Saint Claude

According to tradition, he was born in Salins, into an illustrious Gallo-Roman family. Initially a soldier, he left the army around the age of twenty to become a cleric in Besançon, then a monk at the Condat monastery. He distinguished himself by his virtues and around 650, was chosen as abbot of the community.

On the death of the bishop of Besançon, he was chosen to succeed him and remained in this position for seven years, during which he continued to lead a very austere monastic life. However, noting the relaxation shown by some of the clerics of his diocese, he renounced his episcopal office around 693 and returned to his monastery, where he died around 6992.

In the 12th century, his tomb was opened and his body was found incorrupt. The monastery then became a major place of pilgrimage, renowned for many miracles. Its fame is such that its relics are exhibited to the faithful twice a day, and visitors as well-known as King Louis XI and François de Sales come to pray there.

In 1754, several medical doctors examined his body and attested to its extraordinary state of preservation. However, in 1794, the revolutionaries seized the relics and burned them completely, with the exception of the left forearm which escaped.

We honor him on June 6. He is the patron saint of wood turners, of whom there are many in Haut-Jura, of goldsmiths and blacksmiths.

His remains having escaped destruction are placed in a reliquary designed by the goldsmith Goudji, in the Saint-Pierre-Saint-Paul-et-Saint-André cathedral in Saint-Claude.

"Saint Claude de Besançon : Vie et Cultes" par Pierre Daffner (Besançon : Éditions La Garde, 1990).
"Les Monastères du Haut-Jura : Histoire et Pèlerinages" par Gérard Larcher (Paris : Éditions du Cerf, 2002).
"Histoire des Évêques de Besançon" par Jean-Baptiste Guitton (Lyon : Éditions Desclée de Brouwer, 1987).
"Les Saints du Jura : Saint Claude et ses Contemporains" par René Dubois (Dijon : Éditions Faton, 2005).
"Le Monastère de Condat : Une Histoire Spirituelle" par Étienne Charpentier (Paris : Éditions Albin Michel, 2004).
"Le Relique et le Miracle : Études des Cultes Locaux" par Marie-Hélène Coudrec (Strasbourg : Éditions du Signe, 1999).
"Louis XI et les Saints de son Temps" par André Bouche (Paris : Éditions L'Harmattan, 2003).