DROGONE, called of Reims (Drogo Cardinalis). - Cardinal bishop of Ostia, b. in Champagne (2nd half of the 11th century), d. 19 December 1138. He embraced the monastic life at St. Nicasius of Reims, where he was elected prior; but the desire for a more perfect life made him decide in favor of the Cistercian Order, and he chose, without his abbot's knowledge, Pontigny, the second daughter-house of Cîteaux.
The affair gave rise to a lively correspondence among St. Bernard, the two abbots and Drogo himself (St. Bernard, Epist., 32-34: PL 182, 136-40). St. Bernard's attitude is surprising: writing to the abbot of St. Nicasius, who demanded Drogo's return, he sympathized with him; writing instead to the abbot of Pontigny, he urged him to keep him, and recommended to Drogo that he stand firm; perhaps the Saint had received from Drogo confidences that he could not reveal. In any case, Drogo returned to Reims. In 1128, when the monastery of St. John of Leon had been taken from nuns who had fallen into laxity and ceded by the bishop to the Benedictines (cf. St. Bernard, Epist., 48: PL 182, 154), Drogo was appointed its first abbot. The fame of his learning and his virtues reached Innocent II, who was then residing in France and who, at the Council of Pisa in 1136, created him cardinal bishop of Ostia. Four spiritual opuscules by Drogo have come down to us (PL 166, 1513-64): De sacramento Dominicae Passionis, an allegorical explanation of the various circumstances of the Passion of Jesus; De creatione et redemptione primi hominis, in which the thought of St. Augustine is reflected; De septem donis Sancti Spiritus (ac de Beatitudinibus), a parallel between the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the evangelical Beatitudes; De divinis Officiis (seu horis canonicis), on the spiritual value of the individual hours of the divine office: a work worthy of being made known even today.
Bibliography5 works
Igino Cecchetti