Saint Florent of Bavaria

However, Saint Florent left his country as soon as possible, and having entered Gaul, he arrived fortunately at the banks of the Rhône, near the city of Lyon. It was a Sunday, a day on which he extremely wished to attend the celebration of the holy mysteries; but he found on the bank of this large and rapid river, which he necessarily had to cross, only an old, broken skiff, which could not be used without exposing oneself to an evident shipwreck. The desire not to miss Mass on such a holy day made him then resort to prayer: he invoked the assistance of heaven; and he was immediately heard: for an angel, having made him enter the skiff, became its pilot himself, and guided it safely to the other bank, without it taking on water or any of the planks separating. Upon entering Lyon, he encountered a man possessed by the demon, whom they held bound and shackled with several chains, for fear that he might throw himself upon passersby and do them some outrage. He had pity on his misery, and, after having implored the help of God through a fervent prayer, he delivered him from such a pernicious guest, by the virtue of the sign of the cross.

Having left Lyon, he followed the course of the Loire, and, by the counsel of the angel who guided him, he came to a place cal led Gl Glonne Place of retreat and foundation of the saint in Anjou. onne, at the borders of Anjou, on the side of Brittany. This place was extremely solitary and more suitable for the retreat of wild beasts than for the dwelling of men. Indeed, he found no shelter but a cave filled with snakes, which he was obliged to drive away with the sign of the cross in order to lodge there. He built a chapel there in honor of Saint Peter, prince of the apostles, and since then a famous abbey has been built there called Saint-Florent-le-Vieil, to distinguish it from Saint-Florent-lès-Saumur, which was named Saint-Florent-le-Jeune. After a few years, the same angel, who did not fail to instruct him from time to time on what he should do for his greater perfection, advised him to enter into Holy Orders and to go to Tours to receive them from the hands of Saint Martin . He obeyed saint Martin Spiritual model for Aquilin. this voice, and, after having stayed in that city for the time necessary for his ordination, he returned to his cave to continue to enjoy the delights of solitude there. On the way, he met a poor blind woman, who sufficiently testified, by her cries and her tears, to the magnitude of the disaster that had befallen her; an only son, who led her by the hand, earned her living, and was her sole support, had drowned three days earlier in the Loire, without anyone being able to find his body to give it burial. The affliction of this unfortunate woman touched him so deeply that he resolved to help her through his prayers. He therefore implored the mercy of God for her; immediately the angel appeared to him and told him where the child's body was. It was fished out, and, by a miracle of divine omnipotence, it was found quite alive. The Saint therefore returned him to his mother in perfect health; but, so as not to console her only halfway, he also cured her of her blindness, so that she not only had the satisfaction of embracing her resurrected child, but also of seeing him and being able to walk without his help. There was, near the castle of Saumur, a horrible dragon: not only did it infect and ravage the whole country, but sometimes it also threw itself upon the inhabitants and devoured them. They had recourse to our Saint, who, having traveled to the scene, offered his prayer, and, by the salutary sign of our redemption, delivered them from such a horrible scourge.

Saint Florent spent the rest of his life in the solitude of Glonne, separated from the commerce of the world, but visited and consoled by angels. Fasting, prayer, tears, psalmody, and the combat against the passions were his ordinary exercises. He also went sometimes to the surrounding places to work for the salvation of his neighbor, and he did not refuse his counsel to those who came into his desert to receive some instruction in their doubts, or some relief in their sorrows. Moreover, charity often obliged him to perform miracles for the assistance of the poor and the afflicted who had recourse to him. He enlightened the blind, delivered the possessed, straightened the lame, and restored health to all the sick. Finally, after having lived one hundred and twenty-three years in a very pure and very innocent life, and in incredible austerities, he died on September 22 around the year 440. His acts make known the merit of this death by these few words: *Post sacram communionem, inter verba orationis emisit animam*: "After having received holy communion, he rendered his soul in the actual exercise of prayers."

He is usually depicted in a boat guided by the ministry of an angel.

## CULT AND RELICS.

His body was buried in the hermitage he had sanctified through so many penances and prayers, in the very chapel of Saint-Pierre that he had built there, and which was the place where he ordinarily celebrated the divine mysteries. This hermitage was later inhabited by very holy hermits, until the end of the 7th century, when an abbey of the Order of Saint Benedict was founded there, which took the name of Saint-Florent, and of which Saint Mourant was the fir st abbot. C Charlemagne Emperor of the Franks and uncle of Saint Folquin. harlemagne, emperor and king of France, held this place in such affection that he notably enlarged and enriched it, and it is for this reason that the great Alcuin, his tutor, includes it among the twenty-three abbeys that he says were founded by this generous monarch, according to the order of the letters of the alphabet. However, it could not avoid the fury, first of the Huns, then of the Swedes and Danes, called Normans, who sacked and ruined it, without leaving a single room for the dwelling of the religious. It was during this last irruption that the venerable body of Saint Florent was carried to the monastery of Tournus, in the diocese of Autun, on the Saône river, where it remained for several years without the religious of that house, who were only its custodians, wishing to return it to those who had entrusted it to them. But it was furtively removed by a religious of Glonne, named Abazium, who brought it back to Anjou. And then Thibault, Count of Blois, instead of repairing the abbey of Glonne, had another more august one built under the same name of Saint-Florent, on the hill then called the Throne (Truncus), and where the castle of Saumur stands today, where his sacred remains were placed with marvelous joy and solemnity (956). Amalbert, abbot of this monastery, transferred the body of Saint Florent to a special altar (May 21, 973), and had a bronze reliquary made to deposit the holy relics. Later, in 1025, this abbey was destroyed with the castle by Fulk, Count of Anjou, and the body of Saint Florent was again removed to save it from the fire; but the boat that was carrying it on the Loire, unable to advance due to a secret guidance of the power of God, one was obliged to leave it in a church of Saint-Hilaire, in a town named Trèves, until the new abbey of Florent-lès-Saumur was built. This holy relic remained there in this abbey, from 1030 until 1035; then Hugh, Count of Vermandois, having brought his arms into Anjou, seized it by force, and brought it to Roye, in Picardy, in the collegiate church of Saint-Georg es. Roye Town in Picardy where the relics were transferred. The great church of Saint-Florent was then built in this city, where the college of canons and his sacred bones were transferred, and as the reliquary was too old, the inhabitants of Roye, in 1152, full of devotion towards their new patron, had two other very rich ones made, in which his head and his body were placed separately by Theodoric, Bishop of Amiens, and by Baldwin, Bishop of Noyon.

Things remained in this state until the year 1495; King Louis XI, having Louis XI King of France who enriched the reliquary of the Innocents in Paris. taken the city of Roye, which was occupied by Charles, Duke of Burgundy, had these two great treasures removed. They were first transported to the church of Mortemer, then to Cressonsacq (Oise), and then to the Charterhouse, near Noyon; from there they were taken back to Saint-Florent-lès-Saumur. He also gave two other shrines much more magnificent than the previous ones to enclose them there. After his death, a great lawsuit broke out between the Chapter of Roye and the religious of Saumur; it could not be ended, neither by a sentence of the requests of the palace, nor by a decree of the Court given in favor of the chapter; the parties finally came to a transaction by which they agreed that the body of Saint Florent would be returned in its entirety to the church of Roye with the shrines that had been removed from it, but that his head, with the new shrines given by King Louis XI, would remain at the abbey of Saint-Florent-lès-Saumur; thus, the body of Saint Florent was brought to Roye where it performed new miracles and was received with incredible joy and solemnity. This is what gave rise to the feast of the return of this holy relic, which is held there every year, on the Sunday within the octave of the Assumption, with as much magnificence as the principal feast of September 22.

In the 17th century, the abbey was invaded and profaned by sectarians who broke the shrines; but the relics were fortunately saved from profanation and placed in a safe place. In 1799, they were transported to the parish church where they remained completely ignored until 1825. They were recognized as authentic, in 1828, by Mgr Montault, and the translation took place on September 15 of the following year.

In 1858, the relics were again examined and divided between the parishes of Saint-Florent le Vieil and Saint-Florent le Jeune. The first received: 1° a fragment of the left temporal; 2° a fragment of the right upper maxillary; 3° glenoid cavity of a scapula; 4° one cervical vertebra, two thoracic, one lumbar; 5° the two clavicles; 6° one right rib, one left and three other rib fragments; 7° the entire sternum; 8° this left coxal (a fragment) and the crest of the other; 9° an ischium; 10° a fragment of sacrum; 11° the upper two-thirds of the left femur; 12° small fragments of long bones and flat bones: two of these small fragments are currently enclosed in a portable reliquary in the shape of a monstrance; the others were entrusted by the Bishop to the Carmelite nuns of Angers. The second received: 1° head of the femur of the left thigh; 2° lower fragment of the femur on the right side; 3° a piece of the iliac bone on the right side; 4° one lumbar vertebra, one thoracic and three cervical; 5° five rib fragments; 6° a portion of the left clavicle; 7° one half of the lower maxillary on the left side; 8° a piece of the crest of the iliac bone; 9° a piece of condyle of one of the femurs; 10° thirty-two fragments that cannot be classified; 11° detached piece of one of the femurs.

The village of Saint-Floris, in Artois, placed itself under his patronage. In the 18th century, a bone from the arm and a bone from the head of the Saint were venerated there. His cult was widespread not only in France and Belgium, but as far as Hungary. The Roman Martyrology mentions him on this day, as does Baronius in his Notes.

The Reverend Father de la Vacquerie wrote his life. We have drawn what we have said about him from the lessons of various breviaries, from the Revue de l'Anjou of 1829, and from several memoirs that the religious of Saint-Florent-lès-Saumur and the canons of Roye provided us. — Cf. Acta Sanctorum; Vies des Saints d'Anjou, by the Reverend Father Dom Chaimard.