Today November 29 we celebrate San Saturnino, history and prayer

Today, Monday 29 November, the Church commemorates Saint Saturninus.

San Saturnino was one of the most illustrious martyrs there France donated to the Church. We only possess his Acts, which are very ancient, having been used by St. Gregory of Tours.

It was primo bishop of Toulouse, where he went during the consulate of Decius and Gratus (250). There he had a small church.

To reach it he had to pass in front of the Capitol, where there was a temple, and according to the Acts, the pagan priests attributed to his frequent passages the silence of their oracles.

One day they took him and for his unshakable refusal to sacrifice to idols they condemned him to be tied by the feet to a bull who dragged him around the city until the rope broke. Two Christian women devotedly collected the remains and buried them in a deep pit, so that they would not be desecrated by the pagans.

His successors, Ss. Ilario and Exuperio, gave him a more honorable burial. A church was erected where the bull stopped. It still exists, and is called the church of the Taur (the bull).

The saint's body was moved very soon and is still preserved in the Church of San Sernin (or Saturnino), one of the oldest and most beautiful in the south of France.

His feast was included in the Geronimo Martyrology for 29 November; his cult has also spread abroad. The account of his Acts was embellished with several details, and legends linked his name with the beginning of the churches of Eauze, Auch, Pamplona and Amiens, but these are without historical foundation.

Prayer to San Saturnino

O God, who grant us to celebrate the feast of your blessed martyr Saturninus,
obtain for us to be rescued  thanks to her intercession.

Amen