Norbert of Xanten was the third-born son of a noble family in Germany around 1082. Aristocratic families looked to have “an heir and a spare.” They wanted to make sure their name and estate continued, but they also wanted at least one spare son in case something happened. Usually, the next born son would be sent into the clergy if he was not otherwise needed. In the Middle Ages, becoming a priest was often less about a particular calling or wanting to be a good person as it was about sons having a place in society that had some dignity and power attached. So it was for Norbert. He wasn’t interested in piety or worship. He didn’t want to be a priest, because he didn’t want to have all those responsibilities. When he was ordained as a sub-deacon, his only job was to chant in worship services, but it is said that he kept the salary and paid someone else to chant for him. He was sent to the court of the Archbishop of Cologne as a canon. Having a cleric in the court lent an air of holiness to the goings-on even though there was a lot of excess and fancy balls and lives entangled in frivolity.1
Norbert returned home and continued his way of life. Then there came a day in around 1115 when he was riding about in the country. He saw a thunderstorm come rolling in, gloomy and threatening, but there was nowhere for him to take shelter. Suddenly, a bolt of lightning struck near him and spooked his horse. Norbert was cast down to the ground. For hours, he was unconscious. Rain-soaked and bleary, when he woke up, he echoed Paul’s words on the road to Damascus, “Lord, what do you want me to do?” From deep within his heart, he heard these words, “Turn from evil and do good. Seek peace and pursue it.”2
From that moment, he left the world he knew and devoted himself to prayer and penance. He submitted to ordination as a priest and renounced all luxury, wearing the poorest garments he could find. He left all his wealth behind, all his lackadaisical canon friends, and worked for reform. He ended up founding a monastic order dedicated to prayer and faith, to radical hospitality, to doing the hard work themselves and caring for the poor.3
[1] https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=4448 & https://www.norbert.wa.edu.au/about-snc/norbertine-history/ & https://www.snc.edu/cns/norbertofxanten/
[2] https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=4448 & https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=87 & https://norbertinevocations.wordpress.com/2010/10/02/the-conversion-of-st-norbert/#:~:text=Norbert,-Posted%20by%20norbertinevocations&text=The%20conversion%20of%20Our%20Holy,and%20living%20for%20Him%20alone.
[3] https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=4448 & https://www.norbert.wa.edu.au/about-snc/norbertine-history/
