About St. Cecilia

I chose St. Cecilia this week in honor of my daughter, Joy, whose birthday is today. St. Cecilia was Joy’s choice for a confirmation saint, mostly because she is a patron saint of musicians. Music has always been of central importance in my family, and I am looking forward to exploring these themes over the course of the week.

However, as I begin to read about St. Cecilia in more detail, I am finding parts of her story harder to understand and embrace. But I’m determined to deal with anything that comes my way in this process, so here we go!

Her Life

As is often true of saints from such early times, it is difficult to say what is really known about St. Cecilia. The strongest evidence of this saint, that I have seen, is the fact that there was a church in the 5th century called the Church of St. Cecilia and that St. Cecilia is one of only 7 women, besides Mary, who is mentioned in the old Roman Canon of the mass. So she was venerated in 5th century Rome. Otherwise, her story is usually described as legend. And here it is:

She was born to a wealthy Christian family in the late 2nd century. She decided to take a vow of chastity and devote herself to Jesus, but her father gave her in marriage to a young man named Valerian, anyway. On their wedding night she told him that she vowed to live a life of chastity and there is an angel from heaven with her always and guarding her for that vow.

Of course, Valerian wanted visual evidence of this angel, so Cecilia told him he’d have to go get baptized if he wanted to see the angel. He evidently did so, and when he came back, he indeed saw the angel with his wife. His brother was so impressed by his story that he also was baptized, and the two of them devoted themselves to providing proper burial for the Christian martyrs of that time. This act eventually led to them being arrested, and when they refused to officer sacrifices to the gods, they were also martyred.

Her Death

Cecilia went on to preach after their deaths. People evidently flocked to her house, and she converted over 400 people to Christianity. Unfortunately, she was also arrested and sentenced to death. However, two attempts were essentially unsuccessful, at least initially. They tried to suffocate her, using fire to create smoke, but she was completely unaffected by it. “She didn’t even sweat.” (cited here) Then they tried to behead her, but after three strikes, the executioner was not able to do so. However, she did bleed to death over the next three days. In the meantime, followers collected her blood as relics and continued to listen to her preach in those final three days of her life. She is described as one of the most popular of the Roman martyrs.

Why Music?

So how did she become a patron saint of music? That part of the story is even more unclear, but this is the general idea. It goes back to her wedding ceremony. One site describes it like this, “While the profane music of her wedding was heard, Cecilia was singing in her heart a hymn of love of Jesus, her true spouse.” (found here, para 8) That site also says that St. Cecilia gifts are meant to remind us to pray for church musicians and their music ministry.

There is an ancient document called the Acta of St. Cecilia, which includes this quote, “So at the ceremony, while musical instruments played around her, she prayed that she might remain as pure in body as she was in spirit.” (found here, para 8) This source claims that early translations mistakenly portrayed her as actually singing and playing the organ during the ceremony. Then as the story was passed along, she became known as a musician. However, they also admit that it’s as difficult to discount theses stories as it is to confirm them, and they relate an old Italian saying: “Se non è vero, è ben trovato. ‘If it’s not true, it’s still a good story’.” (same site, para 11)

After Her Death

One of the most remarkable pieces of St. Cecilia’s story didn’t happen until more than 1,000 years after her death. During a renovation effort at The Church of St. Cecilia in 1595, the second time renovations had been done there, her tomb was opened. At that time, her body was found to be incorrupt. This was the first time a saint’s body was exhumed and found in this state. Although exposure to the air after being exhumed eventually caused her body to disintegrate, it remained intact for a few days, long enough for a sculptor to make a statue of her, which is displayed in the Church (and shown here)

Please join us this week as we contemplate the lessons of St. Cecilia, with a little homage to the musicians who enrich our worship and our lives.