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A shepherd who stayed with his people through hard times.

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August 24 · Bishop

St. Ouen of Rouen

St. Ouen of Rouen

A shepherd who stayed with his people through hard times.

Traditional feast

August 24
1914 / pre-1969 calendar, per Baring-Gould (1897)

Current feast

Not verified yet

Represents

Bishop

Early life

The book says little or nothing about early life. This is how the account begins.

Thin entry · the 1897 book gives only 12 words. We have not filled the gap with invented detail.

The life of S. Ouen is singularly deficient in details of interest.

What they represent

How they teach us to live

Drawn from themes in the original account

Learn from the kind of life it was. A shepherd who stayed with his people through hard times.

Keep their day. Remember them on August 24 with a short prayer, and ask for their help.

Read more

The full original · 12 words

Read Baring-Gould’s full account

Baring-Gould’s sources: Roman and Gallican Martyrologies. The Martyrologies of Florus, Usuardus, and Wandelbert. Authorities: — A life, of which only fragments remain, by a writer only a little later; he says, “ I pass On to his miracles which I have heard from his disciples.” Another ancient life by an anonymous writer; there is a metrical life as well, written in the nth cent., of less value.] S. Ouen, otherwise called Dado, or Audoen, was a native of Sancy, in Brie. He was the son of a nobleman named Authair, who received S. Columbanus at Vultiac on the Marne, probably about the time when he was driven from Luxeuil. Aiga, the wife of Authair, brought her two sons, Ado and Ouen, before the venerable Irish abbot to receive his benediction. Neither of the children was then ten years old. Authair placed both his sons at the court of King Clothair II., where they contracted a friendship with S. Eligius. Ado renounced the world and founded the Abbey of Jouarre on the Marne; his brother Ouen remained with Clothair, and served afterwards his son and successor, Dagobert I., who made him keeper of his seal, as grand referendary or chancellor. Ouen founded the Abbey of Rebais in the forest of Brie, and appointed S. Agil, one of the disciples of S. Columbanus, as its first abbot, a.d. 636. S. Ouen would have retired into the monastery he had built, but was not suffered by the king. On the death of Dagobert, and the succession of Clovis II., a.d. 638, S. Ouen for awhile remained at court, and in the performance of his official functions, but in a.d. 640 he -was elected Archbishop of Rouen, at the same time that his friend, S. Eligius, was chosen to fill the sees of Noyon and Toumay. S. Ouen assisted in the council of Chalons in 644, and died at Clichy on August 24th, a.d. 683, after having possessed the episcopal dignity for three years.

The life of S. Ouen is singularly deficient in details of interest.

Feast days

Feast: August 24

Nine days · Free

Pray the novena
with us.

One short email a day for nine days. The day's prayer, a line from St. Ouen of Rouen's story, and a nudge to keep going.

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← All 1726 saints in the library
Sources & notes

Feast-day sources

Sources

Credits

From Sabine Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints, new edition in 16 vols. (London: John C. Nimmo, 1897–98); text from the Internet Archive scan (OCR, lightly cleaned; errors possible). Public domain.

From Sabine Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints, new edition in 16 vols. (London: John C. Nimmo, 1897–98); text from the Internet Archive scan (OCR, lightly cleaned; errors possible). Public domain in the United States. Reproduced unedited, except for short bracketed notes in grey that we added to explain names and terms (“S.” is the old abbreviation for Saint). Some history and judgments reflect 19th-century scholarship.