Saint Wulfstan of Worcester

Having become bishop, he fulfilled with care all the duties of a good pastor, and although he appeared to yield to many in terms of learning, he nonetheless proclaimed the word of God with a dignity and an unction that moved his listeners to tears. He continually visited his diocese, performed ordinations, dedicated churches, rebuked sinners, and used both word and example to lead the souls entrusted to his care toward a desire for eternal life. It happened more than once that he would spend the day, from sunrise until night, while fasting, marking with the sign of the cross, with holy oil, up to two or three thousand children who were brought to him from all sides. He possessed such great gentleness and such ardent zeal for souls when he heard confessions that people flocked to him from all parts of England. The sinners who received his counsel were usually so touched by it that they amended their criminal lives through worthy works of penance.

William the Conqueror, Guillaume le Conquérant Duke of Normandy and successor to Edward on the English throne. who relied only on the loyalty of the Normans, gave them the highest positions in the Church and the State, after having stripped the clergy of England of them; but our Saint, who had initially been declared deposed, kept his see through a special protection of God and of Saint Edward the Confessor.

Wulfstan, approaching the tomb of Edward III, said to him: "I willingly accept my deposition and acknowledge myself unworthy; but you, King Edward, who forced me to take the pastoral staff, it is to you that I shall return it"; and, then pressing his crozier against the tombstone, he made it enter as if it had been soft earth. Lanfranc, A rchbisho Lanfranc Master of Anselm at Bec and his predecessor at Canterbury. p of Canterbury, did not w Cantorbéry Capital of the Kingdom of Kent and center of the Augustinian mission. ish to accept a resignation against which heaven was declaring itself and ordered the holy bishop to resume his rank in the Church.

The care he took for the salvation of others did not lead him to neglect his own. He served well through the frequent celebration of the Mass, through assiduous prayer, through a perpetual abstinence from meat, and through abundant alms poured into the bosom of the poor. The humbler his sentiments were, the more his virtue was exalted by public renown. It reached the point that, not to mention the English and the Normans, foreign prelates commended themselves to his prayers. He died in 1095. He had been a bishop for thirty-two years, and had lived for eighty-seven. He was buried in his cathedral and canonized in 1203.

Saint Wulfstan has been depicted: 1st, restoring sight to a blind nun by means of the sign of the cross; 2nd, refusing a dish of goose presented to him. It is recounted that 1st, while saying Mass one day, he smelled a goose being cooked for him: the aroma of the roast did not fail to pleasantly tickle his Saxon stomach; but, soon overcoming this temptation of gluttony, he promised our Lord Jesus Christ present on the altar never to touch that species of meat in his life: thus, when it was presented to him, he would pretend not to like it; — 3rd, driving his crozier into the tomb of Saint Edward the Confessor.

The life of Saint Wulfstan was written by William of Malmesbury Guillaume de Malmesbury Medieval historian and hagiographer, author of a life of Wulfstan. (in Worthen, vol. II), by Flor ence of Worcester, a Florent de Worcester Medieval chronicler who wrote about Wulfstan. nd by Capgrave. See also the History of Worcester Cathedral, by Thomas.