ST MEDERICUS, ABBOT - 29 AUGUST

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN AUGUST

Saints celebrated on the 29th of August

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 MEDERICUS, ABBOT 

Saint Medericus (St Merri, St Merry) was nobly born at Autun, in the seventh century, and from his infancy turned all his thoughts towards virtue. When he was but thirteen years old, he so earnestly desired to embrace a monastic life, that his parents, who at first opposed his vocation, presented him themselves to the abbot of St Martin’s in Autun.

FIFTY-FOUR FERVENT MONKS

In that monastery then lived fifty-four fervent monks, whose penitential and regular lives were an odour of sanctity to the whole country. Merri, in this holy company, grew up in the perfect exercise and habits of every virtue, especially humility, meekness, charity, obedience, and a scrupulous observance of every point of the rule. 

THE NARROW PATH OF TRUE VIRTUE

Being, in process of time, chosen abbot, much against his own inclinations, he pointed out to his brethren the narrow path of true virtue by example, walking before them in every duty; and the great reputation of his sanctity drew the eyes of all men upon him. 

FEAR OF FALLING INTO THE SNARES OF VANITY MADE HIM RESIGN HIS OFFICE

Fear of the dangers of  falling into the snares of vanity made him resign his office, and retire privately into a forest four miles from Autun, where he lay hid some time in a place called, to this day, Saint Merri’s cell. He procured himself all necessaries of life by the labour of his hands, and found this solitude sweet by the liberty it gave him of employing his whole time in the exercises of heavenly contemplation, prayer, and penitential manual labour. 

HE DIED ABOUT THE YEAR 700

The place of his retreat having at length become public, he travelled to Paris with one companion called Frou or Frodulf, and chose his abode in a small cell adjoining a chapel dedicated in honour of St Peter, where, after two years and nine months, during which time he bore with astonishing patience the fiery trial of a painful lingering illness, he happily died about the year 700. He was buried in the above-mentioned chapel, upon the spot where now a great church bears his name, in which his relics are placed in a silver shrine over the high altar.

(From Fr Butler's Lives of the Saints)