Christmas Every Day

St George’s Day

It is impossible to better this encomium to St George, found in Butler’s Lives of the Saints:

GEORGE is honoured in the Catholic church as one of the most illustrious martyrs of Christ. The Greeks have long distinguished him by the title of The Great Martyr, and keep his festival a holiday of obligation. There stood formerly in Constantinople five or six churches dedicated in his honour; the oldest of which was always said to have been built by Constantine the Great; who seems also to have been the founder of the church of St. George, which stood over his tomb in Palestine. Both these churches were certainly built under the first Christian emperors. In the middle of the sixth age the Emperor Justinian erected a new church, in honour of this saint, at Bizanes, in Lesser Armenia: the Emperor Mauritius founded one in Constantinople. It is related in the life of St. Theodorus of Siceon, that he served God a long while in a chapel which bore the name of St. George, had a particular devotion to this glorious martyr, and strongly recommended the same to Mauritius, when he foretold him the empire. One of the churches of St. George in Constantinople, called Manganes, with a monastery adjoining, gave to the Hellespont the name of the Arm of St. George. To this day is St. George honoured as principal patron or tutelar saint by several eastern nations, particularly the Georgians. The Byzantine historians relate several battles to have been gained, and other miracles wrought through his intercession. From frequent pilgrimages to his church and tomb in Palestine, performed by those who visited the Holy Land, his veneration was much propagated over the West. St. Gregory of Tours mentions him as highly celebrated in France in the sixth century. St. Gregory the Great ordered an old church of St. George, which was fallen to decay, to be repaired. His office is found in the sacramentary of that pope, and many others. St. Clotildis, wife of Clovis, the first Christian king of France, erected altars under his name; and the church of Chelles, built by her, was originally dedicated in his honour. The ancient life of Droctovæus mentions, that certain relics of St. George were placed in the church of St. Vincent, now called St. Germaris, in Paris, when it was first consecrated. Fortunatus of Poitiers wrote an epigram on a church of St. George, in Mentz. The intercession of this saint was implored especially in battles, and by warriors, as appears by several instances in the Byzantine history, and he is said to have been himself a great soldier. He is at this day the tutelar saint of the republic of Genoa; and was chosen by our ancestors in the same quality under our first Norman kings. The great national council, held at Oxford in 1222, commanded his feast to be kept a holiday of the lesser rank throughout all England. Under his name and ensign was instituted by our victorious King Edward III in 1330, the most noble Order of knighthood in Europe, consisting of twenty-five knights, besides the sovereign. Its establishment is dated fifty years before the knights of St. Michael were instituted in France, by Lewis XI, eighty years before the Order of the Golden Fleece, established by Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy; and one hundred and ninety before the Order of St. Andrew was set up in Scotland by James V. The Emperor Frederick IV. instituted, in 1470, an Order of knights in honour of St. George; and an honourable military Order in Venice bears his name.

The extraordinary devotion of all Christendom to this saint, is an authentic proof how glorious his triumph and name have always been in the church. All his acts relate, that he suffered under Dioclesian, at Nicomedia. Joseph Assemani shows, from the unanimous consent of all churches, that he was crowned on the 23rd of April. According to the account given us by Metaphrastes, he was born in Cappadocia, of noble Christian parents. After the death of his father, he went with his mother into Palestine, she being a native of that country, and having there a considerable estate, which fell to her son George. He was strong and robust in body, and having embraced the profession of a soldier, was made a tribune, or colonel in the army. By his courage and conduct, he was soon preferred to higher stations by the Emperor Dioclesian. When that prince waged war against the Christian religion, St. George laid aside the marks of his dignity, threw up his commission and posts, and complained to the emperor himself of his severities and bloody edicts. He was immediately cast into prison, and tried, first by promises, and afterwards put to the question, and tortured with great cruelty; but nothing could shake his constancy. The next day he was led through the city and beheaded. Some think him to have been the same illustrious young man who tore down the edicts when they were first fixed up at Nicomedia, as Lactantius relates in his book, On the Death of the Persecutors, and Eusebius in his history. The reason why St. George has been regarded as the patron of military men, is partly upon the score of his profession, and partly upon the credit of a relation of his appearing to the Christian army in the holy war, before the battle of Antioch. The success of this battle proving fortunate to the Christians, under Godfrey of Bouillon, made the name of St. George more famous in Europe, and disposed the military men to implore more particularly his intercession. This devotion was confirmed, as it is said, by an apparition of St. George to our king, Richard I, in his expedition against the Saracens: which vision, being declared to the troops, was to them a great encouragement, and they soon after defeated the enemy. St. George is usually painted on horseback, and tilting at a dragon, under his feet; but this representation is no more than an emblematical figure, purporting, that, by his faith and Christian fortitude, he conquered the devil, called the dragon in the Apocalypse.

Though many dishonour the profession of arms by a licentiousness of manners, yet, to show us that perfect sanctity is attainable in all states, we find the names of more soldiers recorded in the martyrologies than almost of any other profession. Every true disciple of Christ must be a martyr in the disposition of his heart, as he must be ready to lose all, and to suffer anything, rather than to offend God. Every good Christian is also a martyr, by the patience and courage with which he bears all trials. There is no virtue more necessary, nor of which the exercise ought to be more frequent, than patience. In this mortal life we have continually something to suffer from disappointments in affairs, from the severity of the seasons, from the injustice, caprice, peevishness, jealousy, or antipathy of others; and from ourselves, in pains either of mind or body. Even our own weaknesses and faults are to us subjects of patience. And as we have continually many burdens, both of our own and others, to bear, it is only in patience that we are to possess our souls. This affords us comfort in all our sufferings, and maintains our souls in unshaken tranquillity and peace. This is true greatness of mind, and the virtue of heroic souls. But, alas! every accident ruffles and disturbs us: and we are insupportable even to ourselves. What comfort should we find, what peace should we enjoy, what treasures of virtue should we heap up, what an harvest of merits should we reap, if we had learned the true spirit of Christian patience! This is the martyrdom, and the crown of every faithful disciple of Christ.

1538

John Calvin is expelled from Geneva

John Calvin (1509-64) was a French preacher and theologian inextricably linked with the Reformation in Geneva, a town which he would fashion into the Protestant version of the Vatican, a headquarters for an international religious movement.

Calvin was born into a Catholic family in northern France and moved to Paris as a young man to study philosophy; later he enrolled in the University of Orleans as a law student. He gained a reputation as a brilliant humanist, publishing a translation of Seneca’s De Clementia or On Mercy. Back in Paris he fell into the controversy over religious reform which was dividing the royal court and the intellectual class. He sided with the reformers and had to flee France in 1534 during a crack-down on dissidents after the brazen “Affair of the Placards” in which Protestant tracts appeared surreptitiously in the king’s quarters. Calvin ended up in Basel which was undergoing a reformation and there he wrote his first edition of The Institutes of Christian Religion in 1536. Continuing his enforced wanderings he ended up in Geneva where he was asked by William Farel (1489-1565), the leading reformer, to stay and assist him in converting the townsfolk. The two of them drew up a new confession of faith and a revised church structure but they ran into heavy opposition from some leading families. Finally, in April 1538 after Calvin and Farel had disobeyed the town council and refused to administer communion with unleavened bread (part of a plan to harmonize Protestant practices in the Swiss cities) riots broke out, opposition coalesced and the two reformers were given three days to get out of Geneva.

Farel would find employment in Neuchâtel and Calvin in Strasbourg, but in 1541 Geneva asked for him to return and complete his reforms. He replied, “Rather would I submit to death a hundred times than to that cross on which I had to perish daily a thousand times over” but in the end he agreed to come back on his terms. During his second term Geneva would become the leading city of the Protestant Reformation.

1653

Oliver Cromwell dissolves the Rump Parliament

“You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately … Depart, I say; and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!” With these words General Oliver Cromwell ordered the English Parliament, called “the Rump” because it was all that remained after the last legitimate Parliament elected in 1640 had been purged of dissident members, disbanded at the point of the sword.

The Rump had been instrumental in reshaping the religious landscape of Britain. They had abolished the requirement that all worship must be in an Anglican church, allowing some other forms of Protestantism to flourish while cracking down on extremists such as Quakers and Ranters. They mandated a government license to preach and tried to enforce sexual morality with stiff penalties against adultery or fornication.

On April 20, 1653, when it seemed as if the Rump would not honour its pledge to dissolve itself Cromwell dismissed them with a troop of soldiers and hard words:

It is high time for me to put an end to your sitting in this place, which you have dishonored by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice. Ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government. Ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would like Esau sell your country for a mess of pottage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money. Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye have no more religion than my horse. Gold is your God. Which of you have not bartered your conscience for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth?

Ye sordid prostitutes have you not defiled this sacred place, and turned the Lord’s temple into a den of thieves, by your immoral principles and wicked practices? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation. You were deputed here by the people to get grievances redressed, are yourselves become the greatest grievance. Your country therefore calls upon me to cleanse this Augean stable, by putting a final period to your iniquitous proceedings in this House; and which by God’s help, and the strength he has given me, I am now come to do.

I command ye therefore, upon the peril of your lives, to depart immediately out of this place. Go, get you out! Make haste! Ye venal slaves be gone! So! Take away that shining bauble there [the Speaker’s Mace], and lock up the doors. In the name of God, go!

The body that Cromwell appointed to replace the Rump was supposed to be filled only by godly Puritans; it came to be known as “Barebone’s Parliament” after one its more famous members, Praise-God-and-Flee-Fornication Barebones (brother of the equally wonderfully-named Fear-God Barebones or, according to another source, Rise-Up-and-Tell-the-Glory-of-Emmanuel Barebones or, according to yet another source, Christ-Came-Into-The-World-To-Save-Thee Barebone and If-Christ-Had-Not-Died, Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned Barebone. The latter was known locally simply as Damned Barebone).

1521

Martin Luther defends himself at the Diet of Worms

Since his 1517 publication of the “95 Theses” the Augustinian monk Martin Luther had been under attack by Roman Catholic authorities, but the protection offered by his politically-powerful ruler, Frederick of Saxony, had kept him safe. Frederick had resisted calls for Luther to be tried in Italy and had demanded that the star lecturer at his Wittenberg university be examined by Germans in Germany. The death of the Emperor Maximilian and the delay on the part of the new emperor, Charles V, in moving to Germany meant that Luther had enjoyed four years to freely expand on his radical ideas, but in the spring of 1521 he was finally summoned to the city of Worms to face his accusers at the German Diet or Parliament.

Luther was promised a safe-conduct, which his friends urged him not to trust in because such a document had not saved Jan Hus from burning at the hands of the Council of Constance in 1415, but he was determined to go, believing that though it meant his death he had to affirm the truth of his writings. However, rather than be given a chance to explain or defend his beliefs, he was faced with a simple set of questions when he arrived in Worms. Taken into a room and shown a table full of books he was asked: “Are these your books? Do you recant all or part of your writings?” He asked for 24 hours to reflect and the next evening on April 18 he appeared before the Emperor and court assembled in the cathedral. His short speech revolutionized the world and defined Protestantism:

Since your serene majesty and lordships seek a simple answer, I will give it in this manner, neither horned nor toothed: Unless I am convinced by Scripture or by clear reason (for I do not trust either in the pope or in councils alone, since it is well known that they have often erred and contradicted themselves), I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted and my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not retract anything, since it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. I cannot do otherwise, here I stand, may God help me, amen.

Amid shouting, the emperor declared he had heard enough and the meeting broke up. After a few more days of fruitless palaver Luther left Worms under an imperial safe-conduct. The emperor stayed on to issue the Edict of Worms by which Luther was declared an outlaw, wolf’s-head, liable to instant death at any man’s hand.

In the 1577 woodcut above you can see the phrase “Hier stehe ich. Ich kann nicht anders. Gott helfe mir. Amen.“

St Bernadette

Marie Bernarde “Bernadette” Soubirous (1844 – 1879) was the sickly, illiterate daughter of a poor miller in southern France. When she was 14 years old she underwent a series of visions which convinced the Roman Catholic Church that she had been visited by the Virgin Mary.

In February, 1858 she and her sister were out gathering firewood when Bernadette was struck by the appearance of a bright light inside a grotto. Over the next few weeks, the apparitions continued with the figure of a woman wearing a white robe becoming clearer to Bernadette. She received instructions from the vision to drink the water of the local spring, now miraculously clear, and establish a channel there. In the sixteenth of eighteen sightings the figure identified herself (in the local Gascon dialect) as “the Immaculate Conception”.

Though many neighbours were convinced that mental illness lay at the root of these visions, a Church investigation pronounced them authentic. Visitors began to flock to the grotto in Lourdes and so many claimed miraculous healing that the site has become a major destination of pilgrims for the last century and a half. Five million visits are now made annually.

Bernadette joined the Sisters of Charity and lived as a nun until her death in 1879. She was canonized in 1933 and ten years later Jennifer Jones won the Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of the saint in The Song of Bernadette.

1205

Bulgars defeat the forces of the Latin Empire

Devoted readers of this blog will remember that on April 12 we recounted the story of the fall of Constantinople in 1204 to the forces of the Fourth Crusade who overthrew the Orthodox Byzantine rulers, sacked the city and established a Catholic empire. The first emperor of this new state was Baldwin of Flanders, a western knight who faced resistance from both his fellow crusaders and rebellious Greeks. In 1205 his army was defeated by an army of Bulgars and their pagan allies from the Eurasian steppes, the Cumans. Baldwin was captured and disappears from history except for a legend that he was murdered by his captors and his skull turned into a drinking goblet, the same fate to which the Bulgars had subjected the emperor Nicephorus in 811.

In Western Europe Baldwin became one of those kings whose shadowy fate inspired impostors, like the False Dmitri (I and II) in Russia and the Princes in the Tower who bedevilled the reign of Henry VII in England. A minstrel named Bertrand appeared twenty years later and claimed to be Baldwin, explaining his absence by a story of having become a hermit. Though Bertrand was exposed as a fake, a number of other impostors appeared for the next few decades and inspired discontented peasants to follow them.

The Catholic or Latin Empire never really took hold in the ruins of the Byzantine state and in 1261 Michael Paleologus would succeed in driving the westerners out of Constantinople and establishing the last Orthodox dynasty in the empire.