“One Jewish soldier expressed the wish to know the Christian Faith and is receiving regular lessons, which will probably end in his Baptism. You may well imagine that he will be called Vincent de Paul.“
Blessed Frédéric Ozanam reporting on the work of the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul in Lyons on the 11th April 1839, quotation taken from: Austin Fagan: Spirituality and Charism of Blessed Frédéric Ozanam, in: Vincentiana, Vol. 56 No. 1 (2012), p. 73
French wine
If you try to find some more information on a saintly French bishop by the name of Didier, you will sooner or later stumble across French wine: What about a bottle of a red wine blend including Malbec from Cahors – Château Saint Didier-Parnac? Sounds good?
Turns out, there were, centuries ago, quite a few French bishops named Didier or – in the Latin version – Desiderius. The one I was actually trying to do a research on was not the bishop of Cahors though, who is lending his name to probably quite delicious red wine, but rather the bishop of Vienne, martyred in the year 606 or 612 – different dates are given – and remembered on the 26th May.
But how did it come to my mind to do a research on the bishop of Vienne? Well, it‘s all because of the biography on Blessed Frédéric Ozanam that I have been reading for a while now… So here‘s the third article related to the life of this saintly man.
Sometimes it can be a pleasure to take a dive off the beaten tracks into some obscure side note of collective history. Every individual family history and every biography of a saint readily lends itself to such a detour. Come along.
Queen Brunhilda
Sigebert I, the Merovingian king of the Germanic tribe of the Franks ruling over Austrasia in the 6th century, had a wife by the name of Brunhilda.
This Brunhilda had been raised at the court in Toledo, Spain. She belonged to the heretical sect of the Arians – former Catholics denying essential truths of the Christian faith. But as she married Sigibert and became queen, she converted to the Catholic religion of the Franks who were themselves newcomers to the faith. The Christianization of the Franks was a process taking place in the late 5th and early 6th century.
After the death of her husband, Brunhilda married a second time, a guy called Merowech, son of Chilperich. The peculiar thing about it is that she was Merowech’s aunt.
She reigned as queen over Austrasia and Burgundy from 575 to 583, from 595 to 599, and in the year 613. During those years she got into conflicts with the nobility, parts of the Church, and members of her own dynasty, and was seemingly involved in the murder of Chilperich, her father-in-law, and other murderous intrigues. It is said that in her later years as queen she had a lover and sought to promote him into high office by getting rid of the mayor of the palace of her son Theuderic.
Admittedly though, it feels a bit difficult to get a clear picture on the queen’s personality and her conduct from the historical sources. What is fact, what is fiction?
A source from the 8th century called Liber Historiae Francorum – the Book of the History of the Franks – relates this about the queen‘s temporal end:
“Then the army of the Franks and Burgundians joined into one, all shouted together that death would be most fitting for the very wicked Brunhilda. Then King Clotaire ordered that she be lifted onto a camel and led through the entire army. Then she was tied to the feet of wild horses and torn apart limb from limb. Finally she died. Her final grave was the fire. Her bones were burnt.“
Liber Historiae Francorum
While this source assures us that Brunhilda was “very wicked“ and that “her bones were burnt“, elsewhere one comes across the information that Brunhilda was buried in the abbey of Saint Martin of Tours which she had founded.
We know that Brunhilda, at least in her earlier years, confided in Saint Gregory of Tours, who, by the way, wrote ten books on the history of the Franks, known as Historiae Francorum, covering the period between the lifetime of Saint Martin of Tours and the year 591, and thereby also featuring some of her years as queen.
Yet at the same time she persecuted the bishop of Vienne, Saint Didier, for criticizing her and the immorality of her court. Brunhilda denounced him to the Holy Father – to Saint Gregory the Great – for paganism, and she managed to depose and banish him with the help of the bishop of Lyons and by means of a synod she controlled. Saint Gregory the Great eventually cleared Didier from the false accusations made against him and restored him to his episcopal seat at Vienne.
But just like his grandmother Brunhilda, so also King Theuderic II of Burgundy lacked the virtue of chastity. His four sons were all born of several mistresses. Saint Didier of Vienne rebuked him for his way of life – and died as a martyr for this. He was cruelly murdered by the king‘s soldiers at a place that was then called Saint-Didier-sur-Chalaronne.
Whatever may be the case concerning the life and death of the Frankish queen Brunhilda, we can at least know this: By God‘s grace and providence, good comes out of evil each and every time. In this case the salvation of many souls in the long line of ancestry of one single Jewish family living in the southeast of France. Collective and individual history are intertwined in the most mysterious ways.
Saint Didier of Vienne welcomed at Bouligneux
“Let the charity of the brotherhood abide in you. And hospitality do not forget; for by this some, being not aware of it, have entertained angels.“
Hebrews 13: 1-2
And some have entertained Catholic bishops and have received the grace of Holy Baptism from them…
“(…) Saint Didier, then archbishop of Vienne, fleeing persecution of Queen Brunehaut (whose scandalous life the archbishop had openly criticized), stopped in a place called Bouligneux where he was welcomed in the home of Samuel Hosanham. Didier converted him and his family to Christianity and baptized them in the month of July.“
Rev Ronald Ramson C.M.: Hosanna! Blessed Frédéric Ozanam: Family and friends, WestBow Press 2013 (e-book), p. 7
This Samuel Hosanham, ancestor of Blessed Frédéric Ozanam, was a Jewish man descending from “Jeremie Hosanham, a praetor in the Roman troops“ who “served under Julius Caesar in the seventh legion“ (ibid.).
“The story goes that Jeremie was awarded a sizeable tract of land by Caesar in compensation for his military expertise as displayed in the Gallic wars. This provides a plausible reason how a Jewish colony sprang up in the area known as Bouligneux.“
Rev Ronald Ramson C.M.: Hosanna! Blessed Frédéric Ozanam: Family and friends, WestBow Press 2013 (e-book), p. 7
Today, Bouligneux is still nothing but a small village of just a couple of hundreds inhabitants. It is located in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of southeastern France.
“It was Jean-Antoine’s father, Pierre Benoit, born in Bouligneux, the family homestead, who changed the spelling of the family name to what we know today, Ozanam.“
Rev Ronald Ramson C.M.: Hosanna! Blessed Frédéric Ozanam: Family and friends, WestBow Press 2013 (e-book), p. 8
Pierre Benoit was Blessed Frédéric‘s grandfather. The family annals have it that the original spelling of the family name was “Hosanna“ – the Hebrew cry for God‘s salvation: hoshiya na!, which can be translated as “save, we pray!“ or “please save us!“. The verb in hoshiya na comes from the same root as the name Yeshua…
“Son of David, have pity on us!“
About a thousand years later, the Jewish heritage of the Ozanam family was still palpable when Noel Ozanam, obviously a man born during Christmas time, named one of his sons Abraham, as the family tree shows, and even further down the line in the spirituality of Blessed Frédéric in the mid 19th century. Blessed Frédéric Ozanam loved the books of the Old Testament very much, especially the book of Psalms:
“All promises, all eagerness, every holy impatience of the prophet (David) find their purpose in the Saviour who sprang from his race. And such is the link between both Testaments that the Saviour himself has no name dearer to him than Son of David. The two blind men of Jericho called him thus and I myself often cry to him like they did: ‘Son of David, have pity on us.‘“
Blessed Frédéric Ozanam in a letter to Alexandre Ferriny-Jérusalemy, a Jewish convert to Catholicism, in the year 1953, shortly before his death, quotation taken from: Austin Fagan: Spirituality and Charism of Blessed Frédéric Ozanam, in: Vincentiana, Vol. 56 No. 1 (2012), p. 74
Because of his fragile health and sickness, he had to pass through quite a lot of suffering throughout his lifetime and especially during the final years and months before he died at the young age of 40. During his last stay in Italy that was meant for his recovery – before returning to Marseilles to die on French soil as he wished – his Vincentian confessor gave him this advice:
“The first time I saw him in Antignano, he wanted to know what to do in order to prepare for death. I told him to read the Psalms and to think about the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. He was pleased with this advice and put it into practice.“
Father Massuco C.M., quotation taken from: Austin Fagan: Spirituality and Charism of Blessed Frédéric Ozanam, in: Vincentiana, Vol. 56 No. 1 (2012), p. 74
While reading the Psalms as a sick man, Blessed Frédéric annotated them, and his wife Amélie later went over his notes until they were published five years after his death, in the year 1858, under the title Le Livre des Malades.
“Almost from infancy, he dedicated himself to the defence of truth, and began studying Hebrew to read, in the original text, the fundamental truths of the Faith. Despite his endless work, each morning found him reading a passage from Scripture.“
Amélie Ozanam about her husband, quotation taken from: Austin Fagan: Spirituality and Charism of Blessed Frédéric Ozanam, in: Vincentiana, Vol. 56 No. 1 (2012), p. 75
Blessed Frédéric Ozanam, pray for us!