ON BL. ORANNA, VIRGIN, ALSO CALLED ORANDA, AND HER UNNAMED COMPANION,
AT ESCH NEAR THE TOWN OF BERES IN LORRAINE.
In the fourteenth century or earlier.
COLLECTION.
On the place where the Blessed is venerated; and on her cult and on the examination of her body: her deeds almost unknown.
Oranna, or Oranda, virgin, and her unnamed companion, at Esch near the town of Beres in Lorraine (Bl.)
BY J. S.
Blessed Orana, otherwise called Oranna, or also Oranda, I have found in absolutely no Martyrology, Beres, a town near Saarlouis in Lorraine, although she has been honoured with a sufficiently celebrated cult for at least some centuries. The place where the Blessed is venerated is almost equally unknown in the geographical maps, or at any rate not correctly expressed in those which I have consulted. The first notice of the Blessed was sent to our Predecessors by Father Alexander Wiltheim of the Society of Jesus, who by very many services deserved excellently well of the Acts of the Saints. He, in a letter given to Papebroch in the year 1666, writes thus: Berris is a town of German Lorraine, not far from Wadgassen, a monastery of the Premonstratensian Order, on the Saar. That town has a parish church, after the old fashion, standing at a short distance outside the walls. In that church lies the body of Saint Oranna or Uranna, virgin. In the notices sent from Wadgassen the town is written Beres. I do not doubt that it is the same which in some maps of Lorraine is marked Belrus, Beaurains, and Blerus. For these names are used to designate the same town in exactly that place in which the town of Beres is situated according to the notices sent to us from those parts, namely not far from the abbey of Wadgassen. And this is situated on the banks of the river Saar or Saravus, one hour from the citadel of Saarlouis, as Hugo writes concerning Wadgassen in the Annals of the Premonstratensian Order, volume 2, column [ ]. And so Beres is not far distant from the fortified town of Saarlouis, commonly called SarLouis, which was founded by order of Louis XIV, king of the French, after Wiltheim wrote his notices concerning the town of Beres.
[2] Concerning the situation of the church it is thus stated in another letter: The church, or rather chapel, of Saint Oranda, virgin, is distant from the town of Beres three quarters of an hour, in a somewhat lower and pleasant enough spot, and near that town the church of Bl. Oranna at Esch, but now uncultivated and utterly deserted through the injuries of the wars. It was formerly the parish church of that same town, but on account of the hostile incursions of soldiers and the frequent ambushes of robbers it ceased to be parochial, and the divine offices are performed in the church of the town itself, and now all the Sacraments are there administered. The lord Philip Budeghenius, a religious of the abbey of Wadgassen, and pastor of the place, in a letter of the year 1666 sent before, agrees, and says: Our monastery of Wadgassen has now for nearly five hundred years held the right of patronage of that church, where the body of the said Saint rests and is venerated. And the parish church is in the municipality of Beres, and the place is called Esch or Exweiler. The said right of patronage was given to our church by the most serene Matthew, duke of Lorraine. The lately-praised Hugo, enumerating on page 1008 the pastorates dependent on Wadgassen, writes the following concerning that one: Berus or Eschweiller came by the donation of Marsilius, ministerialis of Liestroff, in the year MCCXX. But it belongs neither to us nor to the Blessed to inquire by whom the right of patronage was given.
[3] Meanwhile Budeghenius explains why the dwelling of the parish priest was transferred to the town, formerly the parish of that town itself: writing thus: Formerly the parish priest dwelt beside the said church, and had his residence there. But it came about, on account of the disturbances of wars and hostile incursions, that even the men who wished to go to the church were captured; nay, in the very church during the divine Office impious soldiers used to offer violence. Wherefore, by order of the most serene duke in Lorraine, about two hundred years ago the residence of the aforesaid parish priest was transferred to the municipality of Beres for the sake of security: but a lay guardian was left there to guard the church and to receive the offerings. Thus far concerning the formerly parochial church.
[4] Concerning the cult of the Blessed in that place he writes these things in the same Letter: the tomb of the Blessed there, which is honoured with an office, The tomb of the said Saint is beside the high altar, enclosed with iron gratings. And by her intercession and merits health is implored for the deaf and the hard of hearing, or those labouring under dizziness of the head, and other diseases. And many who have obtained their wish pour forth prayers in the said place: very many also, having made a vow, who have been afflicted with diseases of this sort and with fluxes of the ears, pay their offerings every year. Her festival is celebrated on the first Sunday after the Exaltation of the holy Cross: and throughout the whole Octave there is a great concourse of men coming thither for the sake of devotion and of paying their vows. On all these things Wiltheim agrees in the Letter already cited. In another his nephew also, to whom he had committed the care of examining everything on the spot, speaks thus: For the rest, the place has for many centuries now been celebrated for the veneration and concourse of the faithful on account of the tomb of that same Saint, which is seen in the middle of the church itself, of rough and unpolished stone, distinguished by no carving or trace of an inscription: it is merely fenced about on all sides with an iron grating, to which the country folk affix their candles, flowers, garlands, and offerings of that sort for the sake of veneration. But above all it is memorable that the deaf experience the patronage of that Saint prompt and effectual, and that she has been renowned (as all affirm) with very many miracles and prodigies from of old down to these times.
[5] Hence pilgrims flock together generally from all Lorraine and the adjacent provinces, and pay their vows not unhappily. And as often as it happens that any priest there celebrates Mass, and she is honoured with votive pilgrimages. then the country people come running together from all the neighbourhood with candles and offerings, and with the greatest sense of piety, as I myself with great consolation beheld, suppliantly honour and venerate their Patroness. Of whom an upright and honest woman related to us, in the presence of many others also as witnesses, that by the intercession of that same Saint she had been freed from a most grievous deafness of many years, the remedies of the medical art having been applied in vain. Thus far Nicholas Wiltheim of our Society, nephew of Alexander by his brother, who, as his uncle writes in another Letter, betook himself to the tomb of Bl. Oranna, both, he says, to invoke that Saint as patroness for recovering the hearing which he lacks, and to inquire concerning her affairs: which indeed he will do excellently, since he is strong in judgment and in talent. Thus Alexander Wiltheim, who nevertheless had himself also been there before, and in his first Letter had added this: Some vow an annual pilgrimage. It has been proved by long experience that the ears of those who do not pay their vow flow with blood.
[6] The body of the Blessed and of her Companion, in the year 1488 He adds that the tomb was formerly opened, so that the sacred body might be examined, and that an instrument of that inspection is extant. But Budeghenius says more of this matter in his letter, writing thus: It happened at some time more than two hundred years ago that it was doubted by many whether the sacred body of the holy Virgin was still in the same sarcophagus. Hence at the instance of the nobles and of other faithful of Christ round about, the said tomb was opened by the Reverend Lord Suffragan of the bishop of Metz during the divine Office, and two bodies were found, one at the head, the other at the feet. He adds that the instrument of this inspection is still preserved: and it was transmitted to us by Wiltheim. Nevertheless the authentic document itself could not then be found; but we received a copy transcribed from it, in which the subscriptions are wanting. This, however, I transfer hither entire: We, Desiderius Natalis, by the grace of God and of the holy Apostolic See bishop of Panada. We make known to All, that whereas it came into doubt with many concerning the bodies of the most blessed Oranda and her Companion, whether they were really and effectually contained in their sepulchre, in which they were venerated, which sepulchre from of old the Lord honours, even as He honours it down to our times, with divers illustrious miracles, since it fell within no man's memory, nay nor did he believe from hearsay that the same sepulchre had ever been opened: whereas also many of Christ's faithful have asked us and earnestly entreated that we should open the same sepulchre, and that if we should find anything laid up therein, without injury to the blessed Virgins, we should make it known to the people, that thereby a greater devotion of the people toward venerating them might be kindled.
[7] was visited in solemn manner: Hence it is that we, having summoned Lord Thilmann, archpresbyter of the said place, and many other rectors of churches, having first celebrated
sacred vigils, with a solemnity of hymns and prayers and a threefold litany, with lights also multiplied, and all things, so far as we were able, duly ordered for this business, on the very feast of the Invention of the holy Cross, namely the third of May of the year of the Lord MCCCCLXXXVIII, in the reign of the most holy Pope Sixtus, of Frederick emperor of the Romans, of Louis king of the French, and of René, most illustrious and most victorious duke of the Lorrainers, we resolved that the sacred sepulchre itself should be opened, and accordingly then, in the presence of many nobles of both sexes and of innumerable persons of the common people, we opened it. In which sacred sarcophagus two bodies with all their bones, as appeared to us at first sight, were found; one as it were at the head, the other at the feet, which we resolved should be presented to the holy people with diligent guard, to be venerated and adored, even as we ourselves were then the first to venerate and adore them: and we laid them away in threefold cloths, and caused them to be enclosed in two sacks [] as reverently as we could. And these, after the solemnities of the Masses, having been as devoutly as we could shut up again in the same sepulchre of theirs, we willed that two letters of this our enclosure should be made, of which one should be shut up in the sarcophagus itself; but the other we willed to be reserved for perpetual memory under the custody of the curate and of Simon of Zeistrom, officer of the lord duke. Done under our seal in the Year and on the day which… Thus far the aforesaid instrument, in which, besides the subscriptions, perhaps one word is wanting after the word Sacks*, because there a space was left empty for one word. Perhaps the word by which the material of the sacks was designated could not be read by the transcriber.
[8] Further, from the aforesaid instrument we have it that St. Oranna was venerated from the fifteenth century, [from which it is gathered that they died at least as early as the fourteenth century:] at the least, and probably earlier. Secondly, the same instrument attributes to Oranna a blessed Companion, but an anonymous one. Thirdly, from the same letters it becomes most probable and almost indubitable that St. Oranna and her Companion did not die later than the fourteenth century, since in the year 1488 they were said to be venerated from of old, nor did anyone then remember or had heard that the sepulchre had ever been opened. For these things would not have had place if the Blessed ones had lived after the year 1400: but rather they could have learned something about their manner of life from their own parents, who in the year 1488 were old men. But as these things intimate that the Blessed ones had not died after the fourteenth century, so they by no means prove that they died in that same century, since they might have died whole centuries earlier. Hence I have determined the death of the Blessed ones no otherwise than in these words: In the fourteenth century or earlier.
[9] Nothing certain is had concerning their deeds. That nothing sufficiently certain is established concerning the deeds of the Blessed ones, Budeghenius the parish priest confesses. He brings forward, however, the conjectures of some, writing these things in the aforesaid letter: But now concerning her origin and birth, her life, her death, nothing certain is established, except that she there with a Companion and attendant led a holy and innocent life in the said place of Esch, as is reported. Some will have it that she was the daughter of a king or of a great prince; and that, because for love of virginity she fled from her father's house with her Companion and maidservant, being pursued and on the point of being seized, she hid herself near the place where the church now is. I pass over what is added, the answer of a husbandman questioned by the pursuers, since it seems fabulous rather than probable. Others say that St. Oranna sprang from the illustrious family of the lords of that land. And that she had a defect in her ears, and heard with difficulty, and that on account of that deafness, they say, being despised and rejected by her brothers, she received that estate near Eschweiler for her dowry and support out of the paternal inheritance: where with her maidservant she passed her days in patience and holiness of life, so that, drawing all into admiration of her, and pleasing God and her neighbour with great edification both of virginity and of the observance of devotion, she at length rested there in peace. After whose death, God, whom she had loved in life, showing forth the sanctity of his Handmaid, the deaf everywhere, and those suffering from dizziness of the head, receive health through the merits of the holy Virgin. This they attest to this day, who, coming for the sake of a vow to the sepulchre of the holy Virgin, return safe and sound, giving thanks to God. Thus far the aforesaid parish priest: nor have I anything more to add to these things.