ST BAUDELIUS, MARTYR - 20 MAY

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN MAY

Saints celebrated on the 20th of May

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 BAUDELIUS, MARTYR 

Saint Baudelius lived in the 2nd or 3rd century. He was a married layman, born at Orleans, who laboured in the propagation of Christianity in Gaul and in the end was put to death on that account by the persecuting Roman authorities at Nimes in the south of France. 

THE DATE OF HIS APOSTOLATE

As in many similar cases of saints engaged in the conversion of France, there is no agreement among the learned as to the date of his apostolate. Some hold that he was beheaded in the year 187; others place him more than a century later, and date his martyrdom in 295. 

CHURCHES DEDICATED TO HIM

He has always been in great popular veneration. Some four hundred churches in France and Spain have been dedicated in his honour.

(From The Book of Saints, 1921, by the Monks of Ramsgate)

SAINT BAUDELIUS' ENTRY IN THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:

"At Nimes, in France, Saint Baudelius, martyr. Being arrested, but refusing to sacrifice to idols, and remaining immovable in the faith of Christ, notwithstanding blows and tortures, he gained the palm of martyrdom by a precious death."