Saint Hidulph of Trier

Saint Hidulphus was from a very noble family of Bavaria: he was born in Regensbur Ratisbonne Episcopal see occupied by Albert. g. He preserved in his childhood, in his youth, and during his studies, the innocence and purity of his baptism, and kept himself from the vices to which that age is prone. He took delight in relieving the poor and coming to the aid of all the unfortunate. Prepared from his childhood for ecclesiastical virtues, he renounced the flattering hopes that the world offered him, embraced the ecclesiastical state, and was received into the number of the clergy in the city of Regensburg. His example was Erard Brother of Hidulph and bishop in Regensburg. followed by Erhard, his brother, who later became a regionary bishop in Regensburg and in Bavaria. It was Er hard who bap sainte Odile Aunt and mentor of Saint Attala, founder of Hohenbourg. tized Saint Odile, and our saint Hidulphus was present at this baptism, which produced such a miraculous effect.

Hidulphus, hearing one day these words of the Savior: "Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life," immediately left his family and his country, took the road to Sicambria or Guelders, and arrived in the city of Trier, then illustrated by religious who spread everywhere the good odor of their virtues. Without fearing the rigors of penance, the intrepid soldier of Jesus Christ mingled in their ranks. Under monastic discipline, his life was so fervent that the less virtuous envied his piety, and he was cherished by his equals and his superiors.

The holy Archbishop of Trier, Numerian, considering the knowledge, maturity, and angelic life of Hidulph, who, on the wings of all virtues, flew toward perfection, drew him from his monastery and kept him near him so that he might succeed him after his death. He associated him from then on with his pastoral life, and Hidulph discharged it with as much piety as courage. Numerian having died, the clergy and the people immediately cast their eyes upon Hidulph, whose talents and virtues shone with a bright luster; but our Saint, frightened by the burden they wished to impose upon him, pushed it away with all his might, regarding himself as unworthy of such a high office. The princes, bishops, clergy, monks, and the people redoubled their entreaties, and Hidulph finally accepted the pastoral charge. From then on, he redoubled his austerities, which were already very great. His charity toward the poor was admirable: he had nothing that was not theirs and that he did not distribute to them liberally. The care of the salvation of souls was his primary occupation. He worked at it through his preaching, his visits, his exhortations, his reprimands, his good examples, his continual prayers, and above all by the virtue of the august sacrifice of the Mass, which he celebrated every day. Among the memorable actions of his episcopate, one must note the elevation and translation of th e body of Saint Maximin saint Maximin de Trèves Bishop of Trier and superior of Saint Cyriacus. of Trier, one of his predecessors, into a chapel he had built in his honor. It was still in the place where Saint Paulinus, bishop of the same see, had buried him, and it was covered by a tomb so heavy that one could not lift it from its place; but Saint Hidulph moved it alone quite easily; and, having found this incomparable relic underneath, he placed it in a cypress reliquary and transported it with great solemnity to the place he had destined for it. He then built a monastery in this place and enriched it with his benefactions. Around the year 665, he introduced the Rule of Saint B enedict into the mona règle de Saint-Benoît Monastic rule followed by Winnoc. stery of Saint-Maximin, founded in the 4th century. He increased its revenues and re-established such perfect regularity there that this house became the admiration of that century. This abbey was destroyed during the French Revolution.

The holy prelate had long envied those religious who had the happiness of living far from the world, in the contemplation of heavenly things: he sighed for the hour when it would be given to him to imitate them. He was finally able to have placed in his stead, on the episcopal see of Trier, some say Saint Veomadus, abbot of Saint-Maximin, others, Saint Basin; after which he went to shut himself up in the monastery of Saint-Maximin. But seeing that he could not find, in his own diocese, the obscurity he sought, he retired secretly, around the year 374, to the borders of Lorraine, in the Vosges mountains. He built a monastery there, which was called Moyenmoutier, becau se it was in Moyenmoutier Monastery founded by Hidulf in the Vosges. the midst of those of Senones, Etival, Saint-Dié, and Bonmoutier, then he had two churches built there, one in honor of the Blessed Virgin, and the other in honor of Saint Peter; later he added a third, outside the enclosure, for the pilgrims and the sick who came to implore his help and that of his religious, giving it the name of Saint-John-the-Baptist; then a fourth which he dedicated to Saint Gregory. He placed the latter on a hill to the south of the monastery, in the middle of the land he had chosen to make the cemetery of the community.

After these constructions, which were rapid, he devoted himself to the contemplation for which he had left the episcopal dignity: this did not prevent him from receiving as disciples many persons distinguished, either by their birth or by their merit, who came to place themselves under his direction. In this way, his monastery was soon filled with holy religious, whose life was entirely heavenly. A crowd of sick and crippled people also came there to receive relief in their misery, because God had given him the grace of miracles to such a high degree that, by his prayer alone, he restored health to those who implored his assistance. From this it came about that many seculars built houses in the vicinity of Moyenmoutier, and that this place, previously deserted and uninhabitable, began to be extremely populated.

Among those who placed themselves under the guidance of Saint Hidulphus, w e count Saint Spinulu saint Spinule ou Spin Disciple of Hidulphus, celebrated for his posthumous miracles. s or Spin, Saint John, and Saint Benignus, whom he used effectively for the propagation of monastic life in these lands. Saint Erard, his brother, also came to find him and remained with him for a long time.

An admirable thing is reported: Hidulphus, fearing that the crowd, which came continually to his monastery, attracted by his miracles and those of Saint Spin, his disciple, who died long before him, would finally ruin the regular observance and distract him, as well as his religious, from the exercises of the contemplative life, addressed himself to this dear disciple already deceased, and prostrate before his tomb, he prayed to him, with tears in his eyes, and even commanded him to cease performing miracles. Immediately the miracles ceased to be as numerous: the blessed Spin thus obeyed the voice of a mortal man, to make us know the merit of obedience, preferable to the greatest miracles.

We shall not pause here to report the gifts that various princes and lords made to Moyenmoutier and the other houses founded by Saint Hidulphus; his reputation was so great in the country that all that was most noble and distinguished regarded him as a man come from heaven: people hastened to show him respect and benevolence.

Saint Hidulphe formed an intimate bond with Saint Deodatus or D saint Déodat ou Dieudonné Bishop of Nevers who became a hermit and founder of monasteries in the Vosges. ieudonné, commonly called Saint Dié, who, having left the bishopric of Nevers for a reason similar to that of our Saint and that of Saint Gundelbert, Bishop of Sens and founder of Senones, had taken refuge in the wilderness of the Val de Galilée, where he had built the monaster Jointures Monastery founded by Saint Dié, later governed by Hidulphus. y of Jointures, since called Saint-Dié, as well as the town that formed there. This monastery was named Jointures because of the junction of the Rothbach stream with the Meurthe, which occurs in the vicinity. Hidulphe and Dié, stationed about two leagues from one another, visited each other once a year to enlighten and support one another in the common path of the spiritual life. On the day appointed for this visit, they would set out at the same hour to come to meet one another. When they had joined, they would kneel on the very spot of their meeting; and after having prayed, they would give each other the kiss of peace, and then converse about the future dwelling of the next life. This holy commerce lasted nearly eight years. At the end of this term, Saint Hidulphe lost this excellent friend, if one can say that Saints suffer a loss when they allow themselves to be preceded by the one they must follow into the eternal rest to which they aspire and toward which they walk.

As Saint Dié had entrusted his community to Saint Hidulphe while dying, the religious of Jointures did not wish to have any other abbot than him. Our Saint thus found himself obliged to take charge of their guidance. He nevertheless governed them without leaving Moyenmoutier, and he placed a vicar at Jointures, who performed the functions of prior there. He maintained these two houses in an admirable union; and, in honor of the one that had existed between Saint Dié and himself, he permitted the religious of one to visit those of the other once a year, in turn. He continued the harsh exercises of his penance.

Since the death of Saint Dié, for the space of twenty-eight years that God let him live after his friend, he lived with a courage and a uniformity of conduct that surprised everyone. He was of such robust health that, even in his final old age, he still occupied himself with manual labor, earning what was necessary to provide for his food and clothing. He possessed the gift of composure to such a high degree that his example alone inspired it in others, without him being obliged to preach it to them. The number of his disciples grew in such a way that he saw himself as the father of nearly three hundred religious, some of whom lived at Moyenmoutier, others in the vicinity, in various cells. One must undoubtedly include in this number those of the monastery of Jointures, who considered themselves his true children, although he always had the modesty to regard them as belonging to Saint Dié, his friend. Moreover, he had such tenderness for them that, thinking of unburdening himself and procuring time, thirteen years before his death, to devote to contemplation, he did not wish to leave the leadership of the monastery of Jointures. He preferred to resign from Moyenmoutier, to which he gave Leutbalde as abbot in his place. He wished to show how precious to him was the memory of such a holy friend, who had conjured him, by all that was most sacred in their friendship, to take care of his disciples. To spur himself to endure the trouble this task gave him, he constantly imagined the reproaches that his friend would make to him one day before God if he did not execute his last will with the fidelity he had sworn to him. He did even more; for Abbot Leutbalde having died in the year 704, he resumed, at the insistence of the religious, the government of his former house, and, for the three years he still lived, he governed both abbeys simultaneously. He usually lived at Moyenmoutier, from where he went to make his annual visit to the brothers of the Val de Galilée. Saint Dié, in a vision, warned Saint Hidulphe of his approaching end: the pious bishop prepared for it with new fervor. This happy moment arrived on July 11 of the year 707. He was buried by his religious in the church of Saint-Grégoire, to the right of the altar. In 787, his body was transferred to the church of the blessed Virgin Mary, and placed under a stone monument worked with art, and covered with plates of gold and silver. Under the government of Adalbert, abbot of the monastery of Jointures, his body was raised from the ground and deposited in a wooden reliquary. In 1130, the religious of Moyenmoutier placed it in a reliquary of the greatest richness. His holy relics are still preserved today in the church of his monastery, which has become a parish church. The silver reliquary in which they were enclosed disappeared during the French Revolution.

He is represented: 1st, assisting at the baptism of Saint Odile; 2nd, ordering the corpse of his disciple, Spin, to cease his miracles; 3rd, delivering those possessed by demons: this is his most common characteristic; 4th, having near him a mitre and a crozier, symbols of his renunciation of the episcopate.

He is invoked for troubled spirits, those possessed by demons, and against the plague and storms.

See the acts of Saint Hidulphe, in the History of Lorraine, by Dom Calmet; and the Saints of the Val de Galilée, by Abbé Guimet.