SAINT FEAST DAY 18 NOVEMBER: ST ODO

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN NOVEMBER 

Saints celebrated on the 18th of November

Prayer to the Angels and the Saints

Heavenly Father, in praising Your Angels and Saints we praise Your glory, for by honouring them we honour You, their Creator. Their splendour shows us Your greatness, which infinitely surpasses that of all creation.

In Your loving providence, You saw fit to send Your Angels to watch over us. Grant that we may always be under their protection and one day enjoy their company in heaven.

Heavenly Father, You are glorified in Your Saints, for their glory is the crowning of Your gifts. You provide an example for us by their lives on earth, You give us their friendship by our communion with them, You grant us strength and protection through their prayer for the Church, and You spur us on to victory over evil and the prize of eternal glory by this great company of witnesses.

Grant that we who aspire to take part in their joy may be filled with the Spirit that blessed their lives, so that, after sharing their faith on earth, we may also experience their peace in heaven. Amen.

ST ODO, ABBOT OF CLUNY, CONFESSOR

Abbo, father to this saint, was a nobleman of the first rank. Odo was born at Tours in 879, and was brought up first in the family of Fulk II, count of Anjou, and afterwards in that of William, count of Auvergne, and duke of Aquitain, who some years after, founded the abbey of Cluni [Cluny]. 

HE WAS VERY MUCH GIVEN TO PRAYER

From his childhood the saint was much given to prayer, and piety made him regret the time that he threw away in hunting and other amusements and exercises of a court life. 

At nineteen years of age he received the tonsure, and was instituted to a canonry in St Martin’s church, at Tours, and from that time bade adieu to Virgil and other profane authors, resolving only to read such books as tended to nourish in his heart compunction, devotion, and divine love. 

HE RESOLVED TO READ ONLY GOOD BOOKS

However, he spent four years at Paris in completing a course of theological studies. 

But, upon his return to Tours, he shut himself up in a cell; determined to have no other employment but prayer and meditation upon the holy scriptures. 

HE RESOLVED TO EMBRACE A MONASTIC STATE

One day, in reading the rule of Saint Benedict, he was confounded within himself to see how much his life fell short of the maxims and rules of perfection which are there laid down, and he determined to embrace a monastic state. 

The count of Anjou, his patron, refusing to consent, Odo spent almost three years in a cell, with one companion, in the assiduous practice of penance and contemplation. 

HE SECRETLY REPAIRED TO A MONASTERY

At length, resolving that no impediments should any longer withhold him from consecrating himself to God, in a monastic state, he resigned his canonry, and secretly repaired to the monastery of Beaume, in the diocese of Besançon, where the holy abbot, St Berno, admitted him to the habit, in 909. 

The great abbey of Cluni was founded in 910, and committed to the care of St Berno, who was obliged to govern six other monasteries at the same time.

Upon his death, in 927, the bishops of that country established St Odo abbot of three of those monasteries, namely, Cluni, Massay, and Deols. The first he made his residence; and the reputation of his sanctity, and of the regularity and good discipline which he established, drew thither many illustrious and fervent persons, who sincerely desired to serve God. 

AS ABBOT, HE ESTABLISHED THE RULE OF ST BENEDICT

The saint established there the rule of Saint Benedict in great purity, and endeavoured to carry its observance to the highest perfection. 

It was his usual saying, that no one can be called a monk who is not a true lover, and strict observer of silence, a condition absolutely necessary for interior solitude and the commerce of a soul with God.

HUMILITY AND SELF-DENIAL

Silence and the most perfect practices of humility, obedience, and self-denial, were the chief objects of his reformation.

The saint was employed by popes and princes in several difficult public negotiations, in all which he succeeded with admirable piety, address and prudence. 

HE WANTED TO DIE AT TOURS

Out of devotion to St Martin, he was desirous to die at Tours, and, being seized with his last sickness, hastened thither, and there happily slept in our Lord on November 18, 942. 

He was buried in the church of St Julian; but the Huguenots burnt the greatest part of his remains. Saint Odo is named in the Roman Martyrology. 

(Excerpts from Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)