Memorial of Saints (November 20)

Feasts, Obligatory and Optional Memorials of Saints

• Edmund the Martyr
• Bernward
• Felix of Valois
• Dasius
• Nerses of Sahgerd
• Maxentia, virgin and martyr

St. Edmund the Martyr (ca. 841-870 A.D.) was elected the king of East Anglia in 855 A.D. when he was only fourteen years old. East Anglia was an old Anglo-Saxon kingdom. Edmund was regarded as a virtuous ruler. During the great war with the Vikings (the Danes) in 869-870 A.D., he was defeated and captured at Hoxne, Suffolk, by the Danish invaders under Ingvar. Edmund refused to renounce the Christian faith. He was first scourged, shot with arrows and beheaded at Hellesden. His body was found incorrupt in ca. 915 A.D. and was transferred to a place near Bedricsworth (died ca. 870 A.D.). He is mentioned in the CD "Passion of the Saints".

St. Felix of Valois founded together with St. John of Matha [Decembeer 17], the Order of the Most Holy Trinity (the Trinitarians). The mission of the Order is to ransom captives from the Moors. St. John worked in Spain, while St. Felix administered the French province of the Order. By 1240 A.D., the Trinitarian Order had some six hundred monasteries (died ca. 1212 A.D.).

Innocent III approved the foundation of the Order of the Most Holy Trinity in 1198 A.D. The members of the Order were given a white habit with a red and blue cross on the breast. In the Order's foundation in France, they were known as the Mathurins because of the Order's site in a chapel dedicated to St. Mathurin. Members of the Order went to Morroco, Tunis, and Spain. Their work succeeded to have released several hundred of captives from the Moors.

Saints- November 20, Learn more

Memorial of Saints (November 19)

Feasts, Obligatory and Optional Memorials of Saints

• Nerses, bishop and martyr
• Barlaam, martyr
• Mecthilde of Magdeburg, abbess
• Hilda of Whitby
• Agnes of Assisi, abbess

St. Agnes of Assisi (d. ca. 1253 A.D.) was the younger sister of St. Clare of Assisi, the foundress of the Poor Clares and the close associate of St. Francis of Assisi. She was only fifteen when she followed St. Clare into the convent. In 1220 A.D. St. Francis sent her to Monticelli to become abbess of a new convent of Poor Clares. Agnes died two months after the death of Clare. Initially buried at San Damiano, her remains were laid alongside her sister in 1260 A.D. in the newly built church of Santa Chiara in Assisi.

Related blog post:

• St. Clare of Assisi, virgin, Learn more

Memorial of Saints (November 18)

Feasts, Obligatory and Optional Memorials of Saints

• Dedication of the Churches of Peter and Paul
• Romanus of Antioch, martyr
• Mawes or Maudez, abbot
• Odo of Cluny, abbot

St. Odo of Cluny (ca. 879-942 A.D.) was born near Le Mans, France. He received the tonsure when he was nineteen, a canonry at St. Martin's in Tours, and then spent several years of study at Paris under Remigius of Auxerre. St. Odo became a monk under St. Berno, who became abbot of the newly founded Cluny monastery. In 927 A.D., St. Odo succeeded St. Berno and became the second abbot of Cluny. St. Odo spread Cluny's influence to many monasteries all over Europe. He wrote hymns, treatises on morality, an epic poem on the Redemption, and a biography of St. Gerald of Aurillac.

Related blog posts:

• The Achievements of Reform at Cluny, Learn more
• Monastic Reform in the 10th Century A.D., Learn more
• Reform in Benedictine Spirituality: Cluny and the Cistercians, Learn more
• Sts. Berno, Odo and Aymard: Benedictine Abbots of Cluny, Learn more