Isidore of Seville on Spiritual Reading

Why is it so crucial to nourish our Christian spirituality, our life of prayer, by spiritual reading? Isidore of Seville was a bishop in seventh century Visigothic Spain, where a beautiful synthesis of the theology and monastic wisdom from the Greek East and Latin West was underway. Isidore saw it as his task to pass on whatever spiritual wisdom he could from the gradually fading classical world, and wrote many works in his attempt to instruct his people on the importance of the Tradition. He was not worried about originality as so many modern people are, but in many ways was quite the opposite, happy to distill and pass on for a new audience the wisdom he had inherited.

Isidore of Seville

Among his less well known writings is a work entitled Book of Maxims, and here are some quotations from that useful compilation:

If a person wants to be always in God’s company, he must pray regularly and read regularly. When we pray we talk to God; when we read God talks to us. All spiritual growth comes from reading and reflection. By reading we learn what we did not know; by reflection we retain what we have learned.

As Isidore stresses, reading is not just for ourselves, but brings with it responsibility; it equips us for a life of Christian service:

The conscientious reader will be more concerned to carry out what he has read rather than merely acquire knowledge of it. For it is a less serious fault to be ignorant of an objective than it is to fail to carry out what we do know. In reading we aim at knowing, but we must put into practice what we have learned in our course of study.

Finally, if we wish to read not just for knowledge, but the more important goal of wisdom, our reading must be joined to prayer and attentiveness to God’s will and his grace:

Learning unsupported by grace may get into our ears; it never reaches the heart. It makes a great noise outside but serves no inner purpose. But when God’s grace touches our innermost minds to bring understanding, his word which has been received by the ear sinks deep into the heart.

 

Pentecost 2017

Pentecost Sermon   June 2017   All Saints Church, St Andrews

“But Moses replied, “Are you jealous for my sake? I wish that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put his Spirit on them!”

Today is a great festive day, the Day of Pentecost, commemorating and celebrating the coming of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and the Blessed Virgin, as well as the larger group of men and women believers who were with them; we are 50 days after Easter, and indeed the culmination of Eastertide; Pentecost shows us the coming of the Advocate and Consoler whom Christ promised. We pray for this continuing presence of the Spirit in ourselves, we pray like Moses that God the Holy Spirit may come and settle upon all of us, and that we will recognize and welcome this Divine presence in our lives. This feast is the culmination of the first Novena, the great time of expectant prayer, the nine days between Ascension and this day, the patient and expectant and hopeful model of all prayer to the Holy Spirit, that He will come upon us; for we are not left as orphans or bereft, although admittedly sometimes it is hard to remember that. As some of you may know about me by now, I never come to a sermon or feast day alone, but rather like to spend this time with great figures from the Tradition, to allow them to help me understand the meaning of these great events of salvation history, replayed over and over again before us in the Church’s liturgical year, holding out to us the hope of new insights and personal, ecclesial and, perhaps we hope, societal renewal.

Today I bring three friends with me, primarily Gregory the Great and two great poets, John of the Cross and Gerard Manley Hopkins, to help me and I hope all of us to spend a few minutes reflecting on this meaning of this great mystery of the Descent and abiding presence of the Holy Spirit. For it is indeed a marvelous thing, and as Gregory put it over fourteen centuries ago when he preached on this very feast, which he ranked equal in importance to the celebration of the Incarnation, in Old St Peters,  to the people of Rome, the Holy Scriptures, the source of our faith and tradition, are full of stories of its transformative power! Gregory’s deep delight in the work of the Spirit I think should be our delight:

“It is my delight to lift up eyes of faith to the wonders of our Creator; and here and there to dwell upon the Fathers of both the Old and New Testament. I behold with these same eyes that were opened by faith, David and Amos and Daniel and Peter and Paul and Matthew, and I am moved to consider how great, as Creator, is the Holy Spirit, but in my reflection I fall far short. For it is He who inspires the youthful harpist, and He who has created the Psalmist. He moves the soul of The herdsman plucking wild figs, and makes him a prophet. He enters into a young boy, disciplined in spirit, and makes him a judge. He enters into a fisherman, and makes him a preacher of the Gospel. He fills a persecutor of the Church, and makes him the Doctor of the Gentiles. He fills a publican, and makes of him an evangelist. What power of creation has this Sprit! As He touches a soul he teaches it; and simply to have touched is to have taught it. For as his light illumines it, the human spirit of a sudden changes; it rejects on the instant what it was, and shows itself at once as it was not.”

We pray for the gifts of the Holy Spirit, gifts that were given and possessed in full by Christ, as detailed by the prophet Isaiah:

The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him—
the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and of might,
the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the LORD—

It is a wondrous thing that Christ fully possesses these gifts. But the whole purpose of the Incarnation, of the Passion, Resurrection and Ascension, the great truths and events of the life of Jesus, is that we too are now a part of it; these gifts and the life they make possible are for us, his adopted brothers and sisters; they are OUR destiny too. Thus we can and should pray, as the great medieval hymn puts it, to be touched by the “digitus Dei”, the finger of God, a phrase implying both pointed focus and intimacy. We traditionally enumerate these gifts of the spirit as sevenfold; they help transform the creed we have learned, the scriptures we have read and heard so often, to make them for us personally living and transformative teachings, that effect us to the very marrow of our existence! Our hymns today, deeply as they draw upon scripture and the liturgical hymns and sequences of the ages, demonstrate that. These gifts I think should be named today, emphasizing how these gifts transform us and unite us ever more closely to Jesus:

1) the gift of wisdom, enabling us to relish spiritual things more than material ones;

2) the gift to understand God and his works, the desire to understand what the life and words of Jesus mean in our own lives.

3) the gift of prudence, enabling us to follow in Christ’s footsteps and avoid bad zeal;

4)the gift of strength: to withstand so many temptations; and the fortitude to face the morning news;

5) the gift of knowledge: to distinguish good from evil by the light of Christ’s holy teaching;

6) the gift of piety: to clothe ourselves with charity and mercy;

7) the gift of fear of the Lord: to withdraw from all ill-doing and live in attentive reverence and awe of the eternal majesty.

 

How these gifts change us, sometimes in an instant, but also over the course of our lives! There are so many ways to describe the Spirit’s work and presence, the depths of this mysterious work are so profound, that the bible needs to use multifold imagery that is not always in our day to day lives and experience obviously compatible; thus the Spirit, Jesus teaches us in today’s Gospel, is flowing and living water, nourishing and giving life abundantly, something anyone can understand, and makes sense both for fishermen and for desert dwellers. It also can be the power of the formidable storm, unable to be tamed, as anyone who has been out in a boat, or walking along a shore in the East Neuk in a gale, can attest. Speaking of wind, It can indeed be a fierce wind, or in turn a breeze that cools us when we need refreshment, or a gentle almost imperceptible breath, like Hildegard of Bingen named herself, a feather floating on the breath of God; or, indeed a descending dove, or a power that gives us the wings of eagles. The poetic voice of Gerard Manley Hopkins expresses it unforgettably, with vivid imagery of the Holy Spirit as a dove of warmth, solicitude and power::

“And for all this, nature is never spent;

There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;

And though the last lights off the black West went

Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.”

But indeed the Holy Spirit can also be Fire, so powerfully set forth in the reading from Acts today. Fire is an amazing thing. I learned that the first time I put my hand near it as a child, but also learned it had other properties joined with gentleness, as my mother put a needle in flame and then removed a splinter from my finger. Fire can melt mountains and planets; it can illuminate a dark room; fire purges and purifies, fire above all gives us warmth, allows us to feel comfort and hope and restore a sense of well being. As John Wesley put it once very famously, this Spirit warms the heart, giving us new life and a new birth, new ways of seeing and being, where ideas and doctrines we have heard countless times before take on a new life and power within us.

And to what end are we transformed by this Fire? Why does this Great Guest, as Gregory the Great puts it, come to dwell in our hearts, to make us His very Temple as St Paul says? He comes, as His name implies, to make us Holy, to bring and instill within us what the theologians call sanctifying grace, to conform us to the Image and Likeness of God, to unite our hearts with the Heart of Jesus. As St John of the Cross beautifully articulates in his sublime and incomparable poem, The Living Flame of Love, this Holy Spirit is not merely interested in a superficial, merely notional or intellectual presence within us, but wants to do all within us that the image of fire implies:

3. O lamps of fire!
   in whose splendors
   the deep caverns of feeling,
   once obscure and blind,
   now give forth, so rarely, so exquisitely,
   both warmth and light to their Beloved.
4. How gently and lovingly
   you wake in my heart,
   where in secret you dwell alone;
   and in your sweet breathing,
   filled with good and glory,
   how tenderly you swell my heart with love.

Because, my friends, all of these gifts must lead to Charity. The Holy Spirit is God and God is Love; he comes to dwell among us to have us share in the Divine Life of Love. That is what these gifts are for, that is what sanctifying grace is for, that is where this transformation should be leading us, and not just us, but ourselves along with those Scripture calls our neighbors. We are not orphans, nor individuals, alone in the world and the vast universe, without hope or comfort. We are not alone, and will not be alone. This Holy Spirit lights our way, it warms us and nourishes us, it lights our way home. To conclude with the words of Gregory the Great, preached so many centuries ago, to me most movingly summing up the message of this feast both with regard to our lives here and now, as well as our eternal destiny:

“Let us then, dearest brothers and sisters, love our neighbor. Let us love him who is close beside us, that we may then come to love Him Who is far above us. Let the soul practice toward its neighbor, what it may offer up to God: so that it may merit to enjoy both God and its neighbor forever. Then shall we reach to that joy of the heavenly throng, of which we now receive a pledge in the Holy Spirit. Let us press forward with all our heart to that end in which we shall have joy without end. There we shall rejoice in the Holy company of the Blessed. There secure happiness, there untroubled rest, there true peace, shall no more be left with us, but shall be given to us by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Who with the Father and the Holy Ghost liveth and reigneth for ever. Amen.”

 

 

 

St Alphonse On Conversing with God

Things we read over and over many times, particularly when we are young, make a deep and lasting impression upon us. In my case, such a book was my father’s old St Andrew’s Daily Missal, which I have mentioned before in this blog. I would pour over the little introductions for each saint’s feast, and particularly was fascinated by the illustrations. One that really caught my imagination was for St Alphonsus Mary de Liguori, the eighteenth century moral theologian, founder of the Redemptorists, spiritual writer, bishop, and Doctor of the Church.

[Image of Alphonse from the St Andrews Daily Missal]

After giving his simple biography, I was struck by the last paragraph in the description, particularly the very last sentence, so refreshingly averse to “the spirit of modernity”:

 

He wrote religious works filled with erudite learning and piety; he condensed all his treatise on grace in one sentence: ‘He who prays is saved, he who does not pray is damned.’ Pope Pius VII wanted to keep in Rome as a relic the three fingers with which this Doctor had written so well.

This quote from Alphonse is not of course meant to imply that prayer is some sort of magic, that we simply perform with no relationship to our behavior, and then somehow hope all will be well. Prayer for him means a sincere orientation of ourselves and our whole lives toward God, and what God wills for us; an alignment, so to speak, of our will with God’s will. And if we do this with trust and sincerity, acknowledging our dependence on God’s grace, and when necessary, a spirit of true penance, then it is never too late to begin to pray. And if a spirit of true prayer undergirds our life, and the choices we make, then our faith and hope in God who is Love will not be disappointed.

St Alphonse is not so much in fashion at the moment, and that is too bad. He was a gentle, learned teacher, with a deep grasp of the whole scope of Tradition. And even more than that, he had a talent for making it accessible to a wide audience. Recently on planning some talks on spirituality I came across this wonderful passage of his on prayer and conversing with God, that encapsulates true wisdom on this matter and has much to say to spiritual seekers today:

If you desire to delight the loving heart of your God, be careful to speak to Him as often as you are able, and with the fullest confidence that He will not disdain to answer and speak with you in return. He does not, indeed, make Himself heard in any voice that reaches your ears, but in a voice that your heart can well perceive, when you withdraw from converse with creatures, to occupy yourself in conversing with your God alone: “I will lead her into the wilderness and I will speak to her heart.” He will then speak to you by such inspirations, such interior lights, such manifestations of His goodness, such sweet touches in your heart, such tokens of forgiveness, such experience of peace, such hopes of heaven, such rejoicings within you, such sweetness of His grace, such loving and close embraces, – in a word, such voices of love, as are well understood by those souls whom He loves and who seek for nothing but Himself alone.

 

 

 

 

Restoration

I wrote the following poem inspired by the life and stories surrounding the Irish hermit St Kevin of Glendalough, who among other things was known for his great rapport with animals.

Restoration

Beasts revere

the rites of nature,

adore

the Word who made them.

For all their fierceness,

hounds do not hate their prey.

 

Men,

immortal beings

made to walk with angels,

are the ones to fear.

Alienated, separate,

cut off

by Adam’s fall

from previous bliss,

afraid or unaware

of life’s potential.

This is clear from all

around me,

such anxious

quiet desperation.

 

So it is the Father of lights

allows the Saints in this

their Age

extraordinary graces,

demonstrates just how

right things can be.

 

Despite February dampness,

Eden’s similitude rises

like the mist in

my valley of two lakes.

Transfiguring imminence

attracts the mated blackbird.

 

She glides above the Green Path,

alights on my rugged shoulder,

finds her way to hand

outstretched in imitation

of my God and Brother.

This creature,

secure in glorious

innocent instincts,

senses how even my

frail fallen body

pulsates in this

glowing dawn in

graceful unity with

a soul once more

aware of its creator.

My palm,

warm and still

despite the morning frost,

will shield her

fragile egg

through Lent

to glorious Easter.

 

 

 

 

St Norbert, Peacemaker

My Sermon given at All Saints, St Andrews, January 29th, 2017

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.”

The liturgical year up until this point, following the Creed, has been attempting to make clear exactly who Jesus is, fully God and fully human, the long hoped for fulfillment of ancient prophecy. The seasons of Advent and Christmastide made this joyful news quite clear, and the season of Epiphany and Theophany continued to reveal and confirm just who Jesus is. Likewise, the latter days of Lent and Holy Week and Easter are on the horizon, where the Church will lay before us and graphically illustrate in incomparable Scriptural imagery what Jesus will do for us and for our salvation. While it is very important to understand and appreciate what Jesus did for us, today we have the task of beginning once again to grasp and come to terms with, and reflect upon what Jesus, the Incarnate Word, had to say to us, including how we should behave if we want to follow him and imitate him and aspire to be his disciples. The creed tells us what he did for us, the deeds of Christ, but Christ also instructs us on how to live, and never more so than in the famous Sermon on the Mount, initiated by his proclamation of the Beatitudes which we heard today. The tradition of the Church urges us to pay close attention to every line of this sermon, for as St Augustine puts it:

“He who reflects soberly and devoutly will find in this sermon, in respect of all that regards the conduct of our daily life, the perfect manner of Christian living.”

I today would focus on one particular verse, “Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.”

I would like to briefly discuss and draw what I hope are helpful lessons from the life of someone who has been an important part of my own study and research in medieval history, namely Norbert of Xanten, who lived in the twelfth century, and was a great reformer of the clergy, founding a new religious order known as the Premonstratensians (their most famous abbey in Scotland being Dryburgh in the borders, where Sir Walter Scott is buried), and later became archbishop of Magdeburg in Germany. This Norbert came as we shall see to have a reputation as the great peacemaker of his troubled times.

Norbert was born around the year 1080, in Xanten, near the modern German-Dutch border on the west bank of the Rhine. He was an aristocrat of the highest level, with close relationships on both side of his family to the German and French royal houses. Around the time his father and brother went off to fight in the first crusade, Norbert, who seemed to have been a pleasant, handsome fun loving and rather spoiled young man, began his own family destined predictable path as a cleric in the German church, finding himself before long in the retinue of the Emperor. His rather steady but unremarkable careerist trajectory seems to have been disturbed when he accompanied the Emperor when during one phase of the long power struggle with the papacy known as the Investiture controversy, the German ruler invaded Italy, took Rome by force, and imprisoned the elderly pope in hopes of convincing him to accept the emperor’s point of view. Norbert we know visited the pope in prison, and seems to have become disillusioned with the whole type of life he was living in the emperor’s service. When they returned to Germany he left the imperial service and refused promotion in the Church, and soon underwent a radical conversion and call to a serious religious life. He gradually divested himself of his wealth and began what today we would call vocation discernment, living in turn with hermits and various types of monks and canons, before deciding to become a poor, wandering preacher. It is a fascinating story, which perhaps I can tell in more detail at another time. While Norbert had many enemies who distrusted his radical way of life, he also had friends among the bishops, and eventually received papal permission for his way of life. He founded a group of religious communities centered on the new abbey of Premontre in France, who became known as “white canons” due to the colour of their habits. As the Cistercians under the leadership of Bernard reformed the monks, so Norbert, his friend, helped spark reform of clergy all over Europe. Even St Bernard, not known for being self effacing, considered Norbert to be the finest preacher of the age. Eventually Norbert was made, to his own reluctance and chagrin, archbishop of Magdeburg on the eastern frontier of Germany, where until his death he supported missions, church reform and tried to mediate in continuing struggles between the popes and German emperors that caused so much distress in those days.

In what ways was Norbert a peacemaker? In good medieval fashion, I would suggest  three, all of which have potential relevance in principle for every Christian in every age, regardless of the differences in state of life and circumstances.

First of all he allowed himself to be guided on the road to inner peace by surrendering himself to God. Through a process of gradual and painstaking discernment, punctuated by dramatic moments, He let Christ take over his life; Norbert gradually came to see that if he became poor in spirit, and let God lead him, his former way of life could be left behind and he could be transformed from the conventional into something that was genuinely centered on God, and because it was centered on God, he came to see that he needed to love others, and to bring to them the peace he had found within. This inner peace, a purity of heart centered upon God and manifested in charity, is something the Beatitudes direct us toward, something we are called to aspire to. As St Jerome puts it about the verse we are considering this morning:

 

“The peacemakers are called blessed who first make peace within their own heart, and then between their dissident brethren. For what does it profit you to make peace between others, while vice is at war within your own heart?”

 

And that is just what Norbert did. After his conversion and years of prayer and recollection, at peace now with himself and God, the focus of Norbert’s itinerant preaching became peace in a second sense, the restoration of hope, and reconciliation in the villages he visited throughout France, Germany and the Low Countries. He would enter into a village, and in those days of feudal violence, he often would attempt to reconcile warring and broken families. We are told how when the villagers knew he was approaching, they would ring the church bells, and children would run out and escort him to the village. He would often preach and hold meetings with those at odds with one another, and after celebrating the Eucharist with them present, would have them make peace over the relics of the saints. More humbly but no less significantly, he would counsel and help reconcile the distressed, the ostracized, and those in need of healing for one reason or another, often women who had been marginalized and accused of demonic possession. He also ministered to the powerful, often stricken by their own form of alienation and inner turmoil. One great example was the German nobleman Count Godfrey of Cappenburg. Godfrey had led a troubled life as a warlike nobleman, and in those tumultuous times had burned down the local cathedral. Dejected in remorse and alienation, he eventually joined Norbert, gave over his wealth, and found peace as a simple lay brother as Norbert’s dear spiritual friend and confidante. For all of these activities of Norbert, we are told by Norbert’s early biographer that while traveling through France,

“the next day early in the morning he rose and departed for another village not far away in order to preach to the people. He was very devoutly received here because they had heard he was a bearer of the Word of God and a bringer of tranquil peace.”

Not a bad epitaph!

 

Thirdly. When he was made archbishop of Magdeburg, essentially a prince archbishop and one of the most important advisors in the Empire, Norbert found himself called to be a peacemaker on yet another level, what we might call today the realm of international politics. The intense conflicts between the popes and emperors continued, with all the distress this brought to people of all levels of society, and Norbert found himself in the often unenviable position of trying to keep things together, or at least from further deterioration. In this he was for the most part successful, but like all great peacemakers, it did not make him universally popular, and I think that is one of the reasons that despite his widely acknowledged sanctity and that he founded one of the major medieval religious orders, the Premonstratensians, which at their height before the Reformation numbered 600 abbeys from Ireland to the Holy Land, he would not be formally canonized until over four centuries after his death. Peacemakers, as the sermon on the Mount brings home so powerfully and poignantly, are not always appreciated, however much they are always desperately needed.

St Norbert and his followers tried to live out the Beatitudes, as best they could with God’s help. They knew there was much darkness in their own hearts and in the world around them, and led by a great and inspired teacher, they hoped to bring the light of Christ wherever they went. As one early Norbertine put it, they prayed, trained and worked that they might be lanterns illuminating the shadows wherever they went, whatever they did. Like their master Christ, they were called, as they often put it, docere verbo et exemplo, to teach by word and example, to let their deeds and teaching go together.

I learn from St Norbert of Xanten that if we really want to be effective peacemakers on all levels, then we must begin in our own hearts, with ourselves. Then we can turn to our families, and our own relationships, in churches, schools, the workplace, to reconciling the alienated, broken and tender souls and hearts within our own, every day reach. Then, when and if we are called, to discern how to do this in a more public arena, perhaps for a few even on the scale of Norbert, perhaps for most of us as engaged citizens. But we will not be effective in bringing peace to others if we do not allow God to bring it to our own hearts first. Follow the previous beatitudes, if we want to know what it takes to be a peacemaker. Listen to the parables in the coming weeks, for they will tell us that if we really want to work for the kingdom of God, we must first recognize and accept and nurture it within ourselves. Then our efforts as true peacemakers, following St Norbert and countless others, from John the Baptist to our own day, will be modeled and centered on Christ, who as it says in the last words of the song of Zachary, sung to his newborn baby son John the Baptist, the canticle Benedictus which the church sings every single morning in her common prayer throughout the world,

 

And thou, Child, shalt be called the Prophet of the Highest : for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways;

To give knowledge of salvation unto his people : for the remission of their sins,

Through the tender mercy of our God : whereby the day-spring from on high hath visited us;

To give light to them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death : and to guide our feet into the way of peace.  Amen.

 

Flight into Egypt

The seasons of Advent and Christmas receive no small amount of attention, both culturally and liturgically, and of course that is how it should be. The festive nature of Yuletide joined to the power of advertizing naturally place these images before us in countless ways, and the liturgy of the Church does not disappoint in celebrating the joyful nature of the Incarnation. Likewise, although modern western culture’s short attention span leaves the commercial aspects behind, the Church celebrates the richness of Epiphany and Theophany throughout the early weeks of January, focusing in turn on the Mysteries of the Adoration of the Magi bearing their gifts, the Baptism of the Lord by John the Baptist, and the first Sign performed by Jesus at the Wedding at Cana. But there is one story that in all of this sometimes liturgically does not get the attention it deserves, namely the Flight of Mary and Joseph with their young infant Son into Egypt. Joseph, having been warned by an angel of King Herod’s nefarious plans, takes his family to a strange land, no less strange due to its rich and rather intense associations with the earlier history of the Israelites.

Artists throughout history however have not neglected this story, perhaps realizing the emotional impact of the episode in illustrating the vulnerability of the Holy Family as something not at all unique to them. And how quickly the hidden years as strangers in a strange land of this small family of refugees can be glossed over. But like many times in the past, our own times do not need to make too much of a leap of imagination to picture the difficulties and even desperation of a poor refugee family. Today, before we move on liturgically to the great Mysteries of the beginning of the adult ministry of Jesus, I think it is good and salutary to pause and think about the unknown people in Egypt who welcomed Jesus, Mary and Joseph, and their stalwart and patient donkey, and reflect on how these unsung heroes in the early Christian story can perhaps serve as models for us in the immediate present.

The Flight into Egypt. Murillo.

Tree Buds in Winter

One of the lovely things about Christmas break is the opportunity to take walks at home. For me that means a daily stroll down to our village harbour and time by the seaside. But also in Anstruther we are right on the edge of the countryside in the inland direction, with the lovely mesmerizing rolling hills and fields of Fife. The last few days I have begun to explore this direction more in the cold brisk sunshine with my daughters, and look forward to many more excursions, watching the fields and landscape change day by day. Walking up steps to cross an old bridge over the fast moving chill waters of the Dreel, I could not help to pause to look at some lovely tree buds already making their presence known, tentatively and almost furtively emerging in the winter light.

It was a lovely thought, and called to mind a passage from the seventeenth century French Carmelite spiritual writer Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection, about whom I have written on this blog before https://festinalentehyland.wordpress.com/?s=Brother+Lawrence . As an old man, speaking of the origins of his own spiritual awakening, Lawrence related the simple but profound insight he experienced decades earlier:

“That in the winter, seeing a tree stripped of its leaves, and considering that within a little time, the leaves would be renewed, and after that the flowers and fruit appear, he received a high view of the Providence and Power of GOD, which has never since been effaced from his soul. That this view had perfectly set him loose from the world, and kindled in him such a love for GOD, that he could not tell whether it had increased in above forty years that he had lived since.”

Each moment in each season contains within it, as Thomas Merton would some day eloquently write, countless “Seeds of Contemplation.” Brother Lawrence knew and lived that, and I hope I can too. As this new year unfolds before us, moment by moment, I wish all of us opportunities to allow God to make us fruitful soil for these precious seeds to blossom, and to see the miracle of Tree Buds in the cold but illuminating winter sun.

Mary the Dawn

A few years ago, when I had eyesight problems that effectively prevented me from reading the Divine Office, or anything else for that matter, I developed the habit of listening to the Office online. One site in particular, http://www.divineoffice.org, was particularly helpful. Although now my vision problems are thankfully a thing of the past, from time to time my wife and I enjoy listening to the Morning Office, joining in it with our own silent prayer, in communion with the countless people praying it across the world. Today it was prefaced by a lovely hymn entitled “Mary the Dawn”, written by Kathleen Lundquist and adapted from a medieval hymn written originally in Middle English:

Mary the Dawn, Christ the Perfect Day;
Mary the Gate, Christ the Heav’nly Way!
Mary the Root, Christ the Mystic Vine;
Mary the Grape, Christ the Sacred Wine!
Mary the Wheat-sheaf, Christ the Living Bread;
Mary the Rose-Tree, Christ the Rose Blood-red!
Mary the Font, Christ the Cleansing Flood;
Mary the Chalice, Christ the Saving Blood!
Mary the Temple, Christ the Temple’s Lord;
Mary the Shrine, Christ the God adored!
Mary the Beacon, Christ the Haven’s Rest;
Mary the Mirror, Christ the Vision Blest!
Mary the Mother, Christ the Mother’s Son.
Both ever blest while endless ages run.
Amen.

 

I was struck by the hymn’s beauty, rhythmically chanted, as one after another powerful images were applied to the Virgin and to her Son. One could spend a lifetime reflecting on these! Like many medieval hymns, much of the imagery is drawn from daily life, and in particular agricultural activities. This of course not only was something ordinary people could relate to, but was also, like most medieval thought, profoundly Biblical. This approach was shared by many great medieval mystics, such as Mother Julian of Norwich, to mention one contemporary to this song. While the language of systematic theology has its place, the images of song and poetry perhaps have the ability to reach beyond the intellect, to touch our imagination in a different way, cultivating our innermost heart to be fertile ground for the action of the Holy Spirit within us.

After prayer this morning, my wife Sabine and I walked down to the sea in Anstruther, the harbour quiet on a New Year’s morning. The early morning light, illuminating the centuries old waterfront, with the Isle of May and Bass Rock glimmering in the sea, seemed to bring home both the promise and fresh start of a New Year, and the quiet but certain hope of Mary the Dawn, Christ the Perfect Day.

 

 

Skeith Stone, Kilrenny (Christmas 2016)

I wrote the following poem inspired by the Skeith Stone, a carved Pictish stone from the seventh century. It is in a field between our village of Anstruther and the neighboring village of Kilrenny in the East Neuk of Fife. In early Christian times there was a Celtic monastery in Kilrenny, associated with St Ethernan, and this stone probably marked the sacred boundaries of the community. From the stone one can look out to the sea to the lovely Isle of May, where there probably was a hermitage that later became a monastery until it was destroyed by the Vikings. I hope to write more poems inspired by early Celtic Christianity in Fife.

At Skeith Stone (Christmas 2016)

By Bill Hyland

 

Fields sloping down to cold grey sea,

Sun illuminating, clouds and gulls

dancing overhead,

Rushing on mysterious errands.

 

A timeless place;

Relentless seas pushing on the shore,

Then withdrawing their embrace,

A constant never ending dance.

 

But here,

Where headland overlooks

The waves,

And gaze drifts toward the sacred isle,

An ancient poignant stone

Marks the spot where once

Came pilgrims to see the end of their

Long and hopeful journey.

 

Marked by circled cross,

A jagged tooth of the Rock of Ages,

Cushioned by grass,

You bid us now to rest and dream.

 

Danish Harvest

Scenes of the autumn harvest have inspired many painters, and the Danish schools of the nineteenth century are no exception. Likewise, with its obvious resonance with theological concerns, harvest imagery and metaphors often have found their way into hymns and sermons. The following are a few Danish paintings, accompanied by a translation of a wonderful hymn by the great nineteenth century poet and hymnographer N.F.S. Grundtvig.

Harvest scene with a view of Svanninge Church, Funen By Peter Marius Hansen

Harvest hymn for Maibølle congregation

by N.S.F. Grundtvig (translated by John Irons)

Now every wood grows pale and wan

and voice of bird soon parting,

the stork has crossed the shore and gone –

pursued by swallows darting.

Where fields but recently like gold

with ears of corn were swaying,

is only soil that’s black and cold

with stubble old and greying.

But threshing floor and barn are now

where we God’s gifts have treasured,

where active toil and wealth will grow

from stooks in bushels measured.

And he who out of earthly clay

let golden corn be scaling

is with us with his word alway,

the word that’s never-failing.

Him do we thank with songs of praise

for all that he’s been giving:

for summer cornfields all ablaze,

his word, and life for living!

Then over us throughout the year

he lets his peace shine gently,

and, winter over, spring is here

with summer, corn and plenty.

And when at last at his command

from earth we must be wending,

with God in paradise we’ll stand

in summer never-ending.

Then we shall reap as birds do now

though theirs was not the sowing,

then we shall ne’er remember how

earth’s toil and strife kept growing.

For harvest there and harvest here

to God all praise and glory,

who by our Lord, Christ Jesus dear

would be our Father surely.

May then his mighty spirit move

and us, in days fast waning,

raise up through faith and hope and love

till paradise attaining!

Anne Ancher, Harvest Workers