Godfrey of Amiens

Godfrey of Amiens (French: Geoffroy d'Amiens), 1066-1115, was a bishop of Amiens. He is a saint in the Catholic Church.

Life

Godfrey was born in 1066 in Moulincourt, in the diocese of Soissons. The third child in a noble family, he was taken in at a young age by his uncle, the bishop of Soissons, who sent him to be educated in a monastery close to Péronne.

At the age of 25, he was ordained priest by the bishop of Noyon and became the abbot of the Abbey of Nogent-sous-Coucy.

In 1104, Godfrey was named the bishop of Amiens. While serving as bishop, he came across many problems. Shunned by the nobles and bourgeois because of his teachings advocating better relations with the poor, menaced by the revolt of peasants against the feudal lords and worried about the menaces of civil war, he preferred to spend his time at the Grande Chartreuse to maintain a life of penitence. However, in 1115, he was called back to his post by the people of Amiens, where the same problems awaited him.

He fell sick and took refuge in the abbey of Saint Crépin in Soissons, where he died November 8, 1115.

Veneration

*Godfrey of Amiens is celebrated on November 8.
*A street in Amiens is named after him

Sources

*(fr) Essai sur Saint Geoffroy, évêque d'Amiens - Guérard - 1843
*(fr) Histoire de la ville d'Amiens depuis les gaulois jusqu'à nos jours - R.de Hyacinthe Dusevel - 1848 - Amiens (France) - Page 259 - (Gallica)
*(fr) Le livre des saints et des prénoms - Alain Guillermou - 1976 - Page 146