SAINT NICHOLAS STUDITES

St. Nicholas Studites
Abbot
Feast day: February 4
 Born at Sydonia (Canea), Crete, in 793; died at Studius Monastery, Constantinople, in 863. Saint Nicholas was a disciple of Theodore Studites, educated at Studius Monastery from age 10, and at age 18 became a monk there. During the iconoclastic persecution he followed his abbot into exile, and aided others who had been banished.

 In 842, on the death of Emperor Theophilus, peace was temporarily restored and he returned to the monastery where he was elected abbot. When Emperor Michael III exiled Saint Ignatius and made Photius patriarch of Constantinople in 858, Nicholas refused to recognize Photius as patriarch, was imprisoned, and then went into voluntary exile; Michael then appointed a new abbot.

 After several years in exile, Nicholas was brought back to his monastery and imprisoned. When Emperor Basil restored Ignatius, the lawful patriarch, Nicholas considered himself too old to resume charge of the monastery, and died as a simple monk .He was brought back to his monastery and imprisoned there just before he died.

SAINT REMBERT

St. Rembert
Rembert of Bremen
Feast day: February 4
Died: 888
 Born near Bruges, Flanders; died June 11, 888. Saint Rembert entered religious life as a monk of Turholt. He shared an apostolate to Scandinavia with and succeeded his friend Saint Ansgar as bishop of Hamburg-Bremen in 865. This feast day commemorates his episcopal consecration. He wrote an excellent biography of Saint Ansgar


HE was a native of Flanders, near Bruges, and a monk in the neighbouring monastery of Turholt. St. Anscharius called him to his assistance in his missionary labours, and in his last sickness recommended him for his successor, saying: “Rembert is more worthy to be archbishop, than I to discharge the office of his deacon.” After his death, in 865, St. Rembert was unanimously chosen archbishop of Hanburgh and Bremen, and superintended all the churches of Sweden, Denmark, and the Lower Germany, finishing the work of their conversion. He also began the conversion of the Sclavi and the Vandals, now called Brandenburghers. He sold the sacred vessels to redeem captives from the Normans; and gave the horse on which he was riding for the ransom of a virgin taken by the Sclavi. He was most careful never to lose a moment of time from serious duties and prayer; and never to interrupt the attention of his mind to God in his exterior functions. He died on the 11th of June in 888, but is commemorated in the Roman Martyrology on the 4th of February, the day on which he was chosen archbishop. His life of St. Anscharius is admired, both for the author’s accuracy and piety, and for the elegance and correctness of the composition. His letter to Walburge, first abbess of Nienherse, is a pathetic exhortation to humility and virginity.