Saint Desiderius of Vienne

Almost everything about his early life comes from a single entry in the book of the bishops of Vienne compiled under Bishop Léger in the ninth century, which Louis Duchesne printed in 1907. ⁴ Paraphrased from its Latin, it says he was of an Autun family and was brought up at Autun until he was grown, that he was trained in the Church's learning by the holy bishop Namatius, and that he then attached himself to the teaching of Verus, bishop of Vienne. ⁴ The chronicler Ado adds that he served the church of Vienne as a deacon under Verus, a detail Duchesne notes is missing from the account of his martyrdom. ⁴

Verus became bishop in 586, and Desiderius succeeded him. ⁴ Georges Goyau's list of the bishops of Vienne honored as saints, which follows Duchesne's chronology, gives his years as 596 to 611. ⁸ Léger's book sets him, in the old way, by the rulers of his day: he flourished under the emperor Maurice, was raised to the episcopate under King Childebert, and suffered under Childebert's son Theuderic. ⁴

Gregory's Register gives the clearest picture of him while he lived. In 596 the pope wrote to him and to Syagrius of Autun to commend "Augustine, the servant of God, the bearer of these presents", who was on his way north with other monks. ⁴⁵ Gregory asked them to give the travelers whatever help the case required, "that your action may prove to us the truth of the good report that we have heard of you." ⁵

More letters followed. Duchesne summarizes one of 599 asking Desiderius not to stand in the way of a deacon of Vienne who wanted to enter religious life, and a reply to his request for the pallium, in which Gregory asked him first to produce the documents showing it had been granted to his predecessors. ⁴ He was one of four metropolitans who received Gregory's circular against simony in Gaul, which complained that "sacred orders are conferred through simoniacal heresy" and that laymen were being tonsured at a bishop's death and made bishops at once. ⁶

The best known letter is the last, of 601. Gregory began warmly: so many good things had been reported of Desiderius that he could not refuse what was asked. ⁷ Then came the rebuke. "It afterwards came to our ears, what we cannot mention without shame, that your Fraternity is in the habit of expounding grammar to certain persons," he wrote, "since the praises of Christ cannot find room in one mouth with the praises of Jupiter." ⁷ The priest Candidus, questioned in Rome, had denied it, and Gregory promised to give thanks if the report proved false. ⁷ In the same letter he commended to Desiderius the second band of monks bound for England, sent with Laurentius and Mellitus. ⁷ Duchesne observes that none of this correspondence appears in Fredegar's chronicle or in the two early Lives, which dwell instead on how he died. ⁴

Those Lives, as Duchesne reports them, tell of a bishop with powerful enemies: Protadius, the mayor of the palace, and Aridius, bishop of Lyon, as well as Brunhilda and King Theuderic II of Burgundy. ⁴ Desiderius was brought before a council held at Chalon in 602 or 603. There, on the accusation of a woman named Justa and the evidence of bribed witnesses, he was declared to have lost his office and was banished to an island. ⁴ Domnolus was put in his place. ⁴

The current Roman Martyrology gives the reason for Brunhilda's hostility: he had reproved her, in its words translated from the Italian, for "her incestuous marriage and other depravities". ¹ Alban Butler says that the "zealous pastor boldly reproved her for her incests and cruelties". ³

The exile did not last. Desiderius was recalled after a time and given back his church. ⁴ Duchesne remarks that Brunhilda had thereby reversed her own judgment once. ⁴ The bishop of Lyon's enmity did not end, and neither did the rebukes Desiderius addressed to the sovereigns for their disorders. ⁴

The sources agree that he was killed, and that the order came from the court, but not on who gave it or how it was done. ¹²³⁴ The current Martyrology says he was stoned, again on Brunhilda's orders. ¹ The 1897 English Martyrology says he was "overwhelmed with stones by order of king Theodoric". ² Duchesne writes that Brunhilda had him stoned and beaten to death. ⁴ Butler tells it differently: a sermon on chastity that Desiderius preached before Brunhilda and Theodoric, "chiefly in the words of St. Paul", provoked them, and "in his return home, he was, by their order and contrivance, murdered by three assassins". ³

Both Martyrologies and Duchesne place the death in the territory of Lyon. ¹²⁴ Ado, as Duchesne prints him, says the queen's counts killed him in the territory of Lyon on the river Chalaronne. ⁴ Butler names the place as the village "now called St. Didier de Chalaraine, near the brook of that name in the principality of Dombes". ³

The year is uncertain. Butler gives 612. ³ Goyau's list ends his episcopate in 611. ⁸ Fredegar, as Duchesne reports, puts the death in Theuderic's twelfth year, 606 or 607. ⁴ Duchesne weighs a difficulty: the Vienne account of his martyrdom says his body was moved three years after he died, which seems unlikely while Brunhilda lived, and she died in 613. ⁴ That would put his death no earlier than 610. But Duchesne asks whether it is really impossible that the queen kept refusing him a bishop's burial, and concludes there is then no reason not to accept Fredegar's date. ⁴

Léger's book says he lies buried with honor behind the altar of the Apostles, outside the city. ⁴ Duchesne adds that one of the old Lives records a miracle at his tomb in Saint-Pierre at Vienne. ⁴

None of the sources consulted for this page names a patronage for him, so none is given here. ¹²³⁴ Butler records that the village where he was killed came to be called St. Didier de Chalaraine. ³

The current Roman Martyrology keeps Saint Desiderius of Vienne on May 26. ¹ Before that he was kept on May 23: the entry for him in Léger's book is dated to that day, the 1897 Martyrology lists him on it, Butler places him there, and Duchesne gives it as his feast. ²³⁴ The 1897 Martyrology also names him on February 11, "At Lyons, of St. Desiderius, bishop of Vienne, and martyr." ²

For centuries he shared May 23 with an earlier Desiderius, the fourth-century bishop of Langres, who was beheaded after pleading with an invading king for his people. ² The 1897 Martyrology lists the two side by side on that day. ² Moving Vienne to May 26 has separated them. ¹

Gregory's letters to him show an ordinary metropolitan's business: monks to be helped on their way, a deacon's vocation, a request for the pallium, a circular against simony. ⁴⁵⁶ The rebuke over grammar is the most human of them. Gregory was not pleased, and said so, and still hoped the report would prove false. ⁷

The end of his life was not ordinary. He was tried on false witness by a council of his fellow bishops and sent away, then brought back, and he went on saying what had got him exiled. ⁴ The sources do not say he softened his rebukes after his return, and they do not suggest that his restoration bought him any safety. ¹⁴

Nor do they agree on the details of his death, which is itself worth noticing. ¹²³⁴ What they share is the outline: a bishop who told a powerful household that its conduct was wrong, and was killed for it on the road near Lyon. ¹³⁴ The Church remembers him for that, without needing to settle how many men were sent or which royal hand gave the order.