ST CADOC, ABBOT - 25 SEPTEMBER

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN SEPTEMBER

Saints celebrated on the 25th of September

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 CADOC, ABBOT 

Cadoc [Cadocus] [born around 497] [feast day January 24, September 21, September 25] was son to Gundleus, a prince of South Wales, by his wife Gladusa , daughter of Braghan, whose name was given to the province now called Brecknockshire. 

His parents were not less ennobled by their virtues than by their blood, and his father, who some years before his death renouncing the world, led an eremitical life near a country church, which he had built, was honoured in Wales amongst the saints. 

HE EMBRACED RELIGIOUS LIFE

Cadoc, who was his eldest son, succeeded in the government, but not long after followed his father’s example; and embracing a religious life, put himself under the direction of St Tathai, an Irish monk, who had opened a famous school at Gwent, the ancient Venta Silurum of the Romans, afterwards a bishop’s see. 

St Cadoc made such progress both in learning and virtue, that when he returned into Glanmorganshire, his own country, he spread on every side the rays of his wisdom and sanctity. 

HE BUILT A CHURCH AND A MONASTERY 

Here, three miles from Cowbridge, he built a church and a monastery which was called Llan-carvan, or the Church of Stags, and sometimes Nancarvan, that is, the Vale of Stags. The school which he established in this place became most illustrious, and fruitful in great and holy men. 

BY OUR SAINT'S PERSUASION ST ILTUT RENOUNCED THE COURT

By our saint’s persuasion St Iltut renounced the court and the world, and learned at Llan-carvan that science which he preferred to all worldly treasures. He afterwards founded the great monastery of Llan-Iltut. 

These two monasteries and that of St Docuinus, all situated in the diocese of Landaff, were very famous for many ages, and were often governed by abbots of great eminence. 

ABBOTS OF GREAT EMINENCE

St Gildas, after his return from Ireland, entered the monastery of St Cadoc, where he taught for one year, and copied a book of the gospels which was long preserved with great care in the church of St Cadoc, and highly reverenced by the Welsh, who used it in their most solemn oaths and covenants. 

HIS HOLY DEATH

After spending there one year, St Gildas and St Cadoc left Llan-carvan, being desirous to live in closer retirement. They hid themselves first in the islands of Ronech and Echni. 

An ancient life of St Cadoc tells us, that he died in 580, in a place now called Wedon, in Northamptonshire. 

(From Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)