Today, October 28th, the feast of Sts. Simon and Jude, will be the 174th anniversary of the consecration of Simon Brute as the first Bishop of Vincennes.
The ceremony took place in the Old Cathedral in St. Louis. In October of 1834, however, this was the “new Cathedral which had been consecrated on the the 26th of October.
Bishop Brute wrote:
It was a source of great happiness and consolation to me to pass so many days in the company of these holy Bishops, and to meet that most excellent Prelate, Dr Rosati, of St. Louis. On the 26th of October, assisted by Bishops Flaget and Purcell, he consecrated his new and beautiful cathedral, which was an occasion of great joy to the whole city. A large body of the militia, and even the United States troops, from the barracks, near St. Louis, assisted at the ceremony. Two days after, on the 28th of October, the day of the Holy Apostles St. Simon (my patron) and St. Jude, I was consecrated in the same cathedral, by the Rt. Rev. Bishop Flaget, assisted by Bishop Rosati and Bishop Purcell. The sermon for the occasion was preached by the Rev. Mr. Hitzelberger.
(Alerding, History of the Catholic Church in the Diocese of Vincennes 1883, p.127)
The new bishop did not arrive in his see city until Wednesday, November 5, 1834.
