29th November is the saint’s day of Sernin of
Toulouse, a 3rd century martyr.
Sernin was born in Rome in about 245. He was sent as a
Christian missionary to Spain but then moved to France where he became Bishop
of Toulouse. His activities in the area
were very successful, but, not surprisingly, his success made him many enemies
among the local pagan priests.
Sernin made himself particularly unpopular by building a
house on one side of the pagan temple in Toulouse and a church on the other
side, thus surrounding the temple with Christian influences. The effect was
that the pagan oracles stopped working.
The pagan priests depended on the oracles for their income
so they decided to take the only action that seemed reasonable in the
circumstances, namely to get rid of Sernin. Without this Christian bishop
queering their pitch, perhaps their gods would return to the temple and speak
through the oracles again, thus restoring the priests’ cushy lifestyle.
The priests grabbed hold of Sernin as he was walking past
the temple and dragged him inside, where a bullock was about to be sacrificed.
However, they had a better use for the animal, which was to tie Sernin’s feet
to it and send it charging down the hill outside the temple. The result was
that Sernin’s brains were dashed out on the cobbles.
Presumably the priests then claimed that it was business as
usual at the temple.
© John Welford
No comments:
Post a Comment