Saint William of Saint-Brieuc

Thus this holy prelate was not content with having his loins girded by chastity; he believed it was his duty to take in hand the burning lamp by which the works of charity are designated to us. He looked upon himself as the father of the poor, and in that capacity, charged with the obligation of feeding them and relieving the miserable in their necessities. He did not believe himself quit of his duty toward them through the liberality of his almoner; he carried a purse himself so as not to expose himself to the pain of meeting some indigent person to whom he could not do good. His solicitude for them was so great that when the remains of his table were distributed to them, he would stand at a window, attentive to those who gave and those who received, and ensuring that this distribution was done in a way that satisfied everyone. If the number of the poor was too great in relation to what was available to distribute to them, he would have it supplemented on the spot.

In a year of scarcity, Saint William saw the poor languishing from hunger, opened his granaries to them, and had all his grain distributed to them; and as there was still not enough to provide for their needs, he borrowed wheat from his canons to give as alms. Finally, he pushed his liberality toward the miserable to the point that he had nothing left with which to make a will. Happy in this, to have preferred making a treasure that followed him into heaven, rather than amassing riches on earth that would have abandoned him at death.

His external occupations did not exclude in him the internal attention to listening to God and speaking to Him in prayer. William, applied to hearing the divine voice in the secret of recollection, also used his own voice incessantly to celebrate His praises; for besides the canonical hours and other ordinary prayers, not a day passed that he did not recite the entire Psalter, which he knew by heart. It is thus that the celestial fire of the lamp he used to enlighten others penetrated to his soul.

His dignity was not a reason that exempted him from the lowest services when it was a matter of making himself useful to the poor; he was seen prostrate on the ground, blowing with his own mouth the fire intended to cook the food he destined for them. One day, a man came to his house to borrow a vat to give a bath to a poor woman. He was alone at the house then with his chaplain. He did not delay for that reason to occupy himself with this good work; he went himself to remove the wheat with which this vat was filled, and with the help of his chaplain, he loaded it onto the shoulders of the one who had come to seek it.

Going to bed one evening, he noticed that the bed of a religious who was lodged in the episcopal house had been set up on the floor, while his own was set up in a higher and more comfortable place. This difference shocked his humility; he immediately had people come, and did not go to bed until the two beds had been made equal. But when he was without witnesses, he often slept on the hard ground, while his servants believed he was resting softly. He treated his body as a dangerous enemy and employed the rigors of penance to diminish its strength and vigor, which are only too often prejudicial to those of the soul. His rank and dignity engaged him, on many occasions, to give meals where an honest, though modest, abundance reigned; but he tasted little of the meats that were served to others, and the poor profited from them more than he did. His habitual drink was pure water, or if he mixed wine with it, it was in a very small quantity.

His bowels were always moved when he saw the sorrows and miseries of others. A dropsical woman one day asked him for alms. The Saint, seeing her in a state so worthy of compassion, was not content to relieve her poverty; he also wished to bring some relief to her ailment. The bishop, at his meal, remembered her, and sent her the best dish from his table, which he had barely tasted. The one who carried out the errand searched for this poor woman for a long time in the streets, and finally found her at home, lying down and suffering from pains that brought her to the point of death. At this distressing news, the holy prelate went to the church to offer to God the sacrifice of his tears and his prayers, and he remained there until someone came to tell him that the woman was up and perfectly healed. He felt extreme joy and had this woman brought to him. When he saw her, he could hardly trust the testimony of his eyes, so unlikely was it that a person he had seen the same day in such a deplorable state could have recovered such perfect health in so little time. But no one doubted that this surprising change was the effect of the Saint's prayers, and of the regard that God had shown for his tears and his charity.

During the war that the misconduct of Duke Pet er of Dreux brought duc Pierre de Dreux Duke of Brittany in conflict with the Church and Bishop Guillaume. upon Brittany, the city o f Saint-Brieuc, being ville de Saint-Brieuc Episcopal see and primary location of the saint's activity. unfortified, was at the mercy of the Bretons at one time and the French at another, and was exposed to a thousand ravages. It was on these occasions that all the zeal and tenderness of the pastor shone forth, occupied incessantly with gathering his scattered flock and consoling them. How many times did he present himself in the midst of the brigands! How many times did he expose his life to preserve the lives and property of those whom Providence had entrusted to his care! How many times, finally, did men of blood lay sacrilegious hands upon him, raise the sword against him, heap insults upon him, and attempt to terrify the holy and venerable pastor, who opposed them only with an unshakable firmness and an invincible courage! He could not sometimes refuse the urgent prayers of his clergy to use the spiritual sword, by cutting off these bloodthirsty enemies and cruel brigands from the bosom of the Church; but it was only with a soul penetrated by sorrow, and eyes bathed in tears, that he exercised the power of the keys in these unfortunate extremities.

The Duke, meanwhile, persecuted the Church and declared himself its enemy, under the pretext of curbing usurpations and reducing it to the level of modesty that he imagined suited it better than the overly brilliant exterior and the pomp to which he claimed it had insensibly surrendered. The executors of his orders found in the Bishop of Saint-Brieuc a wall of brass, which halted their progress and disconcerted their enterprises. He endured their insults and threats with a firmness that irritated them. He would willingly have given his life for this cause; but they were content to drive him from the province. The Saint, persuaded that all lands are equally the homeland of the truly virtuous man, and that the Christian who possesses God possesses everything, endured without pain the exile, the shame, and the loss of his goods, in the hope of having a share in the beatitude promised to those who su ffer persecution fo diocèse de Poitiers City where the saint settled and lived as a recluse. r justice's sake. He withdrew to the diocese of Poitiers, where the bishop, overwhelmed by illness and unable to act, begged him to take care of his flock. Saint William spent a few years there, during which he marvelously edified these strangers by the holiness of his life; he performed ordinations, dedicated churches, consecrated altars, administered the sacrament of confirmation, fulfilled all the other duties of the chief pastor, and made himself as agreeable to men as he was to God.

Finally, when it pleased the Lord to soften the ferocity of the prince and to restore peace to the Church of Brit tany, Wil Guillaume Bishop of Saint-Brieuc in the 13th century, known for his charity and his firmness in the face of ducal power. liam returned in 1230 to take care of his own flock. Not content with edifying it by his holy life, with nourishing it spiritually and bodily, with defending and protecting it, he also wished to embellish his city with a material temple, and began to build t he cathedral chur église cathédrale Edifice built by Guillaume and the site of his burial. ch that one sees there today, which is not among the least beautiful in the province. Whether by an impression of the Spirit of God, who puts words into the mouths of the Prophets, or by a movement of the courage and resolution of the holy man, it is reported that, thinking seriously about the difficulty of the undertaking, the costs of execution, and the length of the work, he said with assurance: "I shall nevertheless complete my church, alive or dead."

The Lord wished to reward a life so pure and so full of good works by calling his servant to Him to enjoy eternal rewards. Saint William, after fulfilling all the duties of a good shepherd, died on July 29, which is the day on which the Church celebrates his feast. His body was buried in his cathedral church, under a flat tomb, on the right side of the upper nave. It remained hidden there, like a precious stone, until, two years after his death, Philip, his successor, intending to continue the building of the church, was obliged, in order to follow the alignments, to have the place where the Saint had been buried excavated. He gathered the clergy and the people for this purpose, and when the holy body was uncovered, it was found as whole as on the day of his death, and an odor as pleasant as if the most precious aromatics had been used to embalm it emanated from it.

From that moment, such a great number of miracles were performed through the intercession of Saint William that the reputation of his holiness was carried not only throughout the province but even to the most distant lands; and the gathering of people at his tomb was so great that the offerings they made and their liberality gave Bishop Philip the means to finish the work that his predecessor had begun. Thus was accomplished what the Saint had said, that he would build this church, living or dead.

Bishop Philip took care to compile an authentic collection of the miracles that occurred at the Saint's tomb and brought it to Lyon to Pope Innocent IV. This pontiff felt a deep joy to learn of such touching wonde rs and sent a ca pape Innocent IV 13th-century pope who testified to the saint's miracles. rdinal to Brittany, whom he charged with the task of conducting a legal inquiry. On the very day that the cardinal had set for the opening of the inquiry, there was an astonishing influx of strangers from very distant lands who came, in addition to the witnesses who had been summoned, to bear witness themselves to the proof they had experienced, in their own particular cases, of the power that the intercessions of the holy bishop had before God.

The Pope, after having seen the inquiry, heard the cardinal's report, and taken the advice of all the cardinals, as well as all the prelates who were present, inscribed William in the Catalogue of Saints and decreed a public cult for him by his bull of April 15, 1247.

The Pope commanded all the bishops of the kingdom of France to celebrate his feast on July 29, the day of his death, and to order that it be celebrated by all the faithful. To this provision, he added indulgences of one year and forty days for those who visit his tomb on the day of his feast and during the octave.

## CULT AND RELICS. The body of the Saint was solemnly raised from the ground in 1246. The ecclesiastical authority of Saint-Brieuc erected a tomb for him at the site of his burial and established a special feast for his canonization on April 15, which is still celebrated today, in addition to the feast of July 29. This tomb can still be seen in the cathedral church; it is located between two pillars in front of the chapel known as the Blessed Sacrament. On the monument is the statue of the Saint in pontifical vestments, lying down and holding his crozier. As for the relics of Saint Guillaume, his skull was formerly in a silver bust that was removed during the spoliation of the churches in 1793. The rest of the body was in a reliquary, placed above the altar of the chapel we have just mentioned. This precious treasure was preserved from profanation during the time of the revolution by a constitut ional pr Pincemin Constitutional priest who preserved relics during the French Revolution. iest named Pincemin, who left a certificate of it; but it seems that his testimony alone was not found to be sufficiently imposing, and these relics are now kept in the sacristy, without daring to expose them to the veneration of the faithful. The saint's skull is now joined to the relics of Saint-Brieuc in the beautiful gilded bronze reliquary given in 1820 by Mgr de Quélen. One also sees in the same church eight teeth of the holy Bishop. After his canonization, the old church of Notre-Dame de la Porte, which is at the entrance to the city of Saint-Brieuc, on the side of the road to Lamballe, was dedicated to him. This church, which was collegiate, bore the name of Saint-Guillaume until the revolution; but it has been profaned since that deplorable era. It can be said that the cult of this Saint was universal throughout Brittany, since his feast is marked in all the old calendars on July 29, with the exception of that of the Church of Vannes, where it is moved forward to the 19th, and that of the Church of Léon, where it is deferred to the 30th. The diocese of Rennes has long since suppressed the feast of Saint Guillaume, without the reason being known; but it is still celebrated in those of Nantes, Vannes, and Quimper. In Saint-Brieuc, it is of the major solemn rite with an octave. Excerpt from the Lives of the Saints of Brittany, by Dom Lobineau.