, archdeacon of Paris, in 638, in a peninsula formed by the river Marne, two leagues from Paris. St. Babolen rendered it a house of saints, and by the perfect spirit of charity, piety, and all virtues which reigned in it, a true image of Paradise on earth. In conjunction with St. Fursey at Lagny, he labored much in serving the whole diocese of Paris by the authority of bishop Audebert and his successor St. Landri. He founded many churches and hospitals in that diocese, and in his old age having resigned his abbacy to Ambrose, his successor, died in holy retirement in the seventh century. The new Paris Breviary honors his memory with one lesson on the 26th of June. See Molanus in Auctario Usuardi, and in Indiculo Sanctor. Belgii. Du Chesne, t. 1, Hist. Francor. Mabillon, sæc. 2, Bened.

St. Anthelm, Bishop of Bellay, C.

He was for his eminent virtue raised to the episcopal dignity in 1163, when his zeal and abilities were particularly distinguished by the great services he rendered to the church in the schism of the antipope Victor III. He died on the 26th of June, 1178, and is named in the Roman martyrology. See d’Andilly, Vies des SS. Illustr. t. 2, Baillet, &c.

The Venerable Raingarda, Widow

She was by birth one of the principal ladies of Auvergne and Burgundy but the maxims of our holy faith had, from her infancy, given her a relish and esteem only for other riches and other nobility than those of the earth. She took no delight in the pomp which surrounded her, but sighed after the liberty of the saints, as a captive sighs for his enlargement, or a banished man for his own country. When any lover of the heavenly Jerusalem came to visit her, it was her great comfort to converse with such a one on the happiness of the life to come. She often prostrated herself on the ground before the servants of God, and bathing their feet with her tears, earnestly begged their prayers, and lamented with bitter sighs that she was not able to do all the good she desired. She was married to Maurice, a nobleman of suitable birth and fortune, and a person also of eminent piety. In her choice of this state, she consulted only motives of religion, and by earnest prayer endeavored to draw down the divine blessing upon her undertaking, being sensible that a happy marriage is the great source of happiness in life, and a powerful help to virtue; but that any poison in this fountain communicates itself very far, infects with bitterness all the pleasures of life, and endangers all moral and Christian duties. With the obligations of a married life, she joined the exercises of the most perfect Christian piety. She continued her former practices of devotion, for which she always found time enough, because, though she gave all possible attention to her family affairs and duties, yet she was more covetous of her time than the most avaricious man is of his money, and she took all precautions not to lose her precious moments in idle conversation or superfluous amusements. The education of her children was one of her most weighty concerns. She never ceased most earnestly to recommend them to God. From their early infancy she used every method to prevent the first sallies of dangerous passions, and taught them meekness, humility, and patience; so that virtue seemed in them almost to spring from nature itself. To inure them to a life of temperance, mortification, and penance, she took care to train them up in habits and maxims of severe sobriety and abstemiousness. Good example is like an inheritance entailed by a parent on a son, and almost an infallible means of conveying the virtues of one to the other. If parents are virtuous, children will easily, and, as it were, naturally take the same east, unless dissipation and bad company abroad adulterate or efface the ideas of the good they see at home.

When Raingarda seemed to have fully discharged herself of this her duty towards her family, she began earnestly to desire an opportunity of living to God alone. A conference she had with B. Robert of Arbrissel, gave her a strong inclination to consecrate herself to the divine service in the monastery of Fontevrault. Her husband Maurice joyfully came into her proposal, and determined to enter among the religious men of the same order; but before he could execute this design, he fell sick, and was taken out of the world. After his funeral was over, and she had put her affairs in order, she retired to the Benedictin monastery of Marsigny, which, after the death of B. Robert, she preferred to Fontevrault. A gallant train of gentlemen attended her to the gate of the monastery, endeavoring by entreaties and tears to draw her from her resolution; but she took her leave of them, saying with a stern countenance: “Do you return into the world: for my part I go to God.” During the remainder of her life she extenuated her body by labor, and consecrated her heart to compunction, and her eyes to tears. She served every one with as much affection as if every nun had been her own daughter. No employment, not even that of cellarer, seemed ever to interrupt the constant attention of her soul to God. Thus she lived many years. In her last sickness, after having received the extreme unction and viaticum, she made this prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, I very well know where this my body will be lodged: it will find an abode in the earth; but what retreat wilt thou this night afford my soul? Who will receive or comfort it? No one can do it but thyself, my Saviour! Into thy hand I commend this thy creature. I am a most ungrateful sinner; but I now ask of thee that mercy which I have always implored, and to thee I recommend my soul and body.” After being laid on ashes, she expired with great tranquility, June the 24th, and was interred on the 26th, in 1135. It does not appear that she has been publicly honored among the saints; or that any jutidical process has been commenced for that purpose. Yet she is reputed a saint by the sacred biographers of Auvergne, and of the Order of Cluni, and several others, as Branche De Sanctis Alverniæ, l. 3, p. 794; Arthur de Moutier in Gynecæo Sacro, &c. Her life is elegantly written by her son Peter Maurice, surnamed the Venerable, abbot of Cluni,* and is the master-piece of his excellent works, l. 2, ep. 17. See the notes on the same in the library of Cluni. D’Andilly has given her life among those of the most illustrious saints and solitaries, t. l, &c.

¹ De SS. Joanne et Paulo, eorumque Basilica vetera monuments, in 4to. Romæ, 1707. See the hymns of Floras Deacon of Lyons, on SS. John and Paul in Mabillon. Annal t. 1, p. 402.

* Her son, Peter Maurice, became first a monk, and afterwards ninth abbot of Cluni, and by the sanctity of his life obtained the surname of Peter the Venerable. He engaged Peter Abailard to retract his errors, and in a spirit of penance, in his old age, to take the monastic habit at Cluni. Peter was much employed by popes in many important affairs of the church, and died in 1156. He left six books of letters, several sermons, hymns, and other pious tracts. His life, written by a disciple named Rodulph, is published by Dom. Martenne, scriptorum Veterum Amplisslma Collectio, t. 6, p. 1187, and some of this holy abbot’s sermons Thesaur Anecdot. t. 5, col. 1419, 1439, and 1448. See also Bibl. Clunlac. p. 1231, and Bibl. Patr ad Lugdun. t. 22.

 Butler, A. (1903). The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs and Other Principal Saints (Vol. 2, pp. 649–653). New York: P. J. Kenedy.