GAUDENTIUS, Saint, Bishop of Brescia. - Successor of Philaster, b. probably at Brescia, d. after 406 (perhaps around 410-11). As a pilgrim in the East (Jerusalem), he made the acquaintance of St. John Chrysostom and brought back with him precious relics (e.g., of the 40 martyrs; cf. tract. 17). Elected, while still young, bishop of Brescia, he accepted the post only under pressure from St. Ambrose and other bishops (tract. 16). The election took place before 397, the year of St. Ambrose's death.
His sermons, which became famous, were taken down in shorthand. Among his admirers was Benivolus, magister memoriam under Valentinian II (383-92), to whom belongs the credit for having preserved a great part of G.'s sermons. When, in 403, St. John Chrysostom was exiled, G. was among the Italian bishops who were sent by Honorius I to his brother Arcadius to intercede in favor of Chrysostom. The mission failed (406). In the collection of the Epistles of St. John Chrysostom, epistle 184 (PG 52, 715 ff.) is addressed to G. His friend was Rufinus of Aquileia, who dedicated to him his translation of the Recognitiones Clementinae and who also mentioned him in the preface to his translation of Gregory's Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans. G. was therefore a Western bishop who had contacts with the Eastern Church and with Greek theology. Feast 25 Oct. His relics are in the church of St. John the Evangelist in Brescia.
G. sent to Benivolus 10 Easter sermons (Tractatus I-X) together with 3 other treatises (4 on Gospel texts and one on Maccabees). These texts, augmented by Benivolus with Tractatus XVI-XIX, were probably gathered and published by the latter in a book with G.'s preface ad Benivolum. Two other sermons have been preserved outside Benivolus' corpus (tractatus XX-XXI). The first, on Peter and Paul, is a sermon delivered at Milan in the presence of St. Ambrose. The authenticity of treatise XXI on Philaster is disputed; Glück (v. bibl.), in the preface to his edition (p. xv ff.), believes it to be a work of G. On G.'s influence on later authors, F. Nautin treats (Hippolyte contre les hérésies, Paris 1949, pp. 208-12); notable is the dependence of Leo the Great's Tomas on G. (Nautin, op. cit., p. 213).
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Erik Peterson