July 6th - Sts. Goar and Palladius

July 6th - Sts. Goar and Palladius Jul 6, 2019 15:51:41 GMT

Post by Elizabeth on Jul 6, 2019 15:51:41 GMT

Saint Goar
Priest and Hermit
(† 575)

Saint Goar was born in the time of Childebert I, son of Clovis, of an illustrious family in Aquitaine. From his youth he was noted for his earnest piety, and having been raised by his bishop to sacred orders, he converted many sinners by the force of his example and the fervor of his preaching against all the contemporary disorders. But wishing to serve God entirely unknown to the world, he went into a region where he would be unidentified, and settling in the neighborhood of Trier in Germany, he built a small church and a hermitage, then retired into prayer.

He came forth after a time and began preaching in the area to the pagans, who opened their eyes to the truth of the Gospel. Miracles seconded his teaching; he cured the sick and the lame by prayer and the sign of the cross. Saint Goar reached so eminent a sanctity as to be esteemed the oracle and miracle of the whole country. He practiced hospitality to the poor and to pilgrims, lodging them in his hermitage which he enlarged for that purpose; hospitality is the particular virtue for which he is and was then known.

Nonetheless certain jealous persons calumniated him as a hypocrite, and the bishop of Trier sent for him. When he entered the episcopal palace, Saint Goar mistook a ray of sunshine for a coat hook and suspended his cloak upon it. The bishop took this for a sign he was a magician. He excused himself for the miracle he had not even noticed. He told his bishop that if sometimes he had served an early breakfast on the days when fasting was not obligatory, he had done so out of charity for his guests, not by intemperance. And he added that it was a great error to place all perfection in fasting and abstinence, since the greatest Saints have always recognized that charity is to be preferred.

The King of Austrasia, Sigebert, learning of the sanctity of Saint Goar, wished to have him consecrated a bishop, and for that purpose summoned him to court. The Saint had already offered to do penance for seven years for a fault of the bishop of Trier which had become known. Saint Goar feared the responsibilities of the episcopal office and prayed that he might be excused, saying that his role was a different one. He was seized with a fever, from which he suffered as an invalid for seven years before he died in 575. A city in Germany is named for him, near Coblentz.

Saint Palladius
First Bishop and Apostle of the Scots
(† 450)

The name Palladius marks Saint Palladius as a Roman; and a seventh century Irish biography of Saint Patrick identifies him as Archdeacon of the Roman Church under Pope Celestine. Saint Prosper of Aquitaine, his contemporary, informs us in his historical chronicle that when Agricola, a noted Pelagian, had corrupted the churches of Britain by introducing that pestilential heresy, Pope Celestine, at the instance of Palladius the deacon, in 429 sent there Saint Germanus, Bishop of Auxerre, as his legate. He, after having ejected the heretics, brought back the Britons to the Catholic faith.

The same Pope sent Palladius to the Celts. The Irish writer of the life of Saint Patrick says that Palladius preached in Ireland some time before Saint Patrick, but that he was soon sent away by the King of Leinster and returned to North Britain, where he had opened his mission. Saint Prosper says that he was consecrated bishop by the same Pope Celestine, and then sent with relics of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, as first bishop to the nation of the Christian Scots. Several colonies of these had passed from Ireland into North Britain and taken possession of the part of the country since called Scotland. Later Saint Palladius also founded three churches in more hospitable regions of Ireland.

He preached to the Scots with great zeal, and formed a considerable church. The Scottish historians tell us that the Faith was first planted in North Britain about the year 200, in the time of King Donald, when Saint Victor I was Pope; but they all acknowledge that Palladius was the first bishop of that country, and they call him their first Apostle. Saint Palladius died at Fordun, fifteen miles from Aberdeen, about the year 450.