Oratory of the Paraclete

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The Oratory of the Paraclete was a Benedictine monastery founded by Peter Abelard in Ferreux-Quincey, France, after he left the Abbey of St. Denis about 1121. (Only a crypt remains.) Paraclete comes from the Greek word meaning "one who consoles" and is found in the Gospel of John (16:7) as a name for the Holy Spirit.

In 1125 Abelard was elected by the monks of the Abbey at Saint-Gildas-de-Rhuys, near Vannes, Brittany, to be their abbot. He turned the Paraclete over to the recently displaced Héloïse, his wife, who had been in a convent in Argenteuil before its disbandment by Abbot Sugar. The Paraclete was rededicated as a convent. Heloise became the Paraclete's abbess and spent the rest of her life there. [1]

She and Abelard were buried together there (Abelard c. approximately 1142, Heloise c. approximately 1164) until 1792, when their remains were transferred to the church of Nogent-sur-Seine nearby. In 1817, their bodies were reportedly moved to a new tomb at Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, but whether they are both actually buried there remains a matter of dispute.

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References

  1. Abelard, Peter. "Historia Calamitatum" in Betty Radice, The Letters of Abelard and Heloise.

Coordinates: 48°28′05″N3°34′13″E / 48.46806°N 3.57028°E / 48.46806; 3.57028