ON ST. FIRMINUS, BISHOP OF MENDE IN GAUL
CommentaryFirminus, Bishop of the Gabali in Gaul (S.)
From Various Sources.
[1] After the city of the Gabali, which learned men conjecture was properly called Anderitum, was destroyed, Mende (Latin: Mimate; French: Mende or Mande)—formerly a small village situated within the Cevennes mountains in a deep valley, but ennobled by the residences and tombs of the ancient bishops— The city of Mende. became the capital of the people, enclosed by walls and adorned with an Episcopal See under the Archbishop of Bourges, although in secular jurisdiction it belongs to Gallia Narbonensis, as Guillaume Catel more fully discusses in book 2 of his History of Occitania, chapter 11.
[2] The Church of Mende venerates with its own proper office, on January 14, When Bishop Firminus lived. St. Firminus, its Bishop. At what time he lived is not stated with certainty; however, by the same Catel and Jean Chenu, he is placed between St. Privatus, who, as we shall relate on August 21, was killed by Crocus, King of the Alamanni, in the time of Gallienus and Valerian, and Genialis, who subscribed to the first Council of Arles in the year 314: "Genialis, Deacon, from the city of the Gabali, province of Aquitania." Claudius Robert places him after St. Veranus, who is said to have lived under the Emperor Valens (if indeed he was Bishop of the Gabali and is not mistakenly taken for Veranus, Bishop of Cavaillon, who subscribed to the second Council of Macon in the year of Christ 585—which we shall investigate on November 14 in relation to his life), and after St. Hilary, who attended the Council of Clermont in the year 535, as we shall relate on October 25. But Robert omitted Leonicus, in whose name Optimus the Deacon subscribed to the Council of Agde in the year 506; and it is evident that the catalogue of the Bishops of the Gabali is incomplete, from the Life of St. Privatus, from which Catel cites the following: "St. Privatus the Bishop had his See in the village of Mende, because those who had been bishops there before him had both resided and been buried in that place." Yet before Privatus only St. Severianus is mentioned, of whom we treat on January 25, so that one may suspect that Firminus perhaps held the see before Privatus.
[3] Ferrarius errs, however, when he writes in the general catalogue of Saints: "At the Gabali in Gaul, St. Firminus, Bishop, the first of that city." For all agree that St. Severianus was the first. Saussaye also writes that he held the see after St. Veranus, although in his Supplement to the Martyrology he makes St. Veranus a native of the Gabali, but Bishop of Cavaillon. He writes thus on January 14: His eulogy from Saussaye. "At Mende of the Gabali, St. Firminus, Bishop and Confessor, who in the flourishing age of the Church, when the Catholic faith had already triumphed over the Arian heresy and the Christian religion, spread throughout the whole world, was shining forth under its chief Doctors and most holy Fathers; having been made Bishop of this See after St. Veranus, by his sanctity and learning he brought great glory not only to his own Cathedral but was also an abundant ornament and support to all Gaul, by the outstanding splendor of his excellent virtue and the untiring zeal of his pastoral vigilance and diligence. At last, having completed his divine charge with great profit of souls, radiant with signs and merits, he flew to blessedness." Relics.
[4] His body, says Chenu, is preserved at the town of La Canourgue in the temple of the monastery. Ferrarius writes in his Notes about it: "His body, having lain hidden for a long time, was discovered by his own revelation in the town called La Canourgue in the territory of the Gabali, and there honorably enshrined, as the learned Odo Gissaeus of the Society of Jesus recently informed us." This town is commonly called La Canourgue. Concerning the same discovery, Saussaye writes in his Supplement to the Martyrology for January 14: "In the town of Banassac in the district of the Gabali, in the church of St. Martin, the revelation of St. Firminus, Bishop of Mende and Confessor, whose blessed passing is also commemorated today. His most sacred body is observed with great veneration in the same church of St. Martin, at the altar of St. Julian, where the blessed Confessor continually shines with frequent miracles, which are wrought as a consolation for those who devoutly seek his aid."