Today, 23 February, is the feast of ...
* Serenus or Cerneuf the Gardener (302?)
- he stayed out of trouble until he chased a woman away
from his patch; she got angry, and told her husband, who in
turn went to the emperor, who in turn arranged for the
gardener to be decapitated
* Alexander Akimetes (c. 430)
- instituted a form of choral service carried on all day
and night without interruption
* Dositheus (c. 530)
- converted to Christianity after seeing a representation
of the last judgement in a painting in Gethsemane; he
became a monk at Gaza, and was under the tutelage of
another monk who taught him to be a balanced ascetic
* Boisil or Boswell, abbot of Melrose (664)
- spiritual master of St Cuthbert
* Milburga, abbess of Wenlock, virgin (c. 700)
- after her tomb was destroyed by a Viking invasion, some
boys in the eleventh century were playing in a field when
they began to sink into the ground; nearby Cluniac monks
then dug at that spot, and found her tomb
* Peter Damian, cardinal-bishop of Ostia, doctor of the
Church (1072)
- virulent opponent of simony and homosexuality, this one-
time Camaldolese monk became an active papal aide; when he
would return to his monastery, he passed his spare time
making wooden spoons
* Willigis, archbishop of Mainz (1011)
- every day, he arranged for his steward to feed thirty
poor people, and he would dine with thirteen other poor
people at his table
- a great statesman, he crowned Otto III at Aachen in 983
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Dr Carolyn Muessig
Department of Theology and Religious Studies
University of Bristol
Bristol BS8 1TB
UK
phone: +44(0)117-928-8168
fax: +44(0)117-929-7850
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
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