Catholic Heroes . . . St. Gertrude Of Nivelles
By DEB PIROCH
The next time St. Patrick’s Day rolls around and you are tempted to drink a mug of green beer, you might recall that March 17 is also the feast day of a lesser-known saint, but one dear to many hearts who lived less than two hundred years later than St. Patrick: St. Gertrude of Nivelles, virgin.
Though Christianity was no more popular in seventh century than in modern-day Belgium, St. Gertrude, born in 626, knew at the young age of ten that her calling was to the religious life. The daughter of a nobleman, her father asked her if she wished to marry the son of another noble and she would have no part of it, stating only Jesus Christ would be her Lord and Master! Her parents were both beatified — Blessed Pepin of Landen and Blessed Itta. Her sister was St. Begga, who married the son of St. Arnulf of Metz.
As this was a time when women were often used to unite families and kingdoms, St. Gertrude was lucky that she was allowed to remain single. Her father died, we are unsure when, but her mother’s concern was to keep her charge safe, both in purity and because marauders wanted to force a union with the family’s wealth. To stop interest in her daughter and make her calling all the more clear, she shaved her daughter’s head, imparting a tonsure in the style of men. That did the trick!
And after consultation with St. Amand, the bishop of Maastricht, the two founded the double monastery at Nivelles, with one section for men, one for women. Gertrude assumed the role of abbess at age 20.
Later, becoming weaker sometime after the age of 30, Gertrude then appointed her niece in her stead. Dates can be sketchy, but Butler’s Lives states her mother Itta, meanwhile, passed away in the year 652, just seven years before her own daughter. By this point, Gertrude began delegating more duties, even before appointing her niece to abbess, so as to spend more time in prayer and study.
This was the dawn of the blossoming of monasticism in Europe, when its great edifices began to be built across its hills and valleys, and the people embraced the ascetism and privation, as well as the study and prayer, the quiet and simplicity that personified a life married to Christ and His Church. Nivelles was founded so early, that while Gertrude was technically Benedictine, one does not see much mention of anything like the Rule and so forth in talk of the founding of the double monastery. Many of the first monasteries that developed were Benedictine and Cistercian, with others like mendicant orders following in turn.
It is said she had a scholastic bent, was a mystic who experienced visions and knew the Bible virtually by heart. The first account of her life or “Vita” was first written about a decade after her death, in other words by a contemporary, and rewritten a few centuries later. But we are told that she was given to perform many common devout practices, such as feeding the poor, prayer, fasting, and poverty of spirit. She wore a hair shirt under her habit and exhausted herself with discipline and lack of sleep to the point that after age thirty she increased them, preparing herself to get ready for death.
Two miracles are mentioned over and over in biographies of Gertrude. One tells of a shining orb that appeared above her, as though of a circle of fire, glowing over her head while she prayed in church and lighting up the building for half an hour or more. The other involved someone — likely monks — who invoked her name in a storm at sea. They tell of a sea monster (!) in a great tempest. They called upon St. Gertrude to ask God to rescue them and the monster disappeared, along with the gale. So, it became the custom to drink out of a glass in her honor before departing on journeys at the time.
As we all do, Gertrude worried about the state of her soul, and sent word to St. Ultan at the Fosses Monastery to inquire if he had experienced any revelations concerning herself. He wrote back that she need not worry, that she would die the following day but would be met by St. Patrick himself and many angels and saints.
St. Gertrude happily prepared herself with Communion and prayer and duly passed away the following day. It was said she was the age of our Lord, thirty-three, and those present experienced the odor of sanctity at her death. She had asked to be buried not in her habit but in a mere hair shirt and a discarded veil from a nun who had thrown it away, as no longer fit to wear; in other words, in total poverty.
Her relics are preserved to this day in Nivelles and annually put on show in her hometown in Belgium, where they were formerly held in a masterpiece reliquary of gold from the Middle Ages. During a bombing in 1940 during World War II, the church that housed them was destroyed and, with it, the reliquary. However, on inspection, while the reliquary was gone, her relics had apparently survived and were rescued. Over the centuries only one vertebra and a finger have disappeared but otherwise, her skeleton is intact.
Some may be wondering why I’ve waited so long to mention St. Gertrude of Nivelles as the patron of cats. Well, to paraphrase Lewis Carroll, this is where her story becomes curiouser and curiouser. All original biographical sources make no mention of cats. Cats do not become associated with her until the 1980s. What art portrays her connected with her is . . . rats or mice! And why? Some say because of the plague . . . only Europeans were unaware rodents were the source of the plague. Yet certainly infestations of rodents must have destroyed crops and no farmer, let alone housewife, would have liked them anymore than bats or snakes or spiders. St. Gertrude was also invoked with regard to travel (remember the sea monsters), mental illness, gardening and, yes, now cats.
Now, I have worked for an organization where the spiritual father objected when people chose to have pets instead of children. Given the organization is pro-life, he naturally felt couples needed to understand they should be open to life.
But some of us are not married and love our pets. Others also have both pets and children. Animals are wonderful. I have three cats and often bless them to keep them safe from harm. In fact, I’m convinced the dear Lord shows us His love and the beauty of His creation through them each and every day.
Another priest I know, now deceased, said when he died he wanted to be in charge of the “lost pets department” and unite people with their pets from Heaven, saying: “It is so devastating when one loses a dear pet.”
So, let us ask St. Gertrude of Nivelles: Please pray for our souls, our journeys, our mental well-being, and our kitty cats (they’ll take care of the mice). Amen!
