Saint Pharaildis patron saint

Patron saint

A patron saint is a saint who is regarded as the intercessor and advocate in heaven of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, family, or person...

 of Ghent

Ghent

Ghent is a city and a municipality located in the Flemish region of Belgium. It is the capital and biggest city of the East Flanders province. The city started as a settlement at the confluence of the Rivers Scheldt and Lys and in the Middle Ages became one of the largest and richest cities of...

, was married against her will at a young age with a nobleman

Nobility

Nobility is a social class which possesses more acknowledged privileges or eminence than members of most other classes in a society, membership therein typically being hereditary. The privileges associated with nobility may constitute substantial advantages over or relative to non-nobles, or may be...

, even after having made a private vow of virginity. Her husband insisted that she was married to him, and her sexual fidelity was owed to him, not God

God

God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

. She was therefore physically abuse

Physical abuse

Physical abuse is abuse involving contact intended to cause feelings of intimidation, injury, or other physical suffering or bodily harm.-Forms of physical abuse:*Striking*Punching*Belting*Pushing, pulling*Slapping*Whipping*Striking with an object...

d for her refusal to submit to him, and for her late night visits to churches. When widow

Widow

A widow is a woman whose spouse has died, while a widower is a man whose spouse has died. The state of having lost one's spouse to death is termed widowhood or occasionally viduity. The adjective form is widowed...

ed, she was still a virgin.

According the Vita Gudilae Pharaildis was the sister of Saint Gudula

Gudula

Saint Gudula was born in the pagus of Brabant . According to her 11th-century biography , written in Lobbes Abbey between 1048 and 1051, she was the daughter of a duke of Lotharingia called Witger and Amalberga of Maubeuge...

, Saint Reineldis

Reineldis

Reineldis was a saint of the 7th century, martyred by the Huns.-Life:...

, and Saint Emebert

Emebert

Saint Emebert, often identified with bishop Ablebert of Cambrai . He would have been the son of Duke Witger of Lotharingia and Saint Amalberga of Maubeuge. His siblings include four other saints, Ermelinde, Gudula, Pharaildis and Reineldis. According the Gesta Episcoporum Cameracensis he was buried...

, but this is not confirmed in her own biography, the Vita Pharaildis.

Veneration

The cult of Pharaildis has been documented as early as the ninth century. She carries a goose as her insignia.

Several miracle

Miracle

A miracle often denotes an event attributed to divine intervention. Alternatively, it may be an event attributed to a miracle worker, saint, or religious leader. A miracle is sometimes thought of as a perceptible interruption of the laws of nature. Others suggest that a god may work with the laws...

s are attributed to the saint. Legend says that Pharaildis caused a well

Water well

A water well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, boring or drilling to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The well water is drawn by an electric submersible pump, a trash pump, a vertical turbine pump, a handpump or a mechanical pump...

 to spring up whose waters cured sick children, turned some bread hidden by a miserly woman into stone, and there are accounts of a "goose

Goose

The word goose is the English name for a group of waterfowl, belonging to the family Anatidae. This family also includes swans, most of which are larger than true geese, and ducks, which are smaller....

miracle," in which Pharaildis resuscitated a cooked bird working only from its skin and bones.