Story Sent in by Frank:
Cassie showed up to our date wearing a pretty blue blouse and skirt. She was also upset about something. She asked, "Why aren't you wearing blue?"
I stammered, "W-Why would I? Is today a special day or something?"
She said, "Uh... it's the feast day of St. Bilfrid," as if I was supposed to know that.
"Who was St. Bilfrid and what does he have to do with blue? And why did his parents name him Bilfrid?"
She said, "I thought everyone knew about St. Bilfrid. He was a Benedictine bookbinder who lived in England. You seriously don't remember his feast day?"
I replied, "I've never even heard of him. And why blue?"
She was clearly upset about it and nothing I could say or do would placate her. Instead of dinner we went to a coffee shop for a quick bite and she beat a hasty retreat. To be honest, I didn't even know she was Catholic. But now I know.
I just googled St. Bilfred to see if he’s the patron saint of anything like, say, getting out of dates. It doesn’t list anything, but it turns out he was real and his feast day is today. Nice work holding this one, JMG. Now I have to change into something blue.
ReplyDeleteAs a former Catholic school girl (NOT a Catholic though!), I have heard of almost every saint. If he is actually a saint, he is not the Saint of bookbinding, and blue doesn't enter into the equation. There are several patron saints of bookbinding- St. Columba, St. John, St. Bart, and St. Chris. I also googled St. Bilfred, and I came up with only four answers, two of them references from the same book, one a non existent St. Bilfred College (clearly a Facebook account mistake, as there is a St. Wilfred College), and a strange fan fiction type blog. Which means there is only one source for St. Bilfred, and it is not clear in the text of this book if in fact March 6th is his day, it only says that March 6th is St. Balther's day:
ReplyDelete"St. Balther H. c. 750 (Mar. 6). Said to have lived as a solitary on the Bass Rock. He is said to
be identical with St. Baldred, q.v. His relics, together with those of St. Bilfred, were translated,
in 1104, to the shrine of the Venerable Bede. Eng. and Scot. Marts., M. Westminster, Turgot
of Durham, etc. college"
I would say that a solitary source from the 1890s claiming his existence only in passing mention about another saint, is strong evidence to suggest he is not much of a saint at all. A search for Bilfred on Catholic.org's saints search engine returns no results, but suggests St. Wilfred. So I think this one author perhaps made a typo, and meant St. Wilfred, and nobody bothered to correct it because it is a rare and unimportant book. Bilfred doesn't even sound like a name, it sounds like two names together- like Ben and Wilfred. So yeah, either this girl just made it up on the spot to get out of the date, or she has read this obscure book (and misunderstood its contents), which means she is super religious and not very intelligent.
Anyway, if anyone else's research returned more results, I would be very interested in them- this is so random and fascinating to me, and maybe I am wrong and he totally is a saint....
This is the sort of detective work into the lives of saints that my nun teachers would have appreciated.
Delete*claps enthusiastically*
DeleteMaybe Bilford is actually a St. Bernard and she just wasn't clear enough. Every March 6th, he rises from his doggy grave and demands the sacrifice of anyone not wearing blue. I heard a guy was so terrified of this ghostly dog that he got a blue house with blue windows and even found a girlfriend, and she is SO blue.
DeleteThank you Megan.If not for you I would of googled the shit out of this subject to try to find the answer.I too went to Catholic school.When a Saint doesn't even register as many search hits as a St.Bernard then that means they are most likely not a saint.Weird fact-I am wearing a blue sweater today without even knowing it was a thing today.
DeleteBriana,I was typing my comment while you posted about about St.Bernard.I am safe!I'm wearing blue and I had blueberry waffles and blueberry herbal tea for breakfast so I am safe from his doggy wrath!
DeleteI found this on Catholic.org through a google search (link following) http://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=1791
Delete.....My first thought was that 'Cassie' got to that website like how people edit Wikipedia. Former Catholic school girl-myself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billfrith says that the Oxford Dictionary of Saints lists 6 March as the feast of Billfrith and Baldred, but I haven’t actually gotten to a copy of the Oxford Dictionary to verify that. “Bilfred” and “Bilfrid” are presumably alternate spellings of “Billfrith” (Anglo-Saxon Bilfrið).
DeleteSee, this is why saints are so confusing. If anyone had done any real research at all (Megan excluded, because damn that was impressive), they would know that Saint Bilfred was the patron saint of bad asses.
ReplyDeleteI lost it when the hot dog showed up.
DeleteArchitect for the win! NO! Megan for the win. She's the one who made proper research!0
DeleteOk, why has no one acknowledged my amazing reference to "I'm blue," the hit song from the 90s-00s?? I assure you people, I am hilarious. Step it up.
ReplyDeleteWe acknowledge your reference appropriately.
DeleteI googled - first entry: Benedictine hermit, the silversmith who bound the Lindisfarne Gospels. He was a hermit in Lindisfarne, England, off the coast of Northumbria, in northern England, where he aided Bishop Eaddfrid in preparing the binding of that masterpiece. He used gold, silver, and gems to bind the famous copy of the Gospels of St. Cuthbert. His relics were enshrined in Durham, England, in the eleventh century
ReplyDeleteAs a nice little Jewish girl, I totally don't understand this whole feast thing. Do people actually keep track of them? Why? Is it just an excuse to eat? Because that I would totally understand.
ReplyDeleteA feast is a feast.May the 4th is a big deal in my home.But we all can't remember every special day so here's a site with calendars to help you stay on top of things.Tomorrow is national proofreading day so Arch will be in heaven
Deleteremember.http://www.nationaldaycalendar.com/calendar-at-a-glance/
We use that site every day in my office to determine what we should do for fun that day... we never actually *do* anything fun from it, but we do check it every day. Except the various national ice cream days. We totally participate in those.
Delete