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St. Vulgan of Lens
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Saints and feasts
St. Vulgan of Lens
Confessor, Patron of the Town of Lens in Artois
Vulgan is honoured as patron of Lens in Artois. Butler associates him with preaching and retirement near Arras, while recording disagreements about his origin and chronology.
The reading
ⓘ Butler source
Alban Butler, The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints, Volume XI (November), Thomas Richardson and Son, Derby, for the Catholic Book Society, 1846; November 2, “St Vulgan, Confessor, Patron of the Town of Lens in Artois,” p. 67.
Vulgan is remembered in Butler’s November 2 notices as the patron of Lens in Artois and the titular saint of its collegiate church. His short account connects him with the preaching of the faith in that region and with a cell near the abbey of St. Vedast at Arras.
The sources cited by Butler disagree about his origin. One tradition calls him Irish, while the manuscript life preserved at Lens describes an Englishman or Briton. The notice also reports differing views of his date and whether he was a bishop. These details cannot all be combined into a certain biography.
What the account clearly records is the honour paid to Vulgan at Lens. This reading preserves that local remembrance while leaving the disputed birthplace, episcopal title and exact chronology open.
Historical note
An original Novena Regina reading adapted and summarized from the cited pre-1962 sources. This is not a transcription of Butler’s words.
This notice precedes the November 3 heading and belongs to November 2. The conflicting accounts of his origin and episcopal status remain unresolved.
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