Paschasius of Rome

31 May

Paschasius, deacon of Rome, author of some theological works which have become lost, died c. 512.

From Jacobus de Varagine’s Golden Legend (1275), translated by William Caxton (1483), referring to Gregory the Great, Dialogues, IV, 40:

“As touching to that that the prayers of friends profit to them, it appeareth by ensample of Paschasius, of whom Gregory telleth in the fourth book of his Dialogues, and saith that there was a man of great holiness and virtue, and two were chosen for to have been popes, but nevertheless at the last the church accorded unto one of them, and this Paschasius always by error suffered that other, and abode in this error unto the death. And when he was dead the bier was covered with a cloth named a dalmatic, and one that was vexed with a devil was brought thither and touched the cloth, and anon he was made whole. And a long time after, as Saint Germain, bishop of Capua, went to wash him in a bath for his health, he found Paschasius deacon there and served. And when he saw him he was afeard, and enquired diligently what thing so great and so holy a man made there. And he said to him that he was there for none other cause but for that he held and sustained more than right required in the cause aforesaid, and said: I require thee that thou pray our Lord for me. And know that thou shalt be heard, for when thou shalt come again, thou shalt not find me here. And then the bishop prayed for him, and when he came again he found him not.”

Murdered

The following people were murdered in the New Orleans metro area in the past two weeks:

5/14/09 Wilbert Bonaparte 51 M Shot Orleans
5/16/09 Devin Goines 23 M Shot Orleans
5/16/09 Qian Sabatier 26 F Shot Orleans
5/17/09 Terry Maxwell 29 M Shot Orleans
5/20/09 Christopher Madison 35 M Shot Orleans
5/21/09 Umar Ervin 27 M Shot Jefferson
5/22/09 Roderick Gordon 16 M Shot Orleans
5/22/09 Joseph Leban 23 M Shot Orleans
5/24/09 John Doe 24 M Shot Orleans (Mandeville Street, St. Roch area)
[information gathered by Deacon Elaine Clements]

Please pray for them and their murderers.

Padre Oprah

From The New York Times today:

MIAMI (AP) -- A popular Miami priest and media personality known as ''Father Oprah'' has left the Catholic Church and joined the Episcopal Church after he was photographed cavorting on the beach with his girlfriend.

The Rev. Alberto Cutie (KOO'-tee-ay) was removed from his Miami Beach church after photos of him kissing and embracing a woman appeared in the pages of a Spanish-language magazine earlier this month.

He was received into Episcopal Church in a ceremony Thursday at Trinity Cathedral and may later announce he will marry his girlfriend, which is allowed in that denomination. He must complete other requirements before serving as an Episcopal priest. (For photos see here.)

We do allow priests to marry their girlfriends (or boyfriends).

Winebald and Worad of St. Bertin

25 May

Winebald and Worad, deacons and martyrs, monks of the abbey of St. Bertin in the Pas-de-Calais region of France, with monks Gerbald and Reginhard, killed by the Danes in 862.

Timothy, Polius, and Eutychius of Mauretania Caesariensis

21 May

Timothy, Polius, and Eutychius, deacons and martyrs, of the African province of Mauretania Caesariensis (mainly in present Algeria), killed under Diocletian, late 3rd to early 4th c.

19 May

Alcuin of York, deacon and abbot of Tours, died 19 May 804. [BCP places him on May 20.]

Alcuinus or Ealhwine (c. 735–19 May 804) was a scholar, ecclesiastic, poet, and teacher from York in Northumbria. He liked to be called by the Latin name Albinus, and at the academy of Charlemagne’s palace he took the surname Flaccus. He was born around 735 close to Eboracum (York), perhaps in the city itself. He was a noble, related to Willibrord, first bishop of Utrecht, whose father founded the monastery of St. Andrew, which Alcuin would later inherit. Alcuin of York had a long career as a teacher and scholar, first at the school at York now known as St. Peter’s School, York (founded in 627), and later as Charlemagne’s leading advisor on ecclesiastical and educational affairs. From 796 until his death he was abbot of the great monastery of St. Martin of Tours.

Alcuin came to the cathedral school of York in the golden age of Egbert and Eadbert. Egbert had been a disciple of the Venerable Bede, who urged him to have York raised to an archbishopric. Eadbert was the king and brother to Egbert. These two men oversaw the reenergizing and reorganization of the English church with an emphasis on reforming the clergy and on the tradition of learning begun under Bede. Alcuin thrived under Egbert’s tutelage. In York he formed his love of classical poetry, although he was sometimes troubled by the fact that it was written by non-Christians.

The York school was renowned as a center of learning not only in religious matters but also in literature and science, known as the seven liberal arts. It was from here that Alcuin drew inspiration for the school he would lead at the Frankish court. He revived the school with disciplines such as the trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) and the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy). Two codices were written, by himself on the trivium, and by his student Hraban on the quadrivium. Alcuin graduated from student to teacher sometime in the 750s. His ascendancy to the headship of the York school began after Aelbert became archbishop of York in 767. Around the same time Alcuin became a deacon. He was never ordained priest, and there is no real evidence that he became an actual monk, but he lived his life like one.

In 781, King Elfwald sent Alcuin to Rome to petition the Pope for official confirmation of York’s status as an archbishopric and to confirm the election of a new archbishop, Eanbald I. It was then, on his way home, that Alcuin met Charles, king of the Franks. Alcuin was reluctantly persuaded to join Charles’ court. His love of the church and his intellectual curiosity made the offer one he could not refuse. He was to join an already illustrious group of scholars that Charles had gathered around him like Peter of Pisa, Paulinus, Rado, and abbot Fulrad. He would later write that “the Lord was calling me to the service of King Charles.”

Alcuin was welcomed at the Palace School of Charlemagne. The school had been founded under the king’s ancestors as a place for educating the royal children, mostly in manners and the ways of the court. However, King Charles wanted more than this—he wanted to include the liberal arts and, most importantly, the study of the religion that he held sacred. From 782 to 790, Alcuin had as pupils Charlemagne himself, his sons Pepin and Louis, the young men sent for their education to the court, and the young clerics attached to the palace chapel. Bringing with him from York his assistants Pyttel, Sigewulf, and Joseph, Alcuin revolutionized the educational standards of the Palace School, introducing Charlemagne to the liberal arts and creating a personalized atmosphere of scholarship and learning to the extent that the institution came to be known as the “school of Master Albinus.”

Charlemagne was a master at gathering the best men of every nation in his court. He became far more than just the king at the center. He made many of these men his closest friends and counselors. They referred to him as “David,” a reference to the biblical King David. Alcuin soon found himself on intimate terms with the king and with the other men at court to whom he gave nicknames to be used for work and play. Alcuin himself was known as “Albinus” or “Flaccus.” Like many of his learned contemporaries, Alcuin was an astrologer. Alcuin’s friendships also extended to the ladies of the court, especially the queen mother and the daughters of the king. His relationships with these women, however, never reached the intense level of those with the men around him.

In 790 Alcuin went back to England, to which he had always been greatly attached. He dwelt there for some time, but Charlemagne then invited him back to help in the fight against the Adoptionist heresy which was making great progress in Toledo, Spain, the old capital town of the Visigoths and still a major city for the Christians under Islamic rule in Spain. He is believed to have had contacts with Beatus of Liébana, from the kingdom of Asturias, who fought against Adoptionism. At the Council of Frankfurt in 794, Alcuin upheld the orthodox doctrine and obtained the condemnation of the heresiarch Felix of Urgel.

Having failed during his stay in England to influence King Aethelraed of Northumbria in the conduct of his reign, Alcuin never returned to live in England. Alcuin was back at Charlemagne’s court by at least mid-792, writing a series of letters to Aethelraed, to Hygbald, bishop of Lindisfarne, and to Aethelheard, archbishop of Canterbury, in the succeeding months, which deal with the attack on Lindisfarne by Viking raiders in July 792. These letters, and Alcuin’s poem De clade Lindisfarnensis monasterii provide the only significant contemporary account of these events.

In 796 Alcuin was in his sixties. He hoped to be free from court duties and was given the chance when abbot Itherius of St. Martin at Tours died. Charlemagne gave the abbey into Alcuin’s care with the understanding that he should be available if the king ever needed his counsel. He made the abbey school into a model of excellence, and many students flocked to it; he had many manuscripts copied, the calligraphy of which is of outstanding beauty. He wrote many letters to his friends in England, to Arno, bishop of Salzburg, and above all to Charlemagne. These letters, of which 311 are extant, are filled mainly with pious meditations, but they further form a mine of information as to the literary and social conditions of the time, and are the most reliable authority for the history of humanism in the Carolingian age. He also trained the numerous monks of the abbey in piety, and it was in the midst of these pursuits that he died.

Alcuin is the most prominent figure of the Carolingian renaissance, in which three main periods have been distinguished: In the first of these, up to the arrival of Alcuin at the court, the Italians occupy the central place; in the second, Alcuin and the Anglo-Saxons are dominant; in the third, which begins in 804, the influence of Theodulf the Visigoth is preponderant. We owe to Alcuin, too, some manuals used in his educational work: a grammar and works on rhetoric and dialectics. They are written in the form of dialogues, and in the two last the interlocutors are Charlemagne and Alcuin. He also wrote several theological treatises, including De fide Trinitatis and commentaries on the Bible. Alcuin transmitted to the Franks the knowledge of Latin culture that had existed in England. We still have a number of his works. They include letters and poetry. Besides some graceful epistles in the style of Fortunatus, he wrote some long poems, and notably a history in verse of the church at York: Versus de patribus, regibus et sanctis Eboracensis ecclesiae.

Alcuin died on 19 May 804, some ten years before the emperor. He was buried at Saint Martin’s Church under an epitaph that partly reads:

Dust, worms, and ashes now . . .
Alcuin my name, wisdom I always loved,
Pray, reader, for my soul.

Sixteen deacons of Cascar (Persia)

16 May

Sixteen deacons (nine men and seven women), with bishop Audas (or Abdas) of Cascar in eastern Persia, and seven presbyters, martyred at Leda in Persia in 420. Audas was martyred on a Friday in May during the reign of the emperor Sapor with 28 members of his flock, including seven presbyters, nine men deacons, and seven virgins (i.e., women deacons). Their deaths marked the beginning of a long reign of terror for Christians throughout the Persian empire. Cascar is now Kashgar in western China near the border with Tajikistan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

Murdered this week

The following people were murdered this week in Orleans and Jefferson parishes. Please pray for them and their murderers:

5/7/09 Ellis Brister 31 M Shot Orleans
5/7/09 Jeremy Watkins 29 M Shot Jefferson
5/9/09 Christina Allen 21 F Shot Jefferson
5/9/09 John Doe unk. M Unk. Orleans
5/10/09 Olander Cassimere 79 M Shot Orleans
5/10/09 Alphathada Cassimere 77 F Shot Orleans
5/11/09 Shaka-Daquan Miller 13 M Shot Orleans

Our legislators at work

From The Times-Picayune:

BATON ROUGE -- Louisiana should outlaw any efforts by scientists to create human-animal hybrids, a Senate committee declared Tuesday, despite a warning that such restrictions could send intellectual capital and research money elsewhere. Senate Bill 115 by Sen. Danny Martiny, R-Kenner, lays out specific scientific acts that would result in jail time and fines for researchers and others who profit from such activities.

Next the legislators will outlaw the support of space exploration, on the grounds that we're intruding on divine creation.

Murdered

Today I begin to report on the murders collected each week by Deacon Elaine Clements of St Andrew's, New Orleans. Please pray for them and their murderers.

The following people were murdered this week in Orleans & Jefferson Parishes:

4/29/09 Stephen Hymel 51 M Shot Orleans
4/30/09 Irma Carranza Sanchez 34 F Shot Orleans
5/2/09 Veronica Parker 23 F Shot Orleans
5/2/09 Bryant Washington 19 M Shot Jefferson
5/4/09 Roosevelt Smith 30 M Shot Orleans

Robert Pantutin of Mota Island

5 May

Robert Pantutun, deacon of Mota in the Banks Group in Vanuatu (formerly New Hebrides), Melanesia, 1910.

Robert Pantutun of Mota island was ordained deacon 17 Nov 1872 in “Pitcairn church” (All Saints, Norfolk Island). According to Bishop H. H. Montgomery of Auckland, The Light of Melanesia: A Record of Fifty Years’ Mission Work in the South Seas (New York: E. S. Gorham, 1904):

“In 1883 the Rev. E. Wogale died at Vipaka, on the island of Lo, where the first school had been opened. In the next year Robert Pantutun began work here. He is a Mota man, though his wife is a native of Lo. The bishop also took some boys with him, in 1880, to Norfolk Island. Two of these were brothers, and are now teachers, William Wulenew and Ernest Tughur. Robert Pantutun is a deacon. He was one of Bishop [John Coleridge] Patteson’s earliest scholars, and has been a steady worker for years. His son John is in this year (1892) the organist of the chapel at Norfolk Island, and most striking it is to watch a Melanesian in that beautiful little church, a boy with frizzly head and bare feet, making full use of the pedals, and playing with taste and feeling the music of most of the great composers of sacred music. It can easily be realized what a deprivation it is to these native organists when they return to their homes as teachers, and are debarred from the use of musical instruments, for no harmonium has yet been invented which will stand the damp and the insect pests of these tropical islands. . . .

“One hot and brilliant morning I landed at Vava, and made the acquaintance of the Rev. Robert Pantutun. . . . The road up to the village was broad and open, according to the custom of the people, for the sake of their burial rites. The church in this village is beautifully built, and is perhaps better appointed than any in these parts. Mr. Robin was away, and therefore there were no confirmations, but upon our return Robert Pantutun hoped to present a class of adults for baptism.”

Euthymius of Alexandria

5 May

Euthymius, deacon and martyr at Alexandria, date of death unknown.

Curcodomus of Auxerre

4 May

Curcodomus of Auxerre, a deacon of Rome, sent by the Pope to help Peregrinus, first bishop of Auxerre (in the Bourgogne region of central France), on a mission to Gaul, died 3rd c.

Bishop Jenkins on the swine flu

Our bishop in Louisiana, Charles Jenkins, has issued a pastoral message on how we should deal with the swine flu (French la grippe porcine, Spanish la gripe porcina). It contains this statement:

This is an opportunity for us to undertake some basic teaching about the Eucharist. I have been asked to issue a policy statement against intinction but I shall refrain from doing so at this time. If the pandemic worsens, such may be necessary. The practice of dipping the consecrated host into the chalice, whether such is done by someone administering the sacrament or by the communicant, does not constitute a more hygienic practice than drinking from the common cup. In fact, such dipping may well pose a threat to those who receive after us. The faithful receive the fullness of Christ in either species. Receiving both bread and wine is part of our Anglican tradition; however, if one is concerned about disease, I think it better to receive only the bread than to dip the host into the chalice. It should be noted that we who share the common cup are no less hearty than those Christians who do not do so. It is better to introduce this subject now as a pastoral matter rather than waiting for something more to happen.

I'm glad the bishop decided not to forbid intinction, even if it is a foolish and unsanitary custom. Such an edict would simply produce confusion and rebellion. When I started on chemo last year, the nurse told me, "You can be on the altar, honey, but don't stick your fingers in people's mouths." It's just as scary and impolite to stick your fingers in the common cup.

Diodorus and Rhodopianus of Aphrodisias

3 May

Diodorus and Rhodopianus, deacons and martyrs, killed at Aphrodisias in the province of Caria, Asia Minor (present Turkey), early 4th c.

As a provincial metropolis, Aphrodisias became the see city of the diocese of Caria, in the ecclesiastical arrangements institutionalized at the Council of Nicaea; the earliest attested bishop of Aphrodisias is Ammonius who attended Nicaea in 325. We know very little about Christianity at Aphrodisias before this date. A confused account of two martyrs at Aphrodisias is conserved in the Martyrologium Syriacum, the Laterculi Hieronymiani, and the Synaxaria Constantinopolitana (all in the Acta Sanctorum), and in a Latin passion narrative, published by P. Peeters. Almost all the sources agree that the martyrdoms took place at Aphrodisias, on April 30, under Decius (Passio) or Diocletian (Synax. Const.). The names of the two martyrs vary, but are most probably Diodoretus (or Diodorus) and Rhodopianus. The name Diodorus, but not Diodoretus, is attested in inscriptions on the site; Rhodopianus is not attested, but a Rhodopaeus appears in the sixth century. According to one source, Rhodopianus was a deacon (Synax. Const.). They were attacked by a crowd in the Agora and stoned to death there (Synax. Const.) or outside the city (Passio).

Mrs Schofield's GCSE

Carol Ann Duffy is the new poet laureate of England, the first woman to hold that post in its 341 years of existence. Last year one of her poems, dealing with school violence, was removed from a school curriculum in England. In response, she wrote the following poem, which was printed in The Guardian on 6 September 2008 [my birthday, as it happens]:

Mrs Schofield's GCSE

You must prepare your bosom for his knife,
said Portia to Antonio in which
of Shakespeare's Comedies? Who killed his wife,
insane with jealousy? And which Scots witch
knew Something wicked this way comes? Who said
Is this a dagger which I see? Which Tragedy?
Whose blade was drawn which led to Tybalt's death?
To whom did dying Caesar say Et tu? And why?
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark - do you
know what this means? Explain how poetry
pursues the human like the smitten moon
above the weeping, laughing earth; how we
make prayers of it. Nothing will come of nothing:
speak again. Said by which King? You may begin.

Acius of Amiens

1 May

Acius (or Ache), deacon and martyr, with subdeacon Aceolus, martyred near Amiens, in 303. They were taken prisoner during Emperor Diocletian’s persecution. Both are revered in Amiens (modern Picardy in northwest France).