Godelina

Saint Godelina (also Godelieve, Godeliève, Godeleva) (Dutch: Sint-Godelieve) (c. 1049 – July 6, 1070) was a Flemish saint. Tradition states that she was pious as a young girl, and became much sought after by suitors as a beautiful young woman. Godelina, however, wanted to became a nun. A nobleman named Bertolf (Berthold) of Gistel, however, determined to marry her, successfully invoked the help of Godelina's father's suzerain, Eustace II, Count of Boulogne. Godelina's mother-in-law soon forced the young bride to live in a narrow cell with little food to support her. Godelina shared this food with the poor.

Bertolf also spread false rumors about Godelina; the marriage was not consummated.

Godelina managed to escape to the home of her father, Hemfrid, seigneur of Wierre-Effroy. Hemfrid, appealing to the Bishop of Tournai and Soissons and the Count of Flanders, managed to have Bertolf restore Godelina to her rightful position as his wife.

Godelina returned to Gistel and soon after, at the order of Bertolf, was strangled by two servants and thrown into a pool. This was made to appear as if she had died a natural death.

After her death

Bertolf married again; a daughter was born blind. Tradition states that Bertolf's daughter was cured through the intercession of Saint Godelina. Bertolf, now repentant of his crimes, went to Rome to obtain absolution. He went on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and became a monk at St-Winnoc at Bergues.

Bertolf's daughter established a Benedictine monastery at Gistel, which was dedicated to St. Godelina. Bertolf’s daughter joined this new community as a nun.

Drogo, a monk at the former St. Winnoc abbey in Bergues, wrote Godelina's biography, the Vita Godeliph, about ten years after her death.

Veneration

Godelina's body was exhumed in 1084 by the Bishop of Tournai and Noyon, in the presence of Gertrude of Saxony, the wife of Robert I, Count of Flanders, the Abbot of Saint Winnoc's at Bergues and a number of clergymen. Godelina's popular cult developed thereafter.

Every year, on the Sunday following July 5, a procession celebrating St. Godelina takes place in Gistel.

Godelina's feast day, July 6, was, like that of Saint Swithun in England and Saint Medard in France, connected with the weather. She is thus considered one of the "weather saints."

The Godelieve Polyptych

Godelina is also commonly known as Godelieve, and her life is represented in the Godelieve Polyptych, found in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.^[1]

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  Donor with Saint Nicholas and Wife with Saint Godelina. Jan Provoost.

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  Chapel at the back of the Onze-Lieve-Vrouw-ter-Duinenkerk. Ostend, Belgium. Stained glass representations of Saint Godelieve and Saint Idesbald.

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Saint Godelina.

• Godelina at the Catholic Encyclopedia
• (German) Godeleva (Godelina) von Gistel
• (Italian) Santa Godeleva
• Saint Godelieve, Martyr at the Christian Iconography web site