St. Oswald
Name: St. Oswald
Date: 28 February
Oswald was of a noble Saxon family; he was endowed with a very rare and handsome appearanceand with a singular piety of soul. Brought up by his uncle, Saint Odo, Archbishop of Canterbury,he was chosen, while still young, as dean of the secular canons of Winchester, at that time verylax. His attempt to reform them was a failure, and he saw, with that infallible instinct which sooften guides the Saints in critical times, that the true remedy for the corruption of the clergy wasthe restoration of monastic life. He therefore went to France and took the habit of Saint Benedict. When he returned to England itwas to receive the news of Odo’s death. He found, however, a new patron in Saint Dunstan,Archbishop of Canterbury, through whose influence he was nominated to the see of Worcester. To these two Saints, together with Ethelwold of Winchester, the monastic revival of the tenthcentury is mainly due. Oswald’s first care was to deprive of their benefices all disorderly secular clerics, whom hereplaced as far as possible by religious priests. He himself founded seven religious houses. Considering that in the hearts of the secular canons of Winchester there were yet some sparks ofvirtue, he would not at once dismiss them, but rather reformed them through a holy artifice. Adjoining their cathedral church he built a chapel in honor of the Mother of God, causing it to beserved by a body of strict religious. He himself assisted at the divine Office there, and hisexample was followed by the people. The canons, finding themselves isolated and the churchdeserted, chose rather to embrace the religious life than continue to injure their own souls, and bealso a mockery to their people, through the contrast offered by their worldliness and the regularityof their religious brethren. Later, as Archbishop of York, Saint Oswald met a like success in his efforts. God manifested Hisapproval of his zeal by discovering to him the relics of his great predecessor at Worcester, SaintWilfrid, which he reverently translated to the church of that city. He died while washing the feetof the poor, as he did daily during Lent, on February 29, 992. |
