A Hermit in Jerusalem

JERUSALEM – On June 15, 2014, the Church of the Holy Land celebrated the great feast of the mystery of the Holy Trinity, but it was also the occasion of a rare event in the Church of Jerusalem, the perpetual profession a young Italian in the presence of Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem Fouad Twal.

The young Italian is Filippo Rossi, a balanced and gentle man of about forty years, from a wealthy family. In a word, someone who has it all! Yet, as a seminarian, Filippo felt that God was calling him to a more “radical” religious life. He chose to dive into the adventure of the eremitical life here in the Holy Land, surrounded by fields of the Trappist Abbey of Latrun, a place that has hosted the eremitical life since the beginnings of Christianity. A local tradition tells how Saint Saba lived in a cave. Archaeologists have also recently found mosaics that show a small church or chapel existed on the site.

The moving celebration took place in the Basilica of Nations, Gethsemane, and was presided over by His Beatitude the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Fouad Twal, and concelebrated by the Abbot of the Abbey of Latrun, Dom René Hascoët and the abbot of the French Trappist Abbey of Sept-Fons, Dom Patrick Olive, and 22 priests. Many religious and lay friends of the young hermit participated in the celebration. The Magnificat Choir of the Custody of the Holy Land provided the sacred music for the celebration.

The call to the eremitical life is closely linked to the Holy Land, and in particular to the area around the Holy City, located near the Judean desert. This way of life was born in Egypt, but soon arrived in the Holy Land with the hermits who wanted to be closer to the same places that reflect the mysteries of the life of Christ, and the place where the early church, called as the Mother Church, the Church of Jerusalem, was born.

Needless to say, Filippo did not invent a new style of life, but he has embraced a lifestyle that the Church has known from the beginning, putting his trust in God first, but in the knowledge and experience of the first hermits, the Desert Fathers, whose tradition has left an entire spiritual wisdom.

During his homily, His Beatitude began with a meditation on the mystery of the Holy Trinity “which is an experience that precedes theory,” and he then expressed his joy and great excitement saying, “With your solemn profession you make a great gift to the Church, the Mother Church, and that keeps alive a tradition that has witnessed major figures such as Saint Hilarion of Gaza and Saint Anthony Abbot, monk of Egypt, who left his native country at a young age to live as a hermit in the desert, along the banks of the Red Sea.”

What prompted this radical desire of Filippo is probably this “experience”, an experience of God that precedes theory, to paraphrase the Patriarch of Jerusalem. Only this experience together with the Gospel can explain the authenticity of this call, and why it does not contradict human nature which has a thirst for infinite love, that is to say, for God Himself.
“Your profession today, dear hermit Filippo, is a fine example of Christian coherence and unity between your faith and life,” said the Patriarch. Still addressing himself to the newly professed, he said: “Dear Filippo, ‘man does not live by bread alone’, we read in Deuteronomy. Having the awareness that there are other needs that go beyond material bread opens a space of freedom, beyond the inevitable suggestions of life.”

According to the Patriarch of the Holy City, the monastic life finds its model in the experience that Jesus made for forty days in the desert. Recalling that the desert “is the place where a person can assert the truth of oneself and understand the relativity of rights and the absoluteness of God (…) the desert experience obliges man to release, to strip unnecessary things and vanity. The desert reduces man to the essential, fundamental things (…) the hermitage reminds us of our hunger and thirst for God.”

Finally, the Patriarch concluded his homily, moved, saying: “Thank you Philip! We will accompany you with our affection, our support and our prayers. The Mother Church will always be close to you. Our Lady Queen of Palestine will protect you. “
After the ceremony, all were invited to a simple but festive buffet, which the hermit and his family planned to celebrate his commitment on the paths of the absolute search for God.
http://en.lpj.org/2014/06/18/a-hermit-for-the-mother-church/

See also: http://www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=25007

In Search of The Hermit Within

I listened this morning to an interesting Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio documentary: “In Search of The Hermit Within” – http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/360/in-search-of-the-hermit-within/5556172

“Being homeless is rarely a lifestyle choice but for some people freedom from social convention and solitude is all that matters.
Seeking out a life without stresses and artificial noise, a hermit will cast off the shackles of modern society and embed themselves in mother nature’s embrace. They willingly trade a fixed abode for the confines of the elements and they gratefully hand over any attachment to commercialism in exchange for living off the land.
But is being a hermit as romantically ideal as it sounds?

‘In search of the hermit within’ explores the dreams and realities of isolation by choice. Using memoir, fiction and interviews writers Stewart Nestel and Peter Davis take us on a journey into the Australian bush to meet real hermits and hear tales of hermits encountered.”

The program included readings from “The Wanderer” (1901) by the Australian poet, Christopher Brennan (1870-1932) – see http://sydney.edu.au/alumni/sam/november2011/christopher-brennan.shtml :

“I know I am
the wanderer of the ways of all the worlds,
to whom the sunshine and the rain are one
and one to stay or hasten, because he knows
no ending of the way, no home, no goal,
and phantom night and the grey day alike
withhold the heart where all my dreams and days
might faint in soft fire and delicious death:
and saying this to myself as a simple thing
I feel a peace fall in the heart of the winds
and a clear dusk settle, somewhere, far in me.”

http://www.middlemiss.org/lit/authors/brennanc/poetry/wanderer.html

Anything but time alone….

“We’ve all complained that we would love some time alone – but few people actually enjoy it, researchers have found. Most volunteers who were asked to spend no more than 15 minutes alone in a room doing nothing but sitting and thinking found the task onerous.
In fact, some of the volunteers, men in particular, preferred to administer mild electrical shocks to themselves rather than sit and do nothing.
‘Many people find it difficult to use their own minds to entertain themselves, at least when asked to do it on the spot,’ said University of Virginia psychology professor Timothy Wilson, who led the study appearing in the journal Science.
‘In this modern age, with all the gadgets we have, people seem to fill up every moment with some external activity.’
Nearly 800 people took part in the study. Some experiments involved only college students.
The researchers then broadened the study to include adults who live in the same area.
They went to a church and farmer’s market to recruit people from a variety of backgrounds and ages up to 77.
And they got the same results: most participants regardless of age or gender did not like to be idle and alone with their thoughts.
In some experiments, college volunteers were asked to sit alone in a bare laboratory room and spend six to 15 minutes doing nothing but thinking or daydreaming.
They were not allowed to have a cellphone, music player, reading material or writing implements and were asked to remain in their seats and stay awake.
Most reported they did not enjoy the task and found it hard to concentrate.
Researchers then had adult and college student volunteers do the same thing in their homes, and got the same results.
In addition, a third of volunteers cheated by doing things like using a cellphone or listening to music.
The researchers did an experiment to see if the student volunteers would even do an unpleasant task rather than just sit and think. They gave them a mild shock of the intensity of static electricity. Volunteers were asked whether, if given $5, they would spend some of it to avoid getting shocked again. The ones who said they would be willing to pay to avoid another shock were asked to sit alone and think for 15 minutes but were given the option of giving themselves that same shock by simply pushing a button.
Many did not, especially men: Two-thirds (12 of 18) administered at least one shock.
One did it 190 times. A quarter of the women (six of 24) gave themselves at least one shock.
‘I think they just wanted to shock themselves out of the boredom,’ Wilson said.
‘Sometimes negative stimulation is preferable to no stimulation.’”

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2679950/Need-time-Researchers-men-administer-electric-shocks-spent-time-do.html#ixzz36TTLyRhR

See also:
http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/science/2014/07/03/idle/J2LpEcTdZzLykRCTnZ80fL/story.html
http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2014/07/04/4039348.htm
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/jul/03/electric-shock-preferable-to-thinking-says-study

Saint Máel Ruain and The Céli Dé

July 7 is the Commemoration of Saint Máel Ruain.

“Saint Máel Ruain died 792) was founder and abbot-bishop of the monastery of Tallaght (Co. Dublin, Ireland). He is often considered to be a leading figure of the monastic ‘movement’ that has become known to scholarship as the Céli Dé. He is not to be confused with the later namesake Máel Ruain, bishop of Lusca (Co. Dublin).
Little is known of his life. Máel Ruain is not his personal name bestowed at birth or baptism, but his monastic name, composed of Old Irish máel (“one who is tonsured”) and Ruain (“of Rúadán”), which may mean that he was a monk of St. Rúadán’s monastery in Lothra (north Co. Tipperary). Though his background and early career remain obscure, he is commonly credited with the foundation of the monastery of Tallaght, sometimes called “Máel Ruain’s Tallaght”, in the latter half of the 8th century. This may be supported by an entry for 10 August in the Martyrology of Tallaght, which notes that Máel Ruain came to Tallaght carrying with him “relics of the holy martyrs and virgins” (cum suis reliquiis sanctorum martirum et uirginum), apparently with an eye to founding his house. There is at any rate no evidence for a religious establishment at Tallaght prior to Máel Ruain’s arrival and although Tamlachtae, the Old Irish name for Tallaght, refers to a burial ground, it was not yet the rule for cemeteries to be located adjacent to a church. Precise details of the circumstances are unknown. A line in the Book of Leinster has been read as saying that in 774 the monk obtained the land at Tallaght from the Leinster king Cellach mac Dúnchada (d. 776), who came from the Uí Dúnchada sept of the Uí Dúnlainge branch of the Laigin, but there is no contemporary authority from the annals to support the statement. In the Martyrology of Tallaght and the entries for his death in the Irish annals (see below), he is styled a bishop.
The best known disciple of Máel Ruain’s community was Óengus the Culdee, the author of the Félire Óengusso, a versified martyrology or calendar commemorating the feasts of Irish and non-Irish saints, and possibly also of the earlier prose version, the Martyrology of Tallaght. In his epilogue to the Félire Óengusso, written sometime after Máel Ruain’s death, Óengus shows himself much indebted to his “tutor” (aite), whom he remembers elsewhere as “the great sun on Meath’s south plain” (grían már desmaig Midi). In the early ninth century, Tallaght also seems to have produced the so-called Old Irish Penitential.

Although liturgical concerns are evident in the two martyrologies, there is no strictly contemporary evidence for Máel Ruain’s own monastic principles and practices. Evidence for his teachings and their influence comes chiefly by way of a number of 9th-century writings associated with the Tallaght community known collectively as the ‘Tallaght memoir’. One of the principal texts is The Monastery of Tallaght (9th century), which claims to list the precepts and habits of Máel Ruain and some of his associates, apparently as remembered by his follower Máel Díthruib of Terryglass. Much of the text survives in a 15th-century manuscript, RIA MS 1227 (olim MS 3 B 23), and in the 17th century, an Early Modern Irish paraphrase was produced now referred to as The Teaching of Máel Ruain. Of less certain origin is the text known as the Rule of Céli Dé, which is preserved in the Leabhar Breac (15th century) and contains various instructions for the regulation and observance of monastic life, notably in liturgical matters. It is ascribed to both Óengus and Máel Ruain, but the text in its present form is a prose rendering from the original verse, possibly written in the 9th century by one of his community. These works of guidance appear to have been modelled on the sayings of the Desert Fathers of Egypt, in particular the Conferences of John Cassian. Typical concerns in them include the importance of daily recitation of the Psalter, of self-restraint and forbearance from indulgences in bodily desires and of separation from worldly concerns. Against the practices of earlier Irish monastic movements, Máel Ruain is cited as forbidding his monks to go on an overseas pilgrimage, preferring instead to foster communal life in the monastery.

Along with his disciple Aengus, Maelruain is regarded as joint author of The Rule of the Céilí Dé.

Máel Ruain’s reputation as a teacher whose influence on the monastic world extended beyond the confines of the cloister walls is further suggested by the later tract Lucht Óentad Máele Ruain (“Folk of the Unity of Máel Ruain”), which enumerates the twelve most prominent associates who embraced his teachings. They are said to include Óengus, Máel Díthruib of Terryglass, Fedelmid mac Crimthainn, king of Cashel, Diarmait ua hÁedo Róin of Castledermot (Co. Kildare) and Dímmán of Araid.
The Annals of Ulster report under the year 792 that Máel Ruain died a peaceful death, calling him a bishop (episcopus) and soldier of Christ (miles Christi). In the Annals of the Four Masters, however, in which he is also styled “bishop”, his death is assigned, probably incorrectly, to the year 787. His feast in the Martyrology of Tallaght and Félire Óengusso is on July 7. He was succeeded as abbot of Tallaght by Airerán.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%A1el_Ruain

Late 14th or 15th wooden statue of St. Maelruain preserved at Crossbeg near Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford

“St Maelruain was the leader of the Céilí Dé, a reform movement aimed at restoring purity and austerity to Irish monasticism which had become somewhat undisciplined by the 8th century. Maelruain founded a monastery at Tallaght, in south Co Dublin. The image is of the Martyrology of Tallaght (Ms A3), a list of the names of saints and their feasts attributed to St Maelruain and his disciple St Aengus and read at their community Mass. Patrick Duffy explains the context in which Maelruain and the Céilí Dé lived.
A monastery at Tallaght
Little is know of the early life of Maelruain. Probably he was born in the Lorrha neighbourhood of north Tipperary in 720. In 755 he founded a monastery at Tallaght in south Co Dublin on land given by Cellach mac Dunchada, King of Leinster. He is associated with the monastic reform movement begun in the eighth century known as the Céilí Dé or Culdees. In both the Annals of Ulster and the Annals of the Four Masters, Maelruain is referred to as a “bishop”, but this terminology may reflect the Church structure of the later time of writing.
Céilí Dé
Céilí Dé probably means the ‘companions’ or ‘intimates’ of God – by analogy, for example, with bean chéile (‘wife’) or fear céile (‘husband’).
Why a reform movement?
Irish monasteries had become lax by the eighth century, possibly as a result of too much going abroad and an overemphasis on the peregrinatio pro Christo (or ‘pilgrimage for Christ’) movement to the continent begun by Saints Colmcille and Columban in the late sixth century. The fact that many monks felt called to go into wandering exile on the continent may have caused the internal discipline of the monasteries to break down somewhat.
A strong ascetical component
Maelruain’s reform at Tallaght was severe. It put more emphasis on preserving the enclosure and keeping the monks from sin than on the missionary dimension. There was a strong ascetical component, strong spiritual direction, frequent confession, as well as long fasts and harsh penances, such as standing in cold water for long periods to control the flesh.
The Rule of the Céilí Dé
Along with his disciple Aengus, Maelruain is regarded as joint author of The Rule of the Céilí Dé. A copy is preserved in the library of the Royal Irish Academy. The 19th century Celtic scholar Eoghan O’Curry says of this: “It contains a minute series of rules for the regulation of the lives of the Céilí Dé, their prayers, their preachings, their conversations, their confessions, their communions, their ablutions, their fastings, their abstinences, their relaxations, their sleep, their celebrations of the Mass, and so forth”.
Liturgy and manual work
The monks came together for a liturgical cycle of prayer, chanting psalms. There was also devotion to Our Lady and Michael the archangel. Mass was celebrated on Sundays, Thursdays and on great feasts. The monks received the consecrated bread, but not the consecrated wine. A litany of the names of the saints (The Martyrology of Tallaght) was read at every Mass. Intellectual and manual work were also valued as part of the monastery routine.
Spread of the movement
Besides Aengus, another disciple of Maelruain called Moling made a foundation similar to the Céilí Dé on the river Barrow at St Mullins in Co Carlow. Moling also became a figure of influence in the Ferns area. Other monasteries of the Céilí Dé movement were founded at Finglas, Clonenagh, Terryglass and Dairinis near Lismore. The Culdees also spread to Wales and Scotland where they survived into medieval times.”

Jul 7 – St. Maelruain of Tallaght (d. 792)

The Seven Ascetic Saints in Tounar Mount

July 6 is the Commemoration of the Seven Ascetic Saints in Tounar Mount (Tona)
“On this day, the seven ascetic saints in Tounar Mount (Tona), were martyred. These were: Basadi, Cotolus, Ardama, Moses, Esey, Parkalas (Mikalas), and a monk called Cotolus. The angel of the Lord had appeared to Sts. Basadi and Cotolus and commanded them to confess the name of the Lord Christ. They rose up straightway to go to the governor. They met the five saints embarking a ship going to the governor to also confess the Lord Christ. They all agreed together on receiving the crown of martyrdom. They went to the governor and confessed the Lord Christ. He tortured them excessively, then hung stones from their necks, and shut them up in prison. The Lord appeared to them, comforted, strengthened, and promised them the kingdom. The governor then sent them to Alexandria, where they were tortured severely. He threw them into cauldrons full of sulphur and pitch, and lighted a great fire under them, then he took them out and threw them away. The Lord sent His angel who healed them. They came back to the governor and confessed the Lord Christ before him. One hundred thirty persons witnessed that. They confessed the Lord Christ, were martyred, and they received the crown of martyrdom. The Governor intensified the torture on the seven saints, and finally cut off their heads with the sword, and they received the crown of martyrdom.”
http://www.abanoub.org.au/synexarium/10_29.html

“SEVEN ASCETICS OF TUNAH. This is a classic story concerning martyr hermits. No details are given about their ascetic life except that they lived near Tunah. It seems, moreover, that only five of them were ascetics, and that Anba Psate (or Basidi) and Anba Kutilus, who was a priest, joined the ascetics in their confession of Christ. The governor (it is not said where he resided) tortured and imprisoned them but, achieving nothing, sent them to Alexandria, where they were tortured again. Then, as a last resort, six of them were beheaded when they refused to worship the idol of Apollo. Kutilus (the priest, apparently) was consigned to the flames. These seven martyred ascetics are known only from a brief notice in the recension of the SYNAXARION of the Copts from Lower Egypt. This text presents two problems for the reader. First is the question of the place called “the mountain of Tunah.” It could be the town that disappeared in the floods of Lake al-Manzalah or the mountain called in Middle Egypt Tunah al-Jabal, in the district of Mallawi. E. Amélineau inclines to the second site (1893, pp. 525- 26), but it seems that in fact it is the town of this name that is meant. In fact, if that were the case, it is more natural that the governor should send them to Alexandria. Second, the names of these martyr ascetics are not certain, for the spelling varies greatly from one manuscript to another. What seems certain is that two of them had a foreign name—they are said to have called themselves “Kutilus” (the transcription credited to a Syrian saint “Gawbdalahu” [22 Tut]). It may therefore be that these two ascetics were of Syrian origin. The other names appear to be Egyptian. In any case, they all seem thoroughly “pagan,” and hence guarantee their antiquity. The Ethiopic version of the Synaxarion renders jabal (mountain) as “monastery,” and precedes the name Tunah by the word “town.” It therefore interprets “al-jabal Tunah” as designating “the monastery of the town of Tunah” (without doubt an anachronism), and places it in the Delta rather than in Middle Egypt.”
http://ccdl.libraries.claremont.edu/cdm/ref/collection/cce/id/1734

Les Vies des SS. Pères des déserts d’Occident

Joseph-François Bourgoing de Villefore “Les Vies des SS. Pères des déserts d’Occident: Avec des figures qui représentent l’austérité de leur vie et leurs principales occupations.” Paris: P.-J. Mariette, 1722

Contents:
1 Early history
2 Development of monastic communities
3 Notable Desert Fathers and Mothers
4 Practices
4.1 Withdrawal from society
4.2 Hesychasm
4.3 Charity and forgiveness
4.4 Recitation of scripture
5 Excerpts from The Sayings of the Desert Fathers
6 Essential texts
7 See also
8 Notes
9 References
10 External links

“The Desert Fathers gave a great deal of emphasis to living and practicing the teachings of Christ, much more than mere theoretical knowledge. Their efforts to live the commandments were not seen as being easy—many of the stories from that time recount the struggle to overcome negative emotions such as anger and judgment of others. Helping a brother monk who was ill or struggling was seen as taking priority over any other consideration. Hermits were frequently seen to break a long fast when hosting visitors, as hospitality and kindness were more important than keeping the ascetic practices that were so dominant in the Desert Fathers’ lives.” [p.25]

http://schilbantiquarian.com/store/1722-desert-fathers-77-copper-plates-egyptian-coptic-hermits-monastic-ascetic-monks-nuns-angels-demons-more-see-photos/

For Joseph-François Bourgoing de Villefore (1652-1737) see: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph-Fran%C3%A7ois_Bourgoing_de_Villefore

The text of the book is available on-line at https://archive.org/details/lesviesdesssper02villgoog and
https://openlibrary.org/books/ia:lesviesdesssper01villgoog/Les_Vies_des_S.S._Peres_des_deserts_et_saintes_solitaires_d%27Orient_et_d%27Occident

Saint Leo of Dalmatia, Hermit

July 1 is the commemoration of Saint Leo of Dalmatia, Hermit

”An imposing town on a massif, San Leo (Rimini Province)[Italy] reigns mid-way over the Valle del Marecchia, a critical spot in terms of the territory’s historic and military events. Before it became Christian, it was a place of pagan worship, but later hosted the hermit Saint Leo of Dalmatia.
Together with his friend St. Marinus, St. Leo contributed to the advent of Christianity in Montefeltro in the 4th Century.”
http://www.italia.it/en/travel-ideas/art-and-history/gioielliditalia/san-leo-jewel-of-italy.html

Cenydd, Hermit of Wales

July 1 is the commemoration of Cenydd, Hermit of Wales.

Cenydd (probably 6th century, also known as Keneth, modern Welsh Cennydd, modern English Kenneth, French Kinède) was a sanctified Christian hermit of the Gower Peninsula, Wales, where place-name evidence indicates he was the founder of the church of Llangennith. In Brittany his cultus is centred on Languidic: he also had a chapel at Ploumelin. He should not be confused with Saint Kenneth (or Canice), the Irish saint popular in Scotland.
Liturgical calendars and place-name evidence suggest the historical existence of Cenydd. His legend, however, is too late and too obviously derivative to be relied upon. According to Welsh sources collected in the 15th century by John Capgrave and published in the Nova Legenda Angliae, Cenydd was a Breton prince, the son of King ‘Dihoc’ (presumably Deroch II of Domnonée) born of incest apparently at Loughor in Glamorgan while his father was attending King Arthur.

A cripple, Cenydd was placed in a cradle made of osiers and cast into the estuary of the River Loughor (a fate that befell several early British saints) and eventually landed on Worm’s Head island, Ynys Weryn. Seagulls and angels with a miraculous breast-shaped bell ensured that he survived and was educated as a Christian.
He became a hermit, his only companion being an untrustworthy servant whose dishonesty was revealed when he stole a spear from one of a group of robbers who had been hospitably received by his master. In 545 Saint David later cured Cenydd while travelling to the Synod of Brefi but he preferred to remain as he was born and prayed for his infirmity to be restored.
An incised stone monument featuring images apparently of the Cenydd legend was discovered during renovation work at St Mungo’s Church, Dearham (Cumbria) in the 1880s and is displayed there as ‘the Kenneth Stone’. The Saint’s connection with Cumbria is currently unexplained.

According to the unreliable Iolo Morganwg, Cenydd was a son of Gildas, and married and had a son before entering Llanilltud Fawr as a monk under Saint Illtud.

Cenydd’s feast day is celebrated at Llangennith on 5 July (colloquially referred to as his ‘Mapsant day’, from the Welsh words ‘sant’ – holy, and ‘mab’ – son: see also ‘Gŵyl Mabsant’). Up to the early twentieth century the festival was traditionally marked by the displaying of an effigy of a bird from a pole on the church tower, symbolising the legendary birds who cared for the infant Cenydd, and the consumption of whitepot or ‘milked meat’ a dish made of flour, milk, sugar and dried fruits, not unlike a rice pudding or bread and butter pudding (see also Cuisine of Gower). The practice has been revived in recent years. William Worcester also records the feast of his translation, apparently to somewhere in North Wales, on 27 June.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cenydd

St. Cenydd’s Church, Llangennith

“The current church of St Cennydd’s fabric is dated from the 11th to 14th century, built on the site, of St Cennydd’s Priory. Which has been a place of worship for over 1500 hundred years.

The present church was consecrated in 1102 – when Norman war-lords were building castles and churches all over the Gower Peninsula.

The church is custodian of several stone artefacts, and contains a significant Norman Font, an effigy of a 13th-century Knight in Armour, and what is said to be the grave slab of St Cennydd.

A recently rediscovered medieval niche in the chancel arch, displays a significant carved slab of around the 9th century, featuring intricate Celtic knots. This is said to be the former grave stone of St Cenydd. Until the nineteenth century remodelling of the church, the stone slab was set flat in the chancel floor.

“St. Cenydd was the original Gower boy who made good. Legend has it he was born in the sixth century with a withered leg, cast adrift in a basket on the Loughor estuary, rescued by gulls and reared by angels. Our local boy grew up to found St. Cenydd’s priory which accounts for the present building being the largest parish church in Gower.

The Danes burnt it, but our church survives, dominated by its massive 13th century stone tower with saddleback roof. Now wall-mounted inside, a carved slab is reputed to have marked the grave of the saint.”
http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WMHZRD_St_Cennydds_Stone_Llangennith_Wales_Great_Britain

“S. Cenydd’s day was observed in Llangennith on July 5, and was the greatest and most popular of all the Gower Mabsants or wakes. One of its peculiarities was the great quantity of what is called in Gower ” milked meat,” or ” white pot,” a mixture of flour and milk boiled together, that was consumed, probably in allusion to the bringing up of the Saint in infancy on the milk of a doe injected into a bell. This bell is said to have been called by the Welsh ” Cloch Dethog,” i.e. the Titty Bell.

An ancient stone, with interlaced work on one side only, in the centre of the chancel floor of Llangennith church, has been supposed to mark the grave of the Saint.

S. Caradog, at the close of the eleventh century went into Gower, and found there the church of S. Cenydd abandoned and desolate, and he cleared the sacred edifice of the brambles that had occupied it. It is probable, therefore, that the elevation or translation took place about this time.

Whether Lesnewth church, in Cornwall, which is said by Ecton to have been dedicated to S. Knet, had originally Keneth or Cenydd as its founder, it is impossible to say. S. Michael is now considered the patron. The church, which was early Norman and of great interest,
has been wantonly rebuilt in a most uninteresting manner.”
http://www.ebooksread.com/authors-eng/s-sabine-baring-gould/the-lives-of-the-british-saints-the-saints-of-wales-and-cornwall-and-such-irish-541/page-12-the-lives-of-the-british-saints-the-saints-of-wales-and-cornwall-and-such-irish-541.shtml

“Gwyl Mabsant (referred to colloquially as Mapsant Day from the Welsh words “sant” – holy, and “mab” – son) is the feast day of Saint Cenydd, celebrated at Llangennith, Gower on 5th July. Recent years have seen a revival of the traditional way the festival was marked up until the early twentieth century, by displaying an effigy of a bird from a pole on the church tower. The said bird, as legend goes, symbolises the legendary seagulls, who saved the cripple Cenydd after he had been cast out to sea as a consequence of being born of an incestuous relationship at the court of King Arthur at Llougor. Apparently, the seagulls (along with a couple of angels and a miraculous breast-shaped bell known locally as the “titty-bell”) also cared for Cenydd during his youth spent on Worm’s Head, and ensured that he survived and was educated as a Christian.”
http://janefraserwriter.com/blog/2013/7/5/gyl-mabsant-mapsant-day-a-sense-of-place

“Not to be confused with the saint of the same name who was Irish and popular in Scotland, Cenydd was a Christian hermit of the Gower Peninsula in Wales where place-name evidence indicates he was the founder of the church of Llangennyth. Stories about his origins are probably only legendary, recalling as they do the story of Moses in the basket. However, there are some elements of his story that are probably more reliable historically. It is fairly certain he was a cripple and a hermit. (It is said that after being cured by St David in 545, he returned to life as a hermit and prayed for his healing to be revoked.)
Cenydd’s Feast Day is marked on 5 July. Up to the early twentieth century the festival was traditionally marked by the displaying of an effigy of a bird from a pole on the church tower, symbolising the legendary birds who cared for the infant Kenny, and the consumption of whitepot or ‘milked meat’ a dish made of flour, milk, sugar and dried fruits, not unlike a rice pudding or bread and butter pudding. It is thought he died on 27th June.”
http://holytransfigurationwalsinghamgallery.simdif.com/gallery_continued_3.html