ON ST. GOBERT, CONFESSOR, AT FOSSES IN BELGIUM.
CommentaryGobert, monk at Fosses in Belgium (St.)
[1] There is a town in the territory of Liege called Fosses, above Namur, between the rivers Meuse and Sambre. Here there is a collegiate church of canons dedicated to St. Foillan; formerly an abbey, mention of which is made in the diploma of King Louis, The town of Fosses. son of Emperor Arnulf, in Miraeus's Account of the Churches of Belgium, chapter 47, and in Chapeaville, volume 1 of the History of the Bishops of Liege, in these words: and the abbey called Fosses, acquired through a precaria from the Abbess Gislana, our kinswoman, with the consent of our will, situated in the pagus and county of Lomme, whose count is now Berengar, etc.
[2] Here on January 26 is venerated St. Gobert, Confessor. So Galesius says: Feast of St. Gobert, In Belgium, of St. Gobert, Confessor. Hugh Menard in the Benedictine Martyrology: In Belgium, at the monastery of Fosses, of St. Gobert, Confessor. Dorganius also records him. Wion writes somewhat more: In Belgium, at the monastery of Fosses, of St. Gobert, Confessor, who rests in that same place. He adds in his Notes: He appears to have been a monk of that same monastery of Fosses, though I do not yet hold this as established. What Wion conjectured, Ferrari subsequently asserted in part: At Fosses in Belgium, of St. Gobert, monk — besides the monastic Martyrology, he cites Galesius, who however does not make him a monk, and Molanus in the Feast-Days of the Saints of Belgium, where there is no mention of this Gobert; whether he appears in the Additions to Usuard, we shall see shortly.
[3] That his relics rest there, as Wion asserts, Saussay also writes: relics. At the monastery of Fosses in Hainaut, the deposition likewise of St. Gobert, Confessor; whose soul possesses divine immortality as a reward for his merits; and his body, long famous for miracles, rests there with honor. But Fosses is not in Hainaut. Concerning the relics, hear what the most inquisitive Molanus once discovered, who writes thus in his Index of the Saints of Belgium: St. Gobert, Confessor, has at Fosses at St. Foillan's an office with nine Lessons on the seventh day before the Kalends of February. Where he rests I do not know. But a certain man named Gobert told me that images of St. Gobert are printed at Brogne, and that he believes his relics are preserved not far from Fosses and Brogne.
[4] Saussay in the Supplement to the Martyrology commemorates a Robert on this day, for he writes: At Fosses at St. Foillan's, of St. Robert, monk and Confessor, with an office of nine Lessons there. No Robert is known to the people of Fosses. The same Saussay, Is he the same who is venerated on November 23? as is clear from his Index, judged this to be the same Gobert who is recorded on November 23 in certain Martyrologies. For us, whether he is another or the same is not clear, since we have seen the Acts of neither. But concerning the latter, in the ancient Martyrology of Ado preserved at the monastery of St. Lawrence in Liege, these words were written by an ancient hand under November 23: Likewise of St. Gothbert, Confessor. The ancient manuscript of Usuard's Martyrology which belonged to Augustin Hunne, also Molanus and the Carthusians of Cologne in their additions to Usuard, and the manuscript Florarium: In the territory of Reims, of St. Gobert, Confessor. But Canisius and Ferrari: In the territory of Laon, of St. Gobert, Confessor. Saussay in the Supplement to the Martyrology: On the same day, in the region of Laon, of St. Gobert, Confessor, distinguished for the testimonies of divine grace.
[5] From this man, however, as Molanus writes in the cited Index of Saints, Gobert, Count of Aspremont, is different; he, despising his nobility, another from the Villers Gobert. professed the monastic life at Villers, where he also has an honorable burial and a life history written in three books. But he has not been enrolled among the Saints by the Church — nor have several others who flourished with great sanctity in that same monastery, whose venerable bones are placed together. We shall give the history of this Gobert on August 20.
[6] St. Gobert is venerated at Fosses (as we learned from letters of the Reverend Lord Aegidius Bourdoux, who has been a canon there for about thirty years) By what rite he is venerated. on January 26, with an office of nine Lessons, which in the second and third Nocturn are taken from the Common of a Confessor Bishop.