Saint Cyndeyrn of Glasgow
Today in the Orthodox Church is the feast-day of Saint Cyndeyrn of Glasgow, a Brythonic saint of Yr Hen Ogledd and one of the great evangelists of the Scottish nation. He is known to Harry Potter fans in particular by his pet-name of Saint Mungo.
Saint Cyndeyrn [also Kentigern and, as mentioned, Mungo] was a child of an act of violence, the offspring of Saint Teneu after she was deceived and raped by Owain mab Urien. His grandfather, King Lot, tried to have him killed in utero along with his mother by having her driven in a chariot off of Traprain Law. When this failed to kill her and her unborn child, and by the power of her prayers to Christ and the Theotokos her chariot landed at the bottom of the cliff as lightly as a bird might light on a branch, she was suspected of being a witch and placed on a hide coracle and cast adrift at sea to die. However, Teneu delivered Cyndeyrn as soon as she cast up on shore in the boat at Culross, where she and her infant were taken into the care and protection of Saint Serbán. Saint Teneu would later leave Culross to enter a much happier union with Dingad ap Nudd, and she would give Cyndeyrn five further legitimate half-brothers by blood, including Saint Eleri of Gwytherin.
Cyndeyrn was raised from a very early age by Saint Serbán, who gave him his nickname of Mungo, which is a Brythonic cognate Mwyn-Gu derived from the Gælic words mo ‘my’, and cóem ‘dear, beloved’. The Life of Cyndeyrn holds that Saint Serbán exclaimed something like this – ‘mo chóhe! mo chóhe!’ – when he first came across Teneu, in her exhaustions of childbirth, and her newborn son who lay on the sand wrapped in swaddling. Seeing early on that the lad had an aptitude for reading and writing, Saint Serbán tutored him in all sorts of sæcular learning. Even as he grew in the knowledge of reading and writing, Cyndeyrn also improved in the natural virtues. He never spoke anything that was not sweet or beautiful or wise, understanding the voice as an instrument for praising God.
Seeing the favour that their master lavished upon the young ‘Mungo’, his other students began to envy him, and secretly plotted against him. Now, Saint Serbán had befriended a wild little red bird, that was wonted to eat out of his hand; this bird in its simple obedience and delight in Saint Serbán was also much coveted by the students. The boys caught this bird and, playing roughly with it, wrung its neck and killed it. They then attempted to place the blame for this deed on Cyndeyrn, who was wholly innocent of their rough games. Saint Serbán was greatly angered on seeing that his pet had been killed, and promised severe punishment on its killer. But Cyndeyrn meekly went and picked up the dead bird, fixed its head in the right place, and made the sign of the Cross on its tiny breast, and breathed upon it with a prayer. The bird at once revived and flew off toward his master, who saw all that took place.
Saint Cyndeyrn as a youth did many other like wonders at Culross. One time, as he was keeping vigil, his jealous schoolmates put out all the lamps and wicks on Culross so that he would have no light; young Cyndeyrn left the place to find growing a hazel branch. This he prayed to God to light with fire, and like the burning bush that was shown to Moses it was lit but gave off no heat, and he brought it back to Culross to the amazement of Saint Serbán and the other youths. On another occasion, Saint Cyndeyrn raised from the dead the abbey cook, whose service was so indispensable to Culross – through tearful and fervent prayers to Christ.
Eventually the envy of the other students became too much for Cyndeyrn to bear, and he left the monastery at Culross. Saint Serbán pursued him, but he was cut off at the bridge by a surge of water in a river that swept the bridge out. Serbán implored his Mungo to return to him, that in his age he might have some comfort in his waning years. Yet Cyndeyrn was steadfast, and gave him to know the reasons for his leaving. When master and pupil departed at last, it was amicably and with mutual blessings, but the bridge would remain impassable ever after that.
Saint Cyndeyrn visited a holy man named Fergus, a one-time companion of Saint Drostan who was suffering from a mortal illness, and attended him in his final pains before his repose. He took Saint Fergus’s body and placed it on a cart behind two oxen, whom he bade go where the Lord willed them to go. The oxen bore the cart all the way to Glasgow, into the yard by the church founded there by Saint Ninian, and there Saint Fergus was laid to rest.
There Cyndeyrn settled, too, living with two brothers named Telleyr and Anguen. These two brothers had very different personalities. One of them, Anguen, was meek and quiet and hospitable, and he waited on Cyndeyrn as though he were an angel. The other, Telleyr, was a hard and proud man who did not like Cyndeyrn one bit, and made no secret of it. The saint took both Anguen’s ministrations and Telleyr’s abuses with equanimity, and treated both men equally. Indeed, he kept a close watch over his tongue such that he dared not speak an ill-tempered word to any. But though Anguen and his children took the saint’s words to heart, Telleyr grew the more perverse. Finally, Telleyr, having upbraided Cyndeyrn in a fit of anger and stormed out of the house, went off to his work. Because his heart was cast into paroxysms of wrath and pride, he saw a large tree in his way and yarked it out of the ground, bearing it on his back. But he didn’t get far, as he tripped over a rock and sprawled to earth – the tree crushed him and he died. When Cyndeyrn heard of this, he chastised himself for not having checked his tongue, and grieved over Telleyr with many tears, and took Telleyr’s burial into his own charge.
Saint Cyndeyrn continued to work wonders among the poor people of Cumbria. It thus fell out that the king in that land, and what few Christians there were, decided to anoint Cyndeyrn as a bishop. Cyndeyrn was not pleased with this decision, and argued against it: that he was too young, that he was incapable, and that he did not want to disturb his inward peace. And yet the Christians of Cumbria all urged the contrary, with repeat urgency, such that Cyndeyrn was forced to acknowledge the workings of the Holy Spirit and assent to be made a bishop, with his seat at Glasgow.
Cyndeyrn adhered to a strict fasting rule, and abstained from meat and intoxicating beverages. He would moderate his fasts when breaking bread with sæcular people, but afterwards he would redouble his efforts to fast as if he were atoning for a crime. When he celebrated the Liturgy, he did so with the greatest and most self-effacing of reverences. It was said of him that a shining spirit in the form of a dove would light upon him when he administered the Gifts. During the Lenten season he would always disappear from the sight and sound of other human beings, and live in a desert solitude for the duration of the fast.
He took care in his clothing, always to wear a hair shirt close to his skin. Outwardly, though, he wore a shimmering white garment and a stole. In this he quite resembled the later Saint Éadgýð of Wilton who mortified herself with humility inwardly but who would not deprive the world of her beauty. Like his fellow Celtic saints Colum Cille and Cóemgen, he made his bed on a hard rock; and he had the practice of reciting the Psalms while submerging himself naked up to the neck in the Clyde, similar to that practiced by Saints Dewi, Pedrog, Cóemgen and Neot.
Saint Cyndeyrn spoke out volubly against hæresies, and was a particular foe of Pelagianism and the practice of simony. He had particular admonitions for those who professed the Christian faith but did not follow its precepts, and he worked with particular zeal in converting the Celtic pagans to Christianity, who still made up the most of the people in Cumbria at the time. Like Saint Aidan, Saint Cyndeyrn refused to ride a horse, but went evangelising on foot – a similar practice in more modern times was followed by Serbian Patriarch Pavle of blessed memory. Like Saint Boniface he was a particular foe of the pagan custom of incest. On the other hand, Saint Cyndeyrn was not averse to blessing unequal unions between newly-baptised men and their concubines or kept women, and turning those (in cases where the man had only one woman) into real marriages on more equal footing. Joscelin of Furness’s hagiography of Saint Cyndeyrn is actually illuminating in several ways with regard to how early Christendom transfigured pagan sexual mores, but a bit more on that later.
Saint Cyndeyrn wrought a number of wonders as bishop. At one time, when there was a shortage of oxen, Cyndeyrn called deer out of the nearby woods. These came out in obedience to the saint in the place of oxen, and pull ploughs as though they were tame beasts. Some time afterward, an opportunistic wolf took advantage of the tame deer and tore the throat out of one of them; Saint Cyndeyrn caught the wolf and bade it take the yoke in place of the deer – and the wolf submitted willingly, as though ashamed. Once the wolf had ploughed across nine acres of field, Cyndeyrn set it free into the woods. At another time, Saint Cyndeyrn had given away all the grain, including the seed corn, to feed the poor in the midst of a drought. So he sowed the fields instead with sand, praying to Christ all the while. And behold: the sand shot forth green shoots, then budded and ripened with corn. This agricultural wonder of Saint Cyndeyrn drew a number of new converts to Christianity.
Cyndeyrn’s successes drew the envy and ire of a local prince, Morcen Mwynfawr. Morcen boasted to Cyndeyrn of his wealth and scorned the teachings of Christ; and thus Cyndeyrn manifested a wonder by which the waters of the Clyde flooded into Morcen’s barns and swept out all of his grain, depositing it dry and whole at a certain desert place where Cyndeyrn was wont to spend time. From there Cyndeyrn took the grain and distributed it all amongst the poor. Morcen’s heart was hardened by this wonder, and he summoned Cyndeyrn to him and proceeded to beat the holy man mercilessly with his shoe. Morcen later died of a tumour which had lodged in his foot. However the long-suffering Cyndeyrn was forced to flee into Wales, to dwell amongst his kinfolk.
While in Wales, he met and befriended Saint Dewi, who greeted him with great hospitality at Mynyw; and there Cyndeyrn was induced to stay for some time, for the theological discourse of Saint Dewi was sweet to his ears and the two of them understood each other in the manner of holy friends. Indeed, Cyndeyrn built a little church not far off from Mynyw – at Llangyndeyrn in Dyfed. Dewi was not at all jealous of his northern friend, however, and word of Cyndeyrn’s holiness spread far. He was soon invited to build a monastery, and Cyndeyrn agreed. Taking leave of his friend, Cyndeyrn ventured into the north country – Gwynedd – after following a wild boar who led him into a suitable desert place on the banks of the Elwy. Despite having the blessing of Cadwallon Llawhir ap Einion, the prince of the north, Cyndeyrn and his disciples were nonetheless harassed at first by Cadwallon’s son Maelgwn Gwynedd (both of whom are Cooper ancestors, if the old genealogies are right), who laid waste to their monastery. It was only when Maelgwn was stricken blind and he went to Cyndeyrn to heal him (which he did) that he left the monks of Llanelwy in peace.
It was around this time that the child Asaph – another scion of Yr Hen Ogledd – was brought to Saint Cyndeyrn. Cyndeyrn cared for Asaph, and indeed valued and venerated him, in much the same way that Saint Serbán had once done for him. Saint Asaph himself performed miracles as a child, indicative of his sanctity and purity of heart – most famously bringing Cyndeyrn, when he asked for light, live embers inside his cotte without being burnt.
Saint Cyndeyrn made several pilgrimages to Rome; and on one of these he met with Saint Gregory Dialogos, who then reigned as the Pope of Rome. It was shortly after he returned that the new king in Yr Hen Ogledd, the great Rhydderch Hael, invited Cyndeyrn to return to Glasgow to resume his former bishopric. Cyndeyrn left Llanelwy in the care of his beloved student Saint Asaph, and returned as he was bidden to Glasgow.
Saint Cyndeyrn returned to Glasgow in triumph, performing wonders along the way. He came to Hoddom where he preached the Gospel to a great multitude of northern Britons. Many of them came to believe, and assented to be baptised, and so Cyndeyrn was employed day and night. Though that land had suffered drought the season before which the idols of the Brythonic heathen could not lift, after Cyndeyrn’s sermon and baptisms the clouds broke open and it began to rain, restoring fertility to the soil. All there gave praise to the risen Christ for His mercies. Rhydderch Hael himself came to meet Cyndeyrn with joy, and even took off his symbols of office and bent his knee to the holy man in token of the awe in which he went of him. He did Cyndeyrn the same honours that Emperor Saint Constantine had once done to Saint Silvester.
Saint Cyndeyrn worked another miracle of fertility – this time for Rhydderch Hael’s hitherto-barren wife Languoreth. It was not long after Cyndeyrn gave her his blessing, that Languoreth found she was able to conceive. Rhydderch Hael begat several daughters by Languoreth – including Gwladys and Angharad – and a son, named for Emperor Constantine. This son would become Saint Custennin of Strathclyde and Gowan.
The Life of Saint Cyndeyrn also notes that he was also close friends with Saint Colum Cille. When the two of them first met, Colum Cille at once identified Cyndeyrn among the men present in the church, and when asked how he had done so, the abbot of Iona replied: ‘I see a fiery column in the manner of a golden crown, interlaced with starry gems, descending from heaven onto his head. And a light of æthereal brightness envelops and surrounds him in the likeness of a veil, which covers him and then again returns to the æther.’ Thereafter the abbot of Iona and the bishop of Glasgow were happy to speak together for hours on holy things, and loved above all else to be in each other’s company. At one time, Cyndeyrn and Colum Cille exchanged croziers as a token of their friendship; one of these found its way into the possession of Saint Wilfrið of Ripon, who kept it in his monastery for a number of generations afterward and allowed it to be publicly venerated as a holy relic of both men.
Saint Cyndeyrn raised, as became a custom for him, a number of stone crosses throughout the Old North, like the one in Aspatria which still stands. These crosses put devils to flight, and thus were used to perform exorcisms and to cure mental illnesses by the people who venerated them. Cyndeyrn is also associated with a holy well in Glasgow Cathedral, which was the site of pilgrimages throughout the High Middle Ages.
St Mungo’s Well, Glasgow Cathedral
Saint Cyndeyrn lived to an ancient old age, and suffered from various infirmities of the joints in his later years such that he ended up having to bind his jaw up with a cloth. He took the Viaticum and exhorted his disciples to keep the true doctrines of the church, the love of Christ, the love of each other and the hospitality and generosity toward strangers that he had tried his best to teach them. He reposed in peace and went to Christ in the company of His saints on the thirteenth of January, 612.
It’s worth considering the Life of Cyndeyrn from the following perspective as well. The neo-pagans who think that European paganism was in any way more permissive than Christianity in pelvic matters are simply deluding themselves. Largely – but not solely – through the likes of Marion Zimmer Bradley (who clearly had her own hang-ups), Christendom has been falsely but popularly imagined as a kind of foreign repression imposed on gender-egalitarian, sexually-liberated nature-loving Northern European pagans.
The people who practised the pre-Christian religions of Europe were in fact even MORE strict about sexual matters than the Christians were, to the point of torturing and executing young people caught in ‘the act’, as they tried to do with Saint Teneu. The reason was precisely patriarchal pride. When your gods are quite literally emblematic of your ancestors, disobedience to the lineage – particularly a disobedience done with your body – becomes one of the most egregious blasphemies.
Early Christianity kept the old sexual taboos largely in place as a means of protecting the dignity of the weak. But it also worked to undermine the social import of these taboos. Under the old pagan strictures applied by King Lot in the case of his daughter Teneu, sexual abstinence is mandated so that one doesn’t shame his or her fathers. Christendom kept the emphasis on abstinence, but not because failing to abstain heaps shame upon one’s forefathers. The more immediate concern is love of neighbour. Christianity’s concern in upholding sexual strictures is the well-being of the other as the image and likeness of God. Thus, even though Christianity will not condone sins of the flesh, at its very best it also does not take the sins of the fathers out on the children!
This is attested in several ways in the Vita of Saint Cyndeyrn. Cyndeyrn does speak out harshly in some ways about sexual sins, including incest and homosexuality. When he arrives in Glasgow Cyndeyrn annuls marriages contracted between close kin among the nobility, while blessing the unions of men and women of unequal social status. In another case, he casts out of the church a priest who had kept male lovers. But consider: an unborn infant who was cast out and sentenced to death by his grandfather for being an unacknowledged bastard, would one day become one of the greatest missionary saints of Scotland, to be venerated by the very people who ran his mother off of Traprain Law. It’s quite difficult to think of a more radical subversion of pagan sexual taboos than that. Holy hierarch Cyndeyrn, dearly beloved one of Scots and Cumbrians and English alike, pray unto Christ our God that our souls may be saved!
Thy name, most radiant ascetic and wonderworker,
All-praised and great Father Cyndeyrn Mungo,
Which means ‘dear friend’,
Is godly sweetness to our wretched ears.
Thus named by thy tutor who foresaw thy missionary service,
Thou wast the truest friend and pastor to the Britons of Strathclyde.
Wherefore, O Saint, befriend us in this hour of need
That we may labour for Christ, as He wills,
And thereby be found worthy of His great mercy!
St Kentigern’s Church, Caldbeck, Cumbria
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