The Right Rev. Dr. Greith gives us a very interesting account of the life and works of the monk Columbanus in the three monasteries; but we can only give a small portion of it here.
In the year 600 the number of the monks at Luxeuil had increased to 220; and crowds of scholars were instructed in the monasteries.
"All must fast daily, but also daily take nourishment; and as all must eat daily, so must they daily partake of spiritual food, pray, work, and read in books every day." The special usages of monastic discipline were observed most strictly in the three cloisters; violators of rules were punished with rods, imprisonment, or a portion of their food was kept from them. "Before eating there was an examination of conscience, then grace was said, and there was reading during the meals. Before a monk used his spoon, he should make the sign of the cross; the same should be done in taking his lamp, in undertaking any work, or in going out of the cloister. He was commanded to pray before and after labor, and on his return to the monastery he should go before the abbot or superior and ask a blessing. Whoever cut the table with his knife, spilled beer or anything else on the table, did not gather the bread-crumbs, neglected to bow his head at the end of the psalms, or disturbed the chaunt with coughing or loud laughter, was punished," etc. Divine service at Luxeuil consisted in the daily reciting of the psalms, and, especially on Sundays and other festivals, in the celebration of Mass. The custom of uninterrupted psalmody by day and night never prevailed at Luxeuil, as was the case among the monks of Agane in Wallis, and of Haben in Burgundy, and among the nuns of the convent of St. Salaberga.
Columbanus, well educated in both profane and sacred literature, taught his own monks, made them acquainted with the discipline of the Quadrivium, and gave them a knowledge of holy Scripture.
Columbanus often retired at the approach of the principal feasts into the solitude of the forests to devote himself to piety and meditation. He sometimes remained fifty days or longer in those places. As in the ages of persecution the blood of the martyrs tamed the tigers and leopards, so that they learned to pity the saints in the circus and amphitheatre; as in the deserts of Africa and Asia Minor holy monks formed a league with nature and its animals, so Columbanus and Gall, whose life was like that of the early fathers of the desert, stood in the most friendly relations with the wild beasts of the Vosges. "As Columbanus was walking one day in the wide forests of the Vosges with a book under his arm, he saw a pack of wolves approaching. The saint stood unmoved. The wolves surrounded him on both hands, smelled the hem of his garments while he prayed to God for protection; they did him no harm, left him and went farther into the wood." Once Columbanus found in a cave a tame bear, which left its abode at command of the saint, who made it his place of shelter. Often, as he reposed under the shadow of old oaks, he called the beasts of the forest to him, and they followed him. He caressed them tenderly; and the birds often flew to him, and sat quietly on his shoulders. A little squirrel had become so accustomed to him as to leap from the branches of the trees and hide in his bosom, run up his sleeves, and then go back to the nearest boughs. A raven was so obedient to him as to return the glove which he had stolen from the saint. (Page 294.)
Columbanus could not remain long in his cloister. He became engaged in a controversy with some French priests, and was persecuted by the corrupt Merovingians, who finally compelled him to quit Luxeuil.
The fact that the Irish clergy clung to the ancient custom of the Irish Church regarding the celebration of Easter, and to the Irish traditions regarding the liturgy of the Mass, gave the French bishops and priests occasion to complain and make opposition. Columbanus wrote three letters on the Easter Controversy to Pope Gregory I. Two of them miscarried; the third reached its destination, but was unsuccessful, because Gregory I. maintained the discipline of the Roman Church on this disputed point. A synod in France, A.D. 600-601, to which Columbanus sent a memorial, did not favor him any more than the Pope. The controversy gradually died out.
The controversy with the Merovingians was far more serious. The crimes of Queen Brunhilda are well known; for instance, how she systematically ruined her grandson, King Theodoric of Burgundy. Columbanus on one occasion having refused to give his blessing to the illegitimate sons of Theodoric, presented to the saint by Brunhilda, she swore vengeance against him. A royal decree was published that no monk of the order of Columbanus should leave his monastery; that no Burgundian convert should for the future hold communion with him, and that no one should establish another foundation according to his discipline. Columbanus expostulated in vain; he wrote a severe protest to the king and threatened him with excommunication. This was the moment of revenge for Brunhilda. She prevailed on the king to cause the abduction of the saint to Besançon by Count Bandulf. Columbanus remained there for some time, highly honored by the people, and doing much good. But he soon returned to Luxeuil. The king, however, sent a whole cohort to seize him and take him out of the kingdom. The soldiers unwillingly executed their orders. The saint left the monastery amid the sighs and tears of his monks, who followed him in funereal procession with weeping and wailing. Only those whom he had brought from Ireland and Britain were allowed to accompany him. Columbanus lived twenty years in the wilderness of the Vosges, and left it in the seventy-fourth year of his life. (A.D. 609-610.)
Let us be brief. Columbanus was brought to Nantes to sail for Ireland; but God prevented him. King Clothaire of Neustria allowed him to return to Austrasia. He went to Metz, then to Mayence, up the Rhine, until he came to Zurich, where he decided to make a longer stay. But the inhabitants of the place were fierce idolaters. Many were converted, while others took arms in hatred of the saint, determined to kill himself and his companions. They consequently left this region and went to Arbon, where they dwelt seven days; thence travelling to Braganza, where they built cells near the ancient Aurelia Church. St. Gall took the three idols from the walls of the church, in the presence of a vast multitude, broke them to pieces, and threw them into the sea. A portion of the people became Christians, and the Aurelia Church was reconsecrated. Columbanus remained a few years in Braganza, when persecutions of various kinds compelled him to quit this region also. (612-613.) He crossed the Rhetian Alps, accompanied only by Attala, and arrived at Milan, where he was well received by Agilulf, king of the Lombards, who offered him a new field for the exercise of his apostolate. King Agilulf and Queen Theodolinda used the holy man for the evangelizing of the Lombards. But his days were numbered. After building a monastery and a chapel at Bobbio, he lived only an entire year, and died on the 21st December, in the year 615, in the seventy-ninth year of his age, one year before the death of Agilulf, king of Lombardy.
"Whilst Ireland glories in being the fatherland of Columbanus, France remembers him in her old abbeys in the Vosges, and his vocation to Italy still lives, not only in the dear relics of Bobbio, in his coffin, chalice, and holly staff, but also in the still living monument of his glory the town of St. Columbano, in the district of Lodi. The writings of this distinguished man, which have come down to us, display a comprehensive and varied knowledge not only of ecclesiastical but also of classic literature. His eventful life has been written by the monk Jonas of Bobbio."