The pilgrimage of Sainte Avoye

The legend of Saint Avoye: "Avoye, Avia, Aurée, Auréa, Ave, Eve, according to the place, according to the dates, is known and invoked under these different names. Did she live in the third or fifth century? Nobody can say precisely. The Jesuits of the seventeenth century nevertheless delivered a biography. Avoye was born in Sicily at the beginning of the 3rd century, to a Sicilian father named Quintian, an idolater, and a baptized mother from Brittany "en l'Ile", named Gerasine. Avoye had eight brothers and sisters. The mother succeeded in converting her husband to the Christian religion. Avoye, however, surpassed all the other children in her fervour! She was also the most beautiful; an almost perfect beauty that does not go unnoticed. The teenager realized this, but from that young age she decided to consecrate herself to God. In her candor, she begged God to make her ugly, in order to help her remain faithful to her vow. As this prayer did not receive the approval of heaven, she decided to live undercover, outside the world.

She was several times the victim of the Barbarians who worked to martyr her with incredible refinement of cruelty. She was whipped with scorpions and rods; Her bones were made bare, "a prickly hair" was thrust into her wounds as well as "boiling molten salt", her breasts were cut off with blunt knives for more sadism, and finally, her neck was cut off.

In the church of Grugny, two modern stained glass windows, one of which was donated by the brotherhood of St. Avoye in 1901, illuminate the chancel. To the right of the altar is a representation of St. Avoye which attracted many pilgrims every year on Trinity Sunday

This annual pilgrimage continued for a few years after the Second World War. Here is the account of one of them reported by Edmond Spalikowski in the 1920s. "Pilgrims and curious people from Rouen, La Bouille and Jumièges, Buchy, Bosc-le-Hard and Tôtes have come from seven leagues around, but all are faithful to the annual event, to honour Sainte-Avoye. It was enough for the people to have crowned her a master healer of stomach aches for the crowd to come to Grugny once again as large and as religious as in the past.

Legend has it that this saint, enclosed in a crenellated tower, was fed with bread and water by the Virgin who rescued her through the grated opening. Thus the saint is represented in a prison and no longer served by the Virgin but by the angels. It is not uncommon to see on the edge of the pedestal fragments of bread deposited by some credulous pilgrim who cannot have the Gospels said for stomach aches, as is customary on Trinity Day during the annual pilgrimage. This also explains the following invocation: "Great Saint Avoye, mother of the Most Holy Trinity (sic), relieve us from the evil of the spleen." If theology thus received a harsh assault, the pilgrim, on the other hand, believed himself cured when he went out.