Saint Waldebert

Infobox Saint
name=Saint Waldebert
birth_date=unknown
death_date=c. 668
feast_day=May 2
venerated_in=Roman Catholic Church


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Waldebert (also known as Gaubert, Valbert [J.B. Clerc, "Eremitage et vie de S. Valbert", 1861.] and Walbert), (died c. 668), was a Frankish abbot of Luxeuil in the Benedictine Order, and a canonized saint in the Roman Catholic Church.

Like his predecessor at Luxeuil he was born of the noble Frankish family of Duke Waldelenus of Burgundy, highly influential in seventh-century Frankish politics [Marilyn Dunn, "The Emergence of Monasticism: From the Desert Fathers to the Early Middle Ages" (Blackwell) 2003:161] and served in the military before dedicating himself to the contemplative life and joining the monastery at Luxeuil on the borders of Austrasia and Burgundy (in modern-day France), where he dedicated his weapons and armour, which hung in the abbey church for centuries. [Alban Butler, "Butler's Lives of the Saints" (Continuum International) 1994, "s.v." 2 May.] He lived as a hermit close to the abbey until the death of the monastery's abbot, Saint Eustace, when Waldebert was elected Luxeuil's third abbot (c. 628).

He was abbot of the monastery for forty years, during which the school of Luxeuil trained the Frankish aristocrats who became bishops in the Frankish kingdoms; Waldebert oversaw the move of the monastery from the Rule of St. Columban to the Benedictine Rule, though in the rule he drew up for the convent of Faremoutiers he drew upon the rules of Columbanus as well as Benedict, but made no mention whatsoever of a ritual of either profession or oblation. [Mayke Jong, "In Samuel's
] He also gained from Pope John IV the independence of his community from episcopal control and increased the size and prosperity of the monastery's territories and buildings. Naturally Jonas dedicated to him [Jointly with the abbot of Columbanus' foundation at Bobbio. Jonas' remarkable silence concerning the royal founding of Luxeuil is noticed by Ian Wood, "Jonas, the Merovingians and Pope Honorius", in Walter A. Goffart and Alexander C. Murray, eds, "After Rome's Fall: Narrators and Sources of Early Medieval History" (University of Toronto) 1998:] his "vita" of Saint Columbanus. Among numerous houses founded from Luxeuil during his tenure, he was instrumental in aiding Saint Salaberga found her convent at Laon.

After his death his wooden bowl was credited with miraculous powers. [Butler.]

His feast day in the Roman Church is May 2. The basic modern study is that in J. Poinsotte, "Les abbés de Luxeuil" (1900).

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External links

* [http://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=2024 Catholic Online]