#Monastery of St Paul

[jontycrane]

Cetinje

The former capital until 1946, Cetinje was one of my favourite places in Montenegro. It was compact, and filled with lovely buildings and interesting museums. The old town centre is pedestrianised, and there isn’t much traffic anywhere else. A day there was the perfect amount of time to see literally everything. The best views of Cetinje are from Eagle Rock, which felt harder to climb that it…

[scavengedluxury]

St. Paul's Monastery, Bükkszentlélek, 1940. From the Budapest Municipal Photography Company archive.

[portraitsofsaints]

Happy Feast Day

St. Paul of the Cross

1694-1775

Feast day: October 20 (New), April 28 (Trad)

Patronage: Hungary, Ovada Italy, the Passionist Order

Saint Paul of the Cross, was an Italian mystic and great preacher. In 1721, after receiving a vision, he founded the Passionists, a community of religious, to evangelize and promote the love of God, through Christ’s passion. Paul spent many hours preaching retreats and spiritual guidance to souls and founded 13 monasteries before his death. He is best known for his apostolic zeal and great penance.

Prints, plaques & holy cards available for purchase. (website)

[whencyclopedia]

Interview: Medieval Christian Art in the Levant

Medievalists retain misconceptions and myths about Oriental Christians. Indeed, the fact that the Middle East is the birthplace of Christianity is an afterthought for many. During the Middle Ages, Christians from different creeds and confessions lived in present-day Lebanon, Syria, Israel, and Palestine. Here, they constructed churches, monasteries, nunneries, and seminaries, which retain timeless artistic treasures and cultural riches.

James Blake Wiener speaks to Dr Mat Immerzee to clarify and contextualize the artistic and cultural heritage of medieval Christians who resided in what is now the Levant.

Dr Immerzee is a retired Assistant Professor at Universiteit Leiden and Director of the Paul van Moorsel Centre for Christian Art and Culture in the Middle East at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

Saint Bacchus Fresco

James Gordon (CC BY)

JBW: ​​The largest Christian community in what is present-day Lebanon is that of the Maronite Christians – they trace their origins to the 4th-century Syrian hermit, St. Maron (d. 410). The Maronite Church is an Eastern Catholic Syriac Church, using the Antiochian Rite, which has been in communion with Rome since 1182. Nonetheless, Maronites have kept their own unique traditions and practices.

What do you think differentiates medieval Maronite art and architecture from other Christian sects in the Levant? Due to a large degree of contact with traders and crusaders from Western Europe, I would suspect that we see “Western” influence reflected in Maronite edifices, mosaics, frescoes, and so forth.

MI: Especially in the 13th century, the oriental Christian communities enjoyed an impressive cultural flourishing which came to expression in the embellishment of churches with wall paintings, icons, sculpture, and woodwork and the production of illustrated manuscripts, but what remains today differs from on one community or region to another. In Lebanon, several dozens of decorated Maronite and Greek Orthodox churches are encountered in mountain villages and small towns in the vicinity of Jbeil (Byblos), Tripoli, the Qadisha Valley, and by exception in Beirut, but only a few still preserve substantial parts of their medieval decoration programs. Most churches fell into decay after the Christian cultural downfall in the early 14th century when the pressure to convert became stronger. While many church buildings were left in the state they were, others were renovated in the Ottoman period or more recently.

Christian Pilgrimage in the Middle Ages, c. 1000

Simeon Netchev (CC BY-NC-ND)

Remarkably Oriental Christian art displays broad uniformity with some regional and denominational differences. Cut off from the East Roman (Byzantine) Empire after the Arab conquest, it also escaped from the Byzantine iconoclastic movement (726-843 CE), which allowed the Middle Eastern Christians to develop their artistic legacy in their own way. An appealing subject is the introduction of warrior saints on horseback such as George and Theodore from about the 8th century. The West and the Byzantine Empire had to wait until the Crusader era to pick up this oriental motif and make it a worldwide success. But the borrowing was mutual. Mounted saints painted in Maronite, Melkite (Greek Orthodox), and Syriac Orthodox churches would increasingly be equipped with a chain coat and rendered with their feet in a forward thrust position, a battle technique developed within Norman military circles. Moreover, the Syrian equestrian saints Sergius and Bacchus were rendered holding a crossed ‘crusader’ banner, an attribute usually associated with Saint George, as if they were Crusader knights. Apart from these examples, there is little evidence of Oriental susceptibility to typically Latin subjects. We find Saint Lawrence of Rome represented in the Greek Orthodox Monastery of Our Lady near Kaftun, but this is exceptional.

Normally, one cannot tell from wall paintings in Lebanon to which community the church in question belonged. They all represented the same subjects and saints whose names are written in Greek and/or Syriac and may have recruited painters from the same artistic circles. Regarding architecture, the last word has not been said on this matter, because the documentation of medieval Lebanese church architecture is still in progress. Nevertheless, the build of some churches undeniably displays Western architectural influences; for example, the Maronite Church of Saint Sabas in Eddé al-Batrun is even plainly Romanesque in style.

JBW: Following my last question, is it then correct to assume that the Crusader lands – Edessa, Antioch, Tripoli, and Jerusalem – were quite receptive to Eastern Christian styles?

MI: That is difficult to tell because there is next to nothing left in the former County of Edessa and the Principality of Antioch. We do have some decorated churches in the former Kingdom of Jerusalem (Abu Gosh, Bethlehem), and here we see a strong focus on Byzantine craftsmanship and Latin usage. Apart from the preserved church embellishment in the Lebanese mountains, there are some fascinating, stylistically and thematically comparable instances across the border with Syria.

Saint Peter in Sinai

Wikipedia (Public Domain)

Although situated within Muslim territory, the Qalamun District between Damascus and Homs stands out for its well-established Greek Orthodox and Syriac Orthodox populations; and from the 18th century onwards, also Greek Catholics and Syrian Catholics. Interestingly, stylistic characteristics confirm that indigenous Syrian painters were also involved in the decoration inside Crusader fortresses such as Crac des Chevaliers and Margat Castle in Syria. It was obviously easier to contract local manpower than to find specialists in Europe.

JBW: The Byzantine Empire exuded tremendous political, cultural, and religious sway across the Levant throughout the Middle Ages; a sizable chunk of the Christian population in both Syria and Lebanon still adheres to the rituals of the Greek Orthodox Church even today.

MI: Leaving aside the cultural foundations laid before the Arab conquest, the contemporary Byzantine influences can hardly be overlooked. In the 12th and 13th centuries, itinerating Byzantine-trained painters worked on behalf of any well-paying client within Frankish and Muslim territory, from Cairo to Tabriz, irrespective of their denominational background. This partly explains the introduction of some ‘fashionable’ Byzantine subjects and the Byzantine brushwork of several mural paintings and icons. Made in the 1160s, the Byzantine-style mosaics in the Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem are believed to be the result of Latin-Byzantine cooperation at the highest levels; they exhale the propagandistic message of Christian unity. In 1204, however, the Crusaders would conquer Constantinople and substantial parts of the Byzantine Empire. The Venetians brought the bounty to Venice, and, surprisingly, also to Alexandria with the consent of the sultan in Cairo, intending to sell the objects in the Middle East. So much for Christian unity…

The Eastern Greek Orthodox Church has its roots in the Chalcedonian dispute about the human and divine nature of Christ in 451, which resulted in the dogmatic breakdown of the Byzantine Church into pro- and anti-Chalcedonian factions. Like the Maronites, the Melkites (‘royalists’) remained faithful to the former, official Byzantine standpoint, except for their oriental patriarchs in Antioch, Alexandria, and Jerusalem were officially allowed autonomy without direct interference from Constantinople. On the other hand, the Syriac Orthodox became dogmatically affiliated with the identically ‘Miaphysite’ Coptic, Ethiopian, and Armenian Churches. To complicate matters even more, part of the Greek Orthodox and Syriac Orthodox communities joined the Church of Rome in the 18th century. This resulted in the establishment of the Greek Catholic and Syriac Catholic Churches.

The Church of Nativity, Bethlehem

Konrad von Grünenberg (Public Domain)

JBW: Could you tell us a little bit more with regard to the Syriac Orthodox Church? If I’m not mistaken, there was a flourishing of the building of churches and monasteries by Syriac Orthodox communities once they fell under Muslim rule around 640.

MI: As a Miaphysite community, the Syriac Orthodox enjoyed the same protected status as other non-Muslim communities under Muslim rule. This allowed them to establish an independent Church hierarchy headed by their patriarch who nominally resided in Antioch, which covered large areas in Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and Syria. Some of their oldest churches, with architectural sculpture and occasionally a mosaic, are situated in the Tur Abdin region in Southeast Turkey. Remarkably, around the year 800, a group of monks from the city of Takrit (present-day Tikrit in Iraq) migrated to Egypt to establish a Syriac ‘colony’ within the Coptic monastic community. Their ‘Monastery of the Syrians’ (Deir al-Surian) still exists and is one of Middle Eastern Christianity’s key monuments for its architecture, wall paintings, icons, wood- and plasterwork ranging in date from the 7th to the 13th centuries. The monastery also houses an extensive manuscript collection. Another decorated monastery is the Monastery of St Moses (Deir Mar Musa; presently Syriac Catholic) near Nebk to the north of Damascus, where paintings from the 11th and 13th-centuries can still be seen. The Monastery of St Behnam (Deir Mar Behnam; presently Syriac Catholic) near Mosul is reputed for its 13th-century architectural sculpture and unique stucco relief, but unfortunately, a lot has been destroyed by ISIS warriors.

The Syriac Orthodox presence in Lebanon remained limited to a church dedicated to Saint Behnam in Tripoli, and the temporary use of a Maronite church dedicated to St Theodore at the village of Bahdeidat by refugees from the East who were on the run from the Mongols during the 1250s. This church still displays its complete decoration program from this period. It is impossible to tell which community arranged the refurbishment, but the addition of a donor figure in Western dress testifies to support from a (probably) local Frankish lord. Finally, the Syriac Orthodox also excelled in manuscript illumination, examples of which can be found in Western collections and the patriarchal library near Damascus.

JBW: As the Lebanese and Syrian Greek Orthodox Churches had fewer dealings with Western Europeans than the Maronite Church, does medieval Christian Orthodox art in Lebanon and Syria reflect and maintain the designs and styles of medieval Byzantium? If so, in what ways, and where do we see deviation or innovation?

MI: As I said before, Byzantine-trained artists have been surprisingly active in the Frankish states and beyond, especially during the 13th century. I prefer to label them as “Byzantine-trained” instead of “Byzantine,” because it is not always clear where they came from. To mention an example, painters from Cyprus still worked in the Byzantine artistic tradition but no longer fell under the authority of the emperor after the Crusader conquest of the island in 1291. Culturally they were still fully Byzantine, but, speaking in modern terms, they would have had the Frankish-Cypriot nationality. The little we can say from the preserved paintings is that some Cypriot artists traveled to the Levant in the aftermath of the power change in search of new clientele. It is unknown if they stayed or returned after the accomplishment of their tasks, but around the mid-13th century we see the birth of a ‘Syrian-Cypriot’ style which combines Byzantine painting techniques with typically Syrian formal features and designs; for example, in the afore-mentioned Monastery at Kaftun in Lebanon. Typically, instances of this blended art are not only encountered in Lebanon and Syria but also in Cyprus.

The Virgin and Child Mosaic, Hagia Sophia

Hagia Sophia Research Team (CC BY-NC-SA)

Focusing on the shared elements in Oriental Christian and Byzantine art, the example of apse decorations illustrates the resemblances and often also subtle differences. From the Early Christian period, the common composition in the apse behind the altar consisted of the mystical appearance of Christ (Christ in Glory) between the Four Living Creatures in the conch and the Virgin between saints, such as the apostles and Church fathers, in the lower zone. However, an early variant encountered in Egypt renders the biblical Vision of Ezekiel: here, Christ in Glory is placed on the fiery chariot the prophet saw. Recent research has brought to light that this variant was also applied in Syriac Orthodox churches in Turkey and Iraq as late as the 13th century. Medieval oriental conch paintings often combine Christ in Glory with the Deesis, that is, the Virgin and St John the Baptist pleading in favour of mankind. Whereas the Byzantines kept these subjects separated, the ‘Deesis-Vision’ is encountered from Egypt to Armenia and Georgia in churches of all denominations

JBW: One cannot discuss medieval Christian art in the Near East without making some mention of Armenians and Georgians. The first recorded Armenian pilgrimage occurred in the early 4th century, and Armenian Cilicia (1080-1375) flourished at the time of the Crusades. During the reign of Queen Tamar (r. 1184-1213), Georgia assumed the traditional role of the Byzantine crown as a protector of the Christians of the Middle East. Armenians and Georgians intermarried not only with one another but also with Byzantines and Crusaders.

Where is the medieval Armenian and Georgian presence the strongest in the Levant? Is it discernible?

Tomb of Saint Hripsime in Armenia

James Blake Wiener (CC BY-NC-SA)

MI: Medieval Armenian and Georgian art can be found in their homelands, but there are also surviving works testifying to their presence in the Levant and Egypt. Starting with the Armenians, they have always lived in groups dispersed throughout the Middle East, whereas in Jerusalem they have their own quarter. A 13th-century wooden door with typically Armenian ornamentation and inscriptions in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem testify to the interest Armenians took in the Holy Land. Further to the south, a 12th-century mural painting with Armenian inscriptions in the White Monastery near Sohag reminds us of the strong Armenian presence in Egypt under Fatimid rule during the 11th to 12th centuries. They had arrived in the wake of the rise of power of the Muslim Armenian warlord and later Vizir Badr al-Jamali, who seized all power in the Fatimid realm during the 1070s. He not only brought his own army consisting of Christian and Muslim Armenians but also made Egypt a safe home for Armenians from more troubled areas.

The Christian Armenians had their own monastery and used a number of churches in Egypt. However, these were appropriated by the Copts at the downfall of Fatimid power and the subsequent expulsion of all Armenians during the 1160s. The Armenian catholicos or head of Egypt is known to have left for Jerusalem taking with him all the church treasures.

At the White Monastery, a mural was made by an artist named Theodore originating from a village in Southeastern Turkey on behalf of Armenian miners who were apparently allowed to use the monastery’s church. It is hard to believe that Theodore came all the way to accomplish just one task in this remote place. There can be no doubt that he decorated more Armenian churches during his stay in Egypt, but the Copts thoroughly wiped out all remaining traces of their previous owners.

The Georgian presence was limited to Jerusalem, where they owned the Monastery of the Holy Cross until it was taken over by the Greek Orthodox in the 17th century. In the monastery’s church, a series of 14th-century paintings with Georgian inscriptions are a reminder of this period. In addition, an icon representing St George and scenes of his life painted during the early 13th century, and kept in the Monastery of Saint Catherine in the Sinai, was a gift from a Georgian monk, who is himself depicted prostrating at the saint’s feet.

St. Catherine's Monastery, Sinai

Marc!D (CC BY-NC-ND)

JBW: Because we touched upon the incorporation of outside artistic influences coming from Western Europe and Byzantium to the Levant, I wondered if you might offer a final comment or two on those architectural or artistic influences coming from the Arab World or even the wider Islamic world.

To what extent did Levantine Christians – who often lived near their Muslim neighbors – adopt or assimilate Islamic styles of art and architecture?

MI: The earliest examples of Islamic art from the Umayyad era display strong influences of Late Antiquity, which in turn had also been the source of inspiration to early Christian art. Over the course of time, these artistic relatives would gradually grow apart to meet again on specific occasions. The earliest example of Islamic-inspired Christian art is the purely ornamental stucco reliefs in the Monastery of the Syrians in Egypt. Constructed during the early 10th century by the Abbot Moses of Nisibis. Its plastered altar room exudes the same atmosphere as houses in the 9th-century Abbasid capital of Samarra and the similarly decorated Mosque of Ibn Tulun (an Abbasid prince who came to Egypt as its governor) in Cairo.

The Mosque of Ibn Tulun, Cairo Egypt

Berthold Werner (CC BY)

The decoration of Fatimid-era sanctuary screens in Coptic churches and woodwork from Egyptian Islamic, Jewish, and secular contexts are fully interchangeable; likewise, 13th-century architectural sculpture, manuscript illustrations, and metalwork from the Mosul area display the same shared stylistic and iconographic artistic language. Broadly speaking, we are obviously dealing with craftsmen working on behalf of different parties at the local level regardless of their religious backgrounds. Occasionally, one comes across ‘Islamic’ ornaments in wall paintings, but the overall impression is that Christian painting was subject to blatant conservatism when compared to more fashionable, ‘neutral’ items of interior decoration. The only Arabic inscriptions found in mural paintings concern texts commemorating building or refurbishment activities, or graffiti left by visitors. There obviously was a difference in status between the vernacular spoken language and the Church’s Greek and Syriac.

JBW: Dr. Mat Immerzeel, thanks so much for your time and consideration.

MI: You are welcome; it is my pleasure to contribute to your magazine.

Mat Immerzeel has been active in the Middle East since 1989, first in Egypt, then in Syria and Lebanon, and recently in Cyprus. His main field of study is the material culture of Oriental Christian communities from the 3rd century to the present. In particular, he studies wall paintings, icons, stone and plaster sculpture, woodwork, and manuscript illustrations. He has participated in research projects focusing on the formation of religious communal identity, the training of local collection curators, and restoration and documentation campaigns. He is the Director of the Paul van Moorsel Centre for Christian Art and Culture in the Middle East and editor-in-chief of the journal Eastern Christian Art (ECA) published by Peeters Publishers in Leuven, the Netherlands.

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[milksockets]

charnel in st. catherine's monastery, sinai, egypt, in memento mori: the dead among us - paul koudounaris (2015)

[camisoledadparis]

THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … December 14

c.530 – Venantius Fortunatus (d.circa 600/609) was a Latin poet and hymnodist in the Merovingian Court, and a Bishop of the early Catholic Church. He was never canonised but was venerated as Saint Venantius Fortunatus during the Middle Ages.

Born in Treviso, near Ravenna in Italy, he spent his time as court poet to the Merovingians. After visiting the tomb of St. Martin of Tours at St. Hilary at Poitiers, he decided to enter a monastery.

He continued to write poetry, some of which have a permanent place in Catholic hymnody, for instance the Easter season hymns "Vexilla Regis" and the "Pange Lingua" (Sing, O my tongue, of the battle). Three or four years before he died he was made bishop of Poitiers. Although never canonized, he was venerated as a saint in the medieval church, and his feast day is still recognized on 14th December each year.

Like Paulinus of Nola, St Venantius's poetry also includes some decidedly secular verse of the romantic sort. That this celebrates male love is clear from its inclusion in the Penguin Book of Homosexual Verse.

"Written on an Island off the Breton Coast" You at God's altar stand, His minister And Paris lies about you and the Seine: Around this Breton isle the Ocean swells, Deep water and one love between us twain. Wild is the wind, but still thy name is spoken; Rough is the sea: it sweeps not o'er they face. Still runs my lover for shelter to its dwelling, Hither, O heart, to thine abiding place. Swift as the waves beneath an east wind breaking Dark as beneath a winter sky the sea, So to my heart crowd memories awaking, So dark, O love, my spirit without thee.

Fortunatus died in the early 600s. He was called a saint after his death, but was never formally canonized.

1901 – King Paul of Greece (d.1964) reigned as king of Greece from 1947 to 1964. He may have been bi-sexual.

Paul was born in Athens, the third son of King Constantine I of Greece and his wife, Princess Sophia of Prussia. He was trained as a naval officer. On 9 January 1938, Paul married Frederika of Hanover at Athens. They had three children.

Before his marriage he is alleged to have invited the homosexual literary muse, Denham Fouts, on a cruise of the Aegean Sea, perhaps because they were lovers. However, Fouts's friend John B. L. Goodwin said Fouts often made up stories about his life, and literary critic Katherine Bucknell thought many of the tales about him were myth.

During most of World War II, when Greece was under German occupation, he was with the Greek government-in-exile in London and Cairo. From Cairo, he broadcast messages to the Greek people.

Paul returned to Greece in 1946. He succeeded to the throne in 1947, on the death of his childless elder brother, King George II.

David Lewis (L) with Producer Irving Pichel

1903 – David Lewis (d.1987 ), born David Levy, was a Hollywood film producer who produced such films as Dark Victory (1939), Arch of Triumph (1948), and Raintree County (1957).

He was also the longtime companion of director James Whale from 1930 to 1952. Although they were separated at the time of Whale's death in 1957, Lewis later released the contents of Whale's suicide note.

Lewis was portrayed in the 1998 film Gods and Monsters by David Dukes.

1915 – The American actor and dancer Dan Dailey was born on this date (d.1978). Dailey was born and raised in New York City and appeared in vaudeville before his Broadway debut in 1937 in Babes in Arms. In 1940, he was signed by MGM to make movies and, although his past career had been in musicals, he was initially cast as a Nazi in The Mortal Storm. However, the people at MGM realized their mistake quickly and cast him in a series of musical films.

He served in the United States Army during World War II, was commissioned as an Army Officer after graduation from Signal OCS at Ft Monmouth, NJ, after which he served with distinction until the war ended. Then returned to more musicals. Beginning with Mother Wore Tights (1947) Dailey became the frequent and favorite co-star of movie legend Betty Grable. His performance in their film When My Baby Smiles at Me in 1948 garnered him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. In 1950, he starred in A Ticket to Tomahawk, often noted as one of the first screen appearances of Marilyn Monroe, in a very small part as a dance-hall girl. In 1953, Dailey starred in Meet Me at the Fair. One of his notable roles was in There's No Business Like Show Business (1954) which featured Irving Berlin's music and also starred Ethel Merman, Marilyn Monroe, Donald O'Connor, and Johnnie Ray.

In 1950 the notorious "Confidential" Magazine (the National Enquirer of its day) printed a picture of him wearing female clothing. His studio, 20th Century Fox, rushed to repair the damage; gossip columnists were told that Dailey had simply been snapped on his way to a fancy dress party. But Andre Previn, the composer, tells in his biography No Minor Chords how Dailey turned up drunk and in female clothing for the press screening of It's Always Fair Weather in 1954. In the mid '70s, gossip columnist Joyce Haber was on television promoting a novel about Hollywood. Asked to dish some gossip, she mentioned that one of the top dancer-actors was a closet transvestite with a costly and beautiful wardrobe that many women would envy.

He had three failed marriages with women, but also was known to hang out in Gay bars. After the suicide of his only son, he was an embittered alcoholic. He died three years later, just after he playing boyfriend Clyde Tolson in (the unintentionally hilarious *and bad*) The Private Files of J.Edgar Hoover (1977). He appeared in over 60 films in his career.

1932 – George Furth (d.2008) was an American librettist, playwright, and actor.

Born in Chicago with the name of George Schweinfurth (he dropped the "schwein" on becoming an actor).

Furth made his Broadway debut as an actor in the 1961 play A Cook for Mr. General, followed by the musical Hot Spot two years later. He was also known for his collaborations with Stephen Sondheim: the highly successful Company, the ill-fated Merrily We Roll Along and the equally ill-fated drama, Getting Away with Murder. Furth penned the plays Twigs, The Supporting Cast and Precious Sons, and wrote the book for the Kander and Ebb musical, The Act.

Company has been revived many times over the years, sometimes updated to the Aids era, although requests from producers to give the show a homosexual slant were turned down by the unmarried Sondheim and Furth, although both of them were gay.

Frequently cast as a bespectacled, ineffectual milquetoast, Furth appeared in such films as The Best Man, Myra Breckinridge, Hooper, Blazing Saddles, Oh God!, Shampoo, The Cannonball Run, Young Doctors in Love, Doctor Detroit, Bulworth and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. His many television credits include Tammy, McHale's Navy, Ironside, I Dream of Jeannie, That Girl, Green Acres, The Monkees, Batman, The Odd Couple, Bonanza, Happy Days, All in the Family, Murphy Brown, L.A. Law, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, Murder, She Wrote, Little House on the Prairie, Love, American Style, Adam-12, F Troop and the made-for-TV film The Scarlett O'Hara War, in which he portrayed famed film director George Cukor. He was a regular in the cast of the short-lived 1976 situation comedy The Dumplings.

He adapted his play Twigs as a 1975 television production, starring Carol Burnett. He also worked as a voice actor in several episodes of the animated television series The Adventures of Don Coyote and Sancho Panda for Hanna-Barbera Productions.

One of Furth's last writing projects was a foray into an area where he had not previously endeavored. Furth penned the lyrics for a musical revue, with music by Doug Katsaros. Furth and Katsaros shaped the work with San Francisco director Mike Ward into "The End - a new musical revue". The piece was performed at San Francisco's New Conservatory Theatre Center during the summer of 2004 and was billed as a "Pre-U.S. Tour Workshop Production". The piece was reworked twice, with the title changing to Last Call and Happy Hour, respectively.

Furth died on August 11, 2008 at the age of 75. The exact cause of death is unknown, although he had been hospitalized for a lung disease at the time.

1955 – Hervé Guibert (d.1991) was a French writer and photographer. The author of numerous novels and autobiographical studies, he played a considerable role in changing French public attitudes to AIDS. He was a close friend and lover of Michel Foucault.

Guibert was born in Saint-Cloud, Hauts-de-Seine, to a middle-class family and spent his early years in Paris, moving to La Rochelle from 1970 to 1973. In his teens Hervé Guibert lied about his age to work at the magazine 20 ans eventually leading to a job with Le Monde. After working as a filmmaker and actor, he turned to photography and journalism. In 1978, he successfully applied for a job at France's prestigious evening paper Le Monde and published his second book, Les aventures singulières (published by Éditions de minuit). In 1984, Guibert shared a César Award for best screenplay with Patrice Chéreau for L'homme blessé. Guibert had met Chéreau in the 1970s during his theatrical years.

Guibert's writing style was inspired by the French writer Jean Genet. Three of his lovers occupied an important place in his life and work: Thierry Jouno, director of an institute for the blind whom he met in 1976, and which led to his novel Des aveugles; Michel Foucault, whom he met in 1977; and Vincent Marmousez, a teenager of fifteen who inspired his novel Fou de Vincent.

In January 1988 Guibert was diagnosed with AIDS. From then on, he worked at recording what was left of his life. In June the following year, he married Christine, the partner of the late Thierry Jouno, so that his royalty income would eventually pass to her and her two children. In 1990, Guibert publicly revealed his HIV status in his roman à clef "À l'ami qui ne m'a pas sauvé la vie" (published in English as To the Friend Who Did Not Save My Life). Guibert immediately found himself the focus of media attention, featured in newspapers and appearing on several television talk shows.

Two more books also detailing the progress of his illness followed: Le Protocole compassionnel (published in English as The Compassionate Protocol) and L'Homme au chapeau rouge (published in English as The Man In The Red Hat), which was released posthumously in January 1992, the same month French television screened La Pudeur ou l'impudeur, a home-made film by Guibert of his last year as he lost his battle against AIDS. Almost blind as a result of disease, he attempted to end his life just before his 36th birthday, and died two weeks later.

1960 – Bob Paris, American bodybuilder and Gay rights advocate, born; The former Mr. Universe, and International Federation of BodyBuilders professional bodybuilder, Bob Paris is a writer, public speaker and civil rights activist. He acknowledged his sexuality in the July 1989 issue of Ironman magazine and has graced the covers of scores of magazines worldwide. After Paris officially came out as a Gay man in the media, he and his then-partner, Rod Jackson, became involved in marriage equality advocacy, started successful non-profits, lectured on a wide variety of Gay civil rights issues, and made many television, radio, newspaper and magazine appearances. The two separated in 1995. Today, Paris lives with his spouse of eleven years, Brian, on an island near Vancouver, British Columbia. Bob and Brian were legally married after Canada equalized the marriage laws in 2003.

In addition to his writing career, Bob Paris remains a committed civil rights advocate as well as a motivational speaker, model and actor. In 1998, he made his New York stage debut, starring at Carnegie Hall opposite Bea Arthur, Sandy Duncan and Tyne Daly in the Broadway musical, Jubilee as the character Mowgli. He is one of the subject of photographer Herb Ritts' gorgeous book, Duo. His official website is: http://www.bobparis.com/

1966 – James Earl Hardy, born in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, New York, is an American playwright, novelist, and journalist.

Generally considered the first to depict same-sex love stories that take place within the hip-hop community, his writing is largely characterized by its exploration of the African-American LGBTQ experience.

Hardy's best-known work is the B-Boy Blues series. The B-Boys Blues series comprises six novels and one short story. B-Boy Blues was adapted into a play in 2013 and into a film, directed and co-written by Jussie Smollett, in 2021.

Hardy attended undergraduate school at St. John's University and afterward went on to graduate from the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism in 1993. From 1992 to 1994, he wrote for Entertainment Weekly as a music journalist.

1968 – Yotam Ottolenghi is an Israeli-English chef, restaurateur, and food writer. He is the co-owner of six delis and restaurants in London, as well as the author of several bestselling cookbooks, including Ottolenghi (2008), Plenty (2010), Jerusalem (2012) and Ottolenghi Simple (2018).

Ottolenghi was conscripted into the Israeli Defense Forces in 1989, serving three years in IDF intelligence headquarters. He then studied at the Adi Lautman Interdisciplinary Program for Outstanding Students of Tel Aviv University, where in 1997, he completed a combined bachelor's and master's degree in comparative literature; his thesis being on the philosophy of the photographic image. While working on his thesis, Ottolenghi served as a night copy editor for Haaretz.

In 1997, Ottolenghi and his then-partner Noam Bar moved to Amsterdam, where he edited the Hebrew section of the Dutch-Jewish weekly NIW and considered getting his doctorate in comparative literature. Instead, he moved to London to study French cooking at Le Cordon Bleu.

Ottolenghi met his partner Karl Allen in 2000; they married in 2012 and live in Camden with their two sons, Max and Flynn. In 2013, Ottolenghi "came out as a gay father" in a Guardian essay that detailed the lengthy process of conceiving Max via gestational surrogacy, an option that he believes should be more widely available to those who cannot conceive naturally.

Ottolenghi served as a pastry chef at three London restaurants: the Michelin-starred Capital Restaurant, Kensington Place, and Launceston Place in Kensington New Town. In 1999, he became head pastry chef at the artisanal pastry shop Baker and Spice, where he met the Palestinian chef Sami Tamimi, who grew up in Jerusalem's Old City. Ottolenghi and Tamimi bonded over a shared language—Hebrew—and a joint "incomprehension of traditional English food".

His debut cookbook Ottolenghi was published in 2008 and has sold over 100,000 copies. Six volumes have followed: the all-vegetable cookbooks Plenty (2010) and Plenty More (2014); Jerusalem (2012); Nopi (2015); the dessert cookbook Sweet (2017); and Ottolenghi Simple (2018).

Ottolenghi's bestselling cookbooks have proven influential, with The New York Times noting that they are "widely knocked-off for their plain-spoken instructions, puffy covers, and photographs [that Ottolenghi] oversees himself, eschewing a food stylist". In 2014, the London Evening Standard remarked that Ottolenghi had "radically rewritten the way Londoners cook and eat", and Bon Appetit wrote that he had "made the world love vegetables".

1988 – The movie version of Harvey Fierstein's play "Torch Song Trilogy" opened in New York.

1989 – Amini Fonua is a Tongan competitive swimmer.

Fonua was born and raised in Ponsonby, Auckland, New Zealand to Tongan lawyer Sione Fonua and British-born mother Julie. He holds dual Tongan and New Zealand citizenship. His family includes two other sisters.

Fonua's swimming career began at the Roskill Swimming Club based at Cameron Pool in Auckland, coached by Sandra Burrow from 1999–2007. He broke numerous Auckland and New Zealand Age Group Records under Burrow's tenure. He then moved to West Auckland Aquatics in 2007, and was coached by Donna Bouzaid. In the Fall of 2008, Fonua enrolled at Texas A&M on a swimming scholarship. While at Texas A&M he was a peer voted Team Captain, Big XII Conference Champion, NCAA All-American, and recipient of The Aggie Heart Award. He graduated with a Telecommunication and Multi-Media degree, with a Minor in Creative Writing in May 2013.

He was the first Tongan swimmer to win a gold medal in international competition, when he took gold in the 50 metre breaststroke at the 2010 Oceania Swimming Championships.

In preparation for the 2012 London Olympics Fonua was trained by New Zealander and designated head coach for Tonga, Jon Winter. He served as his nation's flag-bearer in the 2012 Summer Olympics Parade of Nations. As a swimmer at the 2012 Summer Olympics, he competed in the Men's 100 metre breaststroke, failing to reach the semifinals.

Fonua made an international comeback at the 2015 Pacific Games in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. He created history by becoming the first ever Tongan athlete to ever win 3 Gold medals at a Pacific Games by sweeping the Breaststroke events, setting 2 Games Records in the process (50 m and 100 m Breaststroke). He is the only Tongan athlete in history to ever hold dual Oceania and Pacific Games titles.

Fonua is openly gay and an advocate for LGBT rights.

1993 – In Denver Colorado, Judge Jeffrey Bayless ruled Amendment 2 unconstitutional. The amendment to the Colorado state constitution sought to eliminate all gay rights laws in the state and prevent any more from being passed.

[eagna-eilis]

Ach-To and Irish Archaeology

The sequels were my entry into Star Wars and I never would have gone to see The Force Awakens if I wasn't an archaeology nerd.

During the production of Episode VII, a decent number of people with an interest in our archaeological heritage here in Ireland were quite worried about the impact of filming on one of our only two UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the island known as Skellig Michael down off the coast of Kerry.

I went to the film to see if any potential damage was worth it, or if they'd do something unspeakably stupid with it in-universe. I wanted to see if it was respected.

And holy hell I was NOT disappointed. I think I walked out of TFA sniffling to myself about how beautiful the Skellig looked and how it seemed like its use as a location was not just respectful but heavily inspired by its real history.

See, Skellig Michael was a monastic hermitage established at a point when Christianity was so new that the man who ordered its founding sometime in the first century CE was himself ordained by the Apostle Paul. The fellah from the Bible who harassed all and sundry with his letters, THAT Apostle Paul. This is how old a Christian site the Skellig is. It predates St. Patrick by at the very least two hundred years.

The steps we watch Rey climb were originally cut NEARLY TWO THOUSAND YEARS AGO. They have been reworked and repaired many many times since, of course. Still, the path the camera follows Daisy Ridley up is as much an ancient path built by the founders of a faith in real life as it is in the movies.

A hermitage was a place where monks went to live lives of solitude and asceticism so as better to achieve wisdom. The practice is common to many of the major world religions, including the myriad East Asian faiths which inspired the fictional Jedi.

It is said that the hermitage and monastery were originally built with the purpose of housing mystical texts belonging to the Essanes, one of the sects of Second Temple Judaism which influenced some of the doctrines of Christianity. They also, according to what I have read, characterised good and evil as 'light' and 'darkness' and were celibate.

As such, the use of the island in TFA and TLJ does not merely respect Skellig Michael's history, it honours it. It is framed as somewhere ancient and sacred, which it is. It is framed as a place where a mystic goes to live on his own surrounded by nature that is at once punishing and sublime, which of course it was. It shown to be a place established to protect texts written at the establishment of a faith, which it may well have been.

This level of genuine respect for my cultural heritage by Rian Johnson in particular is astonishing. I don't think anyone from outside the US ever really trusts Americans not to treat our built history like it's Disneyland. Much of the incorporation of the Skellig's real past into a fictional galactic history occurs in TLJ, which is why I'm giving Rian so much credit.

It's Luke's death scene which makes the honouring of Irish archaeological history most apparent though.

Johnson takes the archaeological iconography back a further three thousand years for his final tribute to my culture's beautiful historical temples. This time, he incorporates neolithic passage tomb imagery, specifically that of Newgrange, which is up the country from the Skellig.

I think if you understand what the image represents then it makes a deeply emotional scene even more resonant.

The scene I'm referring to is Luke's death.

As he looks to the horizon, to the suns, we view him from the interior of the First Jedi Temple. The sunset aligns with the passageway into the ancient sanctuary, illuminating it as he becomes one with the Force.

As for Newgrange, every year during the Winter Solstice it aligns with the sunrise. The coldest, darkest, wettest, most miserable time of the year on a North Atlantic island where it is often cold, wet, and miserable even in the summer. And the sun comes up even then, and on a cloudless morning a beam of sunlight travels down the corridor and illuminates the chamber inside the mound.

You guys can see this, right? The similarity of the images? The line of light on the floor?

Luke's death scene is beautiful but I think it's a thousand times more moving with this visual context. Luke's sequel arc isn't merely populated by a lore and iconography that honour the place where the end of his story was filmed, I think that incorporation of that history and mythology honours Luke.

We don't know for sure what the Neolithic people believed, religion-wise. We know next to nothing about their rituals. We know that there were ashes laid to rest at Newgrange. There is some speculation that the idea was that the sun coming into the place that kept those ashes brought the spirits of those deceased people over to the other side.

It's also almost impossible not to interpret the sunlight coming into Newgrange as an extraordinary expression of hope. If you know this climate, at this latitude, you know how horrible the winter is. We don't even have the benefit of crispy-snowwy sunlit days. It's grey and it's dark and it's often wet. And every single year the earth tilts back and the days get long again.

The cycle ends and begins again. Death and rebirth. And hope, like the sun, which though unseen will always return. And so we make it through the winter, and through the night.

As it transpired the worries about the impact of the Star Wars Sequels upon Skellig Michael were unfounded. There was no damage caused that visitors wouldn't have also caused. There also wasn't a large uptick in people wanting to visit because of its status as a SW location, in part I think because the sequels just aren't that beloved.

But they're beloved to me, in no small part because of the way they treated a built heritage very dear to my heart. I think they deserve respect for that at the least.

[wonder-worker]

"Angelberga, wife of Louis II, had a very active role both during her reign and her widowhood. She is considered as an extraordinarily charismatic figure, for she embodied all the aspects of a queen’s powers: political, relational and patrimonial."

-Roberta Cimino, Italian Queens in the Ninth and T3nth Centuries (PHD Thesis, University of St Andrews, 2014) / Patricia Skinner, Women in Medieval Italy 500-1200

"Angelberga’s career has received a certain amount of attention from scholars. When she married Louis II she obtained land from her husband in eastern Lombardy and western Emilia, as her will of 879 shows. She and Louis became the heads of a government which moved round with them, and it is clear that she shared in his power. Odegaard cites her role in diplomatic missions and in warfare as evidence of her prominence. She also intervened in disputes between Louis and his brother Lothar, as well as between the latter and the pope. Her relationship with Pope John VIII was particularly close, and several extant papal letters were addressed to her. In 874 she was commended into papal protection.

Angelberga and the two monasteries of St Salvator at Brescia (the royal convent) and St Clement Casauria (founded in 873) were the only recipients of large land donations from Louis. Louis died in 875 without a son. In his last years his nobles, ‘regarding Engelberge as hateful because of her insolence’, had [unsuccessfully] petitioned him to divorce Angelberga in favour of the daughter of the count of Siena. This was clearly owing to the fact that she had only two daughters by Louis, Ermengard, who went on to control St Salvator, and Gisela, who predeceased her parents in 868. However, her position was much stronger than such a challenge suggests. Bougard points out that of eighteen precepts issued by Louis between 855 and 874, eight were addressed to Angelberga. She was responsible for the foundation of the female house of St Sistus in Piacenza, and her position as a powerful patron is clear. She also controlled the royal house of St Salvator/St Julia at Brescia. Both houses were to function as places of refuge for her and her daughter, if necessary, reflecting earlier patterns of monastic foundations with protective duties towards female kin. Besides her ecclesiastical contacts, Angelberga also worked for her own family. Her kinsman Suppo was recompensed for his mission to Constantinople in 869/870 with the duchy of Spoleto, which probably owed as much to his kinship with the empress as to his work there. Angelberga also procured the deposition of the bishop of Piacenza, Seufrid, in favour of her nephew Paul, provoking a reaction from Pope Nicholas I (although the Liber Pontificalis is silent on the issue)."

[thepastisalreadywritten]

SAINT OF THE DAY (July 6)

July 6 marks the feast day of St. Maria Goretti, a young virgin and martyr whose life is an example of purity and mercy for all Christians.

St. Maria Goretti is best known for her commitment to purity and the courageous defence of her faith at the young age of eleven that made her willing to undergo death rather than participate in a sin against God.

She is also remarkable for the forgiveness she willingly granted her attacker as she lay on her deathbed.

Maria was born on 16 October 1890 in Corinaldo, Italy. Her father, a farmer, died of malaria when she was young, and her mother had to work to support their six children.

Maria took care of the younger children while her mother worked. She prayed the Rosary every night for the repose of her father’s soul.

She grew in grace and maturity. Her cheerful obedience and piety were noticed by those around her.

On 5 July 1902, a neighbouring farm hand, Alessandro Serenelli, tried to rape Maria.

On several prior occasions, Alessandro had harassed Maria with impure advances, all of which she has vehemently rejected.

This time, he locked her in a room and tried to force himself upon her.

She fought against him, shouting, "No! It is a sin! God does not want it!"

She warned him that this was the path towards hell.

When Maria declared that she would rather die than submit to this sin, Alessandro angrily grabbed her and stabbed her 14 times with a knife.

Maria was found bleeding to death and rushed to the hospital.

As she lay dying, she forgave Alessandro for the crime he had committed against her, saying:

"Yes, for the love of Jesus, I forgive him...and I want him to be with me in Paradise."

Although the doctors tried to save her, she died two agonizing days later, only eleven years old.

Alessandro was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

He remained unrepentant until one night, eight years into his prison term, when Maria appeared to him, dressed in white, gathering lilies in a garden.

She smiled, turned towards Alessandro, and offered him the flowers. Each lily he took transformed into a white flame. Then Maria disappeared.

From that moment, Alessandro converted and found peace. He repented of his crime and changed his life.

He was released from prison three years early and begged forgiveness from Maria’s mother, which she duly granted.

Alessandro moved to a Capuchin monastery, working in the garden as a tertiary for the remainder of his life.

He was one of the witnesses who testified to Maria's holiness during her cause of beatification, citing the crime and the vision in prison.

Many miracles were attributed to Maria Goretti after her death.

Pope Pius XII beatified her on 27 April 1947 and canonized on 24 June 1950, becoming the youngest Roman Catholic saint officially recognised by name.

Her feast day is celebrated by the Church on July 6.

She is the patron saint of purity, rape victims, young women, and youth in general.

On her feast day in 2003, Pope John Paul II spoke about St. Maria Goretti at his Sunday Angelus, noting that her life provides an exemplary witness of what it means to be "pure of heart."

"What does this fragile but christianly mature girl say to today's young people, through her life and above all through her heroic death?" asked the Pope.

"Marietta, as she was lovingly called, reminds the youth of the third millennium that true happiness demands courage and a spirit of sacrifice, refusing every compromise with evil and having the disposition to pay personally, even with death, faithful to God and his commandments."

"How timely this message is," the Holy Father continued.

"Today, pleasure, selfishness and directly immoral actions are often exalted in the name of the false ideals of liberty and happiness.

It is essential to reaffirm clearly that purity of heart and of body go together, because chastity ‘is the custodian’ of authentic love."

[catalinadearagonsblog]

"In the 1520s, England too was a country bursting with relics. Catherine had kissed them at Canterbury, Walsingham, Westminster and St Paul’s, and followed Elizabeth of York’s example of going into labour clutching the birthing girdle of the Virgin Mary. And these relics were accessible to the people in small parish churches, not just in the large cathedrals and monasteries. In Shelford visitors might see phials of Mary’s milk and part of her churching candle, in Kaldham the finger bone of St Stephen was on display, in Burton-on-Trent pilgrims might see the staff of St Modwena, and part of the shirt of St Thomas could be found at Derby. Clothing, girdles, combs, hair, bones and bodily fluids could be found housed all around the country as an essential component of pre-Reformation Catholicism, accessible, powerful and defining. Catherine was an important religious leader in England, teaching by example. Among the artefacts that accompanied her on her travels were pictures of Mary and her mother, St Anne, and St Elizabeth, who must have had particular resonance for Catherine, as she had miraculously conceived and given birth to a child even after the onset of her menopause."

Amy Licence, Catherine of Aragon: An Intimate Life of Henry VIII's True Wife

[anastpaul]

One Minute Reflection – 16 October – “The Month of the Most Holy Rosary and of the Angels” – Feast of the Purity of the Blessed Virgin Mary and of St Hedwig of Andechs (1174-1243) Widow – Proverbs 31:10-31, Matthew 13:44-52 – Scripture search here: https://www.drbo.org/ “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a treasure  hidden in a field; he who finds it, hides it and in his joy, goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” – Matthew 13:44 REFLECTION – “In my opinion, it would be unworthy of us to withdraw, even for a moment, from the contemplation of Christ. When we have lost sight of Him, even briefly, let us turn our mind’s regard back to Him, directing the eyes of our heart, as by a very straight line. For everything lies in the soul’s inner sanctuary. There, after the devil has been expelled and the vices no longer reign at all, the Kingdom of God can be established in us, as the Evangelist says: “For amen I say to you that the Kingdom of God is within you.” But within us there can be nothing else than knowledge or ignorance of the truth and the love, of either the vices, or the virtues, by which we make ready a Kingdom in our hearts, either for the devil or for Christ. The Apostle Paul also describes the characteristics of this Kingdom when he says: “For the Kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.” Thus, if the Kingdom of God is within us and the Kingdom of God is itself, righteousness and peace and joy, then, whoever abides in these things, is undoubtedly in the Kingdom of God … Let us lift up the eyes of our soul to that Kingdom which is endless joy!” – St John Cassian (c360-435) Monk, Theologian, Founder of Monasteries, Father of the Church, Disciple of St John Chrysostom (Conferences No 1).

(via One Minute Reflection – 21 August– ‘ … For everything lies in the soul’s inner sanctuary. …’ – AnaStpaul)

[blueiscoool]

A 14th-Century Papal Bull Discovered in Poland

A lead seal found in northwestern Poland has been identified as a rare papal bull from the reign of Pope Boniface IX (1350-1404). It was discovered in 2021 north of a former cemetery in the village of Budzistowo by metal detectorists with the PARSĘTA Exploration and Search Group. Dirt and corrosion made it difficult to identify at first. Specialists in Kraków cleaned and conserved it, revealing the inscription that marks it as the seal of Boniface IX.

Bullae were round seals, usually made of lead, that were hung on silk strings affixed to the parchments of official proclamations and documents. They were legally valid and highly recognizable signatures. Metallurgic analysis found that this one was made of pure lead derived from galenite deposits in Cyprus, Sardinia, Greece and Spain. This composition indicates the bull is original, not a later copy.

The reverse inscription reads: BONI/FATIUS/PP:VIIII. The obverse features the images of Saint Peter and Saint Paul identified by the inscription SPASPE above their heads.

In the 9th century, what is now Budzistowo was founded by Pomeranian tribes as the fortified settlement of Kołobrzeg. The settlement was on the Parsęta River 2.5 miles from its mouth on the Baltic Sea, and was rich in salt, fish, iron ore and arable land. The Polish Piast dynasty conquered the area in the 10th century, and Kołobrzeg grew into a regional center of the trade in salt and salt-cured fish.

It became a seat of a bishopric in 1000, but the area would only become thoroughly Christianized in the 12th century. St Mary’s church was built at that time. It was converted into an abbey in the 13th century when German settlers founded a new town of Kołobrzeg on the Baltic and the former Pomeranian stronghold was renamed Old Kołobrzeg. A monastery for Benedictine nuns was then built in Old Kołobrzeg.

Historians hypothesize that the bull was kept at the Benedictine monastery, based on a reference in the comprehensive history of Kołobrzeg written by the 18th century Pastor Johann Friedrich Wachsen. He recorded that in 1397, Boniface issued a letter of indulgence for the Benedictine nuns. It guaranteed a full indulgence to anyone who visited the local church.

With no relic relating to the monastery surviving to this day, [Dr Robert Dziemba, the head of the Kołobrzeg History Department,] says that if it is proved that this bull is the same one referenced by Wachsen it would be nothing short of “a historical revelation”. […]

Dziemba speculates that this particular papal bull may have been lost in the 16th century.

“After the 1534 congress in Trzebiatów introduced Lutheranism to Pomerania, the document simply lost its value,” he said. “Maybe the bull was thrown out when the duchy took control of the monastery as a result of this congress – but maybe it was lost centuries later. We will probably never know when and why it was discarded.”

The conserved bull has gone on display in the Museum of Arms in Kołobrzeg.

[mybeautifulchristianjourney]

Today in Christian History

Today is Thursday, April 25th, 2024. It is the 116th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar; Because it is a leap year, 250 days remain until the end of the year.

62: Death of Mark the Gospel writer while imprisoned in Alexandria in the eighth year of Nero, according to Vetus martyrologium romanum (an old Roman collation of martyr accounts).

799: Pope Leo III is attacked, his eyes stabbed, and his tongue torn. He recovers and later crowns Charlemagne as emperor.

1449: The ineffectual Council of Basel ends.

1479: Death of Sylvester of Obnorsk, a Russian Orthodox hermit who had lived off roots and bark. Eventually he had established a monastery.

1564: John Calvin, reformer of Geneva, dictates his last will and testament to notary Peter Chenalat.

1595: Death from a fever in the convent of St. Onofrio of Italian poet Torquato Tasso. Ironically, he was supposed to receive a laurel from the pope on this day in recognition of his epic poems, among which Jerusalem Delivered had been the most acclaimed.

1735: Death at Epworth, England, of Samuel Wesley, curate, author, and father of Methodist revival leaders John and Charles Wesley.

1800: Death at East Dereham, Norfolk, England, of English poet William Cowper (pictured above). Despite lifelong depression, he had produced enduring hymns, including, “Oh For a Closer Walk with God” and “There is a Fountain Filled with Blood.” Dementia had led him to believe he was damned.

1879: Consecration of J. B. Lightfoot as Bishop of Durham. A renowned English New Testament scholar, he had left Cambridge and a life of scholarship to devote the remaining ten years of his life to church administration.

1889: Death at Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, of Anzentia Igene Perry Chapman. A member of the Free Methodist Church, she wrote a number of hymns, including, “Thou Shalt Rest at Eve,” and “We’ll Never Say Goodbye.”

1917: Ordination of Paul Sasaki as a priest in the Anglican Church in Japan. He will become bishop of Nippon Sei Ko Kei (an independent church organization within the Anglican Communion), and suffer imprisonment for his refusal to bring Nippon Sei Ko Kei under the authority of a government-ordered church coalition.

[portraitsofsaints]

Saint Charbel Makhlouf

1828-1898

Feast day: July 24

Saint Charbel, born in a small village in Lebanon, to a poor religious family, entered the Maronite Monastery of St. Maroun, (A Lebanese Maronite order) at 23 and was ordained a priest in1859. He served there for 16 years, then retired to the hermitage of Sts. Peter and Paul. Charbel lived a severe ascetic life of prayer, mortification and self-denial and had a remarkable devotion to the Eucharist. He had a massive stroke while saying Mass on Christmas Eve and died 7 days later. For 45 days a bright light surrounded his tomb. The monks exhumed his body and it was found incorrupt. For approximately 62 years a viscous liquid came from his body. Many miracles are attributed to his intercession.

Prints, plaques & holy cards available for purchase here: (website)

[orthodoxydaily]

SAINTS&READING TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2024

november 19_november 6

St PAUL THE CONFESSOR, ARCHBISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE (350).

Saint Paul the Confessor, Archbishop of Constantinople, was chosen to the patriarchal throne after the death of Patriarch Alexander (+ 340), when the Arian heresy had again flared up. Many Arians were present at the Council, which selected the new Archbishop of Constantinople. They revolted in opposition to the choice of Saint Paul, but the Orthodox were in the majority at the Council.

The emperor Constantius, ruling over the Eastern half of the Roman Empire, was an Arian. He was not in Constantinople for the election of the Archbishop, and so it took place without his consent. Upon his return, he convened a council which illegally deposed Saint Paul, and the emperor banished him from the capital. In place of the saint they elevated Eusebius of Nicomedia, an impious heretic. Archbishop Paul withdrew to Rome, where other Orthodox bishops were also banished by Eusebius.

Eusebius did not rule the Church of Constantinople for long. When he died, Saint Paul returned to Constantinople, and was greeted by his flock with love. But Constantius exiled the saint a second time, and so he returned to Rome. The Western emperor Constans wrote a harsh letter to his Eastern co-ruler, which he sent to Constantinople along with the holy exiled archpastor. The threats worked, and Saint Paul was reinstated upon the archepiscopal throne.

But soon the pious emperor Constans, a defender of the Orthodox, was treacherously murdered during a palace coup. They again banished Saint Paul from Constantinople and this time sent him off in exile to Armenia, to the city of Cucusus, where he endured a martyr’s death.

When the Archbishop was celebrating the Divine Liturgy, Arians rushed upon him by force and strangled him with his own omophorion. This occurred in the year 350. In 381, the holy Emperor Theodosius the Great solemnly transferred the relics of Saint Paul the Confessor from Cucusus to Constantinople. In 1326, the relics of Saint Paul were transferred to Venice.

Saint Athanasius the Great, a contemporary of Saint Paul, writes briefly about his exiles, “Saint Paul the first time was sent by Constantine to Pontus, the second time he was fettered with chains by Constantius, and then he was locked up in Mesopotamian Syngara and from there moved to Emesus, and the fourth time to Cappadocian Cucusus in the Taurian wilderness.”

Part of the Saint's skull is in the Holy Monastery of Simonópetra on Mount Athos. The Saint's incorrupt relics are in the Roman Catholic church of Saint George of Greater Venice. A fragment of the Saint's relics is located in the Saint Alexander Nevsky Lavra in Saint Petersburg.

REPOSE OF St HERMAN, BISHOP OF KAZAN (567)

Saint Herman, Archbishop of Kazan, lived during the sixteenth century. He was born in the city of Staritsa and descended from the old boyar nobility of the Polevi. In his youth, Gregory (his baptismal name) was tonsured at the Joseph-Volokolamsk monastery under Igumen Gurias, where he later became Archbishop of Kazan (December 5). (Saint Gurias was head of the monastery from 1542 to 1551).

At the monastery Saint Herman occupied himself with copying books, and he was a close friend of Saint Maximus the Greek (January 21), who was living there in confinement. In 1551 the brethren of the Staritsa Dormition monastery, seeing his piety, chose him as their archimandrite.

Taking up the governance of this monastery with a pastoral zeal, Saint Herman concerned himself with its internal and external order, for he was a model of humility and meekness. He exhorted all to observe their monastic commitment strictly, and he introduced into his monastery the Rule of Saint Joseph of Volokolamsk (October 18).

But after two and a half years Archimandrite Herman left the Staritsa monastery, leaving its direction to the hieromonk Job (June 19), who afterwards was to become the first Patriarch of Moscow, and was an ascetic and sufferer for the Russian Land.

Saint Herman’s love for solitary struggles brought him to return to his original Volokolamsk monastery, where he strove toward salvation as a simple monk. However, when the new heretic Matthew Bashkin (who refused to acknowledge the Holy Mysteries and denied faith in the Holy Trinity) appeared at Moscow, Saint Herman and his own father (who had received tonsure at the Volokolamsk monastery with the name Philotheus) were summoned to the Moscow Council of 1553. The Council censured the heretic Bashkin and resolved to send him for correction to Saint Herman at the Volokolamsk monastery, since Saint Herman was known for his holy life and zeal for the faith in Christ.

In 1555, after the taking of Kazan, an archepiscopal See was established there. Saint Gurias, the former igumen of Volokolamsk monastery, was chosen as archbishop. He was entrusted with building the Dormition monastery in the city of Sviyazhsk for missionary purposes. By decree of Saint Gurias, Saint Herman was appointed as head of this new monastery in Sviyazhsk. A stone cathedral was built with a belltower and monastic cells. The igumen of the monastery lived very frugally in a cramped cell beneath the cathedral belltower. Saint Herman particularly concerned himself with acquiring a library for the monastery.

Soon his monastery became famous for its good works, and it became a center of enlightenment for the Kazan region.

On March 12, 1564, after the repose of Saint Gurias, Saint Herman was consecrated Bishop of Kazan. The short duration of his tenure there was marked nonetheless by his efforts to build churches and to enlighten the people of the region with the light of Christ.

In 1566, Ivan the Terrible summoned Saint Herman to Moscow and ordered that he be elected to the Metropolitan cathedra. At first, Saint Herman refused to have this burden imposed upon him. The Tsar would not tolerate any objection, however, and the saint was obliged to settle into the Metropolitan’s quarters until his elevation to the position of Metropolitan.

Seeing injustice among those of the Tsar’s inner circle, Saint Herman, true to his pastoral duty, attempted to admonish the Tsar. “You are not yet elevated to Metropolitan, and already you place constraints upon my freedom,” the Tsar told him through his aides. He ordered Saint Herman expelled from the Metropolitan’s quarters and that he be kept under surveillance.

The saint lived in disgrace for about two years, and died on November 6, 1567. They buried him in the church of Saint Nicholas the Hospitable. In 1595, at the request of the inhabitants of Sviyazhsk, the relics of the saint were transferred from Moscow to the Sviyazhsk Dormition monastery. Saint Hermogenes, then Metropolitan of Kazan, visited his grave.

Saint Herman is commemorated on September 25 (the first translation of his relics in 1595) and June 23 (the second translation of his relics in 1714).

Source: Orthodox Church in America_OCA

Colossians 2:20-3:3

20 Therefore, if you died with Christ from the basic principles of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to regulations- 21 Do not touch, do not taste, do not handle, 22 which all concern things which perish with the using-according to the commandments and doctrines of men? 23 These things appear as wisdom in self-imposed religion, false humility, and neglect of the body, but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.

1 If you were raised with Christ, seek those things above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. 3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

Luke 12:42-48

42 And the Lord said, "Who then is that faithful and wise steward, whom his master will make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of food in due season? 43 Blessed is that servant his master will find so doing when he comes. 44 Truly, I tell you that he will make him ruler over all he has. 45 But if that servant says in his heart, 'My master is delaying his coming,' and begins to beat the male and female servants, and to eat and drink and be drunk, 46 the master of that servant will come on a day when he is not looking for him, and at an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the unbelievers. 47 And that servant who knew his master's will, and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. 48 But he who did not know, yet committed things deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, from him will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more.

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The Pretty Cures and its Saints: Fresh Pretty Cure!

2009 is the year of something incredible things - from the Miracle on the Hudson, Obama's inauguration as the Commander-in-Chief, Alexander Rybak wins in Moscow, Greenland gains self-rule, to Rio de Janeiro won the right to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. And so, here are the Fresh Quartet with their birthdays corresponding with feast days that is honored and recognized by the Roman Catholic Church!

July 19 - Love Momozono (Cure Peach)

St. Bernold of Utrecht: 11th century bishop that shifted from the domain of the lay Lords in the churches and monasteries in his diocese, founded new churches and introduced Cluniac customs in the monasteries.

January 11 - Miki Aono (Cure Berry)

Pope St. Hyginus: 9th bishop of Rome who reigned for four years. Tradition holds that during his papacy he determined the various prerogatives of the clergy and defined the grades of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. He instituted godparents at baptism to assist the baptised during their Christian life, and also decreed that all churches be consecrated.

February 15 - Inori Yamabuki (Cure Pine)

St. Claude de La Colombière: 17th century French Jesuit priest who assisted St. Margaret Mary Alacoque in establishing the devotion to the Sacred Heart. He was her confessor, and his writings and testimony helped to validate her mystical visions and elevated the Sacred Heart as an important feature of Roman Catholic devotion. He was appointed court preacher to Mary of Modena, who had become duchess of York by marriage with the future King James II of England, and he took up his residence in St. James’s Palace in London. Falsely accused by a former protégé of complicity in Titus Oates's 'popish plot,' he was imprisoned for five weeks and, when released, was obliged to return to France, where he died an invalid under the care of Margaret Mary. Canonized by Pope St. John Paul II on the Feast of the Visitation in 1992, his major shrine can be found in Paray-le-Monial.

June 13 - Setsuna Higashi (Cure Passion)

St. Anthony of Padua: Franciscan Portuguese friar and priest who is noted by his contemporaries for his powerful preaching, expert knowledge of scripture, and undying love and devotion to the poor and the sick, he was one of the most quickly canonized saints in church history. Although he is known as the patron of lost items, his major shrine can be found in Padua, Italy. In January 1946, he is proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius XII, and is given the title of Doctor Evangelicus (Evangelical Doctor).