Saint Victricius of Rouen

It is not know n where Saint saint Victrice Eighth bishop of Rouen and apostle of Gallia Belgica. Victricius retired after his conversion. It is likely, however, that he withdrew into the solitude of Ligugé, near Poitiers, and practiced all virtues there under the guidance of the illustrious Saints Hilary and Martin. The rest of his life is a striking proof of the fervor with which he had prepared himself for apostolic labors. We learn from Saint Paulinus that he went to carry the torch of the faith into the region of Belgic Gaul, inhabite Gaule-Belgique Mission region of Victricius. d by the Morini an d the Morins Pagan people evangelized by Omer. Nervii, which now forms part of Picardy, Hainaut, and Flanders. The progress of the Gospel had been little significant there until then. But no sooner had Victricius appeared than this uncultivated land, with its sandy shores and arid deserts, became one of the most beautiful flowerbeds in the Bridegroom's gardens. The name of Jesus Christ resounded everywhere, and there was almost no one who did not range themselves under his empire. Churches were built, monasteries were formed; the cities, the countryside, the islands, and the forests were populated with saints: in a word, the idols fell and Jesus Christ reigned. We follow Saint Paulinus here, and we even use his expressions.

Some claim that Saint Victricius undertook this mission before occupying the see of Rouen; others maintain the contrary. The first opinion seems to us the most probable. Perhaps the Saint was a regionary bishop at that time. According to Saint Paulinus, he was raised to the episcopate by the Apostolic See around the year 385.

He had a very intimate connection wi th Saint Martin of To saint Martin de Tours Saint whose relics were honored by missionaries in Tours. urs. He was with him in Vienne, on the Rhône, when Saint Paulinus came to consult him on the choice of his retreat, and he was then pastor of the C hurch of Rouen. Église de Rouen Norman city where Simeon stayed and founded a monastery. This was the first and indeed the only time that Saint Paulinus saw our holy bishop. He assures that this short interview was enough to make him conceive the highest idea of his holiness, and to fill him with love and veneration for his person.

We read in Sulpicius Severus that Saint Victricius was still with Saint Martin, in Chartres, when a man from that city brought his daughter, mute from birth, to the latter, to beg him to heal her. The holy bishop of Tours wanted to send her back to Victricius and another bishop named Valentinian, saying that they were both more powerful than he before God. But they both joined the girl's father to ask for her healing, and they did indeed obtain it.

This friendship, this esteem of Saint Martin for Saint Victricius was supported on the most solid foundations. He knew the fruit that his prayers, his examples, and his labors were producing in the diocese of Rouen, of which he was bishop. "Previously," said Saint Paulinus, "the city of Rouen was little known to other nations; but under Victricius it became a new Jerusalem, and its name was famous among the most illustrious Churches of the Christian world. The Apostles chose this city, where they were once strangers, to make their spirit rest there; and, by lighting the flames of divine love in the hearts of the faithful, they make the marvelous effects of the Lord's power burst forth. One sees there a great number of churches, where the sacred psalms are sung with a melodious concert, and numerous monasteries whose inhabitants, by the perfection of the evangelical counsels, raise new trophies to religion every day. One finds there on all sides virgins who, by their purity, make of their bodies and their hearts a sanctuary worthy of Jesus Christ; widows who do not cease night and day to apply themselves to the service of God and to the exercise of works of charity; persons who, although engaged in marriage, keep continence, and who, by the fervor and continuity of their prayers, give the world the most edifying spectacle." Such is the testimony that Saint Paulinus rendered, from the depths of Italy, to the church of Rouen, to the zeal and holiness of its pastor.

Some troubles having arisen among the bishops of Great Br itain, Victrice Grande-Bretagne Birthplace of the saint. was called to appease them. He justified the high opinion that had been formed of him; he succeeded through his patience and charity in establishing calm and peace there. This happened forty years before Saint Germanus of Auxerre went to the same country to confound the Pelagians.

Victrice had barely returned to his diocese when he learned that Sai nt Ambrose and saint Ambroise Saint who appeared in a vision to Bruno. several other bishops were sending him relics, and that the person bringing them was not far from Rouen. He went to meet him out of respect. It had not been long since he had received, probably by the same route, relics of Saint John the Baptist, Saint Andrew, Saint Thomas, Saint Luke, Saint Gervase, Saint Protase, and Saint Agricola. The new chest contained a greater quantity; and there were some of Saint John the Evangelist, Saint Proculus of Bologna, Saint Antoninus of Piacenza, Saint Saturninus and Saint Trajan of Macedonia, Saint Nazarius of Milan, the saints Muce, Alexander, Daty, and Chinde, and the saints Rogate, Leonide, Anastasia, and Anatolia. Victrice himself gives us the names of all these Saints in the discourse he gave on this occasion. Saint Ambrose, having discovered the relics of Saint Gervase and Saint Protase in Milan after the death of the Emperor Theodosius, which occurred on January 17, 375, and those of Saint Nazarius and Saint Celsus shortly thereafter, died in 397. The sending of these same relics to Rouen must therefore be placed around the year 396.

Saint Victrice, in order to place them decently, built a church in his episcopal city, and he performed the translation with great solemnity once the building was completed. He left us a description of this ceremony in the discourse we have just mentioned. In it, he defends virgins and widows against the heresy of Jovinian, which had recently been condemned in the councils of Rome and Milan. He opposes the Arians with an exact profession of faith on the Trinity; he rejoices in having the same faith as the Apostles and the martyrs, and he adds that the confession we make of it, both in sorrow and in joy, obtains grace and salvation. Describing the procession that took place for the translation ceremony, he says: "Here appears in a crowd the troop of monks, exhausted by fasting; there, numerous swarms of innocent children make the air resound with the joyful sounds of their voices; here, the choir of devout virgins carries the standard of the cross; there, a multitude of the continent and widows joins in." He exhorts the faithful to look upon the Martyrs as their protectors. "We must," he says, "devoutly embrace these precious remains of the torments, and seek in them, like the woman with the issue of blood at the fringe of the Savior's garment, the healing of our wounds." He adds, speaking of himself: "You see before you, and at your service, a soldier tested by the years, aged in combat, hardened to fatigue and vigils... who only values the present life by its relationship to eternity, and who never believes himself richer than when he has his hands loaded with the relics of the Saints... Their homes are in heaven; but they are here as guests to whom we can address our prayers." He shows that the gift of miracles and the pledge of their holiness are no less present in the small parts of their relics than in the whole.

It is believed that the church that Saint Victrice had built for the relics sent to him from Italy is the one that bears the name of Saint-Gervais in Rouen. It is at the place where Saint Mellon had been buried, and it is to be presumed that an oratory had previously been erected over the tomb of this Saint.

However, Saint Victrice was accused of erring in the faith, and it is probable that this alleged error concerned the Trinity; but it was not difficult for him to justify himself. Perhaps one should attribute to this accusation the journey he made to Rome, around the year 403, during the pont ificate of I Innocent Ier Pope who received Victricius in Rome and author of a decretal. nnocent I.

The desire he had to rejoin his flock prevented him from going to see his friend, Saint Paulinus, at Nola. The latter complained of this in a letter he wrote at the end of the year 404. In it, he says that he had been unworthy to receive such a great consolation. He inserts therein a profession of faith on the mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation. He rejoices that Victrice has confounded calumny, that he has triumphed over his enemies, and that a passing trial had worked for him an eternal weight of glory.

Saint Victrice having consulted the Holy See on some points of discipline, Pope Innocent I addressed to him, in 404, a decretal containing thirteen articles which mainly concerned the clergy. Continence was strongly recommended to clerics therein. There were also regulations for virgins who have chosen Jesus Christ as their spouse and who have received the sacred veil from the hand of the priest.

Saint Victrice lived for a few more years on the see of Rouen, of which he was the eighth bishop. He died around the year 407. His feast day is marked on August 7 in the martyrologies of France and in the modern Roman one. It is also on this day that it is celebrated in Rouen.

[APPENDIX: CULT AND RELICS.]

The relics of Saint Victric, Bishop of Rouen, were, in the middle of the 9th century (841 ), tra Braine Site of the translation of relics in the 9th century. nsported to Braine, a town and fortified castle four leagues from Soissons. This was at the time of the invasion of the Normans, whose rapacity was feared. The land and the castle of Braine were the property of the church of Rouen, which had received this gift from its bishop, Saint Ouen.

The relics of Saint Victric were first deposited in the church of the priory of Saint-Remi of Braine, located in the suburb on the side of the road to Soissons. The authors of the *Gallia christiana* are mistaken in saying that the church of Saint-Remi has since changed its name to that of Saint-Yved or Evode. These are two different churches. The one of Saint-Remi was entirely destroyed during the French Revolution; the one of Saint-Yved still exists and is today the parish church of Braine.

Agnes, wife of Robert de Breux and Countess of Braine, gave a portion of the bones of Saint Victric to the parish church of Saint-Nicolas of Braine. These bones were religiously preserved there from the 12th century until 1793.

The relics of Saint Victric deposited at Saint-Nicolas of Braine were recognized as authentic by Mgr Languet de Gergy, Bishop of Soissons from 1717 to 1731; then by his successor Mgr Lefebvre de Laubrière, who solemnly conducted a legal inquiry for four days, heard the depositions of a large number of witnesses, and left a twelve-page in-4° record on parchment in which he recognizes the authenticity of the relics of Saint Victric, permits them to be exposed and carried in procession, and in memory of the translation that he himself had just performed on May 5, 1733, he ordered that in his diocese of Soissons the feast of Saint Victric would be celebrated on May 5 of each year. Today it is celebrated on the Sunday closest to May 5.

D. Pommeraye claimed that the Calvinists had reduced the relics of Saint Victric to ashes around 1362. The official report of Mgr de Laubrière, from 1733, gives a formal denial to this learned Benedictine; it describes five perfectly preserved bones of the Saint.

In 1793, the constitutional priest Mangras collected the five bones mentioned in the official report of Mgr de Laubrière and transmitted them to his successor. In 1813, Mgr Leblanc de Beaulieu, Bishop of Soissons, recognized the identity and authenticity of the relics of Saint Victric, which were the same as those previously recognized by Mgr de Laubrière.

On October 16 and 17, 1865, His Eminence Cardinal de Bonnechose, Archbishop of Rouen, accompanied by Mgr Doura, Bishop of Soissons, and a numerous clergy, came expressly to Braine and proceeded to a new translation of the relics of Saint Victric, placed them and sealed them in a magnificent reliquary of gilded copper, adorned with enamel and fine stones, a gift from the metropolitan church of Rouen to the church of Braine. In recognition of this munificence, the church of Braine ceded to that of Rouen an iliac bone of Saint Victric. The reliquary of Saint Victric that remained in Braine contains: a shoulder blade, a fibula, the head of a femur, and a fragment of a humerus. In the Soissonnais Proper, the feast of Saint Victric is set for May 6.

Godescard: *Légendaire de Morinie*, by Abbé Van Drival; Dom Ceillier; and *Local notes provided* by M. Congnet, of the chapter of Soissons. — Cf. *Acta Sanctorum*.