OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Category: Irish saints in Europe

  • St. Cathaldus of Taranto, May 10

    May 10 is the feast of Saint Cathaldus (Cataldus, Cathal), an Irish saint who flourished in Italy. His life and career is still the subject of debate, an 1896 paper can be found here but below is a rather succinct summary from 1909, courtesy of The New Zealand Tablet:

    St. Cataldus, Bishop and Confessor.

    St. Cataldus,  the second apostle and patron saint of Taranto, was born in Ireland about the year 615, and whilst a youth was sent to study at the great monastic school of Lismore. Whilst returning from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, in which he was accompanied by some of his disciples, the vessel was wrecked in the Gulf of Taranto, not far from the city of that name. When the Irish Bishop saw this beautiful city given over to pleasure and vice his spirit was moved within him, and in burning language he implored the inhabitants to return to the service of God, Whom they had forgotten. It happened at this time that there was no bishop in the city, so the people besought Cataldus to remain with them, to which request he reluctantly acceded. The saint succeeded in bringing back the inhabitants to the service of God, and Taranto became a Christian city in reality, as well as in name. St. Cataldus died towards the close of the seventh century, and his remains were buried in a marble tomb, which up to this day is preserved in the sacristy of the Cathedral of Taranto.

    St. Cataldus, Bishop and Confessor.,New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVII, Issue 9, 4 March 1909

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  • Saint Cathaldus of Taranto, May 10

    May 10 is the feast of an interesting Irish saint whose memory is still cherished today in Italy – Saint Cathaldus of Taranto. I have previously published Father J.F. Hogan’s account of his life which is available here, but below is a brief reminder of the career of Saint Cathaldus taken from the children’s column of an American Catholic magazine:

    Our Future Men and Women.

    Irish Saints in Italy.

    Uncle Jack wonders if his Future Men and Women know, as well as they ought to, that the traces of Irish saints are found in many parts of the European continent. In Italy, particularly from the foot of the Appenines down to the island of Sicily, the footprints of the saints of Ireland are clear to all. St. Cataldo, for instance, who founded the see of Taranto, and whose feast is celebrated on May 10-his name does not sound like an Irish name, yet he was an Irish saint, Cataldo or Cataldus being the Latin form of Cahal which was the saint’s name in Ireland. P. L. Connellan, writing from Italy, says: In Taranto, on the tenth of May, the feast of this Irish saint is held with great ceremony. The people come in from the surrounding country in their holiday attire, while the fishermen are conspicuous in the crowds. They regard him as the great Sailor-Bishop, whom their ancestors asked, as the popular tradition has it, for abundance in their fisheries, and since that time the mor piccolo, or little sea, has been a source of life to them. And they say that the saint dropped a ring into the sea, and no one could find it again, but in the place where it fell the salt water became fresh and clear. And whoever goes in a boat even now out into the Mar Grande, or larger gulf, will find a circle of fresh water over a yard in diameter, of a clear azure color, and everyone may drink of it and quench his thirst. The Tarentines call this circle of fresh water the Ring of San Cataldo. In Supino, on the way to Naples, a tiny town stuck on the side of the mountain, the same Irish saint is held in veneration by the people. Hia name is also given to a city on the Adriatic coast on the heel of the bootshaped peninsula of Italy. At Adassa, outside of Sorrento, you meet with a chapel, richly adorned, dedicated under his name. One of the most exquisite twelfth century Romanesque churches in Palermo—now abandoned and maintained as a national monument—also bears his name. So that around the South of Italy his memory is prominent, not only in the places already mentioned, but in so many other towns, that the list of them alone would fill many pages. He is perhaps even more known in this district than his fellow-countryman, San Frediano, is in Lucca and the many towns which surround that Tuscan city.

    The Sacred Heart Review, Number 1, 22 June 1912 
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  • Saint Columbanus and The First Christmas Tree

    Henry van Dyke, The First Christmas Tree (1897)

    I was somewhat amused to find the following article from a 1913 Australian newspaper attributing the origins of the Christmas tree to our own Saint Columbanus and his missionary labours among the Germanic peoples of early seventh-century Europe. Now I have certainly heard that the Christmas tree was introduced to these islands from Germany, but in the nineteenth century by Queen Victoria’s husband, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. The writer below, however, confidently asserts that ‘careful research’ disproves a Germanic origin for the Christmas tree and that its origin is traced to an Irishman – Saint Columbanus. That may come as news to the English who claim that their own great missionary saint among the Germanic tribes, Saint Boniface, holds the honours. I have to admit that it comes as news to me too,  I doubt very much that any individual can claim to be the originator of the Christmas tree or that its origins can be traced in an unbroken line back to pre-Christian practices. I suspect Saint Columbanus might just say ‘Bah, humbug!’.

    THE CHRISTMAS TREE

    ITS ORIGINS TRACED TO THE IRISH SAINT COLUMBANUS

    Familiar us is the Christmas tree to us, and as dearly-beloved as it is to the people of the civilised world, it is surprising how very few there are who know of its origin, or its introduction into the celebration of the most beautiful and impressive festival of the year, legends there are in plenty, but few of them seem founded upon a basis of fact. Most of them, have been handed down – with the customary “warping from the original story”- from generation to generation. The use of the fir tree in the celebration of Christmas is usually believed to have originated in Germany. Careful research proves this to have been a fallacy. As are so many of the ancient customs and institutions, its origin as a Christmas adjunct is traced to an Irishman.

    It was Saint Columbanus, who engaged in converting the pagans of Germany and Switzerland to Christianity, found them so firmly impressed with the sacredness of trees -especially the fir- that he conceived the idea of endowing them with an illustrative Christian meaning. To these people, the tree was an object of worship from which no amount of reasoning would convert them, and because of this, Saint Columbanus and his fellow missionaries found it an especially favourable symbol for their use.
    As far back as the seventh century the fir tree, because of its evergreen verdure, was known in Christmas [Christian?] writings and pictures as a symbol of eternal life, while a legend, dating from the same period, represents an old man bearing a lighted tree, who entered every home at Christmas time and granted a single wish to each of the inmates.  The evolution of this beneficent old personage with his beautiful fir into our own Santa Claus and his gift-laden tree is easily traced.
    THE CHRISTMAS TREE. (1913, December 24). Northern Star (Lismore, NSW: 1876 – 1954), p. 10. Retrieved December 20, 2017, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article72348547

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