S. HILDELITHA, V. ABSS. OF BARKING.
(ABOUT A.D. 720.)
[Ancient Anglican Martyrologies, and Gallican Martyrology. Authority:—Bede, Ecc. Hist. l. iv. c. 10.]
Hildelitha was one of the first virgins of the English nation who consecrated herself a spouse to Christ, going abroad to a French monastery, there being, at that time, none in England. When S. Erkonwald had founded the monastery of Chertsey for himself, and the convent of Barking, in Essex, for his sister Ethelburga, he sent to France for S. Hildelitha, and committed his sister to her care, to be by her instructed in monastic discipline. Thus S. Ethelburga herself, who was the first abbess of Barking, was a disciple of S. Hildelitha, though she died before her, and was succeeded by her in the government of the community. Bede highly commends the piety of this saint, and that she was highly esteemed by others we may gather from S. Aldhelm having addressed to her his poetical treatise on virginity, and from mention of her in one of the epistles of S. Boniface, where he relates what great things he had learned of her.
S. Hildelitha departed to our Lord in a good old age, but the date of her death is undetermined.
S. SIMON, BOY M.
(A.D. 1475.)
[Roman Martyrology. Authority:—The Acts of Canonization by Benedict XIV., and the Acts published in the Italian immediately after the event took place.]
Through the Middle Ages, in Europe the Jews were harshly treated, suffering from sudden risings of the people, or from the exactions of princes and nobles. This nourished in them a bitter hatred of Christians and Christianity, and in some instances led to cruel reprisals. Such was, perhaps, the case in Trent, where on Tuesday in Holy Week, 1475, the Jews met to prepare for the approaching Passover, in the house of one of their number named Samuel, and it was agreed between three of them, Samuel, Tobias, and Angelus, that a child should be crucified, as an act of revenge against their tyrants, and of hatred against Christianity. The difficulty, however, was how to get one. Samuel sounded his servant Lazarus, and attempted to bribe him into procuring one, but the suggestion so scared the fellow, that he packed up all his traps and ran away. On the Thursday, Tobias undertook to get the boy, and going out in the evening, whilst the people were in church during the singing of Tenebræ, he prowled about till he found a child sitting on the threshold of his father's door in the Fossati Street, aged twenty-nine months, and named Simon. The Jew began to coax the little fellow to follow him, and the boy did so, and he conducted him to the house of Samuel, where he was put to bed, and given raisins and apples to amuse him.
In the mean time the parents, Andrew and Mary, missing their child, began to seek him everywhere, but not finding him, and night falling darkly upon them, they returned, troubled and alarmed to their home.