Radegundis

Today we commemorate Radegundis. She was teh daughter of a pagan king. Her father was murdered by his brother, Hermenefrid, who in 531 was defeated by king Theodoric of Austrasia and king Clotaire I of Neustria, and Clotaire took twelve year old Radegundis captive. Six years later he married her. She devoted herself to the poor, the sick, and captives, founded a leper hospital, and bore the cruelties of her husband uncomplainingly until he murdered her brother, Unstrut. She then left the court, received the deaconess habit from Bishop Medard at Noyon, and became a nun at Saix. About 557, she built the double monastery of the Holy Cross at Poitiers, to which she retired and which she developed into a great center of learning. She was active in peacemaking roles, lived in great austerity, and secured a relic of the True Cross for the Church of her monastery. She lived the last years of her life in seclusion and died at the monastery on August 13.