Editing Columbanus (section)

==Legacy==
[[File:Annegray.JPG|thumb|Monastery ruins at Annegray]]
Historian Alexander O'Hara states that Columbanus had a "very strong sense of Irish identity&nbsp;... He's the first person to write about Irish identity, he's the first Irish person that we have a body of literary work from, so even on that point of view he’s very important in terms of Irish identity."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.irishcatholic.com/europes-forgotten-founding-fathers/|title=Europe's forgotten founding fathers|first=Greg|last=Daly|date=15 November 2018}}</ref> In 1950 a congress celebrating the 1,400th anniversary of his birth took place in [[Luxeuil]], France. It was attended by [[Robert Schuman]], [[Seán MacBride]], the future [[Pope John XXIII]], and [[John A. Costello]] who said "All statesmen of today might well turn their thoughts to St Columban and his teaching. History records that it was by men like him that civilisation was saved in the 6th century."<ref name="irishtimes.com">{{Cite news|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/columban-the-patron-saint-of-a-united-europe-1.961368|title=Columban, the patron saint of a united Europe|first=Sean|last=McDonagh|newspaper=The Irish Times}}</ref><ref name="ReferenceA">{{Cite news|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/the-first-poem-about-ireland-by-monk-who-inspired-heaney-and-eu-s-architect-1.3013550|title=The first poem about Ireland by monk who inspired Heaney and EU's architect|newspaper=The Irish Times}}</ref>

Columbanus is also remembered as the first Irish person to be the subject of a biography. An Italian monk named [[Jonas of Bobbio]] wrote a biography of him some twenty years after Columbanus' death.<ref name="irishtimes.com"/><ref name="ReferenceA"/> His use of the phrase in 600 AD {{lang|la|totius Europae}} (all of Europe) in a letter to [[Pope Gregory the Great]] is the first known use of the expression.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.historyireland.com/20th-century-contemporary-history/sidelines-20/|title=Sidelines|date=19 March 2013}}</ref>

At [[Saint-Malo]] in Brittany, there is a granite cross bearing Columbanus's name to which people once came to pray for rain in times of drought. The nearby village of [[Saint-Coulomb]] commemorates him in name.<ref name="mi">{{cite web |title=Columbanus Today: Places of His Ministry |url=http://www.monasticireland.com/storiesofsaints/columbanustoday.htm |access-date=15 January 2013 |work=Monastic Ireland}}</ref>

In France, the ruins of Columbanus' first monastery at [[Annegray]] are legally protected through the efforts of the Association Internationale des Amis de St Columban, which purchased the site in 1959. The association also owns and protects the site containing the cave, which served as Columbanus' cell, and the holy well that he created nearby.<ref name="mi" /> At [[Luxeuil-les-Bains]], the Basilica of Saint Peter stands on the site of Columbanus' first church. A statue near the entrance, unveiled in 1947, shows him denouncing the immoral life of King [[Theuderic II]]. Formally an abbey church, the basilica contains old monastic buildings, which have been used as a minor seminary since the nineteenth century. It is dedicated to Columbanus and houses a bronze statue of him in its courtyard.<ref name="mi" />

[[Luxeuil Abbey]], described in the ''[[Catholic Encyclopedia]]'' as "the nursery of saints and apostles", produced sixty-three apostles who carried his rule, together with the Gospel, into France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy.<ref name="stokes-254">Stokes, p. 254.</ref> These disciples of Columbanus are credited with founding more than a hundred different monasteries.<ref name="stokes-74">Stokes, p. 74.</ref> The canton and town still bearing the name of [[St. Gallen]] testify to how well one of his disciples succeeded.

[[Bobbio Abbey]] became a renowned center of learning in the Early Middle Ages, so famous that it rivaled the monastic community at Monte Cassino in wealth and prestige. St. Attala continued St. Columbanus' work at Bobbio, proselytizing and collecting religious texts for the abbey's library.<ref name=":1" /> In Lombardy, [[San Colombano al Lambro]] in Milan, [[San Colombano Belmonte]] in Turin, and [[San Colombano Certénoli]] in Genoa all take their names from the saint.<ref name="webb">{{cite book|last=Webb |first=Alfred |title=A Compendium of Irish Biography |publisher=BiblioLife |location=Charleston |year=2009 |url=http://www.libraryireland.com/biography/SaintColumbanus.php |isbn=978-1116472684}}</ref>

In 2024, the XXV International Meeting of Columban Associations for the "Columban’s Day 2024" took place in [[Piacenza]], Italy. The Holy Father said Columbanus enhanced the Catholic Church. "The life and labours of the Columban monks proved decisive for the preservation and renewal of European culture", he said.<ref>{{cite news |last1=  Lubov|first1= Deborah Castellano |title=Pope Francis: 'The Holy Irish Abbot St. Columban enriched the Church'|url=https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2024-06/pope-francis-sends-greeting-to-columbans-day-2024.html |accessdate=24 June 2024 |publisher= [[Vatican News]]|date=23 June 2024}}</ref>

The [[Missionary Society of Saint Columban]], founded in 1916, and the [[Missionary Sisters of St. Columban]], founded in 1924, are both dedicated to Columbanus.