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Monthly Archives: November 2019
Suggested Advent Reading
A great introduction to the basic theology of the Incarnation and our experience of salvation.
Looking for a book to read this Advent? Look no further! A great introduction to the basic theology of the Incarnation and our experience of salvation, The Early Eastern Orthodox Church: A History (AD 60-1453), provides what you are looking for. Easy-to-read, user-friendly chapters give the background of the great controversies about how divinity and humanity are present in Christ. Excerpts from the leading theologians of the 4th to 7th centuries are given. Their ideas are discussed and explained in language modern readers can easily grasp.
What better way to prepare for Christmas than to spend time with St. Athanasius of Alexandria, St. Cyril of Alexandria, and St. Maximus the Confessor in order to better understand the mystery of God becoming human in Christ? The early Christian struggle to understand how Jesus is both 100% divine and 100% human is described. The vital role of Mary–and the importance of her title “Mother of God” as the way to adequately describe who her Son truly is–is the subject of one chapter as is the harmonization of our struggling, combative wills with Christ’s will for us.
Although Jesus is the unique God-made-human whose birth we celebrate at Christmas, we are able to share in His life.
“The Word of God, born once in the flesh (such is His kindness and His goodness), is always willing to be born spiritually in those who desire Him. In them, He is born as an infant as He fashions Himself in them by means of their virtues. He reveals Himself to the extent that He knows someone is capable of receiving Him. He diminishes the revelation of His glory not out of selfishness but because He recognizes the capacity and resources of those who desire to see Him. Yet, in the transcendence of mystery, He always remains invisible to all.” (St. Maximus the Confessor)
Get your copy of The Early Eastern Orthodox Church: A History (AD 60-1453) now and celebrate Christmas with a new or deeper understanding and appreciation for the coming together of humanity and divinity in the manger at Bethlehem.
St. Martin’s Day, 2019
A cookie for St. Martin’s Day on display in a bakery window in Venice, Italy shows St. Martin on his horse ready to cut his cloak in half.
St. Martin of Tours was a Roman soldier in 4th century Gaul. He met a beggar one cold, snowy day who begged him for a rag or two to keep himself warm. St. Martin toook his sword and cut his cloak in half, giving a portion to the beggar. That night, he had a dream in which he saw Christ enthroned in glory, wearing the half of the cloak Martin had given to the beggar. “Where did you get such a cloak?” he heard the angels ask Christ. “My friend Martin gave it to me,” Christ replied.
When he awoke, Martin abondoned his duties as a soldier and became a monk. He attracted many disciples and became a famous monk. He insisted that his disciples always care for any poor person who came to the monastery gate because the monks would be serving Christ when they served the poor. He was made the bishop of Tours. Many hospices and hostels for the poor were dedicated in his honor. The ruins of one such hospice in Oxford–at the bottom of Carfax Tower–still has his image above what’s left of the front gate.
St. Martin’s feast day is November 11 and in many European countries that is the beginning of the “holiday season.” There was a 40-day fast before Christmas and St. Martin;s Day was the last important feast day before Christmas; families would often have a fancy goose dinner on St. Martin’s Day to mark the last occasion to have a big meat dinner before Christmas. (According to legend, Martin was reluctant to become bishop, which is why he hid in a stable filled with geese. The noise made by the geese betrayed his location to the people who were looking for him.) The goose dinner on St. Martin’s Day was a “rehearsal” for the goose dinner on Christmas Day, much as the turkey dinner on Thanksgiving in the United States is now often a “rehearsal” for the family dinner on Christmas Day.
In many European towns or villages a man dressed as St. Martin rides on a horse in front of a procession to celebrate St. Martin’s Day. The children sing songs about St. Martin and greet him as Americans greet Santa Claus at the end of the Thanksgiving Day parade in New York.
You can read my blog posts about St. Martin from years past here(2016), here(2013), and another from 2013 here.