Saint Ceolfrid

Saint Benedict Biscop having formed the resolution to buil d the monastery of Saint Paul at monastère de Saint-Paul de Jarrow Monastery founded in 682, led by Ceolfrid. Jarrow in 682, Saint Ceolfrid was charged with the care of forming the new establishment, and chosen to govern the nascent community, which was composed of seventy religious. Seven years passed in this manner. In 689, Saint Benedict Biscop also established him as superior of Wearmouth. He governed the two monasteries for twenty-eight years, which were considered as forming but one, because they were very close, and because there were constant relations of union and understanding between them. He joined to a wise activity in his undertakings, a penetrating mind, a solid judgment, and a great favor of zeal. One finds in Bede Bède Hagiographer whose martyrology attests to the antiquity of the cult. , who lived under his guidance, the most unequivocal proofs of his knowledge, his fine qualities, and his virtues. As he loved the sciences that had religion as their object, he formed good libraries in his monasteries; but he did not wish to place in them those books that serve only to entertain curiosity. Bede is an example of the success with which studies were pursued in the communities that were subject to him.

Nechtan, King of the P Naïtan, roi des Pictes King of the Picts who consulted Ceolfrid on the liturgy. icts, consulted him on the time when Easter should be celeb rated Pâque Point of liturgical divergence between the Scots/Bretons and the Catholic Church. , as well as on the form of the clerical tonsure. His subjects were not in agreement with the rest of the Church on these two matters. The holy abbot replied to him, and proved to him that one must adhere to the practice of the Roman Church; to celebrate Easter with it, and to wear the crown used in that same Church, to which he gives the name of the crown of Saint Peter. Nechtan received it with joy, and ordered his subjects to conform to it; he also asked Ceolfrid for workmen, in order to build a stone church, which he dedicated, as he had promised, to the Prince of the Apostles.

The holy abbot, feeling his strength exhausted by age and illness, resolved to leave his position, which he no longer believed himself capable of fulfilling. His religious brothers begged him, in the most pressing manner, not to abandon them; but they eventually yielded and elected Huchtbert or Hubert as abbot of the two monasteries. There were then six hundred monks, both at Wearmouth and at Jarrow. When Ceolfrid saw himself replaced by the disciple he had himself designated, he gave a speech to exhort the brothers to live in unity and charity; but for fear that the nobles of the kingdom, filled with veneration for him, might make efforts to hold him back, he announced that he was going to leave for Rome, in order to visit the tombs of the Apostles before dying. While on the road, he was not content with saying the divine office every day, he also recited the entire psalter twice. He also celebrated Mass regularly: he only missed it once at sea, and the last three days that preceded his death. As he was crossing France, he fell ill at Langres (Haute-Marne), and died there on Sep tember Langres City of origin of the cleric Warnahaire and several cited martyrs. 25, 716, in the seventy-fourth year of his age. He had been a priest for forty-seven years, an abbot for thirty-five, and had governed the monasteries of Wearmouth and Jarrow alone for twenty-seven years.

He was buried near Langres, in the Church of the three twin martyrs, or Saints Speusippus, Eleusippus, and Meleusippus. The relics of Saint Céolfrid were later taken to Jarrow, then to Glastonbury (S omerset cou Glastonbury Final place of translation of the saint's relics. nty), during the ravages of the Danes. Godescard. — Cf. Vies des Saints du diocèse de Langres, by Abbé Godard; Vie de saint Bénigne de Dijon, by Abbé Bougaud.