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St.Columban
(in Latin Colombanus)
Columban (sometimes spelt Columba) was born in Leinster (Ireland) around the year 540. He died in 615 in the monastery of Bobbio (Northern Italy), which he had founded. Columban is a very inspiring example of the strong missionary spirit that pervaded the many monasteries scattered all over Europe. Monks were imbued with the missionary spirit of announcing the Gospel to all nations.
St Patrick had come to Ireland from Britain. Now St Columban from Ireland goes to other nations in Europe. Great missionaries were nurtured in the silence, penance and prayer of the convent.
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Historical background
At the time of St Columban, Ireland was already a Catholic country. Almost a hundred years earlier, St Patrick had come from Britain to evangelize Ireland. For 30 years Patrick had evangelized the Celtic people of Ireland. The Celtics had come to Ireland from Central and Western Europe many centuries earlier. After their conversion, the Celtic brought into Irish Christianity many Celtic cultural elements.
The Celtic cross is a clear example of Celtic-Christian culture: the circle is the symbol of the sun in Celtic tradition. The circle and the cross are artistically interconnected.
At the time of St Columban, the Celtic-Christian culture was prevalent in the country. Gaelic was the common language.
Another important feature of Irish Christianity was the monastery. There were hundreds scattered all over the country.
Monasteries played a very important role in the life of Irish Christians, in the missionary work of each local Church and in the Irish society in general.
Between the years 500 and 800, while the rest Europe was in the Dark Ages, Ireland became a great centre of education and scholarship. Scholars from all over Europe traveled to Ireland to study the Bible and theology at the great monastery schools. Ireland became known as the Island of Saints and Scholars.
The monasteries also kept the arts alive.
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Columban’s life
The most ancient biography of St Columban was written by the monk Jonas, who entered the monastery of Bobbio a few years after Columban’ death.
Jonas arrived at the monastery of Bobbio in Northern Italy in 618, just three years after the death of its founder Columban, and he asserted that he had based his account of the great Irish saint on the testimony of persons who had known him intimately. According to Jonas’ records, Columban had a rather difficult adolescence. He was tormented by worldly temptations. The young Columban was encouraged by a woman hermit, who adviced him to leave the world and offer his life to God.
Columban went first to a monk on an island, then to the great monastic seat of learning at Bangor (Northern Ireland).
After many years of seclusion and prayer, at about the age of forty, Columban felt the vocation to leave his country and preach the Gospel to other nations. Columban finally obtained permission from the abbot of the Bangor monastery to travel to Gaul (France) with 12 companion missionaries. A great missionary journey began. The Irish monks won wide respect for the rigor of their discipline, their preaching, and their commitment to charity and religious life in a time characterized by clerical slackness and civil strife.
With the zeal of a prophet, Columban attacked the immoral court life of the Merovingian kings, the lax local clergy, and introduced to the continent the Irish penitential system, which became the basis for the wide use of private confession. Reproving a local king for his immoral life, Columban was expelled from Burgundy and ordered to be repatriated to Ireland. However a great storm at sea impeded the ship to leave port. Columban and his companions continued their mission in Europe. Columban traversed France and Germany, leaving disciples behind to found monasteries, and crossed the Alps to found his most famous monastery at Bobbio in Italy, with the blessing of the king of the Lombards.
He wrote the rules for an austere monastic life.The Monastic Rule of St. Columban is much shorter than that of St. Benedict. It deals with the monks’ obedience, silence, food, poverty, humility, and chastity. In these there is much in common with the Benedictine code, except that the fasting is more rigorous. The Rule of St. Columban was approved by the Church in 627, but it was destined before the close of the century to be superseded by that of St. Benedict. For several centuries in some of the greater monasteries the two rules were observed conjointly.
Colomban died in the monastery of Bobbio.
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St Columban’s legacy
Columban’s evangelization strategy was based on establishing local monasteries, wherever he and his disciples decided to settle in Europe. These monasteries became the vitalizing force of each local Church and at the same time they stood as luminous beacons of learning and culture. The libraries and artifacts of each monastery were renowned all over Europe and eventually the monks became the creators and keepers of a new European culture. It is very amazing (in God’s plan everything is amazing) that almost at the same time, a Persian Christian monk, Alopen was leading the first Christian monks into China. They reached Chang-an in the year 635 and began the first Christian Evangelization in China. At the same time, Buddhist monks were spreading Buddhism all over Asia and were building Buddhist monasteries and religious symbols in each angle of Asia. They were sowing the seed of a unifying culture that would become the soul of Asia.
St Columban is in line with all other great European missionaries, St Patrick, St Boniface, St Remigius, St Augustine, Cyril and Methodius and many others. They are the precursors of a new culture for a new Europe.
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