ON ST. PASCHASIUS, ABBOT, AT LESINA AND NAPLES.
CommentaryPaschasius, Abbot, at Lesina and Naples (Saint)
By I. B.
[1] Together with the bodies of SS. Sabinus and Eunomius the Bishops, of whom we treated on February 9, the relics of St. Paschasius the Abbot were also transferred from Lesina to Naples in the year 1598 by Aurelius Marra and placed in the basilica of the Most Holy Annunciation. the feast of St. Paschasius the Abbot His feast, on February 10, was decreed to be celebrated at Naples and throughout the entire diocese with a semi-double Office by Decius Carafa, Cardinal and Archbishop of Naples, in the year 1619. In that year a booklet on the new Offices instituted by that pious prelate was published by the press of Constantinus Vitalis, which says the following about St. Paschasius: relics "The relics of this Saint were also transferred from the same church of Lesina to the church of the Most Holy Annunciation. The Acts of the same holy Abbot have perished through the injury of time. That his cult once flourished in the city of Lesina, however, was attested by the inscription and the honorable entombment in the Confession of the aforesaid Cathedral church of Lesina, where the sacred bones of St. Paschasius were found, together with the relics of other Saints translated to Naples." the history of the Translation The history of the discovery and translation was committed to writing by Aurelius Marra himself, who carried out the transfer, which we gave on February 9. From it, moreover, it is clear that some part of the relics of St. Paschasius and of the others was left at Lesina.
[2] Who, moreover, this Paschasius was, of what monastery he was Abbot, and how his relics were brought to Lesina, no writer (that we have seen) explains. In an old Martyrology, written some centuries ago in Italy (as may be gathered from various indications), which is in our possession, the following is read under the Kalends of February: his name in the Martyrologies "On Monte Gargano, the deposition of Blessed Paschasius the Abbot." Since Lesina is not far from Monte Gargano, I do not hesitate to assert that his remains were carried thither. place of death
[3] What if he was the seventh Abbot of Monte Vergine? Felix Renda writes about him in the Life of St. William the Founder, published at Naples in the year 1581: "After the death of Lord Gabriel, the sixth Abbot, his institute the seventh to be elected, with the divine Spirit breathing, was the holy Paschasius, whose most holy body is found at present among the bodies of the Saints in the aforesaid sanctuary; for by the merit of his holiness, just as he fell asleep in the earth with the beloved of Christ, so he rejoices in heaven with the elect." The same author, elsewhere among the relics of the sacristy of the Guletum near the city of Miscum of the Hirpini, lists "the body of St. Paschasius, the seventh Abbot of Monte Vergine." He perhaps went to Monte Gargano for the purpose of venerating St. Michael and died there, or in the monastery of Pulsano of the same Order. The relics were brought to Lesina for some reason, with a part returned to the people of Guletum. If this is the man whom we conjecture (as is permitted in an obscure matter), his age he seems to have died around the year 1200.