Today

Posted on by Fr. Peter
It has been almost a week since my last post so I thought a little catch up was in order. Today, one of the coldest mornings so far this year, Fr. Greg and myself are rolling on down to Boston to interview His Eminence Metr. Methodious on his pilgrimage with Cardinal O’Malley. This will complete the interview segment of our show Facing East. It has been great to interview the three hierarchs. We have just completed our 10th show and so we will be burning them on CD for those who do not have ipods or other such things and also for people who do not have Internet access. We will also make a separate CD for the interviews.
With Thanksgiving looming I will be heading home tomorrow and returning to the Village on Friday afternoon sometime. I am looking forward to the brake and seeing family. So I wish you all a Blessed Thanksgiving and please remember those who will go without.
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17 November ~ St. Hilda

Posted on by Fr. Peter
Abbess, born 614; died 680. Practically speaking, all our knowledge of St. Hilda is derived from the pages of Bede. She was the daughter of Hereric, the nephew of King Edwin of Northumbria, and she seems like her great-uncle to have become a Christian through the preaching of St. Paulinus about the year 627, when she was thirteen years old.

Moved by the example of her sister Hereswith, who, after marrying Ethelhere of East Anglia, became a nun at Chelles in Gaul, Hilda also journeyed to East Anglia, intending to follow her sister abroad. But St. Aidan recalled her to her own country, and after leading a monastic life for a while on the north bank of the Wear and afterwards at Hartlepool, where she ruled a double monastery of monks and nuns with great success, Hilda eventually undertook to set in order a monastery at Streaneshalch, a place to which the Danes a century or two later gave the name of Whitby.

Under the rule of St. Hilda the monastery at Whitby became very famous. The Sacred Scriptures were specially studied there, and no less than five of the inmates became bishops, St. John, Bishop of Hexham, and still more St. Wilfrid, Bishop of York, rendering untold service to the Anglo-Saxon Church at this critical period of the struggle with paganism. Here, in 664, was held the important synod at which King Oswy, convinced by the arguments of St. Wilfrid, decided the observance of Easter and other moot points. St. Hilda herself later on seems to have sided with Theodore against Wilfrid. The fame of St. Hilda’s wisdom was so great that from far and near monks and even royal personages came to consult her.

Seven years before her death the saint was stricken down with a grievous fever which never left her till she breathed her last, but, in spite of this, she neglected none of her duties to God or to her subjects. She passed away most peacefully after receiving the Holy Viaticum, and the tolling of the monastery bell was heard miraculously at Hackness thirteen miles away, where also a devout nun named Begu saw the soul of St. Hilda borne to heaven by angels.

With St. Hilda is intimately connected the story of Caedmon, the sacred bard. When he was brought before St. Hilda she admitted him to take monastic vows in her monastery, where he most piously died.

The cultus of St. Hilda from an early period is attested by the inclusion of her name in the calendar of St. Willibrord, written at the beginning of the eighth century. It was alleged at a later date the remains of St. Hilda were translated to Glastonbury by King Edmund, but this is only part of the “great Glastonbury myth.” Another story states that St. Edmund brought her relics to Gloucester. St. Hilda’s feast seems to have been kept on 17 November. There are a dozen or more old English churches dedicated to St. Hilda on the northeast coast and South Shields is probably a corruption of St. Hilda.

15 November ~ St. Fergus

Posted on by Fr. Peter
Died about 730, known in the Irish martyrologies as St. Fergus Cruithneach, or the Pict. The Breviary of Aberdeen states that he had been a bishop for many years in Ireland when he came on a mission to Alba with some chosen priests and other clerics. He settled first near Strageath, in the present parish of Upper Strathearn, in Upper Perth, erected three churches in that district. The churchs of Strageath, Blackford, and Dolpatrick are found there today dedicated to St. Patrick. He next evangelized Caithness and established there the churches of Wick and Halkirk. Thence he crossed to Buchan in Aberdeenshire and founded a church at Lungley, a village now called St. Fergus. Lastly, he established a church at Glammis in Forfarshire. He went to Rome in 721 and was present with Sedulius and twenty other bishops at a synod in the basilica of St. Peter, convened by Gregory II. His remains were deposited in the church of Glammis and were the object of much veneration in the Middle Ages. The Abbot of Scone transferred his head to Scone church, and encased it in a costly shrine there is an entry in the accounts of the treasurer of James IV, October, 1503, “An offerand of 13 shillings to Sanct Fergus’ heide in Scone”. The churches of Wick, Glammis, and Lungley had St. Fergus as their patron. His festival is recorded in the Martyrology of Tallaght for the 8th of September but seems to have been observed in Scotland on the 18th of November.

UN Vespers

Posted on by Fr. Peter
As reported in a previous post I rolled on down to the Big Apple yesterday for a vespers service for the Orthodox folks at the UN. This service in an annual event sponsored by the Joint Commission of the Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Bishops in the Americas (SCOBA) and The Standing Conference of Oriental Orthodox Churches in America (SCOOCH). The service goes between the two groups and this year is was SCOBA’s year to host. It was also the Romanian year to host the event and so that is the reason for my involvement.
The service was held at the magnificent Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Holy Trinity. Was an amazing space for worship. Fr. Frank Marangos is the new Dean of the Cathedral and he was a great host.
The theme of the evening was Global Climate Change: A Moral and Spiritual Challenge. Speeches were given by His Excellency Ambassador Mihnea Ioan Motoc Permanent Representative of Romania to the United Nations and His Eminence Archbishop Nicolae of the Romanian Archdiocese. I believe the service was recorded and I have e-mailed to see if it will be available online if so I will post the link in another post.
This was a great service, the choir was wonderful and the Church was filled with people. A reception was held in the hall after and then the long journey back to the village.

13 November ~ St. Brice

Posted on by Fr. Peter
St. Brice was raised by St. Martin of Tours at Marmoutier and also known as Britius. He became a vain, overly ambitious cleric, holding Martin in great contempt. Despite Brice’s attitude, Martin was most patient with him, and in time, in great remorse, he asked Martin’s forgiveness for his attitude toward him. He succeeded Martin as Bishop of Tours in 397 but reverted to his old ways, neglected his duties, was several times accused of lackness and immorality. Though cleared of the latter charge, he was exiled from his See. He went to Rome and in the seven years of his exile there, repented and completely changed his life style. When the administrator of his See, in his absence died, he returned and ruled with such humility, holiness, and ability, he was venerated as a saint by the time of his death. His feast day is November 13th.

12 November St. Machar

Posted on by Fr. Peter
St. Machar is believed to be a sixth-century Irish missionary active on the Isle of Mull and perhaps eastern Scotland. His existence and identity, however, have long been queried.
Legend claims that Machar was a son of Fiachna, Prince of Ulster (not the ancient Fiachna, High King of Ireland) and that he was given the name Mochumma when baptised as a young man by St. Colman of Kilmacduagh (Colman MacDuagh). He was supposedly one of the group of twelve men who accompanied St. Columba from Ireland into exile on Iona in 561, where they established the monastery that became the centre for Christian missionary work in Scotland and northern England. Machar is said to have worked mostly on the neighbouring Isle of Mull, but that the miracles he wrought there made others envious and Columba was asked to send him elsewhere. Columba supposedly told Machar to take their mission to the Pictish people of eastern Scotland, founding a church “where a river formed the shape of a crosier”.
The precision of this purported instruction has meant that more than one place in eastern Scotland has been proposed as the site where Machar founded a church. One is the site of St. Machar’s Cathedral, Aberdeen; another is a site near Aboyne where it is claimed Machar established a cell. Three features in the area are named after him: St. Machar’s Well, St. Machar’s Cross (a boulder into which a cross has been cut) and a rock known as St. Machar’s Chair (the Cathair Mochrieha; “Mochrieha” is another version of Machar/Mochumma’s name).
There is, however, no mention of Machar, Mochumma or Mochrieha in the ancient biographies of St. Columba that survive. In particular, no mention of him is made in the life of St. Columba written by St. Adomnán (Adamnán), an abbot of the Iona monastery who would have had contact with monks who had known Columba and his followers. Adomnán does not list Machar (or Mochumma, or Mochrieha) as one of the twelve who accompanied Columba into exile; nor does he or any other sources from the period mention the story that Machar supposedly accompanied Columba on a journey to visit Pope Gregory I.
On the other hand, much of what is claimed to be known about St. Machar derives from the Aberdeen Breviary, a Roman Catholic work compiled in the late fifteenth to early sixteenth centuries, long after Machar’s supposed existence. By then the Roman Catholic church was well-established in Scotland and wished to play down or even conceal the role of non-Roman missionaries such as Columba and Machar. Information from such sources, therefore, needs to be treated with caution.
One recent theory is that St. Machar and St. Mungo were the same person, on the grounds of a possible link between their names (Colm Ó Baoill, St. Machar – some linguistic light?, Innes Review XLIV, p.1-13).
The Machar oil field in the North Sea is named after the saint
Retrieved from “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Machar”
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