Feastday: February 4
Birth: 1083
Death: 1190
Gilbert was born at Sempringham, England, son of Jocelin, a wealthy Norman knight. He was sent to France to study and returned to England to receive the benefices of Sempringham and Tirington from his father. He became a clerk in the household of Bishop Robert Bloet of Lincoln and was ordained by Robert's successor, Alexander. He returned to Sempringham as Lord on the death of his father in 1131. In the same year he began acting as adviser for a group of seven young women living in enclosure with lay sisters and brothers and decided the community should be incorporated into an established religious order. After several new foundations were established, Gilbert went to Citeaux in 1148 to ask the Cistercians to take over the Community. When the Cistercians declined to take on the governing of a group of women, Gilbert, with the approval of Pope Eugene III, continued the Community with the addition of Canons Regular for its spiritual directors and Gilbert as Master General. The Community became known as the Gilbertine Order, the only English religious order originating in the medieval period; it eventually had twenty-six monasteries which continued in existence until King Henry VIII suppressed monasteries in England. Gilbert imposed a strict rule on his Order and became noted for his own austerities and concern for the poor. He was imprisoned in 1165 on a false charge of aiding Thomas of Canterbury during the latter's exile but was exonerated of the charge. He was faced with a revolt of some of his lay brothers when he was ninety, but was sustained by Pope Alexander III. Gilbert resigned his office late in life because of blindness and died at Sempringham. He was canonized in 1202. His feast day is February 4.
Gilbert of Sempringham (c. 1085 – 4 February 1190) the founder of the Gilbertine Order, was the only Medieval Englishman to found a conventual order, mainly because the Abbot of Cîteaux declined his request to assist him in organising a group of women who wanted to live as nuns, living with lay brothers and sisters, in 1148. He founded a double monastery of canons regular and nuns in spite of such a foundation being contrary to canonical practice.
Life
Gilbert was born at Sempringham, near Bourne in Lincolnshire, the son of Jocelin, an Anglo-Norman lord of the manor, and an unnamed Anglo-Saxon mother. He had a brother, Roger, and a sister, Agnes.
Unusually for that period, his father actively prevented his son from becoming a knight, instead sending him to France, probably the University of Paris but possibly under Anselm of Laon, to study theology. Some physical deformity may have made him unfit for military service, making an ecclesiastical career the best option. When he returned in 1120 he became a clerk in the household of Robert Bloet, Bishop of Lincoln, started a school for boys and girls (the existing primary school at Pointon is still named after him) and was ordained by Robert's successor, Alexander. Offered the archdeaconry of Lincoln, he refused, saying that he knew no surer way to perdition.
A man from Stamford had lived a long time with his wife without having children. It happened that Father Gilbert stopped at their house to spend the night. The discreet lady of the household put her trust in the holiness of the guest she had received, and prepared a place for him on her own couch so that through his merits she might be found worthy to bear a son, as the Shunammite did through Elisha. It turned out just as she believed. For when her husband came home to sleep he before long fathered a son on her, and they named him after Father Gilbert. When Our Lord's servant heard what had happened, being a cheerful and generous person he sent the boy a cow to supply him with food, acting just as if the boy had been his own son.
— The Book of St Gilbert
The Gilbertines
St Gilbert's well at Sempringham
When his father died in 1130, Gilbert became lord of the manor of Sempringham. In 1131 he founded the Gilbertine Order, and with the help of Alexander constructed at Sempringham a dwelling and cloister for nuns, at the north of the church of St Andrew. Eventually he had a chain of twenty-six convents, monasteries and missions. A custom developed in the houses of the order called "the plate of the Lord Jesus", whereby the best portions of the dinner were put on a special plate and shared with the poor. In 1148 he approached the Cistercians for help. They refused because he included women in his order. The male part of the order consisted of Canons Regular.
In 1165 Gilbert was charged with having aided Thomas Becket when Thomas had fled from King Henry II after the council of Northampton, but he was eventually found innocent. In 1174 some of his lay brothers revolted, but he received the backing of Pope Alexander III. Gilbert resigned his office late in life because of blindness and died at Sempringham in about 1190, at the claimed age of 106.
The only religious order of English origin founded during the Middle Ages, it thrived until the Dissolution of the Monasteries under King Henry VIII.
Veneration
St Gilbert of Sempringham C of E Primary School, Pointon, Lincs
Gilbert was canonised in 1202 by Pope Innocent III. His liturgical feast day is on 4 February, commemorating his death, as it remains also in the Church of England (commemoration). According to the order of Hubert Walter, the bishops of England celebrated his feast, and his name was added to the wall of the church of the Four Crowned Martyrs. His Order did not outlast the English Reformation, however; and despite being influenced by Continental models, it did not maintain a foothold in Europe. There are, however, at least three primary schools in England named after him: in Pointon, Stamford, Lincolnshire and Winton, Greater Manchester.
