Martin Luther, Presbyter and Reformer, 1546

Born in 1483 at Eisleben, Martin Luther entered the University of Erfurt in 1501 and completed his Master of Arts in 1505. His father wished him to become a lawyer, but Martin was drawn to the study of the Scriptures and joined the Augustinian canons, spending three years at their monastery in Erfurt. In 1507 he was ordained a priest and went to the University of Wittenberg, where he lectured on philosophy and the Scriptures, becoming a powerful and influential preacher. He was awarded a doctorate in theology in 1512 and joined the theological faculty of the University.

Luther had entered on the search for evangelical perfection with serious zeal and sought exactly to fulfill the rule of the Augustinian order, but he soon found himself struggling against uncertainties and doubts. His inward, spiritual difficulties were enhanced by theological problems, particularly the ambiguities in the nature and scope of the sale of indulgences and his discovery of the message of grace.

As professor of biblical exegesis at Wittenberg, his courses of lectures on the Psalms, Romans, Galatians, and Hebrews during the years 1513 to 1518 show the growing richness and maturity of his thought. In 1514 he became preacher in the parish church, whose pulpit became the center of a long and fruitful preaching ministry in which Luther expounded profoundly and beautifully the Scriptures for the common people and related them to the practical context of their lives.

Having observed much that he found wrong with his Church and the world Luther “for the purpose of eliciting truth” drew up the Ninety-Five Theses and fastened them on the door of All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517, the eve of All Saints’ Day. The theses did not deny papal prerogative, though by implication they criticized papal policy; still less did they attack such established teaching as the doctrine of purgatory. But they did stress the spiritual, inward character of Christian faith. Luther sent copies of the Theses to the Archbishop of Mainz (primate of Germany) and to his own bishop, but the printing press intervened. Copies of the theses circulated far and wide, so that what might have been a mere local issue became a public controversy discussed in ever widening circles.

The Reformation that was triggered soon spread over northern Europe and later over much of the world through Protestant missionaries. Luther’s recovery of the doctrine of “justification by faith” alone (sola gratia) led to a reformation of medieval doctrine and , along with other factors, to the rise of the protestant churches. (We should note that several unreservedly Roman Catholic clerics of the time, including Cardinal Contarini and Reginald Cardinal Pole, recognized that justification was by God’s grace alone, and that the teaching of sola gratia was agreed upon by a number of Lutheran Churches and the Roman Catholic Church in Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, published in 1999.) Luther was a prolific writer, and his commentaries, polemics, and practical devotional works became the hallmark of Reformation writings. His translation of the Bible into the vernacular High German made the Scriptures more widely available in his own homeland, influenced German literature, and influenced the translation of the Scriptures into many other vernacular European languages.

Luther remained professor of biblical exegesis at Wittenberg until late illness prevented his teaching, and he directed much of the reformation of the churches of Germany by personal contact and by his writing. He died February 18, 1546, in Eisleben, the town of his birth, and was buried in Castle Church in Wittenberg.

prepared from various sources

The Collect

O God, our refuge and our strength: you raised up your servant Martin Luther to reform and renew your Church in the light of your Word. Defend and purify the Church in our own day and grant that, through faith, we may boldly proclaim the riches of your grace which you have made known in Jesus Christ our Savior, who with you and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

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The propers for the commemoration of Martin Luther, Priest and Reformer, are published on the Lectionary Page website.

Janani Luwum, Archbishop of Uganda and Martyr, 1977

On 6 January 1948 a young school teacher, Janani Luwum, was converted to the charismatic Christianity of the East African Revival, in his own village in Acholiland, Uganda. At once he turned evangelist, warning against the dangers of drink and tobacco, and, in the eyes of local authorities, disturbing the peace.

But Luwum was undeterred by official censure. He was determined to confront all who needed, in his eyes, to change their ways before God.

In January 1949 Luwum went to a theological college at Buwalasi, in eastern Uganda. A year later he came back a catechist. In 1953 he returned to train for ordination. He was ordained deacon on St Thomas’s Day, 21 December 1955, and priest a year later. His progress was impressive: after two periods of study in England, he became principal of Buwalasi. Then, in September 1966, he was appointed Provincial Secretary of the Church of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Boga-Zaire. It was a difficult position to occupy, and these were anxious days. But Luwum won a reputation for creative and active leadership, promoting a new vision with energy and commitment. Only three years later he was consecrated bishop of Northern Uganda, on 25 January 1969. The congregation at the open-air services included the prime minister of Uganda, Milton Obote, and the Chief of Staff of the army, Idi Amin.

Amin sought power for himself. Two years later he deposed Obote in a coup. In government he ruled by intimidation, violence and corruption. Atrocities, against the Acholi and Langi people in particular, were perpetrated time and again. The Asian population was expelled in 1972. It was in the midst of such a society, in 1974, that Luwum was elected Archbishop of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Boga-Zaire. He pressed ahead with the reform of his church in time to mark the centenary of the creation of the Anglican province. But he also warned that the Church should not conform to ‘the powers of darkness’. Amin cultivated a relationship with the archbishop, arguably to acquire credibility. For his part, Luwum sought to mitigate the effects of his rule, and to plead for its victims.

The Anglican and Roman Catholic churches increasingly worked together to frame a response to the political questions of the day. On 12 February 1976 Luwum delivered a protest to Amin against all acts of violence that were allegedly the work of the security services. Church leaders were summoned to Kampala and then ordered to leave, one by one. Luwum turned to Bishop Festo Kivengere and said, ‘They are going to kill me. I am not afraid’. Finally alone, he was taken away, tried by a kangaroo court, and executed on February 17, 1977. His body was buried later near St Paul’s Church, Mucwini.

adapted from the Westminster Abbey website

The Collect

O God, whose Son the Good Shepherd laid down his life for the sheep: We give you thanks for your faithful shepherd, Janani Luwum, who after his Savior’s example gave up his life for the people of Uganda. Grant us to be so inspired by his witness that we make no peace with oppression, but live as those who are sealed with the cross of Christ; who died and rose again, and now lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

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The propers for the commemoration of Janani Luwum, Archbishop and Martyr, are published on the Lectionary Page website.

The image is of a statue of Blessed Janani Luwum sculpted by Neil Simmons for the Martyrs Wall of Westminster Abbey.

Thomas Bray, Presbyter and Missionary, 1730

Thomas Bray, an English country parson, was invited in 1696 by Henry Compton, the Bishop of London, to have oversight of the Church’s work in Maryland as the Bishop’s Commisary. Long delayed by legal complications, Bray set sail for America in 1699 for his first, and what would be his only, visitation. Though he spent only two and a half months in the Maryland, Bray was deeply concerned about the neglected state of the Church in America and the great need for the education of clergymen, lay people, and children. At a general visitation of the clergy in Annapolis prior to his return to England, he emphasized the need for the instruction of children and insisted that no clergyman be given a charge unless he had a good report from the ship he came over in, “whether…he gave no matter of scandal, and whether he did constantly read prayers twice a day and catechize and preach on Sundays, which, notwithstanding the common excuses, I know can be done by a minister of any zeal for religion.” Implementing a plan for the provision of free libraries that he had worked out while awaiting his departure for America, Bray founded thirty-nine free libraries in the colony as well as a number of schools. Back home, he raised money for missionary work and influenced young English priests to go to America. Bray’s endeavors for the consecration of a bishop for America were unsuccessful.

Among Bray’s educational endeavors was the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge (SPCK), founded in 1698 by him and four laymen “to promote and encourage the erection of charity schools in all parts of England and Wales; to disperse, both at home and abroad, Bibles and tracts of religion; and in general to advance the honour of God and the good of mankind, by promoting Christian knowledge both at home and in the other parts of the world by the best methods that should offer.” The work of the SPCK developed to such dimensions that, on his return to England, Bray founded the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (SPG) in 1701 as a separate society for foreign missions.

In 1706 Bray was appointed Vicar of St Botolph Without, Aldgate, where he ministered until his death in 1730 at the age of 74. He served the parish with energy and devotion, while continuing his efforts on behalf of African slaves in America and in the founding of parochial libraries. Before his death he had been instrumental in the establishment of some eighty parochial libraries.

When the deplorable condition of English prisons was brought to his attention, Bray set to work to influence public opinion and to raise funds to alleviate the misery of the inmates. He organized Sunday “Beef and Beer” dinners in prisons and advanced proposals for prison reform. It was he who first suggested to James Oglethorpe the idea of founding a humanitarian colony for the relief of honest debtors, though Bray died before the Georgia colony became a reality.

Bray’s most widely circulated work was A Course of Lectures upon the Church Catechism, published in 1696. He is commemorated in several Churches in the Anglican Communion on this date.

adapted from material in Lesser Feasts and Fasts (1980) and
The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church

The Collect

O God of compassion, you opened the eyes of your servant Thomas Bray to see the needs of the Church in the New World, and led him to found societies to meet those needs: Make the Church in this land diligent at all times to propagate the Gospel among those who have not received it, and to promote the spread of Christian knowledge; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

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The propers for the commemoration of Thomas Bray, Priest and Missionary, are published on the Lectionary Page website.

Cyril and Methodius, Monk and Bishop, Missionaries to the Slavs, 869, 885

Cyril and Methodius, brothers born in Thessalonika, are honored as apostles to the southern Slavs and as the founders of Slavic literary culture. Cyril, who was originally named Constantine, was a student of philosophy and a deacon who eventually became a missionary monastic. Methodius was first the governor of a Slavic colony, then turned to the monastic life, and was later elected abbot of a monastery in Constantinople.

In 862, the king of the Moravians asked for missionaries who would teach his people in their native language. Since both Cyril and Methodius knew Slavonic, and both were learned men – Cyril was known as “the Philosopher” – the Patriarch of Constantinople chose them to lead the mission.

As part of his task among the Moravians, Cyril invented an alphabet to transcribe the native tongue, probably the glagolitic, in which Slavo-Roman liturgical books in Russian and Serbian are still written. The Cyrillic alphabet is thought to have been originated by Cyril’s followers.

Pressures by the German clergy, who opposed the brothers’ teaching, preaching, and writing in Slavonic, and the lack of a bishop to ordain new presbyters for their people, caused the two brothers to seek foreign help. They found a warm welcome at Rome from Pope Adrian the Second, who determined to ordain both men bishops and approved the Slavonic liturgy. Cyril died in Rome and was buried there. Methodius, now a bishop, returned to Moravia as Metropolitan of Sirmium.

Methodius, still harassed by German bishops, was imprisoned at their behest. Eventually, Pope John the Eighth released him, on the condition that Slavonic, “a barbarous language,” be used only for preaching. Later, the enmity of the Moravian prince caused Methodius to be recalled to Rome on charges of heresy. Papal support again allowed him to return to Moravia and to use Slavonic in the liturgy.

Methodius completed a Slavonic translation of the Bible and of Byzantine ecclesiastical law, while continuing his missionary activities. At his funeral, celebrated in Greek, Latin, and Slavonic, “the people came together in huge numbers…for Methodius had been all things to all people that he might lead them all to heaven.”

adapted from Lesser Feasts and Fasts

The Collect

Almighty and everlasting God, by the power of the Holy Spirit you moved your servant Cyril and his brother Methodius to bring the light of the Gospel to a hostile and divided people: Overcome all bitterness and strife among us by the love of Christ, and make us one united family under the banner of the Prince of Peace; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

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The propers for the commemoration of Cyril and Methodius, Monk and Bishop, Missionaries to the Slavs, are published on the Lectionary Page website.

Absalom Jones, Presbyter, 1818

Absalom Jones was born into slavery in 1746 in Delaware.  He taught himself to read from the New Testament, among other books.  At sixteen, he was sold to a store owner in Philadelphia, where he attended a night school for African Americans, operated by the Quakers.  At twenty, he married another slave and purchased her freedom with his earnings.

Jones bought his own freedom in 1784.  He subsequently became involved with St George’s Methodist Episcopal Church, where he served as a lay minister for its African American membership.  The active evangelism of Jones and of his friend, Richard Allen, greatly increased that community’s membership at St George’s, where the vestry, alarmed at the greatly increased Black membership, decided to segregate them into an upstairs gallery without notifying them.  During a Sunday service when the ushers attempted to remove them, the African Americans walked out en masse.

In 1787, African American Christians organized the Free African Society, the first organized African American society in the United States, and Absalom Jones and Richard Allen were elected overseers.  Membership of the Society paid monthly dues for the benefit of those in need.  The Society established communications with similar associations in other cities, and in 1792, the Society began construction of a church in Philadelphia, which was dedicated on July 17, 1794.

The African Church applied for membership in the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania on the following conditions:  1) that they be received as an organized body; 2) that they have control over their own parochial affairs; 3) that Absalom Jones be licensed as Lay Reader, and if qualified, be ordained as minister.  In October 1794 the church was admitted as St Thomas African Episcopal Church.  Bishop William White ordained Jones to the diaconate in 1975, and to the presbyterate in 1804.

Jones was an earnest preacher.  He denounced slavery, and warned the oppressors to “clean their hands of slaves”.  To him, God was the Father who always acted on “behalf of the oppressed and distressed”.  But it was his pastoral care, his constant visitation and mild manner that made him beloved by his parish and by the community.  St Thomas Church grew to over five hundred members during its first year.  Known colloquially as “the Black Bishop of the Episcopal Church”, Jones was a example of persistent faith in God and in the Church as God’s instrument.

Jones died on this day in 1818.

Jones friend, Richard Allen, who with Jones was one of the first African Americans to be licensed as preachers by the Methodist Episcopal Church, followed a parallel path.  Allen and his congregation converted a blacksmith shop in Philadelphia into a church that was dedicated on July 29, 1794 as Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church.  In 1799, Allen was ordained as the first African American elder in the Methodist Church by Bishop Francis Asbury.  In 1816, Allen gathered four African American Methodist congregations in Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, and Maryland to establish the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first autonomous black Church in Methodism.  In 1816, Allen was elected the Church’s first bishop.  He died in 1831.

prepared from Lesser Feasts and Fasts  (1980) and other sources

The Collect

Set us free, heavenly Father, from every bond of prejudice and fear; that, honoring the steadfast courage of your servant Absalom Jones, we may show forth in our lives the reconciling love and true freedom of the children of God, which you have given us in your Son our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.   Amen.

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The propers for the commemoration of Absalom Jones, Priest, are published on the Lectionary Page website.

The image of Absalom Jones is taken from the portrait by Raphaelle Peale.

Caedmon, Poet, c. 680

In his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731, the Venerable Bede tells of an elderly lay brother, a herdsman named Caedmon, in the abbey of Streonæshalch at Whitby, presided over by the abbess Hilda (died 680, commemorated November 18). Though there must have been many before him, Caedmon is the first poet in English whose name is known to us, as he is also the first known Christian poet in the English language. One source suggests that Caedmon may have been of British origin, as his name is likely an Anglicization of the Cymric, Cadfan.

The Venerable Bede writes that at social entertainments, when Caedmon saw the harp coming towards him, meaning that it was soon to be his turn to play and to sing, he would leave the table and return home.

“Having done so at a certain time, and gone out of the house where the entertainment was, to the stable, where he had to take care of the horses that night, he there composed himself to rest at the proper time; a person appeared to him in his sleep, and saluting him by his name, said, “Caedmon, sing some song to me.” He answered, “I cannot sing; for that was the reason why I left the entertainment, and retired to this place because I could not sing.” The other who talked to him, replied, “However, you shall sing.” ­ “What shall I sing?” rejoined he. “Sing the beginning of created beings,” said the other. Hereupon he presently began to sing verses to the praise of God, which he had never heard, the purport whereof was thus : We are now to praise the Maker of the heavenly kingdom, the power of the Creator and his counsel, the deeds of the Father of glory. How He, being the eternal God, became the author of all miracles, who first, as almighty preserver of the human race, created heaven for the sons of men as the roof of the house, and next the earth. This is the sense, but not the words in order as he sang them in his sleep; for verses, though never so well composed, cannot be literally translated out of one language into another, without losing much of their beauty and loftiness. Awaking from his sleep, he remembered all that he had sung in his dream, and soon added much more to the same effect in verse worthy of the Deity” (The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, Book IV).

Next morning Caedmon told the steward of the gift that he had received, and the steward conducted him to the abbess who, “in the presence of many learned men”, ordered Caedmon to tell his dream and to repeat the verses. All present concluded that “heavenly grace had been conferred on him by our Lord.” Thereafter, Caedmon put to verse any passage of Scripture expounded to him by the learned abbess and brethren, and Hilda made Caedmon a lay brother among the monks of the abbey, ordering that he should be taught the whole of sacred history.

“Thus Caedmon ‘ keeping in mind all he heard, and as it were chewing the cud, converted the same into most harmonious verse; and sweetly repeating the same, made his masters in their turn his hearers. He sang the creation of the world, the origin of man, and all the history of Genesis : and made many verses on the departure of the children of Israel out of Egypt, and their entering into the land of promise, with many other histories from holy writ; the incarnation, passion, resurrection of our Lord, and his ascension into heaven; the coming of the Holy Ghost, and the preaching of the apostles ; also the terror of future judgment, the horror of the pains of hell, and the delights of heaven; besides many more about the Divine benefits and judgments, by which he endeavoured to turn away all men from the love of vice, and to excite in them the love of, and application to, good actions; for he was a very religious man, humbly submissive to regular discipline, but full of zeal against those who behaved themselves otherwise; for which reason he ended his life happily”, ibid.

At the end of what Bede describes as a moderate (not life-threatening) illness, Caedmon perceived that death was near and asked to receive the eucharist. Having received communion in his hand, he asked whether all the brethren were in charity with him and free from anger. Replying that they were and asking whether he were in the same state towards them, Caedmon replied, “I am in charity, my children, with all the servants of God.” Taking communion, he marked himself with the sign of the cross, laid his head upon his pillow, and died.

Bede writes, “Thus it came to pass, that as he had served God with a simple and pure mind, and undisturbed devotion, so he now departed to his presence, leaving the world by a quiet death; and that tongue, which had composed so many holy words in praise of the Creator, uttered its last words whilst he was in the act of signing himself with the cross, and recommending himself into his hands, and by what has been here said, he seems to have had foreknowledge of his death.”

Caedmon was commemorated on February 11 at Whitby.  He is commemorated on this day in the Calendar of the Book of Common Prayer of the Anglican Church of Canada.

None of Caedmon’s poems has survived, save the nine lines recorded by the Venerable Bede in Latin and in several Old English versions among the Latin manuscripts of the Ecclesiastical History extant. The text below is from one of those manuscripts, with Michael Alexander’s translation following (from The Earliest English Poems, Third Edition, Penguin Books, 1991).

Nu sculon herigean heofonrices Weard,
Meotodes meahte ond his modgeþanc,
weorc Wuldorfæder; swa he wundra gehwæs
ece Drihten, or onstealde.
He ærest sceop eorðan bearnum
heofon to hrofe, halig Scyppend:
þa middangeard moncynnes Weard,
ece Drihten, æfter teode
firum foldan, Frea ælmihtig.

Praise now to the keeper of the kingdom of heaven,
the power of the Creator, the profound mind
of the glorious Father, who fashioned the beginning
of every wonder, the eternal Lord.
For the children of men he made first
heaven as a roof, the holy Creator.
Then the Lord of mankind, the everlasting Shepherd,
ordained in the midst as a dwelling place,
Almighty Lord, the earth for men.

The Collect

Almighty God, you gave to your servant Caedmon singular gifts of rendering the holy Scriptures in verse, that the people of your Church at Whitby might be instructed in the faith and give praise to your holy Name: Stir up the hearts of your people, that they may joyfully sing your praises in this life and the life to come; through your Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Creation: Saint Caedmon's Hymn

An audio file of Caedmon’s Hymn (in Old English) may be found at the website for the Norton Anthology of English Literature (scroll down to find the file).

The icon Creation: Saint Caedmon’s Hymn is taken from Aidan Hart’s gallery of icons, and is reproduced here with his generous permission.

Scholastica, Abbess of Plombariola, c. 543

All that we know of Scholastica comes from the Dialogues of Gregory the Great. Sister of Benedict, the Abbot of Monte Cassino and father of Western monasticism, she too was born at Nursia in central Italy, around the year 480. At an early age she consecrated her life to God, but probably remained at home. After Benedict moved to Monte Cassino, she settled about five miles distant at Plombariola, either joining or founding a convent there. As abbess of Plombariola, she followed Benedict’s monastic Rule.

Scholastica and Benedict met once a year in a house near his monastery, where they would praise God together and discuss spiritual matters. At their last meeting, she asked him to stay longer to “keep on talking about the joys of heaven until morning”, but he refused, protesting that he could not stay away from his monastery. At his refusal, she folded her hands on the table and rested her head on them in prayer. The effect of her prayer was a violent thunderstorm that prevented Benedict’s leaving, and they spent the night together as she had wished, from which “both of them derived great profit from the holy converse they had about the interior life.”

Three days later Scholastica died, and as Benedict stood in his room looking up toward the sky, he saw his sister’s soul leaving her body in the form of a dove and entering into heaven. After giving joyful thanks to God his sister’s eternal glory, he sent several of the brethren of his monastery to bring her body back to Monte Cassino, where she was buried in the tomb that Benedict had prepared for himself. Upon his death, he was laid in the tomb next to her.

Scholastica is commemorated on this day in the general Roman Calendar and in the Calendar of the Church of England.

The Collect

Almighty God, by your Holy Spirit you have made us one with your saints in heaven and on earth: Grant that in our earthly pilgrimage we may always be supported by this fellowship of love and prayer, and know ourselves to be surrounded by their witness to your power and mercy. We ask this for the sake of Jesus Christ, in whom all our intercessions are acceptable through the Spirit, and who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

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The icon of Saint Benedict and Saint Scholastica is © Conception Abbey.

The Martyrs of Japan, 1597

Christianity was brought to Japan in 1549 by the Jesuit Francis Xavier, and the spread of the faith was remarkable. It has been estimated that by the end of the sixteenth century there were about 300,000 baptized believers in Japan. The successful spread of the Christian faith led to resentment and opposition on the part of some native Buddhists and Shintoists. The initial successes were also compromised by rivalries between the religious orders, and the interplay of colonial politics, both within Japan and between Japan and the Spanish and the Portuguese, raised suspicion about Western intentions of conquest, particularly on the part of the Spanish, with their nearby presence in the Philippines. After about a half century of ambiguous toleration by the Tokugawa shogunate, a persecution of Christians began.

The first victims of the persecution were twenty-six Christians: six European Franciscan missionaries, three Japanese Jesuits (including Paul Miki), and seventeen Japanese laity, three of whom were young boys. On February 5, 1597, they were executed at Nagasaki in a form of crucifixion by being elevated on crosses and then pierced with spears. Within a year, more than 130 churches had been burned. The persecution subsided for a time, but in 1613 it began again, and by 1630 what was left of Christianity in Japan had been driven underground. The faith was preserved, although the Kirishitan were without clergy until missionaries returned in the latter half of the nineteenth century.

The first victims of the persecution, the twenty-six martyrs of February 1597, were canonized by the Roman Catholic Church in 1862. In 1959, the Nippon Sei Ko Kai (the Holy Catholic Church of Japan), the Anglican Church in Japan, adopted this festival in its Calendar as a commemoration of all those who have given their lives for the Christian faith in Japan. The Martyrs of Japan are commemorated on February 5 in the calendars of the Nippon Sei Ko Kai, the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, and the Book of Alternative Services (Anglican Church of Canada). They are commemorated on February 6 in the proposed calendar of The Episcopal Church and in the calendars of the Roman Catholic Church (Saint Paul Miki and Companions), the Church of England, and the Church in Wales.

prepared from Lesser Feasts and Fasts,
the New Book of Festivals and Commemorations, and other sources

The Collect

O God our Father, source of strength to all your saints, you brought the holy martyrs of Japan through the suffering of the cross to the joys of eternal life: Grant that we, encouraged by their example, may hold fast the faith we profess, even to death itself; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

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Readers wishing to learn more about the history of 16th and 17th century Japanese Christianity and the effects of the persecution even to the present day will find the novels of Shusaku Endo a challenging read, particularly The Samurai, with its story of the journey of a samurai and his companions from Japan to Mexico and thence to Spain and on to Rome in the late 16th century (based on an actual historical journey that also inspired the composition of the Mass for the Japanese Princes by Andrea Gabrieli for their visit to St Mark’s Basilica in Venice in 1585).

Gilbert of Sempringham, Presbyter and Founder of the Gilbertine Order, 1189

Gilbert was born in 1083, the son of a Norman knight, Jocelin, and a Saxon mother. Gilbert suffered from a physical deformity from birth that made him unfit to bear arms, causing him initially to be despised by his father. Gilbert went to France to study where he excelled as a scholar (earning the Master’s degree). Having earned as well his father’s acceptance, he returned home to England, where he soon started a school for both boys and girls and received from his father the livings of Sempringham and West Torrington. As Gilbert was still not a priest, he appointed a priest to serve as his vicar for church services and the administration of the sacraments. Gilbert himself lived in poverty in the vicarage and by his teaching and example made his parish a model of devout and temperate living. Robert Bloet, bishop of Lincoln, made Gilbert his household clerk in 1122, and Bloet stayed on in the household of Bloet’s successor Alexander, living as a devout but unordained pluralist. He devoted the entirety of his income from West Torrington to the poor. Bishop Alexander ordained him priest and offered him a well-endowed archdeaconry, which Gilbert refused, returning instead (with Alexander’s permission) to his parish before 1131. By this time Jocelin had died, and Gilbert returned to Sempringham as both manor lord and rector.

Among his parishioners were seven devout young women who lived under his direction in a modest house he had built for them adjacent to St Andrew’s parish church in Sempringham. Gilbert devised a Rule for them based on the Rule of St Benedict, and on the advice of William, the first abbot of the Cisterican abbey of Rievaulx, he admitted lay sisters to their community. Gradually the Order spread, and lay brothers were added to provide regular labor to safeguard and develop the Order’s possessions. With the growth of the Order it became clear that stable government was needed, and in 1147 Gilbert appealed to the general chapter at Citeaux to rule his Order through the English Cistercian abbots. The Chapter declined Gilbert’s request, and Bernard of Clairvaux helped him draw up the Institutes of the Order of Sempringham, of which Pope Eugenius the Third, who had been present at the Chapter, made him Master. Gilbert added canons to his institute, who lived according to the Rule of Augustinian canons, while the nuns (who formed the backbone of the Order) and lay brothers lived according to the Cistercian Rule. As Master, Gilbert continued his austere manner of life, traveling from house to house in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire, working at copying manuscripts, making furniture, and building. At the age of nearly ninety, he was confronted with a rebellion of the lay brothers, whose main grievances were that there was too much work and not enough food. Despite being slandered by the leaders of the dissenters and their support by magnates in Church and state, the papacy upheld Gilbert, who received the rebels back into the Order, with some improvement being made in the brothers’ food and dress. As age advanced, he delegated much of the government of the Order to Roger of Malton. By the time of Gilbert’s death at the age of 106 on February 4, 1189 the Order had thirteen monasteries in England, including nine double monasteries (for men and women) and four houses for male canons only. The Order of Sempringham, also known as the Gilbertine Order, was the only purely English monastic foundation before the Dissolution of the monasteries under King Henry the Eighth in the sixteenth century.

Gilbert was commemorated in the sanctoral calendar of the Church in England before the Reformation and is now commemorated in the sanctoral calendar in Common Worship.

prepared from various sources,
including The Oxford Dictionary of Saints

The Collect

O God, whose blessed Son became poor that we through his poverty might be rich: Deliver us from an inordinate love of this world, that we, inspired by the devotion of your servant Gilbert of Sempringham, may serve you with singleness of heart, and attain to the riches of the age to come; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Cornelius the Centurion

Saint Peter the Apostle baptizes Cornelius

All that we know of Cornelius is contained in the tenth and eleventh chapters of the Acts of the Apostles. He was the first Gentile converted to the Christian faith, along with his household. A centurion was commander of a company of one hundred men in the Roman army, responsible for their discipline, both on the field of battle and in camp. He was a Roman citizen, a military career man, well-paid, and generally noted for courage and competence. The Acts of the Apostles tells us that Cornelius was a centurion in the Italian Cohort, the Cohors II Italica Civium Romanorum, a cohort of the Roman army formed of citizens from the province of Italy. Some centurions, such as Cornelius, and those whom we know about from the Gospel narratives, were men of deep religious piety.

Saint Luke the Evangelist, the author of the Acts of the Apostles, considered Cornelius’ conversion momentous for the future of Christianity. He records that it occurred as the result of divine intervention and revelation, and as a response to the preaching of Peter the chief apostle. The experience of Cornelius’ household was regarded as comparable to a new Pentecost, and it was a primary precedent for the momentous decision of the apostolic council, held in Jerusalem a few years later, to admit Gentiles to full and equal partnership with Jewish converts in the household of faith.

According to a later tradition, Cornelius was the second bishop of Caesarea, the metropolitan see of Palestine. Undoubtedly, Cornelius and his household formed the nucleus of the first Church in this important city, a Church that was gathered by Philip the Evangelist (Acts 8:40 and 21:8).

Cornelius is commemorated in the Calendar of The Episcopal Church on February 4 and in the Eastern Churches on September 13.

adapted from Lesser Feasts and Fasts (1980)

The Collect

O God, by your Spirit you called Cornelius the Centurion to be the first Christian among the Gentiles: Grant to your Church such a ready will to go where you send and to do what you command, that under your guidance it may welcome all who turn to you in love and faith, and proclaim the Gospel to all nations; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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The propers for the commemoration of Cornelius the Centurion are published on the Lectionary Page website.