Baring-Gould’s sources: Modem Belgian Martyrologies. Authority: — A life, the two first books of which were by Jacques de Vitry, Bishop of Acre and Frascati; he had been canon at Oignies at the time that Marie lived there. He was her confessor, and had often familiarly conversed with her. She bequeathed to him a handkerchief which had often been moistened by her tears, and he, in his will, requested to be buried at Oignies, A.D. 1244. The third book of this life, containing anecdotes of the saint, was added by her contemporary Thomas de ChantiprA] Marie D’Oignies led one of those distressing lives which are rather subjects for wonder than for imitation. She was bom at Nivelles in the diocese of Li£ge, of j rich parents. From earliest childhood she exhibited a capricious love of self-torture and poverty which astonished and annoyed her parents. Her childish enthusiasm was directed towards the religious life, and when she [June a;.
…saw a nun in the road, she would run after her and put her little feet in the places where the religious had trod. At the age of fourteen, she was married to a young nobleman of honour and virtue. She was active in the discharge of her domestic duties, but spent a great part of the night in prayer, and when she slept lay on planks, which she introduced into the bed, much to the inconvenience of her husband. He goodnaturedly submitted to her eccentricities, and being of a pliant nature, and finding, perhaps, after a struggle, that it was impossible for his weaker will to dominate her resolution, he allowed Mary to have her own way.
Her conduct in other circumstances would have driven her husband into dissipation, but the young man to whom she was united was fortunately of too phlegmatic and pliable a disposition to be goaded into infidelity, and he placidly submitted to conform his life to hers, allowed her to dispose of his property, and distribute it with indiscriminate charity among the poor.
Their relations on both sides were highly exasperated, they remonstrated, scolded, scoffed. The husband turned to his wife, and Marie was supremely indifferent to all but the concerns of her soul. She was rewarded, we are told, by Jacques de Vitry, by an extraordinary gift of tears, so that she could not speak or think of any religious subject without her eyes overflowing, and the sight of a crucifix, an object which must have encountered her eyes at every turn in so Catholic a country, threw her into transports of weeping. One day in Lent [the forty days of fasting before Easter] her sobbing during mass was so distracting to both priest and congregation, that the former was obliged to request her to moderate her feelJune aj. J B. Mary D Oignies.
ings, and being quite unable to do so, she was forced to leave the church. According to the story, she then besought God to let the priest understand that this troublesome gift of tears was not subject to control. Accordingly shortly after, when the priest was saying mass, his tears burst forth in spite of all his efforts to restrain them, and soaked his chasuble and the altar linen.
Marie and her husband lived at Wilenbroeck, near Nivelles, and undertook the charge of lepers, to whom they ministered with their own hands. Her various acts of self-torture are too painful to be here detailed. She ate only the hardest and coarsest black bread, and ate only once a day. Sometimes she spent eight or nine days without food, and once extended her total fast to thirty-five days; or at least, her friends believed that she did. What is perhaps more remarkable, is that she sometimes spent several months in succession without speaking.
At length, with the easily obtained consent of her husband, Marie left him and her home to take up her abode at Oignies, where she lived the rest of her days in a cell near the church.
She died there, at the age of 36. Her relics [the bodily remains of a saint, or objects they used, kept with honor] were enshrined by order of Pope Paul V. in 1609. Portions are still in the church of Oignies, and her shift, which women expecting confinement put on, believing it will ensure them an easy delivery.
In Belgium she is invoked by women in child-birth, and also in fever. What became of her husband after she left him is not known, whether he continued ministering to lepers, or whether he accommodated himself to altered circumstances, and returned to his former course of life. VOL vi. 21 The Blessed Marie d’Oignies is represented with an angel at her side, as she is said to have been always conscious of the presence of the guardian angel, and at table to have conversed familiarly with angels. Also prostrate at the foot of a crucifix. She is said to have obtained by her prayers the conversion of a sinner, and when she learned that he had relapsed, she cast herself before the crucifix and would not desist from prayer and rise, till she was satisfied that her prayer for his restoration was granted. She is also represented with the Blessed Virgin spreading her mantle over her head to protect her from rain, in accordance with one of de Vitry’s stories.
Nativity of 8 John the Baptist (Jane Mth). jaw*.] Nativity of S. John the Baptist. The Nativity of S. John the Baftirt. SS. Martyrs at Rome, under Nero, a o. 64. S. Simplicius B. of Mutun, fth rent, SS. Aooard and Aoilbert, MM. at Creil, near Paris. S. Ivan, H. in Bohemia, 9 th cent.
S. Bartholomew. H. in the island of Fame, a.d. xx8e.
