Feast day: March 16
St. Heribert of Cologne
Archbishop of Cologne and chancellor to the emperor, a peacemaker and builder remembered for his care of the poor and for relief he organized in times of famine.
Heribert was born about 970 into a noble family of Worms and educated for the Church. A man of learning and integrity, he rose to become chancellor of the Holy Roman Empire under the young emperor Otto III, serving as his most trusted adviser and accompanying him on his journeys to Italy.
In 999 he was made archbishop of Cologne. Though he had not sought the office and reportedly wept at the burden, he proved a devoted shepherd — generous to the poor, austere in his own life, and zealous for the reform of his clergy.
When Otto III died young in 1002, Heribert was the loyal servant who carried the dead emperor's body and the imperial insignia back across the Alps to Germany, and at first hesitated to support the new king, Henry II — a hesitation that briefly cost him the king's trust before the two were reconciled.
He founded the Benedictine abbey of Deutz, across the Rhine from Cologne, and was long remembered for his charity in hard times; a famous story tells of a drought broken by rain after a penitential procession he led, the origin of his patronage against drought. He died in 1021 and was soon venerated as a saint.
By tradition a great drought broke into rain during a penitential procession he led barefoot — and he became the saint invoked for rain.
Image: Raimond Spekking (CC BY-SA 4.0), via Wikimedia Commons.
Source: newadvent.org/cathen/07264a.htm
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