Gudula
Saint Gudula is named after several places where she is venerated or which are relevant to her biography:
Moorsel (where she lived),
Brussels (where a chapter in her honour was founded in 1047) and
Eibingen (where the relic of her skull is conserved). In Brabant she is usually callede
Goule (
Latin:
Gudula,
Dutch:
Sinte Goedele,
French:
Sainte Gudule). She was born in the shire
Brabant (in present-day
Belgium) and according her 11th century biography (written in the abbey of
Lobbes between 1049-1053), daughter of a Duke of Lotharingia (which is an anachronism) called Witger and Saint Amalberga. She probably lived in the seventh century (+
712?).
After the birth of Gudula, her mother Saint Amalberga embraced the religious life in the abbey of Maubeuge. According tradition, she received the veil out of the hands of St. Aubert, Bishop of
Cambrai (d. about 668). Gudula's sister was St. Reineldis (of Saintes), and her brother, the mission bishop St. Emebertus (often confused with Bishop Ablebertus of Cambrai).
From an early age Gudula proved herself a worthy child, and with Reineldis and Emebertus lived in an atmosphere of piety and good works. She frequently visited the church of Moorsel, situated at a distance of two miles from her parents'house. She was buried at Hamme (Brabant). About a century after her death, her
relics were removed from Hamme to the church of Sint-Salvator at Moorsel, where the body was interred behind the altar. Under Duke Charles of
Lotharingia (977-992), or more exactly, between 977 and 988, the body of the saint was taken from the church of Moorsel and transferred to the chapel of Saint Géry at
Brussels. Count Lambert II Balderic of Louvain (+1054) founded in
1047 a chapter in honour of Saint Gudula and requested the translation of her relics to Bishop Gerardus I of Cambrai (+1051) to the church of Saint Michel in Brussels. Great indulgences were granted on the
feast day of the saint in
1330, to all who assisted in the decoration and completion of the church of St. Gudula at Brussels. On
6 June,
1579, the collegiate church was pillaged and wrecked by the Beggars (Protestants), and the relics of the saint disinterred and scattered.
The feast of the saint is celebrated at
Brussels on
8 January, and at
Ghentâ€"in which diocese Moorsel is situated on
19 January.
If St. Michael is the patron of Brussels, St. Gudula is its most venerated
patroness. In
iconography, St. Gudula is represented on a seal of the Church of St. Gudula of 1446 holding in her right hand a
candle, and in her left a lamp, which a
demon endeavours to extinguish. This representation is doubtless in accord with the legend which relates that the saint frequently repaired to the church before cock-crow. The demon wishing to interrupt this pious exercise, extinguished the light which she carried, but the saint obtained from God that her lantern should be rekindled. The flower called
tremella deliquescens, which bears fruit in the beginning of January, is known as
Sinte Goedele's lampken (St. Gudula's lantern). The old woodcarvers who produced statues of the saints born in the Holy German Empire, often depict St. Gudula with a taper in her hand, which originates probably out of the Paris Saint Geneveva tradition.
The holy head of Gudula is conserved in the Catholic Church of St. Hildegard in
Eibingen,
Germany.
*
St. Michael and Gudula Cathedral*
Catholic Forum: Gudule*
The Saint Michael and Saint Gudula Cathedral*
Pfarrei St. Hildegard,Eibingen with Information of the Church and the shrine of saint Gudula
