November 23 - Saint Columbanus

Quick Facts

• Well-born, handsome and educated, Columbanus was torn between a desire for God and easy access to the pleasures of the world.
• Acting on advice of a holy anchoress, he decided to withdraw from the world; his family opposed the choice, his mother going so far as to block the door.
• Monk at Lough Erne.
• He studied Scripture extensively, and wrote a commentary on the Psalms.
• Monk at Bangor under abbot Saint Comgall.
• In middle age, Columbanus felt a call to missionary life.
• With twelve companions (Saint Attala, Columbanus the Younger, Cummain, Domgal, Eogain, Eunan, Saint Gall, Gurgano, Libran, Lua, Sigisbert and Waldoleno) he travelled to Scotland, England, and then to France in 585.
• The area, though nominally Christian, had fallen far from the faith, but were ready for missionaries, and they had some success.They were warmly greeted at the court of Gontram, and king of Burgundy invited the band to stay.
• They chose the half-ruined Roman fortress of Annegray in the Vosges Mountains for their new home with Columbanus as their abbot.
• The simple lives and obvious holiness of the group drew disciples to join them, and the sick to be healed by their prayers.
• Columbanus, to find solitude for prayer, often lived for long periods in a cave seven miles from the monastery, using a messenger to stay in touch with his brothers.
• When the number of new monks over-crowded the old fortress, King Gontram gave them the old castle of Luxeuil to found a new house in 590.
• Soon after, a third house was founded at Fontaines.Columbanus served as master of them all, and wrote a Rule for them; it incorporated many Celtic practices, was approved by the Council of Macon in 627, but was superseded by the Benedictine.
• Problems arose early in the 7th century.
• Many Frankish bishops objected to a foreign missionary with so much influence, to the Celtic practices he brought, especially those related to Easter, and his independence from them.
• In 602 he was summoned to appear before them for judgment; instead of appearing, he sent a letter advising them to hold more synods, and to concern themselves with more important things than which rite he used to celebrate Easter.
• The dispute over Easter continued to years, with Columbanus appealing to multiple popes for help, but was only settled with Columbanus abandoned the Celtic calender when he moved to Italy.
• In addition to his problems with the bishops, Columbanus spoke out against vice and corruption in the royal household and court, which was in the midst of a series of complex power grabs.
• Brunehault stirred up the bishops and nobilty against the abbot; Thierry ordered him to conform to the local ways, and shut up.
• Columbanus refused, and was briefly imprisoned at Besançon, but he escaped and returned to Luxeuil.
• Thierry and Brunehault sent an armed force to force him and his foreign monks back to Ireland.
• As soon as his ship set sail, a storm drove them back to shore; the captain took it as a sign, and set the monks free.
• They made their way to King Clothaire at Soissons, Neustria and then the court of King Theodebert of Austrasia in 611.
• He travelled to Metz, then Mainz, Suevi, Alamanni, and finally Lake Zurich.Their evangelization work there was unsuccessful, and the group passed on to Arbon, then Bregenz, and then Lake Constance.
• Saint Gall, who knew the local language best, took the lead in this region; many were converted to the faith, and the group founded a new monastery as their home and base.However, a year later political upheaval caused Columbanus to cross the Alps into Italy, arriving in Milan in 612.
• The Christian royal family treated him well, and he preached and wrote against Arianism and Nestorianism.In gratitude, the Lombard king gave him a tract of land call Bobbio between Milan and Genoa.
• There he rebuilt a half-ruined church of Saint Peter, and around it he founded an abbey that was to be the source for evangelization throughout northern Italy for centuries to come.
• Columbanus always enjoyed being in the forests and caves, and as he walked through the woods birds and squirrels would ride on his shoulders.
• Toward the end of his life came word that his old enemies were dead, and his brothers wanted him to come back north, but he declined.
• Knowing that his time was almost done, he retired to a cave for solitude, and died as he had predicted.
• His influence continued for centuries as those he converted handed on the faith, the brothers he taught evanglized untold numbers more, and his brother monks founded over one hundred monasteries to protect learning and spread the faith.
• Miracles ascribed to Columbanus includeto obtain food for a sick brother monk, he cured the wife of the donoronce when he was surrounded by wolves, he simply walked through themat one point he needed a cave for his solitary prayers; a bear lived there; when Columbanus asked, the bear leftwhen he needed water in order to live in the cave, a spring appeared nearbywhen the Luxeuil monastery granary ran empty, he prayed over it and it refilledhe multiplied bread and beer for his communityhe cured several sick monks, who then got straight out of bed to reap the monastery's harvestgave sight to a blind man at Orleanshe destroyed a vat of beer being prepared for a pagan festival by breathing on itwhen the monastery needed help in the fields, he tamed a bear, and yoked it to a plough