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Today, 12 December, is the feast of ... * Epimachus and Alexander and other martyrs (250) - their martyrdom in Alexandria is recounted by the local bishop, St Epimachus * Finnian of Clonard, bishop (c. 549) - as a monk he lived on the island of Flatholm in the Severn River estuary, and while there he cleared the (tiny) island of vermin - in reality, there is little evidence of his being a bishop * Corentin or Cury, bishop (sixth century?) - first bishop of Cornouaille, whose see is now at Quimper - he kept a fish in a well, and he would daily cut off part of the fish, return it to the water, and take it out the next day completely recovered, and then repeat the procedure again Last year Sophie Oosterwijk provided a very helpful explanation for this sort of miracle: It seems to me to be a Christian adaptation of a much older tradition. Of course, the symbolism of the fish and rebirth is quite appropriate for a saintly bishop but the idea of animals eaten today yet alive again tomorrow is one that one finds, for example, in Norse mythology where boars in Walhalla can be killed and consumed one day and hunted all over again the next. I am sure the folklore expert Malcolm Jones can give many more examples of this. * Edburga, abbess of Minster, virgin (751) - had such a great reputation as a calligrapher that St Boniface gave her a present of a silver stilus for writing on wax * Vicelin, bishop of Staargard (1154) - founded the first church of Lu"beck, his cult is active in north-western Germany, even though he is not in the Roman Martyrology **************** Carolyn Muessig [log in to unmask] %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%