Máedóc of Ferns

Saint Máedóc of Ferns, also called Aidan, Madoc or Mogue, was an Irish saint, the first bishop of Ferns in County Wexford and the founder of thirty churches. He fell asleep on 31 January 632 and is remembered on the same day.

Áed was born about the year 558 at Inisbrefny, an island in Templeport Lake, in County Cavan. In the Welsh sources Aeddan is a son of Gildas or Aneurin, sons of Caw, king of Strathclyde; the Irish sources make him a son of Sedna, a chieftain of Connacht, and of Eithne, and a first cousin of Saint Dallán Forgaill. From these different origins, his work in Wales, the extraordinary span of his activity and the two dates of death, some scholars, such as Sabine Baring-⁠Gould, have concluded that the stories of Maedoc combine two different Aeds, one Welsh and one Irish, who were bishops of Ferns a generation apart.

Irish legend says that the “Bell of Saint Mogue” was given to the infant at his birth by Saint Caillín. When no boat could be found to carry the infant across the lake, where Caillín was waiting to baptize him, Aidan was floated to shore on a slab of stone. The font at Saint Mogue's church at Bawnboy is said to be made from part of that stone. As a youth he was a hostage of Ainmuire, High King of Ireland. Ainmire was so moved by him that he told him he could stay or go. Aidan said that he would go only if the other hostages were freed too, and the king let them all return home. He studied at the great school of Saint Finnian at Clonard Abbey, where he made friends with Molaise, who would found the monastery on Devenish Island. Many began to come to the young man wishing to be his disciples, but he fled from Ireland to Wales to study under Saint David. Welsh legends tell of his upbringing with David and of the attempts of David's steward on his life. According to them he destroyed, together with Saint Cadoc, an army of Saxons or Irishmen by rolling stones down on their camp in a narrow valley. He was listed in the Welsh triads as one of David's three most faithful disciples.

He returned to Ireland in 570, landing on the coast of Wexford with hives of honey bees, which he had been told were scarce on the island. He arrived as some locals were plundering another group of strangers, and his quick response impressed the local chieftain, who gave him land for religious settlements. He then settled at Brentrocht in Leinster. It is said that he fasted for seven years, eating during this time only barley bread and water. King Brandubh of Leinster gave him Ferns, where he established a monastery. Through the king's influence a synod was convened at which Ferns was not only made a see but its bishop, Aedan, was given a nominal primacy over the other bishops of Leinster, as chief bishop.

He was known for kindness and hospitality: on one occasion, seeing them exhausted by their journey, he allowed beef to be given to a delegation of British bishops in Lent and let them excuse themselves by saying that the slaughtered cow was only “milk and vegetables in concentrated form.” On another, he was pushed into a lake to see whether he would lose his temper; when he meekly recovered himself, the one who pushed him confessed and begged his pardon. He died on 31 January 632, on the shore of Lough Melvin in County Leitrim. His relics are claimed by Saint Edan's at Ferns, where his stone tomb lies in the cathedral and his remains in the crypt of the original cathedral. The Breac Maodhóg, his shrine, of the ninth century, is an example of an early medieval reliquary; it was often used as a sacred object on which binding oaths were sworn, and it is kept in the National Museum.