Sainte-Foy: Complete Devotion
Were it not Sunday, tomorrow would be the feast day of Sainte-Foy. She was born around AD 291 in the Gallo-Roman city of Aginnum, modern-day Agen in France. She suffered martyrdom in 303 at the age of 12.
Despite her youth, the fame of this little martyr spread quickly, and her cultus was celebrated throughout France and Spain. Indeed, the city of Santa Fe, New Mexico, is named for her.
Although her name (fides) is usually translated as “Faith” in English, its original meaning was probably related to the Latin word for the playing of the lyre. It is for this reason, as well as more than 1,800 years of common usage, that I prefer the French rendition of her name.
So who was she?
According to the Passio of Sainte-Foy,1 she was from an old and high-born family. She is described as “beautiful in appearance, but her mind was more beautiful”.
During the persecution of Diocletian, she was brought before a visiting magistrate with hundreds of others suspected of being Christian. When asked what faith she followed, she is said to have replied, “From my earliest youth I have been a Christian, and I serve the Lord Jesus Christ with complete devotion.”
The magistrate, perhaps taking pity on her because of her young age, gave her several opportunities to walk this back, promising her gifts and almost imploring her to offer incense as a sacrifice to Diana. Foy remained firm in her faith.
After she called Diana a demon, the magistrate lost his temper and ordered Foy to be burned to death on a gridiron, so consummating her martyrdom.
But this was just the start of Sainte-Foy’s story.
After the legalization of Christianity, a church and, later, a basilica were raised to house her relics. Unfortunately, the city fared badly in the early medieval period. It was, over the course of a couple of centuries, attacked and sacked by Vandals, Visigoths, Franks, and then several times by Vikings. After a particularly destructive Viking attack in 853, the monks of the Abbey of Conques made off with the relics of Sainte-Foy.
This entire escapade is probably worthy of an essay in its own right.
After Sainte-Foy settled in Conques, at least five books were written about her miracles2. The author of several was a monk named Bernard of Angers. Writing in the 11th century, he called her miracles joca—”tricks” or “jokes”. And indeed, the young saint seems to have a somewhat juvenile sense of fun.
Her fame spread as stories of her miracles were told and retold. Conques, once a way station on the Camino from Le Puy-en-Velay to Santiago de Compostela, quickly became a pilgrimage destination itself. Pilgrims still come here, seeking a miracle from this little saint.
Last year, I visited her relics in Conques, and I prayed for her intercession on my pilgrimage. Although her relics are in a shrine in the abbey church, each year on her feast day, they are paraded through the streets in a very unusual reliquary, called “the Majesty of Saint Foy”.
We don’t know the origin or date of this reliquary, but it is already mentioned by our old friend Bernard of Angers in about AD 1010. Over the centuries, pilgrims have donated gems and antique cameos and intaglios to further adorn the reliquary. When not in use, it is displayed at the Abbey Museum.
Let us pray for the intercession of this mighty little saint!
O Saint Foy,
you who had the courage to confront your persecutors as faithful witness to the Lord,
help us to testify to Jesus our Saviour.
You who restored sight to the unseeing,
heal us in our blindness and unbelief,
that we might be enchanted by the loving Son of God.
You who freed the prisoners from their chains,
open the doors of our hearts chained by sin.
You, who on the Way to Compostela shine like a first star on the road,
maintain in us always the ardent desire
of being tireless seekers of God
and passionate builders of the Kingdom.
Amen.
- Dated to the mid-9th century, but arguably based on a now-lost 5th century original attributed to Saint Jerome. An English version may be found in Pamela Sheingorn’s The Book of Sainte-Foy.
- These may also be found in Sheingorn’s The Book of Sainte-Foy.