9 October

Saints Denis, Rusticus and Eleutherus

  • Saints Denis, Rusticus and Eleuthera, who are said to have been sent to Gaul by Pope Saint Clement. They were martyred in Paris in the 3rd century.
  • In Hainaut, around 680, Saint Ghislain, abbot, founded the monastery of La Celle.
  • In Valencia, Spain, in 1581, St Louis Bertrand, Dominican, missionary in Peru, where he baptised thousands of Indians.
  • In Rome, in 1609, Saint John Leonardi, founder of the Congregation of Canons Regular of the Mother of God for the Missions. He helped found the College of Propaganda.
  • In Spain, saints Cyril Bertran and his seven companions, Brothers of the Christian Schools, and Innocent of the Immaculate, Passionist, who suffered martyrdom in 1934.

Find out more...

Gregory of Tours, in his History of France, puts it this way: "Under the emperor Decius, wars were waged against the Christian name. These were: Gatien, bishop of Tours; Trophime, bishop of Arles; Paul, bishop of Narbonne; Saturninus, bishop of Toulouse; Denis, bishop of Paris; Austremoine, bishop of the Arvernes; Martial, bishop of Limoges. Among them, Blessed Denis, bishop of Paris, was afflicted with various torments and ended his life by the sword. In this way, the martyrdom of Saint Denis would have taken place around 272. Here are some other details. Denis went as far as Paris, converted many people there by his teachings and miracles, established a clergy and built a church. When persecution suddenly broke out, he was arrested along with Rusticus and Eleutherus, and all three were subjected to various tortures and had their heads chopped off. Later, King Dagobert I founded the famous abbey of Saint-Denis, where the relics of the bishop and his two companions have always been venerated: we know that the church of this abbey was chosen to be the burial place of the kings of France. Artists depict Saint Denis as a bishop holding his head in his hands. He is one of the fourteen Holy Helpers: he is invoked against diabolical possessions... For a time, this saint was identified with Saint Dionysius the Areopagite: hence the epistle in the Mass, recounting the conversion of the latter by Saint Paul.