Eberigisil

Saint Eberigisil, known also as Evergislus, Ebregisus, Evergislo, and Ebrégise, was Bishop of Cologne in the sixth century. He is the fifth bishop of that see whose existence is firmly attested and the first to bear a Frankish name. His episcopate fell in a time of deep disturbance caused by the movements of peoples that unsettled both city and countryside. Amid that turmoil he strove to rebuild religious life and to secure peace within the Church.

Gregory of Tours mentions him several times, always in the past tense, from which it is concluded that he had already died before 594. Gregory records that Eberigisil built a church in honor of the martyr Mallosus at Birten near Xanten. The same historian links him with the early cult of the Theban Legion martyrs in Cologne; Gregory himself relates that he was cured of a headache through their intercession, and it is reasonable to believe that the bishop fostered or even established that devotion. In 590 Eberigisil was sent by King Childebert II to settle disputes that had arisen in a nunnery at Poitiers, a mission that shows the confidence placed in his prudence and diplomatic skill. Medieval sources also note his participation in an assembly convened by the same king. He was remembered among the people for his gift of peacemaking.

An eleventh-century legend places his origins in a wealthy family of Tongeren (Tongres). According to this tradition, when Bishop Severin of Cologne visited the town—then belonging to the ecclesiastical province of Cologne—he was struck by the piety of the boy, took him to the episcopal city on the Rhine, educated him, and ordained him deacon. Upon Severin's death Eberigisil succeeded him as bishop. On a later pastoral visit to his native Tongeren he is said to have been attacked and killed by robbers and buried in the local Church of Our Lady. Other medieval accounts locate his death at a place called Trutmonia (sometimes identified with Termogne or Dortmund) and give 14 September as the day. Historically the Severin connection cannot stand, since Severin lived around the end of the fourth century; yet the tradition of a violent death and burial in the region of Tongeren shaped later devotion and earned him the palm of martyrdom in popular imagery.

In 954 or 955 Archbishop Bruno I of Cologne translated the supposed relics of Eberigisil from Tongeren (or Trutmonia) to the church of St. Cecilia in Cologne, where he became a co-patron. After the secularization of that church the relics were moved to the nearby parish church of St. Peter, where they still rest. He is honored as a saint of the Catholic Church on 24 October (and on 28 March in the former diocese of Tongeren-Maastricht-Liège). Two parish churches in the Archdiocese of Cologne—at Bornheim-Brenig and Bonn-Plittersdorf—are dedicated to him, and stained-glass windows in Cologne Cathedral and the Basilica of Our Lady at Tongeren portray him. He is the patron saint of glaziers and of the Cologne painters' guild, and is customarily depicted in episcopal vestments holding a palm.

May Saint Eberigisil obtain for us the grace of peacemaking and steadfast care for the Church in troubled times.