Innocenzo di Pietro
Francucci da Imola (1494–1548). Martyre de
saint Cassien, vers 1500.
Saint Cassien
Martyr en Emilie (+ v.
300)
Il instruisait les enfants qui ne l'aimaient qu'à moitié à cause des châtiments qu'ils recevaient durant leurs études. Découvert comme chrétien, le gouverneur d'Imola le condamna à mort, donnant ce pouvoir aux enfants. Leur supplice fut cruel, car, à cause de leur faiblesse, ces enfants ne purent le tuer qu'en multipliant des coups maladroits et dans un long espace de temps.
Au Forum de Cornelius [Imola] en Émilie, vers 300, saint Cassien, martyr.
Maître d’école, il avait refusé d’adorer les idoles et fut livré à ses élèves
pour qu’ils le lacèrent à mort avec leurs poinçons, de façon que, plus faibles
étaient leurs mains, plus longue fut la torture du martyr.
Martyrologe romain
SOURCE : http://nominis.cef.fr/contenus/saint/1659/Saint-Cassien.html
Jan Luyken (1649-1712).
Martyre de saint Cassien, Martyrs Mirror.
Saint Cassien
Fête le 13 août
Martyr
Légende de la gravure
Saint Cassien, maître
d’école, est livré à la cruauté de ses élèves, qui le font mourir lentement à
coups de stylet.
Au fond de la cathédrale
d’Imola, à côté du tombeau de saint Pierre Chrysologue, l’illustre archevêque
de Ravenne, s’élève un autre tombeau, dont les vastes proportions attirent
l’attention des visiteurs. Ce monument, que décorent des sculptures d’un grand
mérite, a été restauré par Mastaï Ferretti, évêque d’Imola, qui devait plus
tard occuper le siège pontifical, sous le nom vénéré de Pie IX.
Ce riche mausolée
renferme les reliques d’un confesseur de la Foi, dont les poètes ont chanté le
glorieux martyre, et que l’Eglise honore à la date du 13 août, sous le nom de
saint Cassien.
Saint Cassien, martyrisé
durant la dixième persécution, pour avoir ouvert une école où il enseignait,
avec les règles de la grammaire, les premiers préceptes de la religion
chrétienne ; est le patron des maîtres chrétiens persécutés. On doit donc
l’invoquer avec plus de ferveur à ce moment où Satan prétend s’emparer de
l’enfance, au moyen des écoles sans Dieu. Sa mort glorieuse est un
encouragement et un exemple et elle montre à tous ceux qui ont consacré leur
vie à l’éducation et à la conservation de l’enfance que si, sur la terre, ils
sont parfois en butte au mauvais vouloir et à l’ingratitude des hommes, ils
sont appelés à recevoir la récompense plus solide et plus durable que Dieu ne
refuse pas à ses serviteurs.
Si l’on en croit le
témoignage de certains chroniqueurs, saint Cassien aurait été évêque de Brescia.
Chassé de son siège épiscopal par la persécution, il aurait été obligé de se
retirer à Imola et il aurait ouvert une école, dans cette ville encore païenne.
L’iconographie s’emparant de ces traditions confuses, a souvent représenté le
saint avec les insignes épiscopaux, et la vieille gravure dont nous donnons le
facsimile, fait intervenir un ange qui tient entre ses mains la palme et la
mitre, signe qu’on n’attribue qu’aux pontifes martyrs.
Cependant nous croyons
plus probable que la similitude de nom a fait confondre le martyr d’Imola avec
un autre Cassien, évêque de Brescia, qui lui aussi a subi le martyre durant la
persécution de Dioclétien.
Quelle que soit l’opinion
que l’on adopte, le saint voyant que, malgré toutes les prédications, le peuple
d’Imola restait obstinément attaché au culte des idoles, résolut de sauver au
moins les âmes des enfants, et, dans ce but, il ouvrit une école.
Sa réputation de
grammairien attira autour de lui une grande affluence de disciples et le
maître, dont tout le monde vantait la science et le dévouement, put bientôt
exercer un sérieux apostolat en inculquant avec les préceptes de la rhétorique
les premières vérités de la Foi.
Cependant l’œuvre de
l’éducation ne peut point s’accomplir sans labeur et sans fatigue, et, dans
l’exercice de ses fonctions, le professeur eut à éprouver bien des difficultés
de la part de son auditoire. Bien souvent il se vit contraint de recourir aux
réprimandes et aux punitions, et ces mesures de rigueur soulevèrent contre lui
la foule des paresseux et des mauvais écoliers.
Impatient de s’affranchir
d’un joug insupportable, ceux-ci résolurent de se débarrasser d’un maître
qu’ils trouvaient trop sévère, et à l’instigation des instituteurs païens, dont
les écoles avaient été désertées, ils n’hésitèrent pas à ourdir un abominable
complot contre le saint.
A ce moment, des édits de
persécution venaient d’être portés contre les chrétiens, et sur tous les points
de l’empire les disciples du Christ, pourchassés comme des bêtes fauves,
étaient condamnés aux plus cruels supplices.
Les écoliers, jaloux de
satisfaire leurs mesquines vengeances, ne refusèrent pas de jouer le rôle
infâme de délateurs et, se portant en foule au tribunal, ils accusèrent leur
maître de professer la religion chrétienne.
Cette seule dénomination
équivalait à un arrêt de mort.
Le proconsul qui avait
exécuté dans toute leur rigueur les édits de persécutions, jugea que la prison,
les chevalets, les verges, les tourments ordinaires ne suffiraient pas à faire
expier à Cassien le crime qu’on lui reprochait. Voyant l’acharnement que
mettaient ces enfants à poursuivre le saint, il imagina un nouveau supplice
dont la seule description fait frémir d’épouvante.
Par son ordre, Cassien
est attaché dans l’école même où il donnait ses leçons à des disciples
indociles, et ceux mêmes qui se sont faits ses accusateurs sont appelés à
remplir l’office de bourreau. Et comme les instruments qu’on a l’habitude
d’employer pour torturer les autres condamnés ne prolongeraient pas assez le
supplice, on arme les mains encore débiles des écoliers, du stylet dont ils se
servent pour transcrire les leçons du professeur, et on les jette sur leur
maître, enchaîné et impuissant.
La gravure que nous avons
reproduite dépeint cette scène dans toute son horreur. Les écoliers excités par
les sicaires du proconsul s’acharnent avec une joie sauvage sur le maître,
qu’ils n’ont plus à redouter, et ils se font un plaisir de cribler son corps de
blessures.
Le saint en butte aux
outrages et aux coups de cette vengeance sans pitié voit couler son sang goutte
à goutte, ses forces s’épuisent, son courage seul ne faiblit point, son visage
conserve toujours la même expression de douceur, de tristesse, et de
résignation ; et le maître, déplorant l’égarement de ceux qui ont si mal
profité de son enseignement, se console de l’ingratitude qu’il rencontre sur
cette terre en pensant à la gloire immortelle qui l’attend dans les cieux.
SOURCE : http://viedessaints.free.fr/vds/cassien.html
Adam Baldauf. Saint Cassien, bois polychrome,
vers 1620
Also
known as
Cassiano
Profile
Schoolmaster at Imola, Italy who taught hand-writing,
and sometimes talked about Christianity.
During one of the imperial persecutions he
was ordered to sacrifice to pagan gods;
he refused. He was turned over to his pagan students who
were ordered to execute him;
they did. Martyr.
tied to a post, tortured and stabbed
to death with iron styles, the device used as a pencil on wax tablets,
at Imola, Italy c.304
buried in
the catacombs in Rome, Italy
a sepulchre was built
over his place of burial later
in the 4th
century
in the 5th
century, a basilica was built in
place of the sepulchre
relics transferred
to the crypt of
the cathedral in Imola in 1175
relics enshrined in
a silver and copper reliquary in Imola c.1405
from 1577 to 1914,
the relics were
annually processed through Imola
some relics (4
pieces of the post to which he was tied) transferred to Bressanone, Italy in 1684
Bolzano-Bressanone,
Italy, diocese of
in Italy
writing instruments
Additional
Information
Book
of Saints, by the Monks of
Ramsgate
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of the Saints, by Father Alban
Butler
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of the Saints, by Father Francis
Xavier Weninger
books
Our Sunday Visitor’s Encyclopedia of Saints
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sites in english
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en español
Martirologio Romano, 2001 edición
fonti
in italiano
Martirologio Romano, 2005 edition
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i norsk
MLA
Citation
“Saint Cassian of
Imola“. CatholicSaints.Info. 17 February 2022. Web. 2 June 2022.
<http://catholicsaints.info/saint-cassian-of-imola/>
SOURCE : http://catholicsaints.info/saint-cassian-of-imola/
.jpg)
Gaspar Bouttats (1625–1703). Cassianus
van Imola, 10.5 x 8.6, Thijs Collection (University of Antwerp), University
Library of Antwerp: Special Collections
Weninger’s
Lives of the Saints – Saint Cassian, Martyrs
Article
On the same day, though
at another place, Saint Cassian suffered a martyrdom of unprecedented cruelty.
This saint, was bishop of Brescia, but had been banished from his See on
account of his faith. He intended to go to Rome and offer the Pope his services
for the salvation of souls in some other place. On his way, he changed his
mind, and taking up his residence at Imola, a town in Italy, he resolved to
teach children to read and write, hoping that occasion would not be wanting to
do good. In this apparently humble position, he was no less zealous than he had
been in the administration of his diocese. He taught the children with love and
gentleness, and endeavored to inspire them with respect for the Christian
faith, fear and horror of sin, and love of virtue and piety. He continued in
this occupation with great zeal for some years, to the great benefit of young
and old, when suddenly a terrible persecution of the Christians arose. He was
one of the first who were taken prisoners. The tyrant commanded him to
sacrifice to the gods. The holy bishop and teacher refused, as might have been
expected, and tried to convince the judge of his fearful blindness in
worshipping dumb idols or making gods of godless men. The tyrant, furious at
his arguments, ordered the executioners to strip him of his clothes and tie his
hands behind his back, and leave him exposed to the mercy of the children whom
he had taken such pains to teach. The children, who had been taught that
Cassian was a magician and consequently must die a most painful death, took
their sharp iron pencils with which, in those days, they wrote upon their wax
tablets, and pierced him with them till the blood ran profusely from his veins.
This torture lasted long and was extremely painful. The saint, however, never
complained of the ingratitude of his pupils, nor gave a sign of impatience, but
praised and thanked the Lord until his soul went to Heaven to receive the crown
of martyrdom.
Practical Considerations
Saint Cassius especially
endeavored to impress three moral points upon the minds of his pupils; esteem
for the true faith, horror for sin, and love of virtue and piety. Oh! that all
parents and teachers would try to impress these sentiments deeply upon the
hearts of their children and pupils! How different our youth would be! But
these points should be recommended to the consideration of those also who are
past the age of youth. Whoever you are, esteem the true faith above all things;
for, it is a priceless grace that the Almighty has not permitted you to be born
in Judaism or idolatry, but has granted you that faith without which there is
no salvation. Fear and abhor sin more than any other evil; for, it can do you
more harm than any other. Sin alone can make you eternally unhappy. Love virtue
and piety; for, “godliness is,” according to the Apostle, “profitable to all
things.” (1st Timothy 4) Without virtue we cannot go to Heaven. “Vainly does he
desire to obtain the heavenly glories, who is not adorned with virtue. Virtue
is the road to glory. Through virtue we attain eternal honor and joy,” writes
Saint Bernard.
MLA
Citation
Father Francis Xavier
Weninger, DD, SJ. “Saint Cassian, Martyrs”. Lives
of the Saints, 1876. CatholicSaints.Info.
2 April 2018. Web. 2 June 2022.
<https://catholicsaints.info/weningers-lives-of-the-saints-saint-cassian-martyrs/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/weningers-lives-of-the-saints-saint-cassian-martyrs/
Paul
Troger (1698–1762). Die Marter des heiligen Cassian, 1751-1753,
75 x 45, Belvedere
August 13
St. Cassian, Martyr
HE was a Christian
schoolmaster, and taught children to read and write, at Imola, 1 a
city twenty-seven miles from Ravenna in Italy. A violent persecution being
raised against the church, probably that of Decius or Valerian, or according to
some, that of Julian, he was taken up, and interrogated by the governor of the
province. As he constantly refused to sacrifice to the gods, the barbarous
judge having informed himself of what profession he was, commanded that his own
scholars should stab him to death with their iron writing pencils, called
styles; for at that time it was the custom for scholars to write upon wax laid
on a board of boxen wood, in which they formed the letters with an iron style
or pencil, sharp at one end, but blunt and smooth at the other, to erase what
was to be effaced or corrected. 2 They
also often wrote on boxen wood itself, as St. Ambrose mentions. 3 The
smaller the instruments were, and the weaker the executioners, the more
lingering and cruel was this martyr’s death. He was exposed naked in the midst
of two hundred boys; among whom some threw their tablets, pencils, and
penknives at his face and head, and often broke them upon his body; others cut
his flesh or stabbed him with their penknives, and others pierced him with
their pencils, sometimes only tearing the skin and flesh, and sometimes raking
in his very bowels. Some made it their barbarous sport to cut part of their
writing-task in his tender skin. Thus, covered with his own blood, and wounded
in every part of his body, he cheerfully bade his little executioners not to be
afraid; and to strike him with greater force; not meaning to encourage them in
their sin, but to express the ardent desire he had to die for Christ. He was
interred by the Christians at Imola, where afterwards his relics were honoured
with a rich mausolæum. Prudentius tells us, that in his journey to Rome, he
visited this holy martyr’s tomb, and prostrate before it implored the divine
mercy for the pardon of his sins with many tears. He mentions a moving picture
of the saint’s martyrdom hanging over the altar, representing his cruel death
in the manner he has recorded it in verse. He exhorts all others with him to
commend their petitions to this holy martyr’s patronage, who fails not to hear
pious supplications. 4 See
Prudent. de Cor. hym. 9 de S. Cassiano, p. 203. His sacred remains are
venerated in a rich shrine at Imola in the cathedral. See Manzorius, J. U. D.
et Canonicus Imolensis in Hist. Episcoporum Imolens. an 1719, and Bosch the
Bollandist, t. 3, Aug. p. 16. 5
Note 1. Imola was
anciently called Forum Cornelii from its founder Cornelius Sylla. [back]
Note 2. See Weitzii
Notæ in Prud. hic. p. 605. Casaubon. in Suet. p. 58. Echard. in Symbolis, p.
536, &c. from Cicero, &c. The most ancient manner of writing was a kind
of engraving, whereby the letters were formed in tablets of lead, wood, wax, or
like materials. This was done by styles made of iron, brass, or bone. Instead
of such tablets, leaves of papyrus, a weed which grew on the banks of the Nile,
(also of the Ganges,) were used first in Egypt; afterwards parchment, made of
fine skins of beasts, was invented at Pergamum. Lastly, paper was invented,
which is made of linen cloth. Books anciently written only on one side, were
done up in rolls, and when opened or unfolded, filled a whole room, as Martial
complains; but when written on both sides on square leaves, were reduced to
narrow bounds, as the same poet observes. See Mabillon De Re Diplomaticâ,
and Calmet, Diss. sur les Livres des Anciens, et les diverses Manières
d’Ecrire, t. 7, p. 31. &c. [back]
Note 3. Hexaëmer. l.
3, c. 13. [back]
Note 4.
Audit, crede, preces
martyr prosperrimus omnes
Ratasque reddet quas
videt probabiles.”
v. 97
[back]
Note 5. Baronius
justly rejects the false legends which pretend that St. Cassian was banished
from Sabiona, now Siben, a small ancient town in Tirol, in Germany, where these
legends suppose the bishopric to have been originally placed, which, from the
sixth century, is fixed at Brixen, a small city in the same province of Tirol,
suffragan to Trent. Rubeus, the historian of Ravenna, confounds Brixen with Brescia
in Lombardy. See the false acts of St. Cassian, published by Roschman, imperial
librarian at Ins, who endeavours to defend their veracity in making him bishop
of Siben; but he might be titular saint of the cathedral of Brixen without
having been bishop or native of that country. See Vindiciæ Martyrologii Romani
de S. Cassiano. Veronæ, 1751, 4to. [back]
Rev. Alban
Butler (1711–73). Volume VIII: August. The Lives of the
Saints. 1866.
SOURCE : http://www.bartleby.com/210/8/132.html
Sculpture
de Saint Cassien d’Imola. Annasäule, Innsbruck
Detail
of the Annasäule in Innsbruck, showing the sculpture of Cassian of Imola.
Statue
von Kassian auf der Annasäule in Innsbruck.
St. Cassian of Imola,
Martyr
Biography of St. Cassian of Imola, Martyr
Died: August 13, 302-303 AD, Imola, Italy
Patron of Imola (Italy), Mexico City, schoolteachers, shorthand-writers, parish clerks
Feast Day, August 13
The Christians of the
first few centuries were, for the most part, ordinary people. They lived in a
church that came of age in a period of political unrest and religious
persecution. The times called for heroism and sanctity. Ordinary people did
extraordinary things.
Cassian was such a
person. He was a layman and schoolmaster in Imola, a town approximately
equidistant between Bologna and Ravenna in northeastern Italy. Tradition says
that he was part of the Christian community of Imola. During a
persecution, Cassian was turned over to the civil authorities. His
martyrdom most likely occurred during the terrible persecutions of Emperor
Diocletion in the early 4th Century. Knowledge and devotion of his
martyrdom did not spread through the church until later.
Tradition provides us
with the manner of his death: after being found guilty of the “crime” of
being a Christian, and steadfastly refusing to sacrifice to idols, Cassian was
condemned to death. It seems that the judge had a sadistic streak. Cassian was
to be killed by his former students by being stabbed to death with their styli,
the metal pens used to inscribe letters on tablets of wax, lead, or wood.
Recent evidence taken from his remains verify this method of execution.
It is believed that the saint suffered for days before finally receiving
the crown of martyrdom.
The feast day of St.
Cassian has been celebrated on the 13th of August since late in the IV century.
In iconography, he is pictured sitting (a traditional pose for a teacher) and
holding a book (again, a symbol for a teacher) and a palm branch (a symbol of
the victory of martyrdom). Often, his killers, school-aged children, are
depicted, circling him with their instruments of death.
SOURCE : http://stcassianchurchuppermontclair.org/st-cassian-of-imola/
.jpg)
St. Cassian of Imola
One day the poet Aurelio
Prudencio went to Rome . It is in the early fifth century On his way to the
imperial capital stops at the Forum Cornelius, Imola today . Take a heavy heart
, because the solution of business, purpose of travel , perhaps depends the
security of your future and your family. profoundly Christian spirit , is urged
to commend the Redeemer and goes to pray in a church. Kneels before the tomb of
the martyr Cassian, whose relics are venerated there, and sinks into deep
prayer. A prayer is a count contrite sins and sufferings. When , in tears, he
lifts his eyes to heaven , his eye is caught in the contemplation of a painting
of vivid colors. We see in him the image of a naked man , covered with wounds
and blood, his skin torn by a thousand sites. In a crowd of kids around wield
against him exalted school instruments and strive to stab him in the flesh
lacerated and stilettos used to write. Moved by this tragic poet pictorial
vision , which certainly is a move of its own internal tearing , asked the
sexton of the church for its meaning. This , perhaps with the usual indifferent
voice , explains that the painting depicts the martyrdom of St. Cassian, and
tells the history and details of his death much earlier and witnessed by
documents. Concludes by recalling that he subscribes to their pleas if you have
any need, because the martyr gives gracious he considers worthy of being heard.
Prudencio do so and check the veracity of the words of the clerk, because his
business in Rome is resolved satisfactorily. Returning to Spain, composed in
honor of St. Cassian, as a votive offering of thanks , a beautiful hymn, which
is the ninth of his Peristephanon. It explains the history of his trip to Rome
and puts on the lips of the sexton 's story of the martyrdom of Saint.
Certainly the words of the sexton , despite the tone of sufficiency that could
have, must have been simpler . But a poet Prudentius . It is the most sublime
singer of the Christian martyrs. His spirit leaves his take on the wings of god
and of his enthusiasm. And it gives us a splendid poetic- dramatic version.
Cassian was a school teacher . A stern and effective teacher , according to
this interpretation. Teach your children the rudiments of grammar, while a special
art : the shorthand , the art of signs to condense in a few words. He is
accused of being a Christian . And the occurrence malignant persecutors are
putting into the hands of the same children , his disciples, to die tormented
by them, and that the instruments of martyrdom are the same as that used to be
worth to learn. These circumstances, with all its dramatic, are exploited by
the poet to highlight the cruelty of the martyrdom: "Some will throw the
fragile tablets and break them in your head , the wood chips, leaving the
forehead wound . I hit the bloody cheek with waxed tablets, and small blood wet
page to the coup. Other brandishing their punches. .. For some parts is drilled
, the martyr of Jesus Christ , for others it is torn , some kneel to the depths
of the bowels , others amuse themselves tear the skin . All members, including
hands , were a thousand needles, and a thousand drops blood flow at the time of
each member. verduguito More cruel was amused to sail on the surface of meat
that you kneel down to the bottom of the bowels." The reader is shaken ,
not so much torment in herself to see them come from whom they come : the
children and disciples. But the poet seems carried in the arms of a tragic fire
. He delights in picturing the state of mind of the young executioners,
imagining a horrible malice filled with an air of sarcasm: "Why are you
crying?" asks one, " yourself, teacher, gave us these irons and you
put together our hands. Look, I 've done more than return the thousands of
letters we get up and crying in your school. No airarte because you have reason
to write in your body, you yourself commanded : never be down the stylus in
hand. I do not ask you , maestro cheap , holidays we always negabas . Now we
like to tap with the style and draw parallels grooves to others, and weaving in
the chain dashed lines . You can amend asoplados in long lines tiramira , if I
have missed the hand unfaithful. Exercise your authority, you are entitled to
punish the guilty if any of your students has been slow in trace his
features." Hard to imagine so much treachery in the tender hearts of
children. Prudentius seems to have sensed , that's why before has given us
explanations for this attitude , as if to justify or at least motivate:
"It is known that the master is always intolerable to the young scholar ,
and that the subjects are always unbearable for the kids ... the kids love it
greatly to the same severe master is the scorn of the disciples whom held in
harsh discipline . However, despite these reasons , our heart is overwhelmed .
And it sings Prudencio , especially here, the horrific cruelty of the martyrdom
. Absorbed perhaps only by the impressive realism of the picture, and
transported on the wings of its tragic force , there has been more than the pile
of multiplying indefinitely pains on the body of the martyr. And around this
axis has built in concentric circles , the magical unity of his poem: buy pain
scale because some children are angry , children are exacerbated because they
feel a black pleasure in revenge for the severity of the teacher. There is no
doubt that this provision helps intimate grandeur of the poem, and,
consequently, the martyr. But do not be carried away the poet by the desire of
exaggeration? First, with regard to children . It is true that in the human
heart who long hidden resentments in exceptional cases. It is true that there
may exist , which undoubtedly exist in the hearts of children . The image of
childhood innocence does not absorb all the creases of shadow. It is likely
therefore that in the circumstances of this martyrdom dammed overwhelms the
dark forces of goodness all docks . Add to this the pressure exerted by the
cheerleader and the strong presence of the court mandate persecutor, and the
ease of contamination of the collective fury . But even so , one is reluctant
to generalize. Is it possible that all the children were possessed by the
diabolical fury , that none of them had even a glimmer of compassion, strength,
tears? Second, compared with the same teacher. The image gives us Prudencio St.
Cassian as a teacher , is not too severe ? They are full of edges sharply
features : "Many times the hard precepts and the stark face had stirred
anger and fear their prepubescent children." Of course , sometimes have
had to take the seriousness and even punishment. But always? Was it just the
giant enemy, stunning to the smallness and inability of the weak children? Do
not be differentiated precisely by its quality -minded Christian love, a
greater smoothness of the current in the other schools ? Would have exceeded ,
no doubt, ever , drawn by anger or impatience. Who does not ? And it's so easy
in those who rule this outburst of sufficiency, that can not stand being beaten
by the insolence or worth of subordinates ! But , no doubt , in times of prayer
and humble recognition of sin would have taken the impetus for a sweeter deal ,
more paternal, more loving. In addition, and above all, we noticed , in the
beautiful hymn of Prudentius, that we lack something: the soul of Cassian. The
inner attitude of your mind in trance painful martyrdom. The poet , obsessed by
the body lacerated by the blood bubbling seething , broken through the skin
into a thousand tears , has cheated the source. This rich store hidden in the
depths of being, receptacle of all impressions and source of all strength. Only
once put into the mouth of Cassian all impressions and source of all strength.
"Be brave , I pray , and to overcome the few years with your efforts ,
that mitigates the ferocity what is lacking in age." But this is not just
a piece of mind : the tip of the heroic spirit that beats in the chest of the
martyr. And it is used only as a grace note for the exaltation of the external.
There must be more. The martyr was bound to see the children . A swarm of angry
wasps struggling to cleave in the softness of her flesh the sharp spear of the
stings . A confused uproar , a lot of curling hair , a forest of hands , tender
hands , agitated , a flaming eyes, thousands of eyes to multiply in this
frenetic dance . Also some hands reluctant , hesitant , shyly hiding, and some
moist eyes , trembling , frightened, grieving ... And I could not but see in
the children to their disciples. Were they the same who was devoting his
patience, his knowledge , his life. All there. Would force to scroll through
them one by one? That , the complexion bruna , how expressively recited Homer,
that other , whose tiny hand was often rebellious teacher guide on the wax
tablet , and one that made him spend so patiently until he learned the Greek
declensions and it over here, the concentrated , now half the punch wielded in
secret , but with deep thuds , and the other , the mischievous red-faced , the
worst hit , but not the least wanted , and this little boy , who participated
in the killing as a game ... And one and another and another. All
waves would pass in quick by the imagination of the teacher , their faces ,
their souls, their names as known and so often repeated in a thousand different
shades. Perhaps the moans that escaped from the lips of the martyr , but names
were not students , delivered quietly with an air of surprise, complaint , with
palpitations last agridulzura. And this whirl of names and faces, in the
prolongation of his agony , had to be to the teacher tormented as a mirror that
reflected her life, efforts , hopes , joys, failures. Days filled with the most
monotonous routine , moments of desperate sense of futility , gusts of anger or
helplessness , minutes nitidísima full of joy, impatience , tears , voices compelling
, persuasive words , multiplying through generations of kids who spent their
hands as shapeless and out of them with a light on in the front. Everything for
this failure lead to the end : being killed slowly by them to which he had
striven to educate for righteousness and love. Although it was this indeed a
failure? Humanly , indeed. But it was through this torment as Cassian getting
their true glory. Because this was not the end , the horrific death and
discouraging. The final was beyond the frontier of death in a field that opened
with clear horizons of peace. The target that this arrow was directed sore meat
was the same God. Only God gave meaning to his death , as he had given meaning
to his life. Therefore we can not believe that the soul of Cassian was absent
of God in this terrible time. necessarily had to be anchored in Him Every beat
of his veins, every groan from his throat , every thought of his mind would be
an aspiration and a prayer to the Lord. The same move from their imagination
for faces and hands , and names, and days, have their echoes in God. He could
not be summarized in a concise synthesis of grace and fervor , of sin and
contrition, droughts and efforts, the journey of his life to the Father's
house. What about pain? These sharp pains now, which followed one another
helter-skelter , leaving no room to breathe, was already a prayer force of
blood. Cassian and receive a sense of the Holocaust. And the Redeemer humbly
offer as compensation for the trail of shadows , including flashing lights ,
leave the man on earth. And remember Jesus died on Calvary. That mob of kids in
a crazed dance looking for his body suggest that other imposing mass of Jews
shouting insults thundered in the ears of the Cross. Those were the people of
God. These were the family of the teacher. And , just as Christ prayed to the
Father for his executioners , Casiano ask for their children , that God would
forgive them , they did not know what they were doing, that he really wanted ,
that God will cleanse their souls from the deep black crack open for this
crime, that transforms , that he gave his own sacrifice for them, that ... And,
also like Jesus , he put his spirit into the hands of the Father. A breath
ending that was born from the bottom and dragged him into the bosom of God. Not
that I wanted to break with life, with this his final failure, as he pulled to
the shoulder of the road litter or unpleasant , the tearing of clothing. No.
The same failure -which his martyrdom was human failure , " was what he
wanted to take , as the last sip of the bitter cup , and with it at the very
tip of the lips, go up to God, to the glory which he was inviolable : the
Father's heart. And so deliver his soul. Prudencio tells us these beautiful ,
naive words: "Finally , pity the martyr Christ from heaven , send to untie
the bonds of the chest, and cuts off the painful delays and ties of life,
leaving all their hiding expedited . The blood, following the paths open vein
since his close source, leaving the heart , and soul longing came out all the
holes in the fibers of the body shot." Is it so complete and the image of
St. Cassian ? The poet Prudentius has described with a masterful sense of
realism and dramatic physical torture of the martyr and the children's
animosity raging . We have tried to get closer to your soul. It is a bold
daring, though rarely as reasonably credible as here. In fact, what we know
about Saint Cassian can be reduced to a mere assertions : that was a school
teacher , expert in shorthand , who died at the hands of his disciples, and
that certainly happened on martyrdom under the persecution of Diocletian
(303-304) . But it is lawful for a man 's adventure to understand man.
Moreover, human. And when done with respect and justice , despite all risks,
gets to the heart of reality with greater precision , perhaps, that a plethora
of raw data. In the narrative of history and martyrdom of Saint Cassian
Prudencio has also drawn a conclusion. A very simple conclusion , but
deliciously comforting : that the martyr 's prayers heard gracious men's
troubled heart . For us, after that, we would be sufficient to us rather
timidly ventured - course - in the lake inside the human soul, and at a time of
such deep resonances , when the waters of being are all shaken by a tremor of
full decision. We suffice with this, because it moves , deepens and purifies
our own being. And if we are not satisfied with this essential purification ,
we can still derive a long trail lesson practice. Cassian of Imola was not
tormented by having fulfilled its mission of teaching bad , or the rebellion of
the children and their relentless desire to murder was a direct blast , but
caused by a fire fueled from outside. However, the reality of his death meant
to him the wound in the most painful. In his martyrdom there was nothing knew
to human satisfaction . What other martyrs gives them a certain aura of land -
the heroic victors , with a haughty bearing , upright facing the same challenge
to the judges or executioners are here ...- overshadowed . For Cassian, after
refusing to sacrifice to idols, and not before a tyrant who rebuke , against
whom he said , but their children, their dear students , their fragile
children. Against what opposing force strength? It remains only to let go ,
conquer, destroy, sink. And here's the lesson. The open book of this martyrdom
God teaches us how to climb up to him, hurt us in the dearest , sweeping a
breath of our most cherished illusions, sink into the appearance of futility,
hoisted the flag of our individual failure. And perhaps not all that blood, in
the pure vulgarity of anonymity. Although this would not be an excuse for
discouragement , but one reason for total determination to fight , while for an
active and vital offering. And that until the end. That end is only in God's
hands and they always run the hands of God. The relics of St. Cassian is
venerated in the cathedral of the Italian town of Imola , which prides itself
with its sponsorship. Honored first in a basilica, were taken to the cathedral
, recently built in the thirteenth century, and then encased in a lead box and
placed under the crypt in the center of the sanctuary, the Cathedral restored
in 1704.
References: Catholic.Net
SOURCE : http://aesaintsoftheday.blogspot.ca/2010/08/st-cassian-of-imola.html
Saint
Cassian in the parish church of Bula Gherdëina.
Holzgeschnitzte Statue des Hl. Kassian(Vinazer Schule) in der Pfarrkirche von Pufels Gröden. Das Gebäude steht unter Denkmalschutz.
A Patron Saint of
Teachers
Mar 3, 2009
On Essays and Letters
“Your total ignorance of
that which you profess to teach merits the death penalty. I doubt whether you
would know that St. Cassian of Imola was stabbed to death by his students with
their styli. His death, a martyr’s honorable one, made him a patron saint of
teachers.”
Ignatius Reilly, in John Kennedy Toole’s
A Confederacy of Dunces
As the second semester
begins, ’tis well to think of the lot of the teacher. I had not known that
there was a “patron saint” of teachers. And if there was one, I presumed, at
least for the college and graduate crowd, that it was Thomas Aquinas. But
Aquinas, even though he spent a good deal of time dealing with beginners, is
usually considered the patron of the more heady philosophical types. We know
that Aquinas was not a martyr, even though he died rather young at 49, leaving
several unfinished works, including the famous Summa Theologiae.
So, in early 2008, when I
returned to Washington after Christmas from California, I wanted a book to read
on Alaska Airline Flight No. 6 from LAX to Reagan National. I was at my niece’s
who lives some twenty minutes from LAX. Among the books on her shelves, I
spotted John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces, a title from Swift.
I began to read this novel last summer but only covered a few pages. My good
niece let me have it to read on the five hour flight to D.C. Since the
Introduction was by Walker Percy, I figured it would be a pretty good read.
Somewhere over the
eastern United States, I came to the passage that I cited above, about St.
Cassian of Imola, the patron of teachers. Needless to say, I had not heard of
St. Cassian before, at least not this one. As I recall, another Cassian, a
medieval abbot, wrote something called The Spiritual Meadow. So I looked
up Cassian of Imola (a town near Ravenna) on Google. I found a reference to his
Feast Day, August 13, from Butler’s Lives of the Saints.
Cassian comes from the
time of Julian the Apostate, in the fourth century or so. It seems that the
Emperor had ordered all teachers to take an oath to the local gods, which
Cassian, good Christian that he was, refused to do. (Our modern teachers have
to take an oath that they will not refer to any gods, pagan or Christian,
something known as “cultural evolution.”) Roman soldiers who were Christian had
the same problem. It was a local form of swearing loyalty to the state, which
was identified with the gods. It seemed like state-supported blasphemy, which
it was.
Cassian was evidently a
pious professor and refused to make such an oath. Whereupon, the local
magistrate promptly decided to make an example of him. Cunning man that he was,
the official involved the man’s own students in his punishment. The students,
not having finished the course, evidently had no problem with this strange form
of justice. Cassian was stripped and tied to a post. From whence, his
students, mindful of the man’s punishments for their own scholarly laxities,
drew their iron styli, pens used to mark on wax tablets, and stabbed the man to
death.
So, here we have it. A
Christian teacher was stabbed to death, under orders, by his own students with
their own writing instruments in the name of the state for refusing to offer
sacrifices to pagan gods. Today we have a more cruel punishment.We do not grant
tenure to such stubborn types! But what could be a more graphic example for the
scholarly vocation! One shudders to think of the lessons that students may draw
from this account of how to deal with teachers!
In recording this
remarkable history, the famous Butler, who wrote all their lives, laconically
remarks that “There is no record of his (St. Cassian’s) becoming a patron of
teachers in spite of his pre-eminent qualifications for the role.” Well, from
now on, he is my man. Recently, I decided to forbid computers from being used
in my classes. But, so far, I have seen no indication of my good students
rising to bludgeon Schall to death with their laptops because he would not let
them type letters to their friends during class. Ever since Ignatius Reilly referred
to him, I have had a special devotion to St. Cassian of Imola, patron of
teachers. It is probably worth noting that the “dunces” to whom Jonathan Swift
referred were no doubt all of high academic standing.
* * *
Actually, the patron
saint of professors seems to be the late medieval scholar St. John Cantius. But
I did discover that there is also a patron saint for “liars and fakes,” for
“mediocrity,” for “hand-gunners,” and that even Harry Potter is listed as a
patron saint. We academics can piously hope, of course, that a patron saint of
teachers or professors is not interchangeable with one for “liars and fakes” or
“mediocrity.” The needof an armed professorate sometimes comes up, as the case
of the Virginia Tech student killings might intimate, but for the most part we
prefer our professors to be “unarmed.”
The flip side of this
“unarmed professorship” is Machiavelli’s “unarmed prophet.” The most dangerous
people are not necessarily those with guns, but those with odd ideas. Before
anyone goes to college or graduate school, he should realize this simple fact.
Machiavelli himself was an “unarmed prophet,” much more dangerous in that
capacity than he ever would have been, if, following his own advice, he dressed
in armor and rode a charger through the streets of Florence, yelling “To Arms,
To Arms!”
The second semester of
the academic year begins after the Christmas holidays. Most universities are
not allowed to use that term “Christmas Holidays,” though they still use the
term “Holiday” even though it really means “holy day.” But they may not know
that. The theology of it is that you cannot really have a “holiday” if you do
not also have a “holy day.”
At the beginning of the
second semester, students who are seniors begin to realize that “this is it.”
They become a bit nostalgic while, at the same time, furiously interviewing for
jobs or applying to law schools. Freshmen are, by now, used to the place. They
know where the dining halls are, the library, the class rooms, the ball fields,
probably the local bars. They also have met new friends so that they no longer
miss home or high school friends quite as much. They have also taken the
measure of teachers and have heard the opinions of upperclassmen about the
rest.
Sophomores and juniors
are probably the best students during this period. They have usually learned to
discipline themselves enough to do the work they are expected to accomplish.
One of the main impediments to college learning is indeed lack of personal
discipline, and even more, lack of what used to be called morals. To learn
something, we have to be free to do so. We need especially to be free from
ourselves, from the notion that what “I want” is the most important thing about
us. The great adventure of learning begins the day we realize that there
is something I really would like to know. I like to add, with Aristotle,
“really would like to know for its own sake.”
There is a view of
college that it is something to “prepare us for employment.” From the time a
young student reaches high school, and even worse, college, he is bombarded
with the perennial questions, “What do you want to study?” or “What do you want
to do with your life to make a living?” Now, I do not disdain such questions.
We really need to make a living someday. The image of the “impractical”
professor advising the “impractical” student to plan for an “impractical” life
is amusing. Student princes who want always to stay in school are likewise
worrisome. Actually, if we read Plato, as we will do this semester in my
classes, this suspicion about the nuttiness of academics is generally the
common man’s view of what goes on in college.
The other, greater,
danger in college is ideology. Almost every other talk of the Holy Father
mentions “relativism.” The pope is an academic man and knows of what he speaks.
Christopher Derrick once spent a year at Thomas Aquinas College in its early
days. He went home and wrote a book, which is now republished by Ignatius
Press, with the marvelous title: Escape from Scepticism: Liberal Education
as if the Truth Really Mattered. That title pretty much says it all. I am a
great admirer of good titles.
This title is mindful of
the remark that Allan Bloom made in his Closing of the American Mind that
every professor, when entering any classroom in the “best” universities, can
assume that all the students before him are already relativists. Actually, I
have found over the years with my students, and I have had many, that they are
tempted both by relativism and by truth. They are likely already to know the
case for the former, but are surprised and often pleased if a case for the
latter can be made, which it can. This latter is why the reading of Aristotle
is so important. He is the one that tells us, in the most laconic way possible,
that our problem with what is, with what is true, is not just a question of
knowledge. It begins in the question of how we live, with virtue.
* * *
Thus, to go back to the
second semester, to students who are probably ready to return from their homes,
with a faint realization already that they have already left their father’s
home, not in the sense that they are not welcome there, but in the sense they
have to find their own way in the world. Wendell Berry often points out what a
dangerous thing it is for a family today to send a child to college. Jennifer
Roback Morse’s lecture “Toward
Organic Feminism,” which she gave at the Newman Club at the University of
Colorado, spells out much the same thing. Her books, Love and Economics and Smart
Sex are not to be missed. But I mention these sources here to remind us
that we belong to a heritage that takes a real family—husband, wife,
children—seriously and that understands that intelligence is also what the
faith is about.
Second semester at
Georgetown is basketball season, lacrosse season, baseball season, track
season, rowing and sailing season. At Boston College and the University of
North Dakota, where I was last fall, it is hockey season. I remember early last
semester I ran into a young girl on campus who was in one of my classes. She
was on some team, field hockey, I think, or soccer. I asked her how many hours
the coach expected of her each day. “Something like three or four.” I said to
her, with some envy, “I wish professors could demand such hours!”
But let me conclude with
this point. Students are not in college to “prepare” for some technique or
craft, even the medical or legal crafts. In a sense, as the pope implied in the
Regensburg Lecture, they are here for no purpose at all but to know, and
know the truth on the grounds which truth can be known. We have on this
campus about 20 outside lectures a day from national and international figures.
These are distractions, for the most part. Students are not here this time of
their lives to find out about current events. And if that is what they do while
in the university, that is all they will know. They will have missed the
important things while pursuing the ephemeral ones.
Now I am not opposed to
“ephemeral” things. This is largely what my book, The Sum Total of Human
Happiness, was about. The whole is in the part. But we need time and space to
find it. We need conversation and purpose. We need to read, but to read what
tells us the truth. We need what Aristotle called theorein, to
contemplate.
But before we can do this, to go back to the “greatest
game ever played,” we have to find that spark in our soul that knows the
relation between what we can and cannot do in this world. We
need to put the world in its proper place, and us in it and beyond it. We need
to have a taste for the transcendent. We need really to acknowledge that we
have restless hearts and souls and why. No undergraduate on leaving school in
the springtime is really old enough to know fully what goes on within him.
Plato, who insisted on this point, was right here.
Still, and this is what
makes undergraduate teaching one of the great human adventures, minds become
alert before your very eyes. Souls long. Nothing less than the truth will
satisfy. This life is not enough, but it is where we all begin because it is
where we are.
A student gave me a copy
of David Michaelis’s Schulz and Peanuts for Christmas. As Ioften do,
I find ultimate things in Charlie Brown. On page 192, there is an early
cartoon. It shows Schroeder and Charlie sitting on a stoop. Schroeder says,
“Guess what I am whistling, Charlie Brown.” He then proceeds to whistle
something, with the musical notation conveniently given in the cartoon.
After listening, Charlie
replies, “‘Old Black Joe,’ ‘Take Me Out to the Ball Game,’ ‘Home on the
Range’?” Rather annoyed, Schroeder replies to a perplexed Charlie, “Nope, it
was the last half of the tenth measure of Sinding’s Op. 32, N. 9 . . .” To this
information, Charlie simply says, “Y’know, I almost said that. I don’t know why
I didn’t.”
Of course, we all,
including Schroeder and Charlie himself, know Charlie did not have a clue about
what this music was. Nor did I when I read the cartoon. Christian Sinding, it
turns out, was a Norwegian composer who died in 1949. I had to look it up
myself, as I thought “Sinding” was a misprint. I have never heard his Opus 32,
but I am sure my friend Robert Reilly has and will send me a disc of it on
request.
But this is the point I
want to make here. College is to be what it is, a “liberal,” that is,
“freeing,” education And education means that we seek to know (and see and hear
and taste and feel) what is. To do this, we must free ourselves. And we free
ourselves by encountering the myriads of particular things amid which we live
and whose ultimate cause of being we wonder about.
One does not come to
college to learn something, unless he comes to learn everything. That is
its real adventure and the only real justification for freeing ourselves for
four years from the busy things that storm about us from every side and for
which alone we are told, falsely, that we exist. We cannot, in the end, help
but wonder whether Charlie enjoyed the music even if he knew what it was. It is
not a sin both to enjoy it and know who wrote it. This is what second semester
is about.
Saint Cassian of Imola,
Pray for Us.
James V. Schall, S.J. is
professor of government at Georgetown University. This piece was originally
published online at Ignatius
Insight on January 7, 2008.
SOURCE : https://kirkcenter.org/schall/a-patron-saint-of-teachers/
Saint Cassian, église Notre-Dame, Säben Abbey, Tyrol (Liebfrauenkirche auf Säben| in Südtirol)
San Cassiano di Imola Martire
Martirologio Romano: A
Imola in Romagna, san Cassiano, martire, che, per essersi rifiutato di adorare
gli idoli, fu consegnato ai ragazzi di cui era stato maestro, perché lo
torturassero a morte con i calami: in tal modo, quanto più debole era la mano,
tanto più dolorosa diveniva la pena del martirio.
Le notizie più antiche su Cassiano sono riferite da Prudenzio, nei primi anni del V secolo. Nel suo viaggio verso Roma, Prudenzio si ferma a Forum Cornelii (Imola) e venerò le spoglie del martire, custodite in un sarcofago al di sopra del quale erano raffigurati alcuni episodi del martirio. Non si conosce l’anno del martirio né la pena subita. Non è considerata attendibile la versione tramandata da Prudenzio, secondo il quale Cassiano, che esercitava la professione di insegnate, sarebbe stato condannato ad essere ucciso dai suoi stessi allievi con gli stiletti usati per incidere le loro tavolette.
Se fosse vera questa tradizione bisognerebbe pensare ad un martirio subito non
ad opera di un magistrato romano, ma nell’ambito di sommosse popolari. Il culto
si estese anche a Milano intorno al 450 e in Tirolo, mentre una raffigurazione
del santo è presente a Ravenna, in Sant’Apollinare Nuovo.
Nel corso del XII secolo si diffonde un leggenda che fa del Santo l’apostolo di
Sabiona, in Tirolo, esiliato a Imola dai pagani, ove subì il martirio narrato
da Prudenzio. A Imola la leggenda subisce un’ulteriore corruzione e Cassiano
risultò vescovo della città.
Agnello (sec. IX) ricorda che sopra la tomba del Santo fu costruita la prima
Cattedrale situata fuori dalla città, attorniata da altre costruzioni fino a
formare un fortilizio, a cui venne dato il nome di castrum sancti Cassiani. Nel
sec. XIII il castrum venne raso al suolo e le reliquie trasferite nella nuova
Cattedrale.
SOURCE : http://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/91782
Amico Aspertini (1474–1552). San Cassiano, vers 1540, 34 x 38, Pinacoteca di Brera
San Cassiano di
Imola Martire
240 circa - 303/305
Le notizie più antiche su
Cassiano sono riferite da Prudenzio, nei primi anni del V secolo. Nel suo
viaggio verso Roma, Prudenzio si ferma a Forum Cornelii (Imola) e venerò le spoglie
del martire, custodite in un sarcofago al di sopra del quale erano raffigurati
alcuni episodi del martirio. Non si conosce l’anno del martirio né la pena
subita. Non è considerata attendibile la versione tramandata da Prudenzio,
secondo il quale Cassiano, che esercitava la professione di insegnate, sarebbe
stato condannato ad essere ucciso dai suoi stessi allievi con gli stiletti
usati per incidere le loro tavolette. Se fosse vera questa tradizione
bisognerebbe pensare ad un martirio subito non ad opera di un magistrato
romano, ma nell’ambito di sommosse popolari. Il culto si estese anche a Milano
intorno al 450 e in Tirolo, mentre una raffigurazione del santo è presente a
Ravenna, in Sant’Apollinare Nuovo. Nel corso del XII secolo si diffonde un leggenda
che fa del Santo l’apostolo di Sabiona, in Tirolo, esiliato a Imola dai pagani,
ove subì il martirio narrato da Prudenzio. A Imola la leggenda subisce
un’ulteriore corruzione e Cassiano risultò vescovo della città. Agnello
(sec. IX) ricorda che sopra la tomba del Santo fu costruita la prima Cattedrale
situata fuori dalla città, attorniata da altre costruzioni fino a formare un
fortilizio, a cui venne dato il nome di castrum sancti Cassiani. Nel sec. XIII
il castrum venne raso al suolo e le reliquie trasferite nella nuova Cattedrale.
Nella forma extra-ordinaria del rito romano San Cassiano è commemorato insieme
a Sant'Ippolito il 13 agosto.
Patronato: Imola,
Bressanone, Comacchio, San Casciano in Val Pesa, San Casciano dei Bagni, San
Cassiano a Vico, San Cassiano di Controne e San Cassiano di Moriano
Emblema: Palma
Martirologio
Romano: A Imola in Romagna, san Cassiano, martire, che, per essersi
rifiutato di adorare gli idoli, fu consegnato ai ragazzi di cui era stato
maestro, perché lo torturassero a morte con i calami: in tal modo, quanto più
debole era la mano, tanto più dolorosa diveniva la pena del martirio.
Stabilitosi a Forum
Corneli, l'odierna Imola, vi insegnò grammatica e letteratura. Impartì ad
alcuni suoi allievi anche lezioni di ars notoria, la moderna stenografia.
Educatore della gioventù, non rinunciò a comunicare la fede cristiana ai
discenti. Alcuni cittadini lo denunciarono al Prefetto come "autore di una
nuova religione". Processato, gli fu ordinato di rinunciare al proprio
credo e di sacrificare agli dei della religione romana. Cassiano rifiutò e fu
condannato a morte. Il giudice impose ai suoi studenti, come pena per averlo
ascoltato, di eseguire la condanna.
Il martirio di San
Cassiano si colloca probabilmente al tempo della persecuzione dei cristiani
ordinata dall'imperatore Diocleziano (febbraio 303 - marzo 305). Per lunghi
secoli si è pensato che il racconto del martirio fosse una tradizione popolare;
tuttavia, recenti studi, promossi nell'ambito dell'Anno Cassianeo, compiuti da
diverse équipe statunitensi ed europee, hanno dimostrato che i fori che si
trovano nel cranio del martire sono compatibili con le dimensioni degli stili
con cui all'epoca gli studenti incidevano le tavole di cera e con cui sarebbe
stato compiuto il martirio.
Le spoglie del martire
furono sepolte nella necropoli romana.[5] Quando il cristianesimo divenne religio
licita (Editto di Milano, 313) nel luogo della sepoltura fu eretto un
sepolcro in sua memoria. Nel V secolo nello stesso sito fu costruita una
basilica intitolata al santo, che divenne la residenza del vescovo d'Imola.
Andrea Agnello, storico
ravennate del IX secolo, ricorda che la basilica fu eretta fuori città, secondo
le usanze della cristianità antica, verso ponente, nella località oggi chiamata
Croce Coperta. Attorno ad essa furono innalzate altre costruzioni, tra le quali
l'abitazione del vescovo e quella dei canonici che, assieme ad altri
fabbricati, costituirono una specie di fortilizio, a cui venne dato il nome
di Castrum sancti Cassiani.
Nel 1175 il castrum fu
raso al suolo e le reliquie del martire, riportate all'interno della città,
furono collocate nella cripta del Duomo di Imola a lui dedicato, dove si
trovano tuttora.
Le notizie più antiche
sono riferite dal poeta latino Prudenzio, all'inizio del V secolo
(Peristephanon, IX). Nel suo viaggio verso Roma, Prudenzio si fermò a Forum
Cornelii. Durante una visita ai luoghi sacri della città racconta di aver visto
una pittura raffigurante un uomo nudo circondato da ragazzi che infierivano
contro di lui con degli stili; il custode del luogo gli spiegò che si trattava
del martire Cassiano. Prudenzio venerò le spoglie del martire, custodite in un
sarcofago al di sopra del quale erano raffigurati alcuni episodi del suo
martirio. Nella sua celebre raccolta di poesie dedicò i seguenti versetti a
Cassiano martire:
«Sylla Forum statuit
Cornelius; hoc Itali urbem
uocant ab ipso conditoris
nomine.
Hic mihi, cum peterem te,
rerum maxima Roma,
spes est oborta prosperum
Christum fore.
Stratus humi tumulo
aduoluebar, quem sacer ornat
martyr dicato Cassianus
corpore.»
(Prudenzio,
Peristephanon, carme IX.)
Nel secolo XI un anonimo
tirolese scrisse una Vita et gesta Cassiani, Ingenuini et Albuini episcoporum,
in cui Cassiano era descritto come l'apostolo di Sabiona che, catturato dai
pagani ed esiliato ad Imola, vi fu costretto ad esercitare la professione di
maestro di scuola e vi subì il martirio narrato da Prudenzio.
Di Cassiano rimangono due
gruppi di passiones (martirii), l'uno dipendente in tutto da
Prudenzio, l'altro dai Gesta Sancti Cassiani, Ingenuini et Albuini (Bibliotheca
hagiographica latina 241, 1627, 4273).
L'opera agiografica più
recente sul santo imolese è Divo Cassiano - il culto del santo martire
patrono di Imola, Bressanone e Comacchio, Diocesi di Imola, 2004.
Il luogo del martirio di
Cassiano divenne meta di pellegrinaggio sin dall'antichità. Si ritiene che sul
luogo di sepoltura di San Cassiano sia stata edificata una chiesa già tra IV e
V secolo. Il sepolcro fu visitato da Prudenzio agli inizi del V secolo. La
Chiesa fissò il giorno di commemorazione del santo al 13 agosto.
San Pietro Crisologo (†
450), vescovo di Ravenna, ebbe una particolare devozione verso il martire suo
conterraneo, tanto da desiderare di essere sepolto vicino alle sue spoglie.
L'immagine di san Cassiano fu raffigurata a Ravenna nella cappella detta di San
Crisologo e nella teoria dei santi in Sant'Apollinare Nuovo. Da Ravenna la
devozione si diffuse dapprima a Comacchio, poi si espanse nelle regioni a nord
del Po lungo i territori rimasti sotto la dominazione bizantina, sottratti
all'espansione longobarda. Intorno alla metà del V secolo il culto di San
Cassiano è attestato anche a Milano. Papa Simmaco (498-514) dedicò in onore di
Cassiano un altare a Roma, nel mausoleo a sinistra della basilica di San
Pietro, trasformato nella chiesa di Sant'Andrea. A Pavia il vescovo Ennodio,
nel VI secolo ripose sue reliquie in una chiesa della città.
Nell'Italia alpina, il
culto di San Cassiano, una volta radicatosi, si è conservato fino ad oggi. In
Tirolo Cassiano fu oggetto di un culto speciale, tanto che gli fu dedicata la
cattedrale; quando nel X secolo la sede episcopale fu trasferita a Bressanone,
il nuovo Duomo di Bressanone fu dedicato a San Cassiano e a Sant'Ingenuino. Una
chiesa intitolata a San Cassiano si trova anche a Percha, in val Pusteria e a
Zone, nelle Prealpi Lombarde. Inoltre va segnalato l'Eremo di San Cassiano a
Lumignano di Longare (VI). Al di là delle Alpi, esiste un'antica chiesa
dedicata a San Cassiano ad Innsbruck (Austria) ed a Ratisbona (Baviera).
Il 13 agosto 1577 nacque
l'usanza di portare in processione dal Duomo fino alla chiesa di Croce Coperta
(vicino al luogo in cui avvenne il martirio del santo) il suo reliquiario. Tale
tradizione fu abrogata nel 1914 dal vescovo Paolino Tribbioli.
Dal 1712 esce a
Bressanone ogni anno il St. Kassian Kalender, un calendario di oltre 400 pagine
che raccoglie informazioni storiche, ma anche ricette, poesie e informazioni
sul territorio, con l'obiettivo di «promuovere la venerazione a San Cassiano,
presentato come maestro e patrono degli educatori, e in genere la devozione popolare».
Le reliquie principali
del santo sono il braccio e la colonna su cui fu martirizzato.
Nel 1085 fu rinvenuta per
caso a Imola una colonna in un terreno: su di essa furono trovate tracce del
sangue del santo. A pochi metri dal luogo vi era il pretorio dove fu ucciso
Cassiano. La reliquia fu conservata per secoli nella chiesa parrocchiale dei
Santi Bartolomeo e Cassiano in Croce Coperta di Imola, nel cui territorio si
trovava il luogo del rinvenimento. Tra il 1400 e il 1410 fu realizzato il
reliquiario contenente il braccio, in argento inciso e rame dorato, realizzato
da Jacopo di Michele, conservato nel Duomo di Imola. Sul reliquiario sono
incisi: gli stemmi di Lippo Alidosi (figlio di Bertrando) e della casa Alidosi,
il martirio del santo e la preghiera di san Pier Crisologo.
Nel 1684 quattro
frammenti della colonna furono inviati a Bressanone.
L'ultima ricognizione
delle reliquie del santo è stata effettuata il 13 maggio 2003.
SOURCE : http://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/91782
Donauwörth,
Heilig-Kreuz-Straße 17, Pfarrkirche Hl.Kreuz, Kirchhof: Cölestrin-Kapelle;
hier: Fenster nach Süden
Den hellige Kassian av
Imola (~240-~304)
Minnedag: 13.
august
Skytshelgen for Brixen og
for bispedømmet Bozen-Brixen/Bolzano-Bressanone (sammen med Vigilius);
viktigste skytshelgen for bispedømmet Imola, medskytshelgen for erkebispedømmet
Ferrara-Comacchio; for Macherio og Trecate i Lombardia; for oppdragere, lærere
og elever; for stenografer (1952); i nød
Den hellige Kassian
(Cassian; it: Cassiano; lat: Cassianus) ble født rundt 240 i Roma. Han døde som
martyr i Imola (Forum Cornelii) i provinsen Bologna mellom Bologna og
Ravenna i regionen Emilia Romagna i Nord-Italia, sannsynligvis rundt år 304 i
forfølgelsene fra februar 303 til mars 305 under keiser Diokletian (284-305),
og der befinner hans grav seg. Det er ingen tvil om at det var en tidlig martyr
ved navn Kassian i Imola, men hans tradisjonelle biografi virker tvilsom.
Martyrologium Romanum
forteller at Kassian var en kristen lærer i Imola som lærte guttene grammatikk
og litteratur. Han underviste dem i de hedenske klassikerne, men han passet
også på å få med den kristne lære, noe de hedenske foreldrene reagerte på. Han
ga også noen gutter leksjoner i ars notoria, den moderne stenografi. Under
en voldsom kristenforfølgelse ble han arrestert og forhørt av
provinsguvernøren. Han nektet å ofre til gudene, og da pønsket guvernøren ut en
passende straff. Kassian ble kledd naken og bundet ved en marmorsøyle foran to
hundre hedenske gutter «som mislikte ham fordi han hadde vært læreren deres».
De fikk nå anledning til
å gjøre hva de ville med sin forhatte lærer. Noen kastet tavler, penner og
kniver mot ansiktet hans, og andre stakk ham med sine jerngrifler, redskapene
de brukte for å skrive på vokstavler. Andre brukte kniver og skar ut bokstaver
i ham. Ettersom guttene hadde små krefter, ble Kassians lidelser forlenget
langt ut over det vanlige og det tok lang tid før han døde. Han viste
imidlertid sin villighet til å dø for Kristus ved å oppmuntre guttene.
Samme dødsmåte opptrer i
legendene til tre andre martyrer, den mest kjente er Markus av Arethusa i
Syria på 300-tallet. Kristne gravla Kassian i en storslagen grav i Imola. Over
hans grav ble byens første katedral bygd på 1000-tallet, og den bærer fortsatt
navnet San Cassiano. Den salige pave Pius IX (1846-78),
som var biskop av Imola før han ble valgt til pave, utsmykket Kassians
mausoleum med marmor.
De eldste rapportene om
Kassian er fra tidlig på 400-tallet av den betydeligste tidlige vestlige
kristne dikteren Prudentius (348-ca 405). På sin reise til Roma stanset
Prudentius i Forum Cornelii (Imola) og æret levningene av martyren, som var
bevart i en sarkofag som på toppen hadde avbildninger av noen episoder fra hans
martyrium. Legenden over er en prosaversjon av et dikt av Prudentius. I hans
verk Peri stephanon («Om seierskransen») skildrer Prudentius lidelsen
og kulten til ulike tidlige kristne martyrer, blant dem Kassian.
Ifølge en biografi (Vita),
som trolig ble skrevet av en kannik i Brixen rundt 1240, var Kassian den første
biskopen av Sabiona, det senere Säben (it: Sabiona) ved Chiusa/Klausen i
Südtirol, det tyskspråklige området i Nord-Italia. Det var det daværende
setet for bispedømmet Brixen (Brixinum). Etter å ha blitt fordrevet derfra
skal han ha forkynt evangeliet i Bayern. Ennå i dag finnes i klosteret Säben
det såkalte Kassinsturm, hvor han var fanget. Ettersom begge de to andre
skytshelgenene for bispedømmet, de hellige Ingenuin og Albuin, var biskoper,
har man åpenbart ment at også Kassian må ha vært biskop, og da han var den
eldste av de tre, ble bispedømmets grunnleggelse tilskrevet ham. Han skal ha
blitt bispeviet av biskopen av Aquileia.
På 1000-tallet skrev en
anonym tyroler Vita et gesta Cassiani, Ingenuini et Albuini episcoporum,
hvor Kassian ble beskrevet som Sabionas apostel, fanget av hedninger og sendt i
eksil til Imola, hvor han ble nødt til å praktisere som lærer på en skole og
der led martyrdøden som fortalt av Prudentius. Brixen er nå Bressanone/Brixen i
provinsen Bolzano/Bozen i regionen Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol mens
bispedømmet er Bolzano-Bressanone/Bozen-Brixen (lat: Bauzanensis-Brixinensis).
Han skal ha vendt tilbake
til Säben og lidd martyrdøden der, i alle fall var han i 845 skytshelgen for
katedralen der. De første relikviene av Kassian dukket opp i Brixen på
1300-tallet. I 1685 mottok fyrstebiskop Paulinus Mayr (1677-85) en liten
relikvie av Kassian. I 1704 ble en armrelikvie overført til domkirken i Brixen
og til fyrstebiskop Kaspar Ignatz von Künigl. Byen Regensburg har en
Kassianskirke. I andre legender tilskrives Kassian bispesetene i Todi og
Benevento.
De viktigste relikviene
av helgenen er armen og den søylen som han led martyrdøden ved. I 1085 ble det
ved en tilfeldighet funnet en søyle på et jordstykke. På den ble det funnet
spor av helgenens blod. Dette var noen få meter fra det praetoriet hvor Kassian
ble drept og på jord som tilhørte sognekirken Croce coperta («Det
dekkede korset»), som fortsatt eksisterer. Der ble relikvien bevart i
århundrer. I 1684 ble fire fragmenter av kolonnen sendt til Bressanone. Den siste
undersøkelsen av relikvier av helgenen ble gjennomført den 13. mai 2003.
Den hellige motpave
Hippolyt har vært feiret den 13. august siden på 200-tallet. Den hellige pave
Pontian ble først feiret sammen med ham. På 400-tallet ble Kassians fest slått
sammen med den hellige motpave Hippolyts den 13. august. På 700-tallet ble
Pontians fest lagt til 19. november, men i dag feires Hippolyt og Pontian igjen
sammen den 13. august. Kassian feires fortsatt samme dag, men ved
kalenderrevisjonen i 1969 ble hans fest strøket i Kirkens universalkalender og
henvist til lokale eller spesielle kalendere. I bispedømmet Bozen-Brixen feires
hans fest som høytid på lørdag tyve dager etter påske. I bispedømmet feires
også hans translasjonsfest den 3. desember.
Kassian er skytshelgen
for oppdragere, lærere og elever og for stenografer fra 1952, og i all i nød.
Sammen med Vigilius er han skytshelgen for bispedømmet Bolzano-Bressanone
(Bozen-Brixen). Han er også viktigste skytshelgen for bispedømmet Imola og
medskytshelgen for erkebispedømmet Ferrara-Comacchio. I dag er Kassian også
skytshelgen for Macherio i provinsen Monza e Brianza i regionen Lombardia i
Nord-Italia og for den lille byen Trecate ved elven Ticino i provinsen Novara i
Lombardia. Kassian fremstilles ofte som biskop, eller avkledt og bundet til en
marmorsøyle, som attributter har han skrivegrifler, skrivetavler og
skoleutstyr, ofte også bispestav og bok.
I Østkirken er det en
kjent legende om Kassians møte etter døden med den hellige Nikolas av Myra (ca
280-ca 345). Da Nikolas var avgått ved døden, steg hans sjel opp til himmelen
ikledd en slik skinnende hvit kappe som man ser helgener avbildet med i de
østlige kirkene. På veien oppover sluttet en sjel seg til ham, og det var en
martyr skal man dømme etter den dype røde fargen på den kappen han var ikledd.
Selvfølgelig begynte de å snakke sammen: «Jeg er Nikolas av Myra, jeg var en
biskop og har gjort mye for barn og fattige». «Ganske bra», sa den andre, «jeg
er Kassian av Imola – som er en liten by i nærheten av Napoli [dette stemmer
ikke]. Jeg var skolemester. Men mine studenter drepte meg da det kom ut at jeg
var en kristen». Nå var Nikolas’ nysgjerrighet vekket – han som elsket barn...
«Men hvordan gikk det til?»
Kassian fortalte sin
historie. Han var som skolemester svært glad i gode manerer, og slik som han
selv alltid var preparert inntil perfeksjon, krevde han det samme av sine
studenter. Han var spesielt opptatt av omsorgen for sitt arbeid. Han lot det
vel noen ganger ta overtaket, og det kom frem at han brukte sterke midler som
fysisk avstraffelse. Og det ble ikke alltid verdsatt av alle. I alle fall da
foreldrene til hans elever under forfølgelsene oppdaget at han var en kristen,
de hisset da opp sine barn til å drepe sin skolemester med sine spissede
gåsefjær ... noe de var bare altfor glade for å kunne gjøre. Kassian var derfor
ikke litt stolt av den vakre kappen som hans sjel var kledd i. «Og du, min
herre? Fortell meg nå...» Mens de slik snakket så hyggelig sammen, fløy deres
sjeler til himmelen...
Inntil de hørte rop fra
dypt der nede: «Nikolas av Myra, Nikolas av Myra, hjelp meg, hjelp meg!» Et
sted i Russland de så en bonde med sin vogn bli sittende fast i gjørmen.
Akselen var ødelagt, vognen veltet, og bonden satt der med sin ynkelige frukt
som han hadde ønsket å selge på markedet, og nå ropte mannen i sin nød til St
Nikolas. Med et nikk og et sukk av lettelse sa Kassian: «Det er til deg». «Jeg
vil ta en titt», sa Nikolas, «bare dra videre, jeg ser deg senere». Mens
Kassian fortsatte sin reise, fløy Nikolas ned igjen, fikk reist opp vognen og
krøp under den for å reparere akselen og sette på hjulet. Med ermet på sin
vakre, hvite kappe gned han det kullet som den stakkars bonden skulle bringe
til markedet, slik at det skinte bedre enn noensinne og så ut til å være av
første klasse. Deretter sa han til den fattige bonden: «Få en god pris for det,
slik at du kan ta med noe ekstra til dine barn og din kone. Gå i fred». Etter å
ha gitt ham velsignelsen, fløy han til himmelen.
Da han endelig kom til
himmelens porter, sto Kassian til hans forbauselse fortsatt der. «Kommer du
ikke inn?» Kassian prøvde å skjule den motbydelige stanken som kom fra hans
kollega, og med et silketørkle lot han som om han måtte tørke nesen: «Nei, jeg
måtte vente her». Samtidig svingte perleporten opp og under trompeter og høy
musikk kom en prosesjon av engler, helgener, martyrer, bekjennerne og jomfruer
ut. I sin midte bar de en tom bærestol, hvor Nikolas deretter ble invitert til
å ta plass. Kassian måtte gå bak. Det ble for mye for den hellige martyren:
«Hvorfor skal jeg gå bakerst mens Nikolas får sitte i en bærestol når han ikke
engang er martyr? Jeg har bevart min kappe ren og uberørt helt til nå, og du må
da se hvordan han ser ut!» Han ble fortalt: «Du ser gjørmen og skitten på
kappen hans?» Han svarte med en bryskt nikk. «Det er bare et tegn på hans
hellighet...»
Legenden forklarer
hvorfor Nikolas har fire fester i året (dødsdag, translasjon, kirkevigsel og
votivfest), mens Kassian den 29. februar bare feires en gang hvert fjerde år.
[Hans festdag i Østkirken er nemlig skuddårsdagen 29. februar.]
Kilder:
Attwater/John, Attwater/Cumming, Butler (VIII), Benedictines, Bunson,
Schauber/Schindler, Melchers, CSO, Patron Saints SQPN, Infocatho, Bautz,
Heiligenlexikon, santiebeati.it, it.wikipedia.org, zeno.org, heiligen-3s.nl -
Kompilasjon og oversettelse: p. Per Einar Odden
SOURCE : http://www.katolsk.no/biografier/historisk/cassianu
