Saint Marcellus of Chalon

Marcel, whom this prompt and unexpected success, like a miracle of grace, filled with joy, would have liked to remain longer in this place to add new conquests to his already numerous ones. But the events in Lyon and his escape itself were causing a great stir. The emperor's edict had just been published in all the cities of the province, and Christians were being sought with a resurgence of relentlessness and fury. He thought it prudent to move away to let the violence of the storm pass, crossed the Saône in a remote place, in order to avoid the city, and headed towards Dijon, following the road which is called by the old historian *Argentomagensis agger*.

Suddenly he found himself unexpectedly in the midst of a pagan festival. It was the governor himself, the high steward of the navigation of the Saône (praefectus navium Araricarum), it was Pr Priscus Influential citizen of Chartres who protected the cult of the Virgin. iscus who was there, preparing a solemn sacrifice and a feast in honor of his gods. The traveler, who was unknown, was politely invited to take part. Then the scene changed, the role of apostle began; Marcel refused and boldly justified his refusal by casting some energetic words against the worship of idols. Immediately they cried: "A Christian, a Christian!" — "Yes, I am a Christian," replied Marcel. — "It is the prisoner from Lyon! Let us see if we cannot force him to retract his refusal to worship the gods." And on the spot they tied him, by a cruel game, no doubt new to enliven the feast, to two violently bent tree branches, so that by straightening themselves they would dislocate his limbs and pain would triumph over his obstinacy. Their barbaric expectation was deceived: the martyr remained unshakable. "He rejoiced," say his Acts, "to suffer on the wood, following the example of Jesus Christ, and to be able to unite his passion to that of the divine Redeemer who had willed to expire on the cross, so that, as the crime had come from a tree, the atonement might also come from one."

Then Priscus, judging that it would be better for the sake of example to make a spectacle of his torment before the people, had him led before a colossal statue of Saturn, which rose on the right bank of the Saône and seemed to preside over the dormant waters of the river. There the Christian's head was to fall if he refused to worship the idol. — "Marcel," he said to him, "for it is indeed you, there is no longer any doubt possible, do you not know that the sacred edicts of our divine emperor order that whoever refuses his adoration to Saturn, to the almighty Jupiter, and to all the deities of their celestial race, be punished with death? If, therefore, you do not obey this very instant, I will make you perish in hideous torments." — "Your gods were but miserable mortals stained with crimes. Instead of reigning in heaven, they are in the underworld where they suffer the torments they deserve. There is only one true almighty God: He who was before all ages, who is today, and who will be forever. As for your torments, I do not fear them; I only dread the eternal and truly fearsome punishments with which this God, if I were to worship your idols, would punish my apostasy. Therefore, I repeat to you, I am a Christian. That is my clear and concise profession of faith: it is irrevocable." Furious, Priscus ordered the intrepid confessor of Jesus Christ to be tortured on the rack and his body torn with rods at the foot of the statue of Saturn. After having thus offered the homage of vengeance to the insulted god, he had the Saint led to the other side of the Saône, before the statue of the Sun which protected the left bank, so that other torments might also repair the outrage that this other divinity had likewise received. That was not all. About two miles from the city, still on the side of the left bank, was a place named Ubiliacus, where, in the middle o Ubiliacus Place of torture located two miles from Chalon. f a sacred atrium, rose a high column surmounted by the statue of a god honored in the region with a special cult and who was called Bacon. It was either Bacc Bacon Topical or Gaulish deity honored at Chalon. hus under a Gaulish name or some topical divinity, peculiar to the people of Chalon. The martyr, who had insulted all the pagan deities, was thus dragged before this third idol, to offer through new torments a new reparation. There, his limbs, torn by rods, bruised by chains, were a second time stretched on the rack and subjected at the same time to a more stinging torture, that of fire. "Sacrifice," Priscus shouted at him, "or I shall surely find other torments." But the invincible soldier of Jesus Christ always opposed a more cruel torment with a more unshakable constancy, triumphed over the executioners, and replied to the threatening demands of the tyrant: "How do you expect one who embraces with all the strength of his conviction, who keeps in the most intimate part of his heart the faith in the living God, to be able to sacrifice to insensitive stone idols, simulacra of the demon? To forget my Creator for one who is his enemy and mine, to prostitute my soul which comes from heaven to the adoration of alleged divinities, is a crime, it is a shame to which I will never descend. I offer every day to the only true God a spotless host, and I could defile myself with an impious sacrifice! No, never. I want to imitate my glorious companions who have just given me the example of martyrdom. And if I have not fought with them, in Lyon, on the same battlefield, like them I will die here for my faith, for my God."

The barbarian Priscus, pushed to the limit and defeated, entered into what seemed like a fit of furious madness. Carried away by the rage of spite, he ordered that Marcel, at that very instant and in that very place, be buried standing and alive up to his waist: wishing, through an unprecedented cruelty, that the Christian, his conqueror, should not even have the rest of the grave. During all the time that this unheard-of torment lasted, the Saint, with his eyes raised on high, did not cease to praise God with heart and mouth. He considered himself too happy to have been able to preach the Gospel in this region, to win souls for Jesus Christ, and to regain the crown of martyrdom that had escaped him the first time. A little more time and he would join his brothers of Lyon. This anticipated death lasted three days, after which the divine Master finally permitted his great soul to fly to heaven, on September 4, around the year 178. He is represented: 1st, tied to two trees, or to two strong branches violently brought together; 2nd, buried in a hole, up to the waist, to mark the various kinds of torments he endured.

[APPENDIX: CULT AND RELICS.] The body of the blessed Saint Marcel is preserved almost entirely in a large and beautiful reliquary supported by a group of white marble angels of the greatest beauty, which can be seen at the back of the sanctuary of the beautiful church of Saint-Marcel-lès-Chalon, near Chalon-sur-Saône, where every year a large gathering of the faithful from the city and the entire province come to celebrate with pomp the feast of their holy apostle. The cult of Saint Marcel is common throughout the ancient kingdom of Burgundy. Several churches, even in the border regions, are dedicated to him. For the ancient kingdom of Burgundy, one can cite the chu Marceau A priest from Lyon and martyr at Chalon-sur-Saône in the 2nd century. rch of Sai Orléans The first diocese of which Roger was bishop. nt-Marceau in Orléans (throughout this part of France, one pronounces Marceau for Marcel), a beautiful and large parish near Orléans, on the banks of the Loire, which possesses a considerable portion of the relics of Saint Marcel, enclosed in a very large reliquary remarkable for its style. There, as in Chalon, the cult of the holy martyr is held in great veneration, as are his precious relics which are carried each year in the touching procession of the deliverance of Orléans. The preservation of the relics of this great Saint is due to the vigila nce of the Bénédictins Monastic order whose church housed the saint's remains. Reverend Benedictine Fathers, who always possessed the abbey of Saint-Marcel from its foundation until the Revolution of 1793. Taken from the History of Saint Symphorien and his cult, by Abbé Dinet.