Pierre tombale de Saint Laurent à l'abbaye Saint-Augustin de
Cantorbéry.
Saint Laurent de Cantorbery
Premier
successeur de saint Augustin de Cantorbery (✝ 619)
Il
faisait partie de la première mission menée par saint Augustin. Il souffrit beaucoup durant la réaction
païenne du roi Eadbaud, après la mort du premier roi chrétien Ethelbert. Il
subit d'ailleurs plusieurs fois une cruelle flagellation.
À Cantorbéry en Angleterre, l’an 619, saint Laurent, évêque, qui reçut le gouvernement de cette Église après saint Augustin, et la fit grandir considérablement en convertissant le roi Edbald.
Martyrologe romain
Saint Laurent de Cantorbéry (né au Ciel le 2 Février 619). Laurent fut
l'un des moines qui avaient accompagné saint Augustin dans sa mission au
Royaume de Kent et, une fois que le roi Ethelbert fut baptisé et la foi
chrétienne fermement établie dans son royaume, il est devenu le principal
assistant de l'archevêque. Augustin avait peur qu'à sa mort, les nouveaux
convertis ne retournent au paganisme, alors il consacra Laurent comme évêque
coadjuteur pour lui succéder à sa mort.
Laurent a beaucoup oeuvré, quand il devint archevêque et il a redoublé les efforts d'Augustin pour gagner l'Église celtique aux coutumes romaines, mais la mission a subi un grave revers car à la mort d'Ethelbert les gens du Kent ont commencé à se détacher de leur nouvelle foi. Ceci fut largement dû à Eadbald, le nouveau roi, qui n'avait pas suivi son père en devenant chrétien et qui avait offensé la Loi de l'Église en épousant sa belle-mère. Les remontrances de l'archevêque ne servirent qu'à rendre le roi plus déterminé dans ses pratiques païennes, et Laurent commençait à désespérer, décidant avec ses collègues évêques, Mélitte de Londres et Juste de Rochester, d'abandonner la nation anglaise comme irrécupérable.
Mélitte et Juste quittèrent le pays et Laurent devait les suivre le lendemain. Pour sa dernière nuit, il avait préparé un lit dans l'église abbatiale devant l'autel, et après avoir dit ses prières, il s'endormit. Au milieu de la nuit, il fut réveillé par une vision dans laquelle l'apôtre Pierre le fit battre de verges avec un grand fouet, lui demandant la raison de sa désertion.
"Pourquoi abandonnes-tu le troupeau qui t'a été confié?" demanda-t-il. "A quels bergers laisses-tu les brebis du Christ, qui sont parmi les loups? As-tu oublié mon exemple, par lequel pour l'amour de ces petits que le Christ me donna comme un gage de Son affection, j'ai souffert aux mains des infidèles les chaînes, les coups, l'emprisonnement, les tortures et enfin la crucifixion, afin que je puisse être couronné avec Lui? "
Au matin, Laurent alla voir Eadbald et lui montra les cicatrices des coups qu'il avait reçus, et le roi fut horrifié d'apprendre que des mains aient été portées sur ce saint homme, exigeant de savoir qui avait osé agir ainsi contre lui. Quand l'archevêque le lui dit, le roi fut très impressionné et, renonçant à son mariage, il fut baptisé dans la foi chrétienne.
Mélitte et Juste revinrent, et saint Laurent continua à construire l'Église du Christ en Angleterre. Quand il mourut, son corps fut enterré dans l'église abbatiale, où il avait eu sa vision, et on se souvint de lui, en lui dédiant un hôpital de la vieille route de Douvres, qui fait partie de Watling Street (maintenant remplacé par le Cricket Ground du comté qui porte encore son nom .)
Laurent a beaucoup oeuvré, quand il devint archevêque et il a redoublé les efforts d'Augustin pour gagner l'Église celtique aux coutumes romaines, mais la mission a subi un grave revers car à la mort d'Ethelbert les gens du Kent ont commencé à se détacher de leur nouvelle foi. Ceci fut largement dû à Eadbald, le nouveau roi, qui n'avait pas suivi son père en devenant chrétien et qui avait offensé la Loi de l'Église en épousant sa belle-mère. Les remontrances de l'archevêque ne servirent qu'à rendre le roi plus déterminé dans ses pratiques païennes, et Laurent commençait à désespérer, décidant avec ses collègues évêques, Mélitte de Londres et Juste de Rochester, d'abandonner la nation anglaise comme irrécupérable.
Mélitte et Juste quittèrent le pays et Laurent devait les suivre le lendemain. Pour sa dernière nuit, il avait préparé un lit dans l'église abbatiale devant l'autel, et après avoir dit ses prières, il s'endormit. Au milieu de la nuit, il fut réveillé par une vision dans laquelle l'apôtre Pierre le fit battre de verges avec un grand fouet, lui demandant la raison de sa désertion.
"Pourquoi abandonnes-tu le troupeau qui t'a été confié?" demanda-t-il. "A quels bergers laisses-tu les brebis du Christ, qui sont parmi les loups? As-tu oublié mon exemple, par lequel pour l'amour de ces petits que le Christ me donna comme un gage de Son affection, j'ai souffert aux mains des infidèles les chaînes, les coups, l'emprisonnement, les tortures et enfin la crucifixion, afin que je puisse être couronné avec Lui? "
Au matin, Laurent alla voir Eadbald et lui montra les cicatrices des coups qu'il avait reçus, et le roi fut horrifié d'apprendre que des mains aient été portées sur ce saint homme, exigeant de savoir qui avait osé agir ainsi contre lui. Quand l'archevêque le lui dit, le roi fut très impressionné et, renonçant à son mariage, il fut baptisé dans la foi chrétienne.
Mélitte et Juste revinrent, et saint Laurent continua à construire l'Église du Christ en Angleterre. Quand il mourut, son corps fut enterré dans l'église abbatiale, où il avait eu sa vision, et on se souvint de lui, en lui dédiant un hôpital de la vieille route de Douvres, qui fait partie de Watling Street (maintenant remplacé par le Cricket Ground du comté qui porte encore son nom .)
Version française Claude Lopez-Ginisty
d'après
Laurence of Canterbury,
OSB B (RM)
Died February 2, 619; feast day was February 2. Saint Laurence was one of the
13 monks of Saint Andrew's Monastery, Rome, sent by Pope Saint Gregory the
Great with Saint Augustine of Canterbury to England in 597. Augustine sent him
back to Rome to report on the progress of the English mission and to bring back
reinforcements for the work. He also brought back Gregory's answers to
Augustine's questions about the organization of the Church in Canterbury. As
Augustine's most trusted helper, he named Laurence succeeded him as Archbishop
of Canterbury in 604 (Augustine irregularly consecrated Laurence before his own
death).
As archbishop of
Canterbury, Laurence followed Augustine's policy of consolidation in the
southeast of Britain and attempted cooperation with the British bishops in the
conversion of the Anglo-Saxons. Unsuccessful in convincing the Britons to
accept the Roman liturgical practices, Laurence was faced with even greater
difficulties when Eadbald succeeded his father, Ethelbert, as king of Kent in
616, married his father's wife, and allowed the country to lapse into pagan
practices. Saints Mellitus and Justus retired temporarily to Gaul. Laurence
considered joining them there but, according to Bede, was rebuked, then
physically beaten black and blue by Saint Peter in a dream for thinking about
abandoning his flock. The story seems to be a conflation of the Quo Vadis?
legend of Saint Peter and a famous letter of Saint Jerome. Whether the story
Bede tells is true, Laurence decided to remain, and the day after his vision
converted King Eadbald to Christianity when he displayed the stripes on his
back to the king and told him their origin.
Laurence was buried
in the monastery church of Saints Peter and Paul (later called Saint
Augustine's), Canterbury, which he had himself consecrated. His body and those
of other early saints of Canterbury were translated in 1091. His tomb was
opened in 1915. The Irish Stowe Missal commemorates him by name in the canon of
the Mass and marks his feast. There is a feast of the translation of his relics
at Canterbury on September 13 (Attwater, Benedictines, Delaney, Encyclopedia,
Farmer, Gill).
Saint Lawrence is
pictured being scourged by Saint Peter or showing his stripes to King Eadbald
(Roeder).
St.
Lawrence
Second Archbishop of Canterbury, d. 2 Feb., 619. For the particulars of his life and
pontificate we rely exclusively on details added by medieval writers being unsupported by historical
evidence, though they may possibly embody ancient traditions.
According to St. Bede, he was one of the original missionaries
who left Rome with St. Augustine in 595 and finally landed in Thanet
in 597. After St. Augustine had been consecrated he sent St. Lawrence back to Rome, to carry to the pope the news of the conversion
of King Ethelbert and his
people, to announce his consecration, and to ask for direction on certain
questions. In this passage of the historian St. Lawrence is referred
to as presbyter, in distinction to Peter
who is called monachus. From this it has been conjectured that
he was a secular priest and not a monk; but this conclusion has been questioned by Benedictine writers such as Elmham
in the Middle Ages and Mabillon in later times. When St. Gregory had decided the questions asked, St.
Lawrence returned to Britain
bearing the replies, and he remained with St. Augustine sharing his work. That saint,
shortly before his death which probably took place in 604, consecrated St. Lawrence as bishop, lest the infant Church
should be left for a time without a pastor. Of the new archbishop's episcopate
Bede writes: "Lawrence, having attained the dignity
of archbishop, strove most vigorously to add to the foundations of
the Church which he had seen so nobly laid and to forward the
work by frequent words of holy
exhortation and by the constant example of his devoted
labour." The only extant genuine document relating to him is the fragment
preserved by Bede of the letter he addressed to the Celtic
bishops exhorting them to peace and unity
with Rome. The death of King
Ethelbert, in 616 was followed by a heathen reaction under his son Eadbald,
and under the sons of Sebert who
became kings of the East Saxons.
Saints Mellitus and Justus,
bishops of the newly-founded Sees
of London and Rochester,
took refuge with St. Lawrence at Canterbury and urged him to fly to Gaul
with them. They departed, and he, discouraged by the undoing of St. Augustine's work, was preparing to follow them, when St.
Peter appeared to him in a vision,
blaming him for thinking of leaving his flock and inflicting stripes upon him.
In the morning he hastened to the king, exhibiting his wounded body and
relating his vision. This led to
the conversion of the king, to
the recall of Saints Mellitus and Justus,
and to their perseverance in
their work of evangelizing Kent
and the neighbouring provinces. These events occurred about 617 or 618, and
shortly afterwards St. Lawrence died and was buried
near St. Augustine in the north porch of St. Peter's
Abbey church, afterwards known
as St. Augustine's. His festival
is observed in England
on 3 February.
Sources
Bede, Historia Ecclesiastica
Gentis Anglorum, I, xxvii; Ii, iv-vii; Elmham, Historia Monasterii S.
Augustini in Rolls Series (London,
1858); Acta SS. Boland., February, I;
Hardy, Descriptive Catalogue (London,
1862-71), giving a list of MS. lives; Haddan and Stubbs, Ecclesiastical Documents I (London, 1869), ii; Stubbs in Dict. Christ. Biog., s.v. Laurentius
(25); Hunt in Dict. Nat. Biog., s.v.
Lawrence.
Burton, Edwin. "St. Lawrence." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol.
9. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910. 3 Feb. 2017
<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09090a.htm>.
Transcription.
Dedicated to St. Rita of Cascia.
Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. October 1, 1910. Remy Lafort, Censor. Imprimatur.
+John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York.
Saint Lawrence of
Canterbury
Profile
Benedictine monk. At the order of Pope Saint
Gregory the Great, he accompanied Saint
Augustine of Canterbury to evangelize England in 597. Upon Augustine‘s death, Lawrence became archbishop of Canterbury. When the Britons began to abandon Christianity and return to the old pagan
customs, Lawrence planned to abandon them and return to France. However, he had a dream in which he was rebuked and scourged
by Saint Peter the Apostle for giving up on his flock. Lawrence remained,
redoubled his efforts at evangelization, and converted King Edbald who brought many of his subjects to the faith. Legend says that Lawrence carried physical scars from his
dream beating by Saint
Peter.
Born
- 2 February 619 in Canterbury, England of natural causes
St. Laurence, Archbishop of Canterbury
HE was one of those who accompanied St. Austin into
this island, about the year 597, and was his immediate successor in the see of
Canterbury, in 608, in which he sat eleven years. When Eadbald, son and
successor to the holy king Ethelbert, not only refused to follow his father’s
example in embracing the faith, but gave into idolatry, and incestuously took
to his bed his father’s widow. Laurence having laboured hard for his conversion
to no purpose, and despairing of reclaiming him, thought of nothing but retiring
into France, as some others had already done. But he was severely scourged by
St. Peter, in a dream, on the eve of his intended departure, with reproaches
for designing to forsake that flock for which Christ had laid down his life.
This did not only prevent his going, but had such an effect upon the king, when
he was shown the marks of the stripes he had received on this occasion, that he
became a thorough convert, doing whatever was required of him, both for his own
sanctification and the propagation of Christianity in his dominions. St.
Laurence did not long survive this happy change, dying in the year 619. He is
mentioned in the Roman Martyrology. See Bede, Hist. b. 2. c. 4. 6, 7. 1
Malmesb. l. 1. Pontif. Angl.
Note 1. From these words
of Bede, b. 1. c. 27. Austin sent to Rome Laurence the priest, and Peter the
monk, some modern historians infer that Saint Laurence was no monk, but a
secular priest; though this proof is weak. See Collier, Dict. Suppl.
Henschenius, p. 290. and Le Quien, Oriens Christ. T. 1. p. 421. [back]
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume
II: February. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
St. Laurence of
Canterbury (Reposed 2 February, 619). Laurence was one
of the monks who had accompanied St.Augustine on his mission to the Kingdom of
Kent and, once King Ethelbert was baptised and the Christian Faith was firmly
established in his kingdom, he became the Archbishop's chief assistant.
Augustine was worried that in the event of his death the new converts might
return to paganism and so he consecrated Laurence as his coadjutor bishop to
succeed him when he died.
Laurence was
industrious when he became Archbishop and renewed Augustine's efforts to win
over the Celtic Church to the customs of the Roman, but the mission suffered a
severe setback, for with the death of Ethelbert the people of Kent began to
fall away from their new faith. This was largely due to Eadbald, the new king,
who had not followed his father in becoming a Christian and had offended
against Church law by marrying his stepmother. The remonstrations by the
Archbishop only served to make the king more determined in his heathen
practices and Laurence began to despair, deciding with his fellow bishops,
Mellitus of London and Justus of Rochester, to abandon the English nation as
beyond redemption.
Mellitus and
Justus left the country and Laurence was to follow them on the next day. For
his last night he had a bed prepared in the abbey church before the High Altar,
and after he had said his prayers he went to sleep. At the dead of night he was
awoken by a vision in which the Apostle Peter scourged him with a great whip,
asking him the reason for his desertion.
"Why do
you forsake the flock committed to you?" he asked. "To what
shepherds are you leaving Christ's sheep, who are among wolves? Have you
forgotten my example, who for the sake of these little ones that Christ gave me
as a token of His affection, suffered at the hands of unbelievers chains,
beatings, imprisonment, tortures and finally crucifixion that I might be
crowned with Him?"
In the morning
Laurence went to Eadbald and showed him the scars of the beating that he had
received, and the King was horrified to learn that hands had been laid upon
such a holy man, demanding to know who had presumed to use him so. When the
Archbishop told him, the King was greatly impressed and, renouncing his
marriage, was baptised into the Christian Faith.
Mellitus and
Justus returned, and St. Laurence continued to build up the Church of Christ in
England. When he died his body was interred in the abbey church, where he had
had his vision, and he was remembered by a hospital in the Old Dover Road,
which is part of Watling Street (now replaced by the County Cricket Ground
still bearing his name.)
