Father Corapi's Biography

THOUGH no doubt these two saints really existed and were early apostles of Périgord, their legends seem to have been fabricated or altered with the object of giving an apostolic origin to the see of Périgueux. Pronto, it is said, was of the tribe of Juda and was born in Lycaonia. He was converted by the testimony of our Lord’s miracles, was baptized by St Peter, and became one of the Seventy-two. He accompanied St Peter to Antioch and Rome, and was sent thence with the priest George to preach to the Gauls. On the way George died, but, like St Maternus of Trier and St Martial of Limoges, he was brought to life again by the touch of St Peter’s staff.

St Fronto preached with conspicuous success, and several fantastic miracles and inconsistent particulars are given of his mission. His centre was at Périgueux, whereof he is venerated as the first bishop. Later legends import into his life an incident recorded of quite another St Fronto, who was a hermit in the Nitrian desert. St George evangelized the Velay and is accounted the first bishop of Le Puy.

In the earliest known form of the legend, St Fronto is not described as born in Lycaonia, but at Leuquais in the Dordogne, not very far from the Périgueux he was destined to evangelize. The extravagances and anachronisms are much the same as those in the legend just summarized, but there are signs that the earlier compiler did use some historical material, and a seventh-century Life of St Géry undoubtedly speaks of a tomb of St Pronto venerated in Périgueux at that date.

The Benedictines of Paris in their Vies des saints…, vol. x (1952), have reprinted the following pleasing anecdote. It occurs in the prolegomena to André Lavertujon’s edition of the Chronicle of Sulpicius Sevens. Mr Lavertujon tells us that he learned to read from a Histoire de S. Front, and goes on: What struck us most among the extraordinary happenings of St Fronto’s life was this: Fronto was banished by the proconsul Squirius to a wilderness near Périgueux, and would there have died of hunger had not the fierce Roman been struck with remorse and sent him food, loaded on to seventy camels (for the holy man had companions). We were entranced and inflated by these camels walking about the banks of our Dordogne, and asked, ‘Monsieur l’Abbé, why aren’t there any camels here now’—‘Because we no longer deserve them’, was the reply.”

The names of these two martyrs were famous throughout northern Europe in the middle ages, but are today known in England chiefly from the great speech which Shakespeare puts into the mouth of King Henry V on the eve of Agincourt (Henry V, act iv, scene 3). Their very late passio unfortunately cannot be relied on. It says that they came from Rome to preach the faith in Gaul toward the middle of the third century, together with St Quintinus and others. Fixing their residence at Soissons, they instructed many in the faith of Christ, which they preached during the day; and, in imitation of St Paul, worked with their hands at night making shoes, though they are said to have been nobly born (and brothers).

The infidels listened to their instructions and were astonished at the example of their lives, and the effect was the conversion of many to the Christian faith. They had continued this employment several years when, the Emperor Maximian coming into Gaul, a complaint was lodged against them. He, perhaps as much to gratify their accusers as to indulge his own superstition and cruelty, gave orders that they should be taken before Rictiovarus, an implacable enemy of Christians (if, in fact, he was an historical person). He subjected them to various torments and in vain tried to kill them by drowning and boiling; this so infuriated him that he took his own life by jumping into the fire prepared for them. Thereupon Maximian commanded that they be beheaded, and this was done.

Later a church was built over their tomb, and St Eligius the Smith embellished their shrine. SS. Crispin and Crispinian are supposed to have plied their trade without taking payment unless it was offered and thereby disposed men to listen to the gospel. They are the traditional patrons of shoemakers, cobblers and other workers in leather.

The Roman Martyrology says that the relics of these martyrs were translated from Soissons to the church of St Laurence in Panisperna at Rome. Nothing is certainly known about them, and it is possible—even more likely—that the reverse is the truth: that SS. Crispin and Crispinian were Roman martyrs whose relics were brought to Soissons and so started a local cultus.

From the example of the saints it appears how foolish is the pretence of many Christians who imagine that the care of a family, the business of a farm or a shop, the attention which they are obliged to give to their secular profession, are im­pediments which excuse them from aiming at perfection. Such, indeed, they make them; but this is altogether owing to their own sloth and weakness. Many saints have made these very occupations the means of their perfection. St Paul made tents SS. Crispin and Crispinian were shoemakers; the Blessed Virgin was taken up with the care of her cottage Christ Himself worked with His reputed father; and those who renounced all commerce with the world to devote them­selves totally to the contemplation of heavenly things made mats and baskets, tilled the earth, or copied and bound books. Opportunities for every kind of good work never fail in any circumstances; and the means of sanctification may be practised in every state of life.

The Bollandists in the Acta Sanctorum, October, vol. xi, print the passio and supply a very full commentary. The historical fact of the martyrdom seems sufficiently guaranteed by the entry on this day in the “Hieronymianum”, in “Galiis civitate Sessionis Crispini et Crispiniani”. Cf. Delehaye, Étude stir le légendier romain, pp. 126—129, 132—135, and CMH., pp. 337—338, 570—571 and Duchesne, Pastes Épiscopaux, vol. iii, pp. 141-152.

410 Saint Gaudentius of Brescia 387 consecrated by Saint Ambrose 10 sermons survive friend of John Chrysostom B

GAUDENTIUS seems to have been educated under St Philastrius, Bishop of Brescia, whom he styles his “father”. His reputation was very high and he travelled to Jerusalem, partly on pilgrimage and partly hoping by his absence to be forgotten at home. In this, however, he was mistaken. At Caesarea in Cappadocia he met with the sisters and nieces of St Basil, who bestowed on him relics of the Forty Martyrs, knowing that he would honour those sacred pledges as they had honoured them.

During his absence St Philastrius died, and the clergy and people of Brescia chose Gaudentius for their bishop: they bound themselves by an oath to receive no other for their pastor. St Gaudentius only yielded to the threat of refusal of communion by the Eastern bishops if he refused to obey. St Ambrose consecrated him about the year 387; the sermon, which he preached on that occasion, expresses the humility with which his youth and inexperience inspired him.

The church of Brescia soon found how great a treasure it possessed in so holy a pastor. A certain nobleman named Benevolus, who had been disgraced by the Empress Justina because he refused to draw up an edict in favour of the Arians, had retired to Brescia, and being hindered by sickness from attending the Easter sermons of Gaudentius, requested that he would commit them to writing for his use. By this means were preserved ten out of the twenty-one sermons of the saint which are extant. In the second, which he made for the neophytes at their coming from the font on Holy Saturday, he explained to them the mysteries which he could not expound in presence of the catechumens, especially the Blessed Eucharist, of which he says: “The Creator and Lord of Nature, who brings the bread out of the ground, makes also of bread His own body; because He has promised, and is able to perform it. And He who made wine of water, converts wine into His own blood.”

Gaudentius in the preface to his discourses warns the reader against pirated editions of them. He built a church at Brescia, which he named the “Assembly of the Saints”, and to the dedication of which he invited many bishops and in their presence made the seventeenth sermon of those that are extant. In it he says that he had deposited in this church relics of the Apostles and others, affirming that a portion of a martyr’s relics is in virtue and efficacy the same as the whole. “Therefore”, he says, “that we may be succored by the patronage of so many saints, let us come and supplicate with an entire confidence and earnest desire, that by their interceding we may deserve to obtain all things we ask, magnifying Christ our Lord, the giver of so great grace.”

In 405, St Gaudentius was deputed with two others by Pope St Innocent I and the Emperor Honorius to go into the East to defend the cause of St John Chrysostom before Arcadius, for which Chrysostom sent him a letter of thanks.
The deputies were ill received, and imprisoned in Thrace their papers were forcibly taken from them, and bribes were offered if they would declare themselves in communion with the bishop who had supplanted St John Chrysostom. St Paul is said to have appeared in a vision to one of their deacons to encourage them. They eventually arrived back safely in Italy, though it is supposed their enemies intended them to be cast away at sea, for they were put on a most unseaworthy vessel. St Gaudentius seems to have died about the year 410, and Rufinus styled him “the glory of the doctors of the age wherein he lives”. He is honoured on this day in the Roman Martyrology, which mentions on October 14 another ST Gaudentius. He was the first bishop of Rimini, and may have been martyred by the Arians in the year 359. The Canons Regular of the Lateran keeps his feast.

1272 Bd Christopher of Romagnola; personal disciple of St Francis of Assisi; parish priest who joined Friars Minor; distinguished for bodily austerities and devotion to the lepers;

Bd Christopher (often called “of Cahors”) was a personal disciple of St Francis of Assisi. He was a parish priest in the diocese of Cesena, and when about forty years of age he resigned his benefice and joined the newly formed order of Friars Minor, among whom he was distinguished for his bodily austerities and his devotion to the lepers. He was eventually sent into France where he preached against the Albigensians and established his order at Cahors, among other places. He died here in 1272, at a great age, and his cultus was approved in 1905.

The Bollandists on October 31 relegate this holy friar among the praetermissi on the ground that no sufficient evidence had then been produced for his continued cultus. The decree of confirmation, which includes some biographical details, may be read in the Analecta Ecclesiastica for 1905, p. 206. There is a life by Bernard of Besse in the Analecta Franciscana, vol. iii, pp. 161—173. See also the biography by Leopold de Chérancé (1907).

1447 BD THOMAS OF FLORENCE; a Franciscan lay brother; the gift of miracles; Many urged that Bd Thomas should be canonized with St Bernardino of Siena, whose cause was then in process. To prevent the delay that would have resulted, St John of Capistrano, it is said, went to Thomas’s tomb at Rieti and commanded him in the name of holy obedience to cease his miracles until the canonization of Bernardino should be achieved. They stopped for three years, but Bd Thomas has never been canonized. His cultus was approved in 1771.

THOMAS BELLACCI, a native of Florence, was a Franciscan lay brother, who as a young man had led a wild and disorderly life. Realization of the futility of it all and the wise words of a friend wrought a change in him and he was accepted—with some trepidation, for his excesses were notorious—by the friars of the Observance at Fiesole. But his penitence equaled his former sinfulness, and in time, for all he was a lay brother, he was made master of novices, whom he trained in the strictest ways of the Observance.

As a result of the “reunion council” at Florence in 1439, Friar Albert of Sarzana was sent as papal legate to the Syrian Jacobites and other dissidents of the East, and he took Thomas with him, although he was in his seventieth year. From Persia Albert commissioned him to go with three other friars into Ethiopia. Three times on their way the Turks, who treated them with great cruelty, seized them. But Bd Thomas insisted on preaching to the Mohammedans, and eventually they had to be ransomed by Pope Eugenius IV, just before their captors were going to put them to death. Bd Thomas could not get over that God had refused the proffered sacrifice of his life, and in 1447, aged as he was, he set out for Rome to ask permission to go again to the East. But at Rieti he was taken ill, and died there on October 31.  Many urged that Bd Thomas should be canonized with St Bernardino of Siena, whose cause was then in process. To prevent the delay that would have resulted, St John of Capistrano, it is said, went to Thomas’s tomb at Rieti and commanded him in the name of holy obedience to cease his miracles until the canonization of Bernardino should be achieved. They stopped for three years, but Bd Thomas has never been canonized. His cultus was approved in 1771.

1492 BD BALTHASAR OF CHIAVARI; vision of our Lady and was miraculously sheltered from a heavy fall of snow; When he could not walk he had himself carried into church in order to assist at Mass and the choir offices and to hear the confessions of the faithful

BALTHASAR RAVASCHIERI was born at Chiavari on the Gulf of Genoa about the year 1420. He joined the Friars Minor of the Observance, and in due course was professed and ordained. Balthasar was a friend and fellow-preacher with Bd Bernardino of Feltre, and joined enthusiastically and successfully in his missions, but his activities were cut short by ill health.  When he could not walk he had himself carried into church in order to assist at Mass and the choir offices and to hear the confessions of the faithful who came to him in crowds. He also used to be taken into the woods and left there for long periods of meditation and reading, and here he had a vision of our Lady and was miraculously sheltered from a heavy fall of snow. This double marvel was commemorated in the sixteenth century by an inscription cut in stone, and in 1678 was recorded in the archives of the town of Chiavari. Bd Balthasar died on October 17, 1492, at Binasco, and his cultus was confirmed in 1930.

Though we have a certain amount of evidence regarding the later cultus of this beatus, very little can be stated with certainty about the facts of his life. See the Archivum Fran­ciscanum Historicum, vol. ii (1909), p. 523. What little is known has been gathered together in the small volume of Fr Bernardino da Carasco, I1 b. Baldassare Ravaschieri (1930).

1497 BD THADDEUS, BISHOP OF CORK AND CLOYNE; his tomb, and the popular cultus of Bd Thaddeus, encouraged by many miracles, was thus begun. Bishops Richelmy of Ivrea and Cailaghan of Cork having co-operated in the for­warding of his cause, the cultus was confirmed in 1895. His feast is kept in the dioceses of Ivrea, Ross, Cork and Cloyne.

When Bd Thaddeus arrived, he found his cathedral closed against him and the see’s endowments in the hands of the FitzGeralds, Barrys and others. In vain he endeavoured to assert his canonical rights and to obtain peaceful control of his charge: there was nothing for it but to go again to Rome and appeal to the Holy See. The pope condemned the tyrants and provided Thaddeus with letters to the earl of Kildare, then lord deputy of Ireland, to the heads of the bishop’s own clan, and to others, exhorting them to protect and aid his just cause. With these Bd Thaddeus set out for home as a pilgrim on foot, and in the evening of October 24, 1497, reached Ivrea, at the foot of the Alps, where he stayed at the hospice of the canons regular of St Bernard of Montjoux. The next morning he was found dead in his bed.

When an examination of his luggage showed who the dead pilgrim was, the matter was reported to the bishop of Ivrea, who ordered that he should be buried with the utmost solemnity. The story of the episcopal pilgrim travelling incognito and on foot soon got around, and the cathedral was crowded with people from the neighbourhood who came to the funeral. They continued to visit the tomb, and the popular cultus of Bd Thaddeus, encouraged by many miracles, was thus begun. Bishops Richelmy of Ivrea and Cailaghan of Cork having co-operated in the for­warding of his cause, the cultus was confirmed in 1895. His feast is kept in the dioceses of Ivrea, Ross, Cork and Cloyne.

Not very much seems to be known concerning this beatus. In the Irish Ecclesiastical Record for 1896 the lessons sanctioned for the office of his festival are printed, pp. 859—861. The decree confirming the cultus may be read in the Analecta Ecclesiastica, vol. iii (1895), p. 456. It gives very little biographical detail, but dwells principally on the miracles worked at the shrine at Ivrea. Cf. V. Berardi, Italy and Ireland in the Middle Ages (1950).

FOR forty years after the dissolution of the monasteries Wales remained a stronghold of the Catholic faith; many of the great families and most of the common people were faithful to it. But soon after the missionary priests began to arrive from the continent, Queen Elizabeth and her ministers set themselves to stamp out the religion by cutting off the channels of sacramental grace and closing the mouths of those who should preach the word of God. In Wales the first victim of this campaign was a layman, Richard Gwyn (alias White). He was born at Llanidloes in Montgomeryshire in 1537, and was brought up a Protestant. On leaving St John’s College, Cambridge, he went to Overton in Flintshire and opened a school.

Some time after he became a Catholic, and his absence from Protestant worship drawing suspicion on himself, he left Overton with his family for Erbistock. In 1579, being in Wrexham, he was recognized by the vicar (an apostate), denounced, and arrested. He managed to escape. But in June 1580, the Privy Council directed the Protestant bishops to be more vigilant in their dealings with Catholic recusants, especially “all schoolmasters, public and private”. Accordingly, in the very next month, Richard Gwyn was seized and brought before a magistrate, who sent him to Ruthin gaol. At the Michaelmas assizes he was offered his liberty if he would conform, and on refusal was returned to prison, to be kept in irons. At the May assizes he was ordered taken by force to the Protestant church, where he interrupted the preacher by vigorously clanking his chains. He was then put in the stocks from 10 a.m. till 8 p.m., “vexed all the time with a rabble of ministers”. One of them claimed that he had the power of the keys as much as St Peter; but he also had a conspicuously red nose, and Gwyn retorted in exas­peration, “There is this difference, namely, that whereas St Peter received the keys of the kingdom of Heaven you appear to have received those of the beer-cellar!”

He was indicted for brawling in church and fined the equivalent of £800, and brought up again in September and fined £1680 in modern money for not having attended church during the seven months he had been in gaol. The judge asked him what means he had to pay these absurd fines. “I have somewhat towards it”, he replied. “How much?” “Sixpence”, said Gwyn. He appeared at three more assizes and was then sent with three other recusants and a Jesuit, Father John Bennet, senior, before the Council of the Marches, which had them tortured at Bewdley, Ludlow and Bridgnorth to try and get the names of other Catholics.

   In October 1584 Bd Richard appeared at his eighth assizes, at Wrexham, with two others, Hughes and Morris, and was indicted for treason, in that he was alleged to have tried to reconcile one Lewis Gronow to the Church of Rome and to have maintained the supremacy of the pope. He denied ever speaking with Gronow, and the man afterwards made a public declaration that his evidence and that of the other two witnesses was false and paid for at the instigation of the vicar of Wrexham and another zealot. The jury summoned had refused to appear, so another was impaneled on the spot. The members asked the judge whom they were to convict and whom to acquit! Accordingly Gwyn and Hughes were sentenced to death (Hughes was afterwards reprieved) and Morris released. Mrs. Gwyn was brought into court with her baby and warned not to imitate her husband. She rounded on the sheriff. “If you lack blood”, she said, “you may take my life as well as my husband’s. If you will give the witnesses a little bribe they will give evidence against me too!” Bd Richard was executed on October 15, 1584, a very wet day, at Wrexham (now the see of the Catholic diocese of Menevia, Mynyw). The crowd called for him to be allowed to die before disemboweling, but the sheriff (himself an apostate) refused, and the martyr shrieked out in his agony, “0 Duw gwyn, pa beth ydyw hwn?” “Holy God, what is this?” “An execution for the Queen’s Majesty”, said an official. “Iesu, trugarha wrthyf” “Jesus, have mercy on me!” exclaimed Bd Richard, and his head was struck off.