Today January 29

Today is the feast of St. Gildas the Wise (circa 500 - 570). There is much evidence that this abbot was considered wise as well as exasperating. He was criticized as severe but his criticism of the state of English Catholicism was justified and even could be considered an act of charity. His excoriating words were in the book De excidio Britanniae, a list of the terrible sins and crimes rampant in Britain in his day. In it he displayed a remarkable knowledge of Scripture, Roman poets and early saints, such as St. Ignatius of Antioch. Gildas, a disciple of the knight Sir (and Saint) Illtud, ministered to the people's souls even as he fearlessly pointed again and again to the sins of the great and the small, assuring them that sin was the worst thing in the world. And he truly knew the people, the lowliest as well as the bishops and priests, going among them, listening to them and discussing with them, not only in England and Wales, but in Ireland and what is now France, where he ended his days. St. Gildas, pray for us.