Saint Desiderius of Vienne

Saint Numace, bishop of Vienne, having made the acquaintance of Didier, discovered in him the seeds of eminent qualities and wished to cultivate them himself. He therefore took him into his company and loved him as a son (558). Saint Philippe, his successor, could not fail to take the same interest in a young man who showed such great promise, and admitted him among the clergy of his church. Didier soon distinguished himself among all by his piety and his progress in ecclesiastical sciences. Dear to Saint Evance as well as to Saint Numace and Saint Philippe, appreciated by Saint Verus as much as by the three preceding bishops, he was raised by him to the office of archdeacon and distinguished himself so much in this important ministry that after the death of this holy prelate (596), the clergy and the faithful of Vienne called him with a unanimous voice to fill the vacant seat. The choice could not have been better. Didier shone in the Church of the Gauls for his knowledge and for all the episcopal virtues. His reputation soon extended even to Rome; saint Grégoire Pope contemporary to Saint Psalmodius. and Saint Gregory, an eminent judge of true merit, gave him in the letters he wrote to him the most honorable testimonies of esteem and confidence. This great Pope recommended to the holy bishop of Vienne, as to Saint Virgile of Arles and Saint Syagre of Autun, the missionaries he was sending to England, made use of his zeal, as firm as it was enlightened, to combat simony, and entrusted to him the important task of keeping the ecclesiastical discipline intact in his province. However, Didier, who had received a brilliant education, believed he could continue to cultivate or to give as a relaxation to his mind the study of human letters. Assuredly nothing was more legitimate: indeed, he only used the advantages he derived from this study to better present religious truths. But some weak, narrow, or envious minds accused him before the Pope of substituting pagan fables for Scripture and of profaning with the praises of Jupiter a mouth destined to sing the praises of Jesus Christ. The illustrious head of the Church wrote to the holy bishop about it. The latter had no difficulty in having his apology accepted by a Pontiff who was himself so enlightened. Saint Gregory confounded the accusers of Didier by publicly rendering him justice.

Soon after, the great Pope died, and a more terrible hatred was unleashed against our Saint. Br unhilda, Brunehaut Queen of Austrasia and Burgundy, principal political opponent of Columbanus. who no longer had the word and authority of Gregory as counsel and restraint, abandoned herself from then on to the passion of vengeance. She did not forgive Didier for having raised his voice, with the generous and holy freedom of a bishop, against the disorders fomented by the ambition of a scandalous court. For her vengeance to be fully satisfied, she needed two things: to discredit the bishop who had condemned her, in order to strip his reproaches of all value; then to banish him, in order to rid herself of his presence, which was for her an accusation and a remorse. She therefore convened a conventicle at Chalon-sur-Saône and produced false witnesses who charged Didier with crimes. The new Chrysostom was deposed and relegated to a distant and wild island on the coasts of Scotland. But God took it upon Himself both to justify the slandered innocence of His servant and to proportion glory to humiliations, by honoring him with the gift of miracles. The fame of these wonders made a great noise, and Brunhilda trembled: she was undoubtedly afraid of divine vengeance. Perhaps she also feared public opinion, which reproached her for persecuting a Saint. Be that as it may, she allowed Didier to see his desolate diocese again after four years of exile. But the governor of Vienne did not leave him in peace there for long and seemed to make it his task to molest him in every circumstance. One day, among others, he had twelve servants of the Church thrown into prison. The Pontiff, filled with sorrow, shed tears before God: his prayer was not finished when Saint Severus appeared to the prisoners and delivered them. It is thus that heaven, by this miracle and by others still, continued to show that the cause of our Saint was its own. The young King Theuderic II was struck by Thierry II King of Burgundy, grandson of Brunhilda, admonished by Columbanus for his morals. this: he wanted to see the man of God and asked him for advice. Didier, whom persecutions had not taught to hold the truth captive, boldly dictated his duty to him: "Drive away," he told him, "these wretched women whose presence defiles the court and take a legitimate wife, a princess worthy of you, worthy of Burgundy." The prince, docile to this advice, as generous on the part of the bishop as it was salutary and glorious for him, asked for the daughter of Witteric, King of the Visigoths. But Brunhilda, fearing to lose her authority as queen mother through this marriage, succeeded in preventing it and prepared a new vengeance against Didier.

This new Herodias had three assassins posted, Beffan, Galifred, and Betton, whom she ordered to follow him when he returned from Chalon to Vienne. Accompanied by a troop of scoundrels, they caught up with him in the Dombes region, at the village of Cormoranche, where they treated him inhumanely; continuing his journey in the midst of his executioners, this holy bishop succumbed, overwhelmed by a hail of stones, in the place of Prissignac.

(*Prisciniacum*), near the Chalaronne river. Thus died our holy bishop, on May 23, 608; thus, having suffered for justice what the martyrs endured for the truth, he shared in their glory, as a true imitator of Saint John the Baptist and the prophet Elijah, in the conduct they had maintained toward Herodias and Jezebel.

His body was buried in the village of Prissignac, where it pleased God to reveal, through the miracles performed at his tomb, the holiness of his servant and the felicity with which he had been rewarded. The blind recovered their sight there; the lame and the infirm, afflicted with various diseases, were healed there; but it was above all to be delivered from fever that the crowd, at all times of the year, from all parts of the Dombes and the Lyonnais, came on pilgrimage to the church of Prissignac. A considerable town formed there which took the name of Saint-Didie r-sur-Chalaronne; it is tod Saint-Didier-sur-Chalaronne Site of the martyrdom and the first tomb. ay a very large parish in the canton of Thoissey. The growth of this town must therefore be attributed to this Saint.

Five years later, in 613, Clotaire II having united the entire French monarchy under his rule, put Brunhilda to death and exterminated her entire lineage by massacring the children of King Theuderic, the grandson of that princess.

The Bishop of Vienne, Domnolus, who had been substituted for the Saint, having died around the year 620, his successor, Saint Etherius, transferred the body of Saint Desiderius to Vienne, into the church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, outside the walls, on the 11th day of February, around the year 620. Numerous miracles occurred during this translation: those that continued to take place near his relics made his cult famous for a long ti me throughout the Daup Adon, évêque de Vienne Archbishop of Vienne and 9th-century hagiographer. hiné. Ado, Bishop of Vienne, the author of the Martyrology, who also wrote the history of the martyrdom and this translation of our Saint, detached some relics from it, arou nd the year 870, to abbaye de Saint-Gall Famous Benedictine abbey in Switzerland originating from the saint's hermitage. send them to the Abbey of Saint Gall, in Switzerland.

The attributes of Saint Desiderius of Vienne in the arts are the *staff* with which he was scourged, the rope that was used to lead him like a criminal and perhaps to strangle him. He is also represented speaking with authority to Brunhilda.

We have supplemented Father Giry, in this place, with the *Histoire hagiologique du diocèse de Belley*, by Mgr Depéry; this prelate, of learned and pious memory, having deigned, only a few days before his death, to send us his works with a letter, one of the best encouragements we have received. We also made use of *Saint Symphorien et son culte*, by M. Dinot; the *Légendaire d'Autun*, etc.