Genevieve
This page is about the Saint. For the film see Genevieve (film).In
Eastern Orthodoxy and
Catholicism,
Saint Genevieve (
Nanterre near Paris,
ca 419/422 - Paris
512) is the patron of
Paris. Her feast is kept on
January 3.
Though there is a
vita that purports to be written by a contemporary, Genevieve's history cannot be separated from her
hagiography, which describes her as a peasant girl of Nanterre who was encouraged by Saint
Germain of Auxerre. She went to live with her
godmother Lutetia in Paris, where she became admired for the extremes of her piety and her devotion to works of charity, which included her severe corporal austerities, and a
vegetarian diet which allowed her to sup but twice in the week. "These mortifications she continued for over thirty years, till her ecclesiastical superiors thought it their duty to make her diminish her austerities," the
Catholic Encyclopedia reports.
Like many of her
Celtic neighbors, Genevieve had frequent communication with the other world and reported her visions and prophesies, until her enemies conspired to drown her; through the intervention of Germain of Auxerre, their animosity was finally overcome. The bishop of the city appointed her to look after the welfare of the virgins dedicated to God, and by her instruction and example she led them to a high degree of sanctity. Genevieve's presence in Paris was credited with averting
Attila and his army, who went on to besiege
Orléans instead. During
Childeric's siege of Paris, Genevieve passed through the siege lines in a boat, bringing grain to the starving city.
|
Front of the Ancient Church of the Abbey of Sainte-Geneviève, in Paris, founded by Clovis, and rebuilt from the Eleventh to Thirteenth Centuries.--State of the Building before its Destruction at the End of the Last Century. |
Genevieve died in 512. When it was complete,
Clovis' church dedicated to Sts. Peter and Paul at Mont-lès-Paris received her remains. Under the care of the
Benedictines, numerous miracles wrought at her tomb caused the church to be rededicated in her name, and people enriched it with their gifts. In
847 it was plundered by the
Vikings and was partially rebuilt, but was completed only in
1177. The saint's relics were carried in procession yearly to the cathedral, and
Mme de Sévigné gives a description of the pageant in one of her letters.
This church having fallen into decay once more,
Louis XV ordered a new church worthy of the patron saint of Paris; the
Marquis of Marigny was entrusted with the construction, and he gave the task to his protégé
Jacques-Germain Soufflot, but completed after Soufflot's death by his pupil,
Jean-Baptiste Rondelet. The
Revolution broke out before it was dedicated, and it was taken over in
1791, under the name of the
Panthéon, by the
National Constituent Assembly, to be a burial place for distinguished Frenchmen. Though her remains had been publicly burnt at the
Place des Greves in
1793, the Panthéon was restored to Catholic purposes in
1821, secularized again as a national mausoleum in
1831 and once more in
1852. Then, though the
Communards dispersed the remaining relics, the Pantheon was finally reconsecrated to Genevieve in
1885.
About
1619 Louis XIII named
Cardinal François de La Rochefoucauld abbot of St. Genevieve's. The canons had been lax and the cardinal selected
Charles Faure to reform them. This holy man was born in
1594, and entered the canons regular at
Senlis. He was remarkable for his piety, and, when ordained, succeeded after a hard struggle in reforming the abbey. Many of the houses of the canons regular adopted his reform. In
1634, he and a dozen companions took charge of
Sainte-Geneviève-du-Mont of Paris. This became the mother-house of a new congregation, the
Canons Regular of Ste. Genevieve, which spread widely over France.
The institute named after the saint was the
Daughters of St. Genevieve, founded at Paris, in
1636, by
Francesca de Blosset, with the object of nursing the sick and teaching young girls. A somewhat similar institute, popularly known as the
Miramiones, had been founded under the invocation of the Holy Trinity, in
1611, by Marie Bonneau de Rubella Beauharnais de Miramion. These two institutes were united in
1665, and the associates called the
Canonesses of St. Genevieve. The members took no vows, but merely promised obedience to the rules as long as they remained in the institute. Suppressed during the Revolution, it was revived in
1806 by
Jeanne-Claude Jacoulet under the name of the
Sisters of the Holy Famly.
*
Collège de Juilly*
Montagne Sainte-Geneviève*
Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève*
Saint-Étienne-du-Mont*
Catholic Encyclopedia article on Ste Genevieve*
Hagiography of Ste Genevieve
