Bishop Hugh Latimer on the Lord’s Prayer

Tudor church history is at the same time a truly fascinating, poignant and tragic subject. There were martyrs on all sides as the power swung from monarch to monarch, and as various clergy and others found themselves on the “wrong side” of the current situation, they often paid with their lives to witness to the strength of their convictions. On such figure was the Bishop of Worcester and Anglican reformer Hugh Latimer. By no means innocent of co-operation in the persecution of Catholics, he himself was burned at the stake for his Protestant views under the rule of Mary Tudor. All of this to me is profoundly sad. He, along with fellow bishops Cranmer and Ridley, is immortalised in a famous 19th century memorial monument to their martyrdoms in Oxford.

Bishop Hugh Latimer on the Martyr’s memorial in Oxford.

In these less rancourous and more ecumenical times, one can hopefully appreciate the spirituality and courage across the divides of Tudor ecclesiastical politics. Latimer was deeply committed to pastoral care, and encouraging among the laity a serious Christocentric piety. Nowhere is this more evident than in his sermons on the Lord’s Prayer.

Latimer’s pulpit in Cambridge.

Today I was reading one of them, his fourth in a series, and I was struck by some very lovely passages. The one I would share today is his reflection on how the adjective “Our” in the Lord’s prayer, in its opening and throughout, insists upon a profound equality and identification of all believers with one another, and the need to overcome any artificial divisions. For the prayer that is given to us by Christ himself to be efficacious, it must be offered in a spirit of not having disdain, arrogance or feelings of superiority towards anyone around us. This is a lesson whose importance never goes away, and is as timely as ever. We are in this together, as equals, in sincere humility, or else our Christian profession and prayer is no more than a posturing sham.

“Now to make an end: we are monished here of charity, and taught that God is not only a private Father, but a common Father unto the whole world, unto all faithful; be they never so poor and miserable in this world, yet he is their Father. Where we may learn humility and lowliness : specially great and rich men shall learn here not to be lofty or to despise the poor. For when ye despise the poor miserable man, whom despise ye? Ye despise him which calleth God his Father as well as you; and peradventure more acceptable and more regarded in his sight than you be. Those proud persons may learn here to leave their stubbornness and loftiness. But there be a great many which little regard this : they think themselves better than other men be, and so despise and contemn the poor ; insomuch that they will not hear poor men’s causes, nor defend them from wrong and oppression of the rich and mighty. Such proud men despise the Lord’s prayer : they should be as careful for their brethren as for themselves. And such humility, such love and carefulness towards our neighbours, we learn by this word “Our.”

Third Sunday of Easter, 2020

Here is the pre-recorded Sermon I gave today, April 26, 2020, at All Saints, St Andrews. The sermon itself begins at about 20 minutes in to the recording, but I recommend the whole Sung Eucharist, which is very lovely:

 

Sung Mass

Candlemas 2020

Here follows a sermon I gave at All Saints Church, St Andrews, February 2, 2020.

“Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace according to thy word.
For mine eyes have seen thy salvation,
Which thou hast prepared before the face of all people;
To be a light to lighten the Gentiles and to be the glory of thy people Israel.”

 

Today, Candlemas, is the traditional culmination of the whole season of Christmas. The Infancy Narratives (the first two chapters of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke) are marked by powerful moments of divine annunciations and epiphanies, as well as by human and angelic response in song. These accounts of the birth and childhood of Jesus have served as profound inspiration for Christian theology and art throughout history, and the truths they embody are central to the Christian imagination. We have journeyed through the birth of John the Baptist, as well as of the events surrounding and following the nativity and epiphany of Jesus. Far from seeing the infancy narratives as a charming prelude to the main events of the Gospel, made up after the facts, we can see in them an indispensable summation of the main themes of the Christian faith, and, more specifically, the fulfillment of the promises of the Old Testament in the coming of Jesus Christ, and our own place in all of this.

The culmination of the Infancy Narratives is the very feast we celebrate today, sometimes known by its earlier designation as the Purification of the Virgin Mary, sometimes the Presentation of Christ in the Temple, and Candlemas because of the blessing of candles and procession which we undertook today. Over the centuries, this is seen as an episode where both Christ and his Mother, through his presentation and her ritual purification after giving birth, submit themselves to the Jewish law. This, tradition tells us, is a profound act of humility, for such purification is needed, in fact, by neither of them. The infant Christ is presented to the elderly Simeon who, embodying Old Testament wisdom, is enabled to experience the promised, but long-awaited consolation of Israel. His ecstatic song, known as Nunc dimittis by its opening word in Latin, is sung every night by the Church in either Evensong or Compline. The medieval theologian   Bonaventure feels this is quite fitting, as it encapsulates the whole gospel story and its central theological meaning:

 

“Thus in this canticle Christ is praised as peace, salvation, light and glory. He is peace, because he is the mediator. He is salvation, because he is the redeemer. He is light, because he is the teacher. He is glory, because he is the rewarder. And in these four consist the perfect commendation and magnification of Christ, indeed the most brief capsulation of the entire evangelical story: incarnation in peace; preaching in light; redemption in salvation; resurrection in glory.”

 

            For Bonaventure, Simeon can only be explained in light of Old Testament scriptures because he is the representative of the just man, responding for all the just who had come before him and had longed to see this day. Besides Simeon being the fulfillment of Scriptural descriptions of the just man, the embodiment of Wisdom literature, Bonaventure tells us how the Holy Spirit continued to speak to Simeon through the Scripture, making more annunciations: especially on the theme of looking for the consolation of Israel: “Thus the Holy Spirit in a most powerful way  said to him what is read in Habbakuk 2:3 :if he tarries a little, look for him, for he will surely come and will not delay.” Bonaventure argues that the Spirit was present with Simeon through grace and love, Simeon also received, in response to his long years of prayer, a special response of Revelation, that is from the Holy Spirit. [As Bonaventure says,] “Finally, Simeon was told by the Spirit of truth, and prompted to comprehension infused with Joy, that he himself would meet the Lord with the suddenness promised in Malachi 3:1:Behold I send my angel and he shall prepare the way before my face. And presently the Lord, whom you seek, and the angel of the testament, whom you desire, shall come to his temple. Behold he is coming, proclaims the Lord of hosts.

Then Bonaventure moves to the romantic imagery of the Song of Songs, and urges us to imitate the behavior of the elderly Simeon who let down his inhibitions and embraced the infant Jesus: “Let love overcome your bashfulness; let affection dispel your fear. Receive the infant in your arms and say with the bride I took hold of him and would not let go (Song of Songs 3:4).”

Bonaventure then turns to another key figure in this episode, the prophetess and aged widow Anna. As his discussion of her demonstrates, there is even more theological richness to be found in this episode. Bonaventure tells us he will describe why Anna herself is a suitable witness to these great events, but first he makes an important digression to assert that witnesses were needed from every stage of life and both genders, as Christ was coming to restore everything and everyone:

 

“After the testimony of an elderly man there now follows the testimony from a woman. For it is fitting that there be testimony to the advent of Christ from every sort of person, so that those who do not believe the Gospel might be without excuse. Whence there was angelic and human testimony to Christ, and also of the simple and of the perfect of both sexes to show that both sexes looked for redemption just as both had fallen. Therefore to show that there was no crack in the firm foundation of the testimony, there was sevenfold testimony to the birth of Christ.”

 

This sevenfold testimony as shown in the Christmas story, of how all creation must witness to the birth of the redeemer: 1) heavenly testimony from the star  2) source above heaven, the angels ; 3) from under heaven, simple folk like shepherds ; 4) wise men like the magi ; 5) elderly men, like Simeon ; 6) elderly women like Anna; 7) even infants who gave their lives, that is the Holy Innocents in Bethlehem;. “And every nature, every sex, every age produced testimony to the birth of Christ, because he had to restore all things.”) Bonaventure sums this point up dramatically by citing Luke 19:40 about how all things, even the stones and material world, will cry out in response to God’s appearance among us, even if some keep silence. As Simeon is the fulfillment of all the just men of the Old Testament, so Mary and the Prophetess Anna could be seen as functioning in the same way for all of the Old Testament women who responded to God, whether in their prophecies, laments, songs of praise and periods of thoughtful and profound silence.

But there is another part of Simeon’s words which give us pause, as with one eye we look back and marvel with the events of Christmas and Epiphany. For Simeon also suddenly gazes forward in time and speaks to Mary his prophecy about Christ being the rise and fall of many, and that a sword will pierce her heart. This episode plays an almost unique role in the later medieval devotional tradition, forming as it does, along with the Finding of Christ in the Temple at the age of Twelve, one of the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary, but also one of the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin Mary. This complexity of the episode reflects that while the parents of Jesus are marveling at Simeon’s words, the elderly man then prophetically indicates doleful things in Mary’s future; as one commentator puts it, “In a stage whisper Luke announces the Cross.”  In this way, there is a poignant combination of Joy and Sorrow which attends this mystery and gives it more depth and matter for reflection, a fitting hinge in the calendar between Christmastide and Lent.

            And in fact Mystery is the word, for so much is hidden here, like in all the Infancy Narratives, in seemingly simple dress.  For when we think of God, the awesome and infinite God, all powerful and all knowing, at times he can seem so totally other and far beyond us. As the fifteenth century theologian Nicholas of Cusa put it speaking to God,

“Moreover, if anyone expresses any likeness and maintains that You are to be conceived in accordance with it, I know as well that this likeness is not a likeness of You. Similarly, if anyone recounts his understanding of You, intending to offer a means for Your being understood, he is still far away from You. For You are separated by a very high wall from all these [modes of apprehending]. For [this] wall separates from You whatever can be spoken of or thought of, because You are free from all the things that can be captured by any concept. Hence, even when I am very highly elevated, I see that You are Infinity. Consequently, You are not approachable, not comprehensible, not nameable, not manifold, and not visible.”

Yet, as Cusanus continues, and as we celebrate today, in Jesus Christ somehow God has nevertheless made himself approachable and accessible. He is our way of approaching God. In becoming one of us, God is eminently approachable. We are called today to do something as simple as to “walk forth to meet the mother and child”. As we did so in procession earlier, let us do so shortly in another procession. To the altar to receive Him in communion. Let us walk forth to meet him, conscious of the Joy of Christmas, conscious also of what he did for us on the Cross, and what he does now.

For this “now” that Simeon sings about, his moment of meeting God, is also a Now for us. As the priest and poet John Donne wrote centuries ago reflecting on this song of Simeon in its relation to us about to receive Christ in the Eucharist:.

 

“For mine eyes have seen thy salvation; Now, now the time is fulfilled!  And all the way, in every step that we make, in his light (in Simeon’s light) we shall see light; we shall consider that that preparation and disposition, and acquiescence which Simeon had in his Epiphany, in his visible seeing of Christ then, is offered to us in this Epiphany, in this manifestation and application of Christ in the Sacrament.”

Thus, to carry a lighted candle as we did today is a profession of faith.  By that little ceremony you say that you have Christ, that you believe in Him, hope in Him, and love Him, and that you are willing to be consumed, burnt up for Him.

The world today, all of us, need Christ, we are hungry for Him without knowing it; we are at times in the dark.  We can help bring light, bring it to each other.  The lighted candle tells us so.  We need but be more fervent in our own Christian and religious life, more faithful to our daily duties, more patient in our daily crosses.  This is to preach Christ, to let Christ’s light shine to all people.  A quiet, humble, holy life is the best of sermons.The blessed candle, in its simplicity and power, reminds us all of this.

 

To end with the words of St Sophronius of Jerusalem, preached to his people some 14 centuries ago,

Our lighted candles are a sign of the divine splendor of the one who comes to expel the dark shadows of evil and to make the whole universe radiant with the brilliance of his eternal light. Our candles also show how bright our souls should be when we go to meet Christ…..

The true light has come, the light that enlightens every man who is born into this world. Let all of us, my brethren, be enlightened and made radiant by this light. Let all of us share in its splendor, and be so filled with it that no one remains in the darkness. Let us be shining ourselves as we go together to meet and to receive with the aged Simeon the light whose brilliance is eternal.

Amen.

Sunday 5 After Pentecost 2019

Sermon given at All Saints, in St Andrews,  July 14, 2019

“But the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.”  Deuteronomy 30:14.

All of us have biblical verses which strike a cord within us and remind us of certain people or moments or events. As I digested the readings this week preparing to preach, this verse from Deuteronomy reminded me of how much over the years I have come to appreciate a humble and unassuming giant of the spiritual life, Br Lawrence of the Resurrection.

Br Lawrence was a seventeenth century Carmelite lay brother in Paris. After years as a soldier, he entered the monastery and spent most of his life doing kitchen chores and repairing sandals for his fellow religious, and gradually became known as a spiritual guide. His letters and sayings were published after his death, and quickly, under the title Practice of the Presence of God, became an instant classic, translated into many languages, including English. There is much wisdom in his simplicity and approach, all focused on calmly throughout the day, in whatever work or occupation one finds oneself, habitually calling gently to mind the presence of God, whom, he came to realize, is never far away, indeed is always at hand and within reach. As Lawrence puts it,

“He does not ask much of us, merely a thought of Him from time to time, a little act of adoration, sometimes to ask for His grace, sometimes to offer Him your sufferings, at other times to thank Him for the graces, past and present, He has bestowed on you, in the midst of your troubles to take solace in Him as often as you can. Lift up your heart to Him during your meals and in company; the least little remembrance will always be the most pleasing to Him. One need not cry out very loudly; He is nearer to us than we think.”

The seventeenth century was a great time of spiritual writers, and many of them devised rather complex forms of meditation. Lawrence tells us that after reading many books about these methods and many headaches in trying to follow them, he came up with a much simpler approach. Lawrence had been a soldier before becoming a Carmelite friar, and that is reflected in the following description of his method:

“A little lifting up of the heart suffices; a little remembrance of God, an interior act of adoration, even though made on the march and with sword in hand, are prayers which, short though they may be, are nevertheless very pleasing to God, and far from making a soldier lose his courage on the most dangerous occasions, bolster it. Let him then think of God as much as possible so that he will gradually become accustomed to this little but holy exercise; no one will notice it and nothing is easier than to repeat often during the day these little acts of interior adoration.”

It is not surprising that this little book about the little way of being Christian has become a classic in the ecumenical sense, and has helped countless Christians of all stripes in their spiritual journey. His deep sense of finding God and abiding in His Presence among the pots and pans, the sewing of sandals, and in every task and every human encounter, can resonate with everyone. This approach, what we might call the Little Way, of joining love and awareness of God with love of neighbor in the small everyday tasks, the stuff of daily existence, is at the heart of Christian life, and is central to the Gospel reading of the Good Samaritan today.

The life of Mother Teresa of Calcutta witnessed an overwhelming response of the Church and much of the world to her simple but profound way of love: doing the humblest things for the humblest people, driven by her desire to love the children of a God who loved us first. Her constant acts of kindness and inclusivity in her idea of neighbor, each perhaps little in itself, amounted to great things that made the world take notice. Likewise, but in a different context, with St. Therese of Lisieux (1873-97), “the Little Flower”. At the heart of her spirituality was the Little Way, of offering not only great suffering up to God, but also the everyday and seemingly trivial difficulties which arise in our daily lives and relationships with others. Such an attitude goes to the very heart of Christ’s relationships with almost everyone he encounters in the Gospels. Likewise, the parables are full of ordinary people, events and things, and opportunities to show love of God and neighbor.

Just a few days ago the Church celebrated the life of one of the most important figures in the whole spiritual tradition, the sixth century monastic teacher St Benedict about whom Gregory the Great wrote a life. As in all medieval hagiographical literature, miracles performed by God through the intercession of the saint form an important part of the story. In Gregory’s Life of St. Benedict, the very first miracle Benedict performs, while still a young man, is to quietly repair a tray which his nurse accidentally broke. As Pope Gregory describes the action:

The poor woman burst into tears; she had just borrowed this tray and now it was ruined. Benedict, who had always been a devout and thoughtful boy, felt sorry for his nurse when he saw her weeping. Quietly picking up both the pieces, he knelt down by himself and prayed earnestly to God, even to the point of tears. No sooner had he finished his prayer than he noticed that the two pieces were joined together again, without even a mark to show where the tray had been broken. Hurrying back at once, he cheerfully reassured his nurse and handed her the tray in perfect condition.¹

Benedict would go on to prophesy before kings, found abbeys, heal the sick and even raise the dead, but I am not sure if any of those great works of the Spirit are more beautiful than this prayerful and heartfelt desire to reach out and help a fellow human being in emotional distress. His life and his Holy Rule are full of concern for the little things, such as caring for the sick and extending hospitality to all. Many examples could be given, but his description of the duties of the Cellarer in the monastery is typical, describing him in many of the ways that would fit well the Good Samaritan:

He must show every care and concern for the sick, children, guests and the poor, knowing for certain that he will be held accountable for all of them on the day of judgment. He will regard all utensils and goods of the monastery as sacred vessels of the altar, aware that nothing is to be neglected. He should not be prone to greed, nor be wasteful and extravagant with the goods of the monastery, but should do everything with moderation and according to the abbot’s orders. Above all, let him be humble. If goods are not available to meet a request, he will offer a kind word in reply, for it is written: ‘A kind word is better than the best gift ‘ (Sirach 18:17).

The Rule also says that all guests must be received as if one is receiving Christ, and hospitality is a central part of the Little Way just as it is in monastic life.

Likewise this week our Scottish church remembered another lesser known monk St Drostan, who is particularly venerated in Aberdeenshire. We know little about him, except that most likely he was a disciple and fellow missionary of the great St Columba, and that holy well dedicated to him serves as the water source for Aberlour distillery. But what we really know is that he prayed, recited the Psalms and drew sustenance from the liturgy, and preached and trained others to do so. He baptized and lived in community, being solicitous for the poor, and one miracle for which he is remembered is the simple but kind act of restoring the sight of a priest who had gone blind.

 

What gave these figures the strength to do these things, to persevere in their spiritual paths? There is a threefold way that prepares us for this, that characterizes this monastic spirituality.  One cultivates an attentiveness to God and the needs of our neighbor by first of all living a life based upon praying together in common, through the liturgy, offering our prayers to God as a community as we do this morning, and do week after week, year after year. Secondly, by the prayerful reading of scripture, known as lectio divina, or sacred reading, we ponder over and over the meaning of God’s Word for us. And, thirdly, we do not just think about God and offer up pious thoughts, but we put our faith into action, as the Benedictine motto puts it, ora et labora, prayer and work. Like the cellarer mentioned in the Rule, our work, whatever it is, should be permeated by kindness, outreach to others, an offering lifted up to God, to use another Benedictine motto that is in itself a prayer, “that in all things Christ may be glorified.”

This not just something for monks, and indeed it has long been noted that our Anglican way of worship, though the Book of Common Prayer lived out in parish communities, has deep roots in this Benedictine and wider tradition.

The Anglican monk and spiritual theologian, Bede Thomas Mudge, notes that The Benedictine spirit is certainly at the root of the Anglican way of prayer,  in a very special and pronounced manner:

The example and influence of the Benedictine monastery, with its rhythm of divine office and Eucharist, the tradition of learning and ‘lectio divina’, and the family relationship among Abbot and community were determinative for much of Anglican life, and for the pattern of Anglican devotion. This devotional pattern persevered through the spiritual and theological upheavals of the Reformation. The Book of Common Prayer . . . the primary spiritual source-book for Anglicans . . . continued the basic monastic pattern of the Eucharist and the divine office as the principal public forms of worship, and Anglicanism has been unique in this respect.

 

While this spirituality and discipline, with deep roots in monastic and Anglican tradition, can hopefully prepare us to be attentive to God and neighbor, we must avoid complacency.  As the parable of the Good Samaritan shows, merely being an expert on the letter of the Law was not enough to truly discern who your neighbor is, nor does the painstaking performance of ritual automatically prepare us to understand what God wants from us in our everyday encounters with those around us.

The Lawyer answered Jesus correctly on love of God and neighbor as being the heart of the Law, and Jesus tells him to do this, and he shall live. And when in response to the further question of the lawyer, about who is his neighbor, Jesus relates this parable we heard today, and when the lawyer replied that he was a true neighbor to the wounded man who had showed mercy to him, the Lord responds again with a command, “Go, and do in like manner.” That is to say, remember that it is with such prompt mercy you must love and sustain your neighbor who is in need. And by this Christ most clearly revealed to us, that it is love alone, and not love made known by word only, but that which is proved and manifested also by deeds, which brings us to eternal life.

St Benedict and St Drostan and a host of others teach us in their words and deeds that in the guest we receive, in the ones we comfort and support in whatever type of need they are in, that we also do this for Christ. In such acts we perfectly manifest, and make real, love of God and neighbor. We should not excuse ourselves, saying that these matters are too great for us. The Scriptures and the whole tradition of the Little Way, which is in fact a sacred and golden way, tells us that if we cannot do greater things, then let us all help in the lesser things. Help others to live, whether physically or emotionally or spiritually in need. Give food, clothing, medicines, apply remedies to the afflicted, bind up their wounds no matter what type they are, ask about their misfortunes, speak with them of patience and forebearance, draw close to them. It is hard, but we must have confidence that God will supply us with the strength to see Christ in our neighbor. We must let compassion overcome our timidity. We must let the love of our fellow human beings in need overcome the promptings of fear that hold us back. We must not despise our brothers and sisters in need, we must not pass them by.

If I might end with the words of the great patristic writer Gregory of Nazianzus, commenting upon this very Gospel and its implications for all of us, for God, in our hearts and in our neighbor, is indeed closer to us than we might think:

“O servants of Christ, who are my brethren and my fellow heirs, let us, while there is yet time, visit Christ in his sickness, let us care for Christ in His sickness, let us give to Christ to eat, let us clothe Christ in his nakedness. Let us do honour to Christ, and not only at table, as some did, not only with precious ointments, as Mary did, not only in his tomb, as Joseph of Arimathea did, not only doing him honour with gold, frankincense and myrrh, as the Magi did. But let us honour Him because the Lord of all desires from us mercy and not sacrifice, and goodness of heart above thousands of fat lambs. Let us give him this honour in his poor, in those who lie on the ground here before us this very day, (stricken by wounds both seen and unseen), so that when we leave this world they may receive us into eternal tabernacles, in Jesus Christ our Lord, to Whom be there Glory for all ages, Amen.”

Rembrandt. The Good Samaritan.

 

 

 

Guerric of Igny and Advent

The Cistercians, ever since my frequent visits to their abbey in Conyers, Georgia while an undergraduate at Emory, have had a deep appeal to me. There are so many great spiritual writers found among them in their earliest flourishing in the mid twelfth century, and one of the finest is Blessed Guerric of Igny (+1157), who with Bernard of Clairvaux, William of St Thierry and Aelred of Reivaulx, is considered one of the “four evangelists of Citeaux”.

 

We do not know much about Guerric’s early life as a teacher and scholar, but we do know that like so many others he fell under the spell of St Bernard and became a Cistercian monk and then abbot at the new foundation of Igny in France. There he attained a saintly reputation as a scholar and spiritual teacher.

Igny abbey today

Igny has gone through many travails in its long history, suffering much in the French Revolution and modern trials. After various closures and persecutions, it once again flourishes as an abbey for Cistercian nuns, who in their daily lives continue to live out this beautiful tradition of prayer and work, ora et labora, that is at the heart of the Benedictine and Cistercian heritage.

 

Guerric has left to us fewer writings than many of the other Cistercians mentioned above, but his 54 Liturgical Sermons are a precious and in my opinion unequaled reflection on the meaning of the liturgical year and the Christian way of prayer and salvation.  In this beautiful setting of Igny, Guerric set forth for his monks the spiritual riches of the liturgy, and the profound meaning of the important seasons and festivals of the Church year.

As we approach the great feast of Christmas, I would like to share with you two brief passages from Guerric. The first concerns an exhortation to the monastic practice of lectio divina, the prayerful reading of Scripture which the monks and nuns make time for everyday. In one sermon Guerric has this to say:

Search the Scripture.  For you are not mistaken in thinking that you find life in them, you who seek nothing else in them but Christ, to whom the Scriptures bear witness.  Blessed indeed are they who search his testimonies, seek them out with all their heart.  Therefore you who walk about in the gardens of the Scriptures do not pass by heedlessly and idly, but searching each and every word like busy bees gathering honey from flowers, reap the Spirit from the words. (Sermon 54).

This is an invitation in this busy season to take time in the days leading up to Christmas and in the subsequent holiday to quietly and prayerfully read the Infancy Narratives in the first two chapters of Matthew and Luke, and the Prologue to the Gospel of John. Let them speak to your heart, and bring new insights to light, to nourish your soul with these familiar stories in new and even unexpected ways.

In one of his sermons for Advent, in a striking manner Guerric urges us to also cultivate silence in a season not always known in our contemporary society for quiet reflection. Indeed, he strikingly draws upon the imagery of Christ patiently waiting in the womb of his Blessed Mother these days before his birth as a model for our own spiritual practice:

“As the Christ-child in the womb advanced toward birth in a long, deep silence, so does the discipline of silence nourish, form and strengthen a person’s spirit, and produce growth which is the safer and more wholesome for being the more hidden.”(Sermon 28)

May this Advent and Christmastide bring us many moments of productive silence, and a fresh appreciation, with the eyes and ears of a spiritual child of God, of the treasures of familiar yet always new Sacred Scripture, and what the Spirit is trying to teach us through them.

St Bonaventure on the Prophetess Anna

Here is a piece I just published on the blog of Systematic and Historical Theology at the University of St Andrews, where I teach. It is a reflection on what St Bonaventure has to say about the Prophetess Anna in Luke’s Gospel:

Bonaventure on Anna in the Temple

22nd Sunday after Pentecost, 2018

Sermon given at All Saints in St Andrews

October 21, 2018 (22^nd Sunday after Pentecost)

 

“But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all.”

 

There are strong and clear messages for us in today’s readings, both about who Jesus is, and how he accomplished his Mission, and no less significant, how we who want to be his followers must strive to exercise our own discipleship. Clearly Christ came to save us and redeem us by becoming for us the Suffering Servant so powerfully described by Isaiah in today’s first reading. His suffering and humility were quite real, and his redemptive work no easy path. As Christ’s mission progressed, and as he approached Jerusalem and his redemptive Passion, Jesus often would give hints to his Apostles about the nature of his Kingdom, and what it would cost to establish it, a cost described so powerfully in our readings from Isaiah and Hebrews today.

Then we come to our two hapless brothers, James and John, (Peter is not the only Apostle who does not always get it!) who in this remarkable passage make two great mistakes in their approach to Jesus. In the first place, they actually have the temerity, and in Matthew’s version of the story egged on by their mother, a detail which we shall put aside, to tell Jesus that he should give them whatever they ask for. Jesus could have given them right then and there a rebuke, but he chooses to let them continue and ask, giving them the chance, for example, to echo the humble petitions of the Lord’s Prayer which they had already been taught. Instead they ask for something seemingly even more outrageous, namely a fantasy of honor, to sit on his left and right hands when he comes into his kingdom and power. But whatever the two enthusiastic brothers may have been imagining, Jesus makes it clear how much the apostles did not know what they were saying, and refers to the Cup that He must drink:

As St John Chrysostom comments,

“Jesus says therefore, “Can ye drink it?” as much as to say, You ask me of honours and crowns, but I speak to you of labour and travail, for this is no time for rewards. He draws their attention by the manner of His question, for He says not, Are ye able to shed your blood? but, “Are ye able to drink of the cup?” then He adds, “which I shall drink of.”

Clearly the intense service would be that of the suffering Servant, and as St Jerome says,

“By the cup in the divine Scriptures we understand suffering, as in the Psalm, “I will take the cup of salvation;” and straightway He proceeds to shew what is the cup, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.”

(The Sons of Zebedee approaching Christ, Friedrich Heinrich Füger)

As if this were not enough, then the rest of the Apostles also fall into the pits of pride, muttering angrily about the affront given by James and John to their own imagined merited places of honour.

This whole episode makes the apostles incredibly worked up and agitated.  In another famous passage when the apostles were becoming overly impressed with themselves, Christ brought forward a child in their midst, and admonished them that they needed to become childlike. Here he uses another approach, to calm their disquiet, and instead of responding in angry chastisement, the Lord uses the opportunity to teach them something fundamental. As John Chrysostom puts it,

 

“ By thus calling them to Him, and speaking to them face to face, Christ sooths them in their discomposure; for the two had been speaking with the Lord apart by themselves. But not now as before does He do it by bringing forward a child, but He proves it to them by reasoning from contraries; “Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them.””

 

Before we are too hard on the apostles, who unlike us had not yet had the benefit of witnessing the Resurrection and strengthened by Pentecost, we should recall that this particular temptation, to embrace the way of the princes of the Gentiles, is not something that faded away in time. Far from it, it is sadly often found in church history, particularly among those who convince themselves that they are doing something good. For me, this passage called to mind something the Venerable Bede relates about those who were the founders of the church in Britain, thus the founders of our own Christian traditions.

The pagan Anglo-Saxons had conquered and driven the Celtic British Christians into the Western regions, what we now call Wales and Cornwall, and there was no love lost between these British Christians and their enemies and conquerors. When the future St Augustine of Canterbury  arrived as a missionary from Italy sent by Pope Gregory, bringing with him the customs and traditions of Rome which by now differed from the older British ones, from his Roman point of view he expected the Celtic Christians to accept his authority. A meeting was arranged by the two sides, and Bede tells us what happened:

Seven bishops of the Britons, and many most learned men, were to go to the aforesaid council, but first they consulted a certain holy and discreet man, who lived as a hermit among them, and asked him, whether they ought, at the preaching of Augustine, to forsake their traditions. He answered, “If he is a man of God, follow him.” – “How shall we know that?” said they. He replied, “Our Lord says, Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart.” If therefore, Augustine is meek and lowly of heart, it is to be believed that he has taken upon him the yoke of Christ; and offers the same to you to take upon you. But if he is stern and haughty, it appears that he is not of God, nor are we to regard his words.” They insisted again, “And how shall we discern even this?” – “Do you contrive,” said the hermit, “that he may first arrive with his company at the place where the synod is to be held; and if at your approach he shall rise up to you, hear him submissively, being assured that he is the servant of Christ; but if he shall despise you, and not rise up to you, whereas you are more in number, let him also be despised by you.”

Now of course Augustine, following the normal Roman way for a bishop, sat in a chair waiting for them, and, following the old Roman ways, drawn from imperial protocol, did not stand, and it probably never entered his mind to stand. So it happened that when the British bishops came, Augustine was sitting on a chair, and when they observed this, like the apostles in our reading today, Bede tells us, fell into a passion, and charging him with pride, endeavoured to contradict all he said. He said to them, “You act in many particulars contrary to our custom, or rather the custom of the universal church, and yet, if you will comply with me in these three points, viz. to keep Easter at the due time; to administer baptism, by which we are again born to God, according to the custom of the holy Roman Apostolic Church; and jointly with us to preach the word of God to the English nation, we will readily tolerate all the other things you do, though contrary to our customs.” They answered they would do none of those things, nor receive him as their archbishop; for they alleged among themselves, that “if he would not now rise up and stand for us, how much more will he contemn us, as of no worth, if we shall begin to be under his subjection?” To whom the man of God, Augustine, is said, in a threatening manner, to have foretold, that in case they would not, all would go poorly for them.”

Here both sides failed to understand one another, standing upon their rights and what was due to them as both of their cultures, whether the Celtic or the Roman, understood it. Standing on ceremony, threatening and despising one another, embracing all too much the way of the princes of the gentiles as they understood them, perhaps almost hoping that the other side would make a mistake they could pounce upon, the meeting failed and cemented a legacy of distrust for generations.

But Bede has more to say, namely the witness of the saintly bishop Chad. He had been made a bishop for York and the North by the saintly Aidan of Lindisfarne in the Celtic manner, and was known for his itinerant preaching on foot in the countryside, care for the poor, his own poverty and simplicity and dedication to reading and praying with Scripture, a care for the sick which eventually led to his own death from plague. Due to confusion a dispute arose and when the new archbishop, St. Theodore of Canterbury, arrived in England, he charged Chad with improper ordination. In humility Chad resigned, but when he actually met Theodore, the archbishop was so moved and impressed with Chad’s transparent humility, his sincere self-effacement, that Theodore himself physically helped the reluctant  Chad to mount a horse, and when another  bishop died he asked the king to appoint Chad as the bishop’s successor.  Peace had come to the Church in the North.

Jesus knows how hard this is, how strong the temptation is to insist on the prerogatives of the princes of the Gentiles, even for saints like Augustine or Theodore of Canterbury; and that is why, as Jerome says, Jesus did not chastise the apostles, but rather

“the meek and lowly Master neither charges the two with ambition, nor rebukes the ten for their spleen and jealousy; but instead the Gospel says, “Jesus called them unto him.”

Jesus knows us very well; he knows we have this temptation, this weakness, to want recognition, to get our due, to be revered, to seek power even when it is in the cause of seemingly good things. He knows from his own experience it is not always the case to encounter a posture of receptivity, and instead to be met with constant judgement, misunderstanding, and sometimes rejection and much worse. Perhaps He was patient and  gentle with the apostles because He knew that they themselves would someday imitate Him as Suffering Servant even to the point of their own martyrdoms, as Tradition tells us.

We may not, hopefully, be called to literally imitate every aspect of the Suffering Servant, but we are nonetheless called to our own form of participation in the servant hood of Christ. This was the message Jesus gave us in today’s Gospel and other similar passages, and most dramatically and poignantly right before his Passion, when he washed the feet of the disciples, and directed them to a life of service, that is ministry. It may well indeed lead to martyrdom, but more likely for most of us a life of daily service, marked by a sincere attentiveness to the needs of the day, attentiveness to the needs of those around us, a posture of receptivity as we become as individuals and a church and society what one spiritual teacher once called “people of the towel and water.” As Evelyn Underhill once beautifully put it:

“To the eye of faith the common life of humanity, not only abnormal or unusual experience, is the material of God’s redeeming action. As ordinary food and water are the stuff of the Christian sacraments, so it is in the ordinary pain and joy, tension and self-oblivion, sin and heroism of normal experience that His moulding and transfiguring work is known…A deep reverence for our common existence with its struggles and faultiness, yet its solemn implications, comes over us when we realize all this; gratitude for  the ceaseless tensions and opportunities through which God comes to us and we can draw a little nearer to Him—a divine economy in which the simplest and weakest are given their part and lot in the holy redemptive sacrifice of humanity and incorporated in the Mystical Body.”

Let us ask Jesus for the insight to see these opportunities all around us. Let us conform our will to his, so that when we pray that he does what we want, we are actually asking him for the right thing, that His actual will be done, that we be strengthened to be servants in the greatest task of all, humbly going about doing the small but crucial tasks that make his Kingdom come. That way, the people we encounter will recognize the face of Christ in us, just as we recognize him in them. When we practice this servant way of love, no matter what befalls us, we know that Christ will be near us, and welcome us, recognizing us as his brothers and sisters, ready to share every aspect of his life, to drink with him not just the cup of suffering, but indeed the cup of eternal salvation. And then, we will rejoice to hear spoken both to ourselves and all those around us the lovely words of the Prophet Isaiah,

“Those who love me, I will deliver;

   I will protect those who know my name. 

When they call to me, I will answer them;

   I will be with them in trouble,

   I will rescue them and honour them. 

With long life I will satisfy them,

   and show them my salvation. Amen.”

 

 

Feast of St Olaf 2018

Sermon given at All Saints, St Andrews   July 29, 2018  (Feast of St Olaf, and Sea Sunday)

[Readings: 2 Kg 4.42-44; Ps 145.10-19; Ephesians 3.14-21; John 6: 1-12]

“All thy works shall give thanks to thee, O LORD, and all thy saints shall bless thee! They shall speak of the glory of thy kingdom, and tell of thy power, to make known to the sons of men thy mighty deeds, and the glorious splendor of thy kingdom.”

There can be no doubt the Scriptures are often full of praise for the glories of nature, and how our observance and appreciation of nature calls to mind  God’s divine power as Creator, Sustainer and the Lord of Creation. At extraordinary times this power over creation is often worked through human agents, such as the Prophet Elijah in our first reading, and of course miracles, or extraordinary signs of God’s power,  are events most dramatically also associated with the life and ministry of Jesus himself, from the Virgin Birth through the Wedding at Cana to the multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes, walking on water, to the raising of Lazarus and His own glorious Resurrection. The fact that the prophets could work miraculous signs, and the signs worked by Christ, is integral to the Biblical Narrative, as we saw in our first reading. Interestingly, control over nature has often been expected in the lives of the saints in the Christian folk tradition. Today as it happens, is the Feast of St Olaf, the patron of Norway, an eleventh century royal seafarer who ranged far and wide in the northern world fighting battles as far afield as London and Russia.

Eventually as king of Norway who set out, often by rather stern methods, to unite the country and Christianise its hinterland, Olaf was killed in battle by his pagan enemies on this day in 1030. He was soon venerated as a saint, ultimately as Norway’s Eternal and Apostolic King,  Olaf’s memory is celebrated in Catholic, Orthodox, and various Anglican and Lutheran calendars, a recognition that his shrine in Trondheim became a great centre of pilgrimage in Scandinavia, not unlike St Andrews here, until the Reformation. And not unlike St Andrews, pilgrimage is now being revived in Norway much like in Fife, pointing to a strong spiritual need that pilgrimage has an enduring power to satisfy.

Trondheim cathedral

According to one story popular in the middle ages, Olaf posthumously had defeated a sea monster who was threatening some sailors, and one could still point to the spot where he had dashed it against a cliff! Here we have a bit of Thor defeating the Midgard serpent, but also, significantly, Christ walking on water and calming the storm. It gave comfort to sailors in their dangerous work to know that God and his saints could work such miracles of power. In this beautiful church, on a day when in our collection we call to mind fishermen and sailors, and gaze at the lovely votive ship we have hanging in the nave of the church, and as someone who has a long line of Norwegian sailors and fishermen in my own ancestry,  I must admit to being moved by the faith and piety that these tales nourished. And even if God did not always choose to vanquish enemies on the field of battle, as Olaf experienced in his last battle, His Power meant much more than that, and trust in Him led to eternal life.

Votive Ship in the nave of All Saints

Jesus certainly could do signs, perform miracles of power and in fact the Gospel of John is famously structured around these signs; and there is no doubt Jesus is portrayed by John as  fulfilling the promise of OT prophets, and the lectionary today makes that connection clear. But this connection between the Old Testament and the miracles of Jesus goes back to early Church interpretation, as St John Chrysostom pointed it out in the 4^th century when preaching on these texts. Chrysostom felt that in this passage we just read, the Apostle Andrew (and we can take heart here as he is our patron), is very conscious of his Bible, as, following the remark of Philip, he probes Jesus further on the need to feed the crowd, saying: “There is a lad here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what are they among so many?” Chrysostom goes on to say:

“I believe that Andrew did not speak without a reason, but because he knew of the miracle Elijah had wrought with the barley loaves. For the prophet had fed 100 men with twenty loaves. Andrew’s mind therefore rose somewhat higher; but he did not rise to the heights, as appears from what follows: But what are they among so many? For Andrew reckoned that He who was wont to perform miracles would make fewer from the few, and more from the greater number. But this was not so. For He could as easily feed the multitudes from a few loaves as from many. For he needed no subject matter. But lest created things seem outside the power of His wisdom, He uses created things to work His wonders.”

John’s gospel presents Andrew as a significant figure among the disciples of Jesus. Andrew is not only the ‘first called’ among the apostles, and the one who introduces his brother Simon Peter to Jesus, but also most importantly he had been a disciple of John the Baptist. Presumably Andrew witnessed John the Baptist being questioned, and responding in the negative, about whether he was the Messiah or Elijah, and must have pondered all this as he began to follow Jesus. In this context of the hungry multitude, Andrew may well have had the Elijah story of feeding the 100 in mind as he continued to discern who Jesus was, and this would go along the lines of what Chrysostom speculates.  Andrew must have been aware that John the Baptist did not perform miracles, as Elijah did and the Messiah was expected to do, and in a sense his whole life was a sign (medieval exegetes loved to discuss this!). The narrative of John seems to hint that Andrew, the former disciple of the Baptist, feels Jesus can and perhaps should do something here, and his words are perhaps a gentle hint of things he thinks Jesus is capable of, and like Mary at Cana, is prompted by divine inspiration to move beyond the words of Philip, to prod Jesus to set the stage for a further sign. And so Jesus complies and exceeds even the miracle of Elijah.

But there is more. This miracle should indeed induce us to give thanks and great glory to God for his works, both his creation and his lordship over creation; As the fourth century writer St Hilary put it in response to this miracle:

“Five loaves are accordingly placed before the multitude, and broken in pieces. The new increase flowing imperceptibly from the hands breaking the fragments; the bread from which they are broken not growing less, while the portions broken off continue to fill the hand that is breaking them. Neither sense nor sight can follow the progress of the wondrous operation; That is now which was not; that is seen which is not comprehended; what alone remains is to believe that God can do all things.”

Yet as we accept these signs for what they are, and the happiness and joy and wonder their contemplation rightly brings us, we can grow uneasy as we realize that this is not enough, that Jesus is calling us to do something more than follow Him because of His signs. His plan is clearly not just to keep multiplying bread and calming storms and walking on water, no more than it is to keep healing every single person suffering from an illness. It is clear, often to our dismay, that we cannot expect this sort of sign at all times, in every circumstance.

Jesus in fact in the Gospel at several places expresses frustration that the crowds only want signs, whereas he wants them to focus on something else, namely the message and teaching that accompanies these signs. Jesus, as Andrew found out, cannot only do many times over what Elijah did, but that, just as there was someone greater than Solomon here, there was also someone greater than Elijah here. Following this miracle Andrew and the others were soon to hear Jesus teach something about himself which was much harder to understand but exponentially greater. For the rest of Chapter 6 in John’s gospel Jesus will move beyond this sign and miracle of the loaves to claim and assert in breath-taking and quite shocking terms to his audience that He Himself  is the Bread of Life, which we are first of all called upon to hear and ponder and allow to work into the very marrow of our souls; likewise there is now seen from the vantage point of this side of the events known as the Last Supper, Passion and Resurrection,  a clear Eucharistic meaning to his words and deeds, which bring out for us the fullness of the meaning of the loaves and fishes; and in just a few moments we will approach the altar to receive his very body and blood. Word and Sacrament working together, Jesus the bread of Life will renew us and transform the inner man as described by St Paul.

Over 12 centuries ago, one of the great lights of the early Church in the North, the remarkable teacher and exegete Alcuin of York, made this very connection as he wrote about how Christ performed this sign we ponder today as he approached Jerusalem for the great feast of Passover:

“That Christ fed them at the approach of the Pasch signifies that whosover desires to be nourished by the Bread of the Divine Word, and by the Body and Blood of the Lord, should make a spiritual pasch; that is, pass over from the vices to the virtues.”

Echoing the Psalm we prayed today, Alcuin continues,

“The eyes of the Lord are truly spiritual gifts, which he mercifully bestows upon His elect, whenever He turns His eye upon them: that is, when he bestows on us the rewards of filial devotion.”

Every time we approach the altar, as loving and humble children of God, filled with the grace of what Alcuin calls ‘filial devotion,’  we, in a very real sense are on a pilgrimage, no less than those who went and still go to the shrines of St Olaf or St Andrew. We are on a journey to encounter the living God, and we cannot do it by ourselves. Participation in God’s glory depends on his grace and the gift of faith, but we in all humility must recall we are in the presence of something greater than Solomon and Elijah here, although they and all the company of saints, Olaf and Andrew included, and hosts of angels, are with us right now, offering praise and thanksgiving, that cloud of witnesses whose fellowship should be our joy and delight. As Alcuin and the whole tradition of the Church and the very words of Scripture urge us over and over again, we can confidently hope and ask to move beyond the veils that so often cloud our understanding, vision and way, to move beyond the signs to the reality behind them, that is so much more than we can ever imagine, the God Who is Love, so capable of changing us and transforming us into the persons God wants us to be; to bring about the renewal of our inner selves, as St Paul says,  

“…that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have power to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fulness of God.”

This is our destiny as Christians, this is what we want, this is why we are here today; as we have pondered God’s Word in Scripture, and find Him also in those all around us in this congregation, and encounter Him in the Eucharist, let us ask the Lord for this right now, in the words of Alcuin:

Eternal light, shine into our hearts,
Eternal Goodness, deliver us from evil,
Eternal Power, be our support,
Eternal Wisdom, scatter the darkness of our ignorance,
Eternal Pity, have mercy upon us;
that with all our heart and mind and soul and strength
we may seek your face
and be brought by your infinite mercy to your holy presence;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

Transfiguration 2017

Sermon on Transfiguration, given at All Saints Church St Andrews, 6 August 2017

“This is my beloved Son, hear him.”

 

Sometimes in reading Scripture, some of the most important conversations happen off stage, so to speak, and I for one wonder what they are saying. You may have your own examples of this, and for me, two stand out. For instance, how about the Disciples speaking with Jesus on the Road to Emmaus after the Resurrection? What exactly did Jesus say, and how did he say it, to make their hearts burn like fire within their breasts? In today’s great mystery, what were Moses and Elijah saying when they stood there in the presence of the Transfigured Christ? Like the 3 apostles present, were they wondering who this Jesus was, who was so clearly resplendent in Glory?

For he was beautiful, and glorious, and awful to behold, shining with the light of divinity, and, significantly, was this way even before he had died and risen from the dead. And Elijah and Moses, the text tells us, also were beautiful in his reflected splendour. We must not be afraid of beauty; we must never feel guilty about gazing upon and resting in admirable awe in the presence of beauty in God’s good creation. For Jesus was transfigured, revealed to us as he truly was at all times, even before his resurrection, for those capable of seeing, whom he briefly allows to see Him thus, and also showing us a glimpse of our own destiny:

As Saint Thomas Aquinas put it,

“At his Transfiguration Christ showed his disciples the splendor of his beauty, to which he will shape and color those who are his: ‘He will reform our lowness configured to the body of his glory.'” 
Now there are many possible things this mystery teaches us.

First and foremost that Jesus Christ is both God and man, and is the beloved of the Father. Secondly, that there is a deep harmony which exists between the Old and the New Testaments regarding Christ, made clear to us by the visible presence of Moses and Elijah.

But in this emphasis on glory and fulfillment of ancient promise, there is even a deeper mystery. Even before the Transfiguration became a feast day in the western church, this Gospel was read on the first Sunday of Lent. It follows in the narrative when Christ has set his face towards Jerusalem, and all that would entail, both for him but also for the disciples, including and perhaps especially Peter who had just ecstatically confessed his belief in Him, and who had also wanted to dissuade Jesus from going to Jerusalem. We must remember this event is a stage to the Cross, as the ancient liturgical cycle and the words themselves teach us; and the Cross, just as it must not be separated from the resurrection which will follow it, must also not be separated from the Transfiguration which preceded it.

As the text indicates, Moses and Elijah were also in splendor as they discussed this very thing, this approaching Passion, with Jesus. And it would be nice to stay on that mountain, basking in the glory of the Lord, nice for Peter, and nice for us, but as real as this light and glory of Mt Tabor was and is, it is not separated, for either Jesus or for us, by the reality of Calvary. As Archbishop Michael Ramsey put it, in the midst of a world too easily dominated by the shadow of Calvary, we must ever look for signs of God’s ability and power to transform even the ugliest of the realities of sin and despair into moments for a more powerful light to break though and transform all around us, right here and now:

“Confronted with a universe more terrible than ever in the blindness and the destructiveness of its potentialities, men and women must be led to Christian faith, not as a panacea of progress or as an otherworldly solution unrelated to history, but as a gospel of Transfiguration. Such a gospel transcends the world and yet speaks directly to the immediate here-and-now. He who is transfigured is the Son of Man; and as he discloses on the holy mountain another world, he reveals that no part of created things, and no moment of created time lies outside the power of the Spirit, who is Lord, to change it from glory to glory. “

 

As Archbishop Ramsey continues to tell us in his famous book on the Transfiguration, the Eastern Church has always been much more comfortable with this language, of keeping Transfiguration always before us, the transforming presence of the light of Mt Tabor, present already in our lives here and now, perceptible for those with eyes to see, than in the West.

But if we look to the earliest days of Christianity in Scotland, the life of St Columba, we find this language wonderfully present in several stories about Columba handed down by his disciples. One story tells us that while Columba presided at the Eucharist, a visiting saint noticed a shining ball of light around Columba’s head, and a column of light surrounding him until the Eucharist ended. Another story relates directly to the Transfiguration, as it focuses on opening up the meaning of Scripture. A fellow monk, who admitted he was terrified afterwards until Columba consoled him, witnessed the following:

“On another occasion when St Columba was living in Hinba, the grace of the Holy Spirit was poured upon him in incomparable abundance and miraculously remained over him for three days. During that time he remained day and night locked in his house, which was filled with heavenly light. No one was allowed to go near him, and he neither ate nor drank. But from the house rays of brilliant light could be seen at night, escaping through the chinks of the doors and through the keyholes. He was also heard singing spiritual chants of a kind never heard before. And, as he afterwards admitted to a few people, he was able to see openly revealed many secrets that had been hidden since the world began, while all that was most dark and difficult in the sacred scriptures lay open, plain, and clearer than light in the sight of his most pure heart.”

 

We may not be granted such moments very often, and, like St Columba’s disciple, perhaps we would not always know what to do with them if we were! But we do experience humbler visions all the time when we see people around us, through acts of love and charity and forgiveness manifest purity of heart, and truly are transfigured into angels of light. When one has the grace to sense a strong experience of God, it is as though seeing something similar to what the disciples experienced during the Transfiguration: For a moment they experienced ahead of time something that will constitute the happiness of paradise. In general, it is brief experiences that God grants on occasions, especially in anticipation of harsh trials. However, no one lives “on Tabor” while on earth, and we must acknowledge this. But as Pope Benedict XVI recently wrote in a talk given on this very feast, we do have a sure way to nourish the light within us, and this is by learning how to listen to the word of God:

“Human existence is a journey of faith and, as such, goes forward more in darkness than in full light, with moments of obscurity and even profound darkness. While we are here, our relationship with God develops more with listening than with seeing; and even contemplation takes place, so to speak, with closed eyes, thanks to the interior light lit in us by the word of God.”

When I think back to my first memories of this story, I remember that it made me want to know much more about who Moses and Elijah were, and how what they were saying and doing pointed to Jesus. This Transfiguration story points us to the Scriptures, encourages us to ponder them again, Old Testament along with the actual words of Jesus. I have come to feel that this feast among many other things that it represents, is also a celebration of the Word of God, and the act of pondering it, praying over it, and listening to what it tells us to do and how to be. As we are but a few days from Lammas, the celebration of the first loaf made from the harvest, I would like to share a lovely quotation from the fourth century theologian Ephraim the Syrian, which employs this harvest imagery, significantly as the opening of our oldest preserved full sermon on the Transfiguration:

“The harvest comes joyfully from the fields, and a yield that is rich and pleasant from the vine; and from the Scriptures teaching that is life giving and salutary. The fields have but one season of harvest; but from the Scripture there gushes forth a stream of saving doctrine. The field when reaped lies idle, and at rest, and the branches when the vine is stripped lie withered and dead. The Scriptures are garnered each day, yet the years of its interpreters never come to an end; and the clusters of its vines, which in it are close to those of hope, though also gathered each day, are likewise without end. Let us therefore come to this field, and take our delight of its life giving furrows; and let us reap there the wheat of life, that is the words of Our Lord Jesus Christ.”

 

 

If we desire enlightenment, ponder the scriptures; ponder the prophets, ponder the law, ponder the proverbs and psalms, all in light of the teaching of Jesus Christ; do all in our power to be open to this light and illumination, and listen in serious delight to Jesus over and over again; ponder who he is, the Transfigured One who yet humbled himself to die on a cross, and who then rose again, and let his words sink into the very depths of our being, allowing us to be transfigured in his image and likeness; as an old American hymn that I learned in my childhood put it, describing Jesus: “In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, with a glory in his bosom which transfigures you and me”. The Father’s testimony is meant to raise us up and strengthen our own infirmity of Spirit, and help us remember the implications of what it truly means to be brothers and sisters of Jesus, made in the image and likeness of God.

As Pope Leo the Great concludes his sermon on this great mystery, the oldest sermon on the Transfiguration we have in the Western church, he dwells upon the command of the Father, “Listen to Him”.

“Without delay therefore hear Him Whom in all things I am well pleased; in preaching Whom I am made known; in whose lowliness I am glorified; for He is the Truth and the Life, He is my power, My wisdom. “hear ye Him” whom the mysteries of the Law foretold; whom the mouths of the prophets proclaimed. “hear ye him” Whose Blood has redeemed the world; Who has chained the demon, and taken from him what he held; Who has blotted out the deeds of sin, the covenant of evildoing. “hear ye him” Who opens the way to heaven, and though the humiliation of the Cross prepared for you a way to ascend to his kingdom. “ Amen.