St. Aldegundis, also known as Aldegonde, Aldegund, or Adelgondis, was born in Flanders in 639 CE, in the county of Hainaut, which straddled the borders of modern Belgium and France. Her parents, Walbert and Bertilia, and her sister, Waldetrudis, are also all saints. In fact, her nieces and nephews by Waldetrudis: also all saints. They were all closely related to the Merovingian dynasty, who ruled the Franks until 751 CE.
The story of Aldegundis is, in part, your classic vow-of-chastity story. At a relatively young age she began having visions of Christ, and came to understand that she was to take no other husband but him. Predictably, her parents, saints though they were, had other ideas and wanted her to marry an English prince named Eudon. To solve this problem she ran away from home, but had to stop when she came to the Sambre river.
Showing excellent problem-solving skills, she called on God to help, and he sent two angels who told her to walk across the river on water, which she did, not even wetting the soles of her shoes. On the other side she continued a little way into the forest, then stopped to build a cabin. She received the veil-i.e., was made a nun-by St. Amandius, the bishop of Maastricht.
Her cabin in the woods eventually became a convent, which became the Benedictine monastery Mauberge, which in turn was taken over by canonesses.
She had visions all her life, but near the end she had a vision of Satan as a wolf. Her two hagiographers had different takes on how she handled this: according to one, she got angry and kicked him out. According to the other, she was compassionate and asked why he hates people so much (jealousy), before kicking him out.
In 684 CE she died of breast cancer. Her saint day is January 30, and she’s the patron saint of cancer, wounds, and sudden death.
I realize that I’m late on this bandwagon, but I finally discovered Google Books, and holy shit you guys. There is a ton of stuff there-public domain, some scholarly stuff, some regular books. The best part is that my academic fantasy has come true with Google Books: you can search inside a book instead of using an index or whatever. Wow.
Dreams, Visions, and Spiritual Authority in Merovingians Gaul, by Isabel Moreira
A Dictionary of Miracles: Imitative, Realistic, and Dogmatic by Ebenezer Cobham Brewer
A Dictionary of Saintly Women by Agnes Baillie Cunninghame Dunbar
Do you know if there is a prayer to her? or a novena?
I can’t find much on Saint Aldegundis.
Please pray for Mark N. he was stabbed o his way home. Him and his mother are having a very difficult time.
i’d like to just say that this was a VERY fluky run.on the practice mats evhtryeing was perfect.and catching our tops is number 1 priority but we’re all human and make mistakes.im so proud of this team considering over 50% have never competed before this year.Sherwood has so many great things for the future and i can’t wait to see them!
Bhadhai cha Laaligurans manchlai ..mero baaitgkt tarfa bata ramro ho progremme garnu bhaneko harek Nepali haruko lukeko pratebhako kadar hunecha..hami sampurna nepaliharule yes sasthaka sathiharulai hausala denu parhca programme leunu show garnu bhaneko sajilo kam haina..ani..jaba samma hami nepaliharule Kalakar ko Ijayt gardainau jabasamma hamro dehs nepalko sayeu kalakarharuko barsau mehenet khera jancha.hamile sabai Nepali samudai milera Nepali programme lai heridenu parcha..paisa matra tholo hoina..:)