Daily Reading for November 1 • The Feast of All Saints

How glad I am to find this short chapter from the Rule on the celebration of Vigils or Matins on the anniversaries of saints. It adds another dimension to the sense of time and order that Benedict is giving us. Once again I find it brings me something that I find so strongly in the Celtic tradition: the sense of an almost physical presence of the saints around me so that it is quite natural to feel oneself “keeping house amid a cloud of witnesses.” I am reminded of how I am linked to the communion of saints. If at intervals during the year I am recalled to their life on earth and their presence in eternity, this helps me to become aware of my part as a member of the body of Christ. Here is one more element in that corporate sense that Benedict is building up. I am inserted into the community here on earth; I am also part of a community in the wider context of the Church beyond time and space. It makes me think in gratitude of what I owe to the saints, living and dead, known and unknown.

From A Life-Giving Way: A Commentary on the Rule of St. Benedict by Esther de Waal (Liturgical Press, 1995).

Daily Reading for November 2 • All Faithful Departed

Death has come to reveal the faith.
It has begun with us, and it will end with us.
O you who fear death, do not fear death.
It only means that one will disappear from the earth.
Who is there who can save his life and leave death aside?
We who live in the world, we are mere sojourners upon the earth.

Let us encourage our hearts in the hope of God
who once breathed the breath of life into the human body.
His ears are open to prayers; the Creator of humankind is watching;
He reigns from his high place, seeing the souls of those who die.
Turn your ears to us: upon whom else can we call?
Is it not you alone, O God? Let us be branches of your Son.

From a song composed in the Jieng Tuich dialect by Mary Alueel Garang and translated by Marc Nikkel, quoted in “Death has Come to Reveal the Faith: Spirituality in the Episcopal Church of the Sudan Amidst Civil Conflict” by Marc Nikkel, in Anglicanism: A Global Communion, ed. Andrew Wingate, Kevin Ward, Carrie Pemberton, and Wilson Sitshebo. Copyright © 1998. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

Daily Reading for November 3 • Richard Hooker, Priest, 1600

The praises of God in the mouths of his Saints are not so restrained to their own particular, but that others may both conveniently and fruitfully use them; first, because the mystical communion of all faithful men is such as maketh every one to be interested in those precious blessings which any one of them receiveth at God’s hands; secondly, because when any thing is spoken to extol the goodness of God, whose mercy endureth for ever, albeit the very particular occasion whereupon it riseth do come no more, yet . . . a small resemblance between the benefits, which we and others have received, may serve to make the same words of praise and thanksgiving fit, though not equally in all circumstances fit for both. . . . By often using their words in such a manner, our minds are daily more and more inured with their affections.

From Richard Hooker’s Ecclesiastical Polity, Book V, in The Works of Mr. Richard Hooker, edited by the Rev. W. S. Dobson, M.A. (London: J. F. Dove, 1825).

Daily Reading for November 4

Another thing has begun to happen in our days. The holy places have begun to come to life. Who could have foreseen the revival of pilgrimage to Lindisfarne and Glastonbury, or still more surprisingly, to Walsingham? What is it which draws people to such places? It is the presence of the saints and the prayers of the saints.

“For wherever a saint has dwelt,
wherever a martyr has given his blood for the blood of Christ,
There is holy ground, and the sanctity shall not depart from it.”
(T. S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral)

The instinct to go to places where people have lived is not a wholly vain one. It is one thing to know that George Herbert gave up a promising career in Cambridge and London in order to bury himself in an insignificant country parish. It is another to kneel before the altar in the tiny church at Bemerton. It is one thing to know that at a time of great danger during the war George Bell and Dietrich Bonhoeffer met in Sweden, transcending all the conflict in a relationship established in Christ. It is another thing to sit in the quiet house in Sigtuna where the meeting actually took place. Our own lives and the life of our nation are not so full of places of epiphany that we can afford to neglect them. They are part of our eucharist and our anamnesis, our recalling of the things that God has done, and our thanksgiving for them. For the lives of God’s friends often seem in a strange way to gather up and fulfil the aspirations of a whole people. What is true and characteristic of a nation or a country in them is not lost, but transfigured.

For the communion of saints is never an abstract or ethereal thing, a piece of superfluous doctrine. It is rooted in this earth, in places where people have lived and loved, and seen the glory of God shining out in the common light of every day. But those who have been constantly with God in prayer have even in this life become somewhat freer of time and space than most of us are. In prayer we come more intimately into touch with those unconscious levels of our being which seem to be less tied to the time sequence than our consciousness is. Beyond them we begin to enter into the deep places of the Spirit. Perhaps that is why, even after centuries of neglect, holy places are still found to be full of a timeless presence.

From “The Communion of Saints” in The World is a Wedding by A.M. Allchin (London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1978).

Daily Reading for November 5

If we seriously believe that the redemptive power of Christ’s death and resurrection works backwards in time as well as forwards, we must not narrow the scope of God’s activity and God’s love. All are united with all. Those whom the Churches officially recognize as “Saints” are simply those in whom the Christian people recognize some outstanding manifestation of the one life in Christ which is common to all. It is because all are called to be saints, that the Church is able to recognize in some the outstanding generosity of response to a call which all share.

And what a glory of generosity is revealed in the lives and faces of the Saints! In them the true dimensions of our common humanity begin to become apparent. “The human heart can go to the lengths of God.” There is in man a capacity for suffering and for joy, for love and for knowledge which too often we hardly suspect. Our wounded and deeply pessimistic age has too small a regard for the nature and dignity of man. . . .The world will live by the faith of the Saints, those who have not despaired, who in the darkness have seen light, and have therefore been able to bring light and hope to a whole people. These are not only men and women of our own day. Here time and space no longer divide. A young monk on Mount Athos has recently written, “I am reading St. Isaac the Syrian. I feel for the first time that there is a voice which resonates in the very depths of my being. Although he is so far removed from me in space and time, he has come right into my room, spoken to me, sat down beside me. For the first time I feel a kind of pride in our human nature, an amazement before it. . . . He belongs to our common humanity. I rejoice at this. Being of the same nature as myself, he can transfuse the life-giving blood of this freedom into me. He reveals to me man in his true nature.”

From “The Communion of Saints” in The World is a Wedding by A.M. Allchin (London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1978).

Daily Reading for November 6 • William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1944

O God of love, we ask you to give us love:
love in our thinking, love in our speaking, love in our doing,
and love in the hidden places of our souls;
love of our neighbours, near and far;
love of our friends, old and new;
love of those whom we find it hard to bear with us;
love of those with whom we work,
and love of those with whom we take our ease;
love in joy, love in sorrow,
love in life and love in death;
that so at length we may be worthy to dwell with you,
who are eternal Love. Amen.

A prayer of Archbishop William Temple, quoted in Give Us Grace: An Anthology of Anglican Prayers, compiled by Christopher L. Webber. Copyright © 2004. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for November 7 • Willibrord, Archbishop of Utrecht, Missionary to Frisia, 739

When this youth, as highly endowed with sacred learning as he was with self-control and integrity, reached the twentieth year of his age he felt an urge to pursue a more rigorous mode of life and was stirred with a desire to travel abroad. And because he had heard that schools and learning flourished in Ireland, he was encouraged further by what he was told of the manner of life adopted there by certain holy men, for love of Christ, forsook home, fatherland and family and retired to Ireland, where, cut off from the world though close to God, they lived as solitaries enjoying the blessings of heavenly contemplation. The blessed youth wished to imitate the godly life of these men and, after obtaining the consent of his abbot and brethren, hastened quickly across the sea to join the intimate circle of the said fathers, so that by contact with them he might attain the same degree of holiness and possess the same virtues, much as a bee sucks honey from the flowers and stores it up in its honeycomb. There among these masters, eminent both for sanctity and sacred learning, he who was one day to preach to many peoples was trained for twelve years, until he reached the mature age of manhood and the full age of Christ.

Accordingly, in the thirty-third year of his age the fervour of his faith had reached such an intensity that he considered it of little value to labour at his own sanctification unless he could preach the Gospel to others and bring some benefit to them. He had heard that in the northern regions of the world the harvest was great but the labourers few. Thus it was that, in fulfilment of the dream which his mother stated she had seen, Willibrord, fully aware of his own purpose but ignorant as yet of divine preordination, decided to sail for those parts and, if God so willed, to bring the light of the Gospel message to those people who through unbelief had not been stirred by its warmth. So he embarked on a ship, taking with him eleven others who shared his enthusiasm for the faith. Some of these afterwards gained the martyr’s crown through their constancy in preaching the Gospel, others were later to become bishops and, after their labours in the holy work of preaching, have since gone to their rest in peace.

From The Life of St. Willibrord by Alcuin (c. 796). http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/Alcuin-willbrord.html

Daily Reading for November 8 • The Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost

We have been entrusted with the administration and use of temporal wealth for the common good, not with the everlasting ownership of private property. If you accept the fact that ownership on earth is only for a time, you can earn eternal possessions in heaven. Call to mind the widow who forgot herself in her concern for the poor and, thinking only of the life to come, gave away all her means of subsistence, as the judge himself bears witness. Others, he says, have given of their superfluous wealth; but she, possessed of only two small coins and more needy perhaps than many of the poor—though in spiritual riches she surpassed all the wealthy—she thought only of the world to come, and had such a longing for heavenly treasure that she gave away, all at once, whatever she had that was derived from the earth and destined to return there. Let us then invest with the Lord what he has given us, for we have nothing that does not come from him: we are dependent upon him for our very existence. . . . So let us give back to the Lord the gifts he has given us. Let us give to him who receives in the person of every poor man or woman. Let us give gladly, I say, and great joy will be ours when we receive his promised reward.

From the letters of Paulinus of Nola, quoted in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament II, Mark, edited by Thomas C. Oden and Christopher A. Hall (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1998).

Daily Reading for November 9

Our work for justice must flow naturally out of our being in love with those for whom there is no justice. Otherwise our activism is nothing more than a “sounding gong or a clanging cymbal.”

When we are truly “with” those on the margins, or not even on the system’s map at all, those real relationships will lead to the confrontation of unjust systems. When we join our hearts with the excluded we may not always witness a change in systems, but we will certainly discover that we, ourselves, are being transformed.

Sharing resources and engaging in compassionate works, on their own, may in fact have the unintended effect of postponing the dismantling of unjust systems. We must not let our call and focus on compassionate works result in our allowing city, state and federal governments to shirk the responsibilities of providing affordable housing, healthcare, adequate education, decent wages, unemployment benefits and so on.

In her book, Sweet Charity, sociologist Janet Poppendieck writes that charity can act as “a sort of moral safety valve; it can reduce the discomfort evoked by visible destitution in our midst by creating the illusion of effective action and offering us myriad ways of participating in it. It can create a culture of charity that normalizes destitution and legitimates personal generosity as a response” to injustice, rather than encouraging the work of systemic change.

We must maintain a sense of outrage over systems that leave out huge segments of our human family. Compassionate works are not enough. Compassionate works and confronting unjust systems must go together as two sides of the same coin.

From “The Ultimate Question: Where Is My Security?” by K. Killian Noe, quoted in Money and Faith: The Search for Enough, edited and compiled by Michael Schut. Copyright © 2008. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for November 10 • Leo the Great, Bishop of Rome, 461

It is a great and very precious thing, beloved, in the Lord’s sight, when Christ’s whole people engage together in the same duties, and all ranks and degrees of either sex co-operate with the same intent: when one purpose animates all alike of declining from evil and doing good; when God is glorified in the works of His slaves, and the Author of all godliness is blessed in unstinted giving of thanks. The hungry are nourished, the naked are clothed, the sick are visited, and men seek not their own but “that which is another’s,” so long as in relieving the misery of others each one makes the most of his own means; and it is easy to find “a cheerful giver,” where a man’s performances are only limited by the extent of his power. By this grace of God, “which worketh all in all,” the benefit and the deserts of the faithful are both enjoyed in common. For they, whose income is not like, can yet think alike, and when one rejoices over another’s bounty his feelings put him on the same level with him whose powers of spending are on a different level. In such a community there is no disorder nor diversity, for all the members of the whole body agree in one strong purpose of godliness, and he who glories in the wealth of others is not put to shame at his own poverty. For the excellence of each portion is the glory of the whole body, and when we are all led by God’s Spirit, not only are the things we do ourselves our own but those of others also over the doing of which we rejoice.

Let us then, dearly-beloved, lay hold upon this most sacred unity in all its blessed integrity and engage in the solemn fast with the concordant purpose of a good will. Nothing hard, nothing harsh is asked of anyone, nor is anything imposed beyond our strength, whether in the discipline of abstinence or in the amount of alms. Each knows what he can and what he cannot do: let every one pay his quota, assessing himself at a just and reasonable rate, that the sacrifice of mercy be not offered sadly nor reckoned among losses. Let so much be expended on pious work, as will justify the heart, wash the conscience, and in a word profit both giver and receiver. Happy indeed is that soul and truly to be admired which in its love of doing good fears not the failing of the means, and has no distrust that He will give him money still to spend, from Whom he had what he spent in the past. But because few possess this greatness of heart, and yet it is truly a pious thing for each one not to forsake the care of his own, we, without prejudice to the more perfect sort, lay down for you this general rule and exhort you to perform God’s bidding according to the measure of your ability. For cheerfulness becomes the benevolent man, who should so manage his liberality that while the poor rejoice over the help supplied, home needs may not suffer.

From Sermon LXXXVIII of Leo the Great, “On the Fast of the Seventh Month”; found at http://www.synaxis.org/cf/volume35/ECF00019.htm#4d9bf608

Daily Reading for November 11 • Martin, Bishop of Tours, 397

At a certain period, when Martin had nothing except his arms and his simple military dress, in the middle of winter, a winter which had shown itself more severe than ordinary, so that the extreme cold was proving fatal to many, he happened to meet at the gate of the city of Amiens a poor man destitute of clothing. He was entreating those that passed by to have compassion upon him, but all passed the wretched man without notice, when Martin, that man full of God, recognized that a being to whom others showed no pity, was, in that respect, left to him. Yet, what should he do? He had nothing except the cloak in which he was clad, for he had already parted with the rest of his garments for similar purposes. Taking, therefore, his sword with which he was girt, he divided his cloak into two equal parts, and gave one part to the poor man, while he again clothed himself with the remainder. Upon this, some of the by-standers laughed, because he was now an unsightly object, and stood out as but partly dressed. Many, however, who were of sounder understanding, groaned deeply because they themselves had done nothing similar. They especially felt this, because, being possessed of more than Martin, they could have clothed the poor man without reducing themselves to nakedness.

In the following night, when Martin had resigned himself to sleep, he had a vision of Christ arrayed in that part of his cloak with which he had clothed the poor man. He contemplated the Lord with the greatest attention, and was told to own as his the robe which he had given. Ere long, he heard Jesus saying with a clear voice to the multitude of angels standing round—“Martin, who is still but a catechumen, clothed me with this robe.” The Lord, truly mindful of his own words (who had said when on earth—“Inasmuch as ye have done these things to one of the least of these, ye have done them unto me”), declared that he himself had been clothed in that poor man; and to confirm the testimony he bore to so good a deed, he condescended to show him himself in that very dress which the poor man had received.

After this vision the sainted man was not puffed up with human glory, but, acknowledging the goodness of God in what had been done, and being now of the age of twenty years, he hastened to receive baptism. He did not, however, all at once, retire from military service, yielding to the entreaties of his tribune, whom he admitted to be his familiar tent-companion. For the tribune promised that, after the period of his office had expired, he too would retire from the world. Martin, kept back by the expectation of this event, continued, although but in name, to act the part of a soldier, for nearly two years after he had received baptism.

From Life of St. Martin by Sulpitius Severus, translated by Alexander Roberts; found at http://www.users.csbsju.edu/~eknuth/npnf2-11/sulpitiu/lifeofst.html

Daily Reading for November 12 • Charles Simeon, priest, 1836

But we must go further, and say, that the use of the Liturgy is equally expedient still. Of course, we must not he understood as speaking of private prayer in the closet; where though a young and inexperienced person may get help from written forms, it is desirable that every one should learn to express his own wants in his own language; because no written prayer can enter so minutely into his wants and feelings as he himself may do: but in public, we maintain, that the use of such a form as ours is still as expedient as ever. To lead the devotions of a congregation in extempore prayer is a work for which but few are qualified. An extensive knowledge of the Scriptures must be combined with fervent piety, in order to fit a person for such an undertaking: and I greatly mistake if there be found a humble person in the world, who, after engaging often in that arduous work, does not wish at times that he had a suitable form prepared for him.

That the constant repetition of the same form does not so forcibly arrest the attention as new sentiments and expressions would do, must be confessed: but, on the other hand, the use of a well-composed form secures us against the dry, dull, tedious repetitions which are but too frequently the fruits of extemporaneous devotions. Only let any person be in a devout frame, and he will be far more likely to have his soul elevated to heaven by the Liturgy of the Established Church, than he will by the generality of prayers which he would hear in other places of worship: and, if any one complain that he cannot enter into the spirit of them, let him only examine his frame of mind when engaged in extemporaneous prayers, whether in public, or in his own family; and he will find, that his formality is not confined to the service of the Church, but is the sad fruit and consequence of his own weakness and corruption.

Here it may not be amiss to rectify the notions which are frequently entertained of spiritual edification. Many, if their imaginations are pleased, and their spirits elevated, are ready to think, that they have been greatly edified and this error is at the root of that preference which they give to extempore prayer, and the indifference which they manifest towards the prayers of the Established Church. But real edification consists in humility of mind, and in being led to a more holy and consistent walk with God: and one atom of such a spirit is more valuable than all the animal fervour that ever was excited. It is with solid truths, and not with fluent words, that we are to be impressed; and if we can desire from our hearts the things which we pray for in our public forms, we need never regret, that our fancy was not gratified, or our animal spirits raised, by the delusive charms of novelty.

From Sermon II in The Excellency of the Liturgy, in Four Discourses preached before the University of Cambridge in November 1811, by the Rev. Charles Simeon, M.A. (New York: Eastburn, Kirk, and Co., 1813).

Daily Reading for November 13

My prayers, of little worth though they be, will not fail you; I have promised it and I will keep my word. How happy we might be, if only we could find the treasure, of which the gospel tells us—all else would seem to us nothing.

How infinite it is! The more one toils and searches in it, the greater are the riches that one finds. Let us toil therefore unceasingly in this search, and let us not grow weary and leave off, till we have found. . . .

I know not what I shall become: it seems to me that peace of soul and repose of spirit descend on me, even in sleep. I only know that God keeps me; I am in a calm so great that I fear nought. What can I fear, when I am with him? And with him, in his presence, I hold myself the most I can.

May all things praise him. Amen.

From Daily Readings with Brother Lawrence, arranged and introduced by Robert Llewelyn (Springfield, Ill.: Templegate Publishers, 1985).

Daily Reading for November 14 • Samuel Seabury, First American Bishop, 1796

An intense earnestness and profound simplicity pervade the pages of Bishop Seabury’s Journal; and indeed, appear to have permeated his whole life. There is always evidence of his abiding consciousness that he was not his own, but that he belonged wholly to God, in whose presence, and under whose fatherly protection and guidance, he lived and moved and had his being. Such habitual devotion, and the utter simplicity of the faith and love out of which it grew, belong to a type of Christian character which the world knows little of, and which the Church, one is sometimes tempted to think, has well nigh forgotten. But it has existed, and doubtless still does exist; though to describe it now would be but describing the fashion of a kind life which some of us can well remember to have been brought up in, but which few, alas, can be conscious of having continued to keep.

From Memoir of Bishop Seabury by William Jones Seabury, D.D. (New York: Edwin S. Gorham, 1908).

Daily Reading for November 15 • The Twenty-Fourth Sunday after Pentecost and Francis Asbury, 1816, and George Whitefield, 1770, Evangelists

Friday 5. The rain is over; the clouds scattered and gone; and nature smileth again. I only mourn the oppression I cannot remove. . . .

Tuesday 9. The weather is temperate: my mind is much pained. Oh! to be dependant on slave-holders is in part to be a slave, and I was free born. I am brought to conclude that slavery will exist in Virginia perhaps for ages; there is not a sufficient sense of religion nor of liberty to destroy it; Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, in the highest flights of rapturous piety, still maintain and defend it. I judge in after ages it will be so that poor men and free men will not live among slave-holders, but will go to new lands: they only who are concerned in, and dependent on them will stay in old Virginia.

Wednesday 10. I have some peace and some pain of heart. . . .

Tuesday 22. We had news from the assembly, that the American ambassadors were rejected at Paris. A report prevails that the French were about to invade England with one hundred and fifty thousand men. The British can raise two hundred thousand militia, and two hundred thousand regulars; there may yet be most desperate times—worse than in Julius Cesar’s day. My mind is in peace. We have winterly weather: more snow after much rain this day: thank God I have where to lay my head, a little reading and winding of cotton that I may not be quite idle. . . .

Friday 25. Was a gloomy morning to me: nothing but the thoughts of death agitated my mind. It oppresses my heart to think that I live upon others and am useless, and that I may die by inches.

Sunday 27. A solitary day to me, neither preaching, reading, writing, nor conversing.

Monday 28. I was employed in revising my journal. I am like Mr. Whitefield, who being presented with one of his extempore sermons taken in short hand, could not bear to see his own face. I doubt whether my journals yet remaining will appear until after my death; I could send them to England and get a price for them; but money is not my object.

Tuesday 5. My fever was very light last night. I received a most loving letter from the Charleston conference; there is great peace and good prospects there. I hope to be able to move next week. I have well considered my journal—it is inelegant; yet it conveys much information of the state of religion and country. It is well suited to common readers; the wise need it not. I have a desire that my journals should be published, at least after my death, if not before. I make no doubt but others have laboured: but in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and those kingdoms which have been civilized and improved one thousand years, and which are under such improvements, no ministers could have suffered in those days, and in those countries, as in America, the most ancient parts of which have not been settled two hundred years. Some parts not forty, others not thirty, twenty, nor ten, and some not five years. I have frequently skimmed along the frontiers, for four and five hundred miles, from Kentucky to Green Brier, on the very edge of the wilderness; and thence along Tigers Valley, to Clarksburgh on the Ohio. These places . . . yet abound with wild beasts. I am only known by name to many of our people, and some of our local preachers; and unless the people were all together, they could not tell what I have had to cope with. I make no doubt the Methodists are, and will be, a numerous, and wealthy people, and their preachers who follow us will not know our struggles but by comparing the present improved state of the country with what it was in our days, as exhibited in my journal and other records of that day.

From The Journal of the Rev. Francis Asbury, From August 7, 1771 to December 7, 1815, vol. 2 (New York: Bangs and Mason, 1821); entries taken from February and March, 1798.

Daily Reading for November 16 • Margaret, Queen of Scotland, 1093

To these two excellent gifts of prayer and abstinence she joined the gift of mercy. For what could be more compassionate than her heart? Who could be more gentle than she towards the necessitous? Not only would she have given to the poor all that she possessed; but if she could have done so she would have given her very self away. She was poorer than any of her paupers; for they, even when they had nothing, wished to have something; while all her anxiety was to strip herself of what she had. When she went out of doors, either on foot or on horseback, crowds of poor people, orphans and widows flocked to her, as they would have done to a most loving mother, and none of them left her without being comforted. . . .

Now and then she helped herself to something or other out of the King’s private property, it mattered not what it was, to give to a poor person; and this pious plundering the King always took pleasantly and in good part. It was his custom to offer certain coins of gold upon Maundy Thursday and at High Mass, some of which coins the Queen often devoutly pillaged, and bestowed on the beggar who was petitioning her for help. Although the King was fully aware of the theft, he generally pretended to know nothing of it, and felt much amused by it. Now and then he caught the Queen in the very act, with the money in her hand, and laughingly threatened that he would have her arrested, tried, and found guilty. Nor was it towards the poor of her own nation only that she exhibited the abundance of her cheerful and open-hearted charity, but those persons who came from almost every other nation, drawn by the report of her liberality, were the partakers of her bounty. . . .

Who can tell the number of English of all ranks, carried captive from their own land by violence of war and reduced to slavery, whom she restored to liberty by paying their ransom? Spies were employed by her to go secretly through all the provinces of Scotland and ascertain what captives were oppressed with the most cruel bondage, and treated with the greatest inhumanity. When she had privately ascertained where these prisoners were detained, and by whom ill-treated, commiserating them from the bottom of her heart, she took care to send them speedy help, paid their ransom and set them at liberty forthwith.

At the period of which we are speaking, there were in many places throughout the realm of Scotland persons shut up in different cells, and leading lives of great strictness; in the flesh, but not according to the flesh; for being upon earth, they led the life of angels. These the Queen busied herself in often visiting and conversing with, for in them she loved and venerated Christ, and would recommend herself to their prayers. As she could not induce them to accept any earthly gift from her, she urgently entreated them to be so good as to bid her perform some almsdeed or work of mercy, and this devout woman did forthwith fulfil whatever was their pleasure, either by helping the poor out of their poverty or by relieving the distressed in their troubles, whatever these might be.

From The Life of St Margaret, Queen of Scotland by Turgot, Bishop of St Andrews, edited by William Forbes-Leith, S.J., third edition (Edinburgh: David Douglas, 1896). http://mw.mcmaster.ca/scriptorium/margaret.html

Daily Reading for November 17 • Hugh, 1200, and Robert Grosseteste, 1253, Bishops of Lincoln

“They that are Christ’s” begin by preparing a cross for themselves in their mind. For from the center of the mind, which is love or the will, they aim their love upward to God, to love Him above all things. From that very same center they aim love at their friends, to love them in God “as themselves.” Furthermore, they aim love at their enemies, to love them “as themselves,” for God’s sake. Now these two extensions of conscious love, that is, to friends and enemies, are like the two arms of a cross extended to the right and to the left. In the fourth place they aim their love at their flesh, since [it is written that] “no man ever hated his own flesh” [Eph. 5:29]; and they aim it also at other bodily creatures, in order to love them to the extent that they are matter for the knowledge, love, and praise of God. Since these creatures are of lower dignity than man, the love that is extended to them is like that cross-line that is directed from the center downward.

And so, just as in the physical cross the four lines forming the cross are drawn from a unique central point (one reaching upward, two going out to the right and left, and the fourth extending downward), in the same way it comes about spiritually in the cross of love, that the love of God is a line working its way upward; the love of friends a line stretching out to the right; the love of enemies a line going left; and the love of one’s own flesh and of other corporeal creatures a line reaching downward. Thus in this cross the flesh is crucified, since all the works that are done through the members of the body are directed in accordance with one of these four loves.

From a sermon of Robert Grosseteste on Galatians 5:24, quoted in Robert Grosseteste by James McEvoy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).

Daily Reading for November 18 • Hilda, Abbess of Whitby, 680

This question of the Benedictine and the Celtic traditions is a fascinating subject to explore, for it would seem at first glance so apparent that here we have two traditions that are extremely unalike. We have the Benedictine tradition, nurtured within the confines of the Roman Empire—even though it was in its demise, the great Roman concepts are still there: gravitas, stabilitas, ordo—while the Celtic flowers in those countries on the fringes of the Roman Empire were essentially untouched by its cultural and social infrastructure. The Celtic world has saints, peregrini, who go wandering in coracles without oars, wherever the spirit will take them; it has monastic rules which vary from monastery to monastery, and are written in poetry. . . .

It is this sense of being earthed in place, in the landscape, being rooted and grounded that I take as the first thread of this canvas which these two traditions give us. For both are deeply incarnational. Of course, everyone immediately associates Celtic spirituality with creation, with being close to the ground, bonded with the earth and with nature. This is the end of that disastrous split which has so damaged and twisted the way in which many of us first received our Christian faith, believing that it was really about being spiritual, going to church, saying prayers, being good. As a result we grew up finding a divorce between the material and the spiritual—something which George McLeod himself put his finger on so memorably on that day when I met him at Iona and walked round the cloisters with him, and he said, “Everyone is saying what is the matter with the church, the world today. The Matter is MATTER. The way in which we have spiritualised the faith, and set it apart from matter, whereas if we had remembered what the Celtic people always knew and still know, we should not be where we are today. . . .”

But then this is also St. Benedict’s gift. I can still remember the delight and amazement when I read that small phrase in the Rule where he told me that I could handle the things of the kitchen or the pantry or the garden with as much reverence and respect as if they were the sacred vessels of the altar. Handling with reverence and respect essentially means recognizing matter as God-given, seeing the tools of daily life, the times of the day, the light and dark, the stones and wood and glass of the monastery itself as things which can lead to God.

From “Where Celtic and Benedictine Traditions Meet” by Esther de Waal, in Christ is the Morning Star: When Celtic Spirituality Meets Benedictine Rule, edited by Linda Burton and Alex Whitehead (Dublin: Lindisfarne Books, 1999).

Daily Reading for November 19 • Elizabeth, Princess of Hungary, 1231

The independent spirit of Elizabeth’s personality, which feared losing itself in her privileged status of aristocratic courtship and motherhood, became manifest in her single minded dedication to live the “option for the poor.” Her desire to live as the poor must not be mistaken as conventional almsgiving, which was the duty of a noble lady. Very much influenced by Francis of Assisi, Elizabeth was not content to be the generous benefactor of the poor; instead she wanted to live as one who is poor among the poor.

What makes Elizabeth’s life most outstanding, however, is her sense of social justice. Elizabeth’s contribution consisted in seeing poverty not as willed by God but as closely linked with the lifestyle of the rich and noble classes. She recognized that many consumer goods were unjustly taken away from the poor peasants who were her subjects. Peasants and petty workers paid for the luxurious living of the princes and lords. Not wanting to participate any more than necessary in such brutal exploitation, she vowed to eat only the food that had been justly acquired—a protest that anticipates by centuries our modern form of boycotting consumer goods in order to bring about change.

From Discipleship of Equals by Elisabeth Schüssler-Fiorenza (New York: Crossroads, 1993).

Daily Reading for November 20 • Edmund, King of East Anglia, 870

Kingship, as every medieval churchman knew and as every medieval ruler was informed, was instituted by divine concession: it was exercised Dei gratia. The kingdom, accordingly had the status of a divine trust, in relation to which the ruler functioned not in or by his own right but rather as God’s vice-regent upon earth—as the holder of an office with more or less well-defined rights and duties and with a more or less well-defined scope and purpose. In general terms, that scope and purpose may be described as protection of the trust. . . .That ruler’s overriding concern was with the attainment of national felicitas--with pax, prosperitas and national salvation. The attainment of that goal was dependent in part upon the ruler’s own right relationship with God: by providing an example of personal virtue he was to act as moral rector to his people. It was dependent also upon the public utilitas of the ruler. That utilitas comprised, first, leadership in war; internal peace was to be the product of external security. And, second, it comprised the special and all-enveloping royal virtue—that of iusticia, with its associated power of correction. . . .

In the matter of kingship, the church did far more than simply adopt the traditions of pre-Christian society. Its concern was rather to mould the rulership which it inherited in accordance with its own societal needs—to create a new model of useful rulership. In do doing it produced a radical reinterpretation of the traditions to which it was the heir. Kings might be expected to do much the same things; but the principles underlying that expectation were new and challenging. The Christian leaders created a kingship which was not sacral, and sanctity which differed fundamentally from sacrality. . . . The Lives of the royal saints, it is clear, are wholly representative of early medieval thought on the nature of kingship: they are indeed one of the most important sources upon which analysis of that thought can and should be based. The rulership which they portray is a rulership conferred by God, justified by virtue and consummated by an ultimate translation to the kingdom of heaven. . . . Edmund attained sanctity not by the manner of his life but rather by the nature of his death, by his suffering martyrdom at the hands of the pagan. The single and crucial act upon which sanctity was founded represented not the renunciation of royal status but the fulfillment of royal duty. . . . Edmund’s martyrdom was a direct and immediate product of that moral choice which represented the ultimate fulfillment of his duty as a Christian king.

From The Royal Saints of Anglo-Saxon England: A Study of West Saxon and East Anglian Cults by Susan J. Ridyard (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988).

Daily Reading for November 21 • William Byrd, 1623, John Merbecke, 1585, and Thomas Tallis, 1585, Musicians

To an age like ours, fascinated with alienation and marginalization, Byrd presents an intriguing dilemma. Revered by his contemporaries and honored by his chief employer, Queen Elizabeth, he appears in some lights as the perfect royal musician, writing on order for the newly established Church of England as well as clothing courtiers’ ditties in substantial if often rather sober musical garb. The other, darker side of his life is represented by his stubbornly persistent Roman Catholicism. Clinging to his faith, he refused to conform and stayed away from his parish church in defiance of the law as long as he lived. His religious music, most of it in Latin, and some of it written expressly for the proscribed services of the Roman Catholic rite, has an intensity that appears to stem directly from his religious and political predicament as an outsider on the inside of Elizabethan society. . . .

Byrd had to face not only the persecution of his religion but also the Puritan suspicion of music, which affected even liberal thinkers like Roger Ascham, who argued that instrumental music was effeminate and that while the young might learn singing, shooting was better. No wonder that Byrd in his first songbook, the much reprinted Psalmes, Sonets & Songs of sadness and pietie of 1588, included a list of reasons “to persuade every one to learn to sing.” These reasons carefully emphasize the spiritual and the physical; “it doth strengthen all parts of the breast, and doth open the pipes” is a fair example. The Oxford don John Case, in his Praise of Musicke (1586), was prepared to go much further in asserting that “the chief end of music is to delight.” . . .

In a famous personal statement in one of the Gradualia prefaces, Byrd speaks of the sacred words that he sets to music:

“In the very sentences (as I have learned from experience) there is such hidden and concealed power that to a man thinking about divine things and turning them over attentively and earnestly in his mind, the most appropriate measures come, I know not how, as if by their own free will, and freely offer themselves to his mind if it is neither idle nor inert.”

From William Byrd and His Contemporaries: Essays and a Monograph by Philip Brett (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2007).

Daily Reading for November 22 • The Last Sunday after Pentecost: Christ the King

What in fact is Christ’s kingdom? It is simply those who believe in him, those to whom he said, “You are not of this world, even as I am not of this world.” He willed, nevertheless, that they should be in the world, which is why he prayed to the Father, “I ask you not to take them out of the world but to protect them from the evil one.” So here also he did not say, “My kingdom is not” in this world but “is not of this world.” . . .

Indeed, his kingdom is here until the end of time, and until the harvest it will contain weeds. . . . Everyone who is reborn in Christ becomes the kingdom that is no longer of the world. For God has snatched us from the powers of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of his beloved Son. This is that kingdom of which he said, “My kingdom is not of this world; my kingly power does not come from here.”

From Tractates on the Gospel of John 115.2, quoted in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament IVb, John 11-21, edited by Joel C. Elowsky (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2007).

Daily Reading for November 23 • Clement, Bishop of Rome, c. 100

Think of the various ways, dear friends, by which the master points us toward the coming resurrection, by which the Lord Jesus Christ was made the firstfruit when he raised him from the dead. Let us observe, dear friends, how something like resurrection is so often anticipated in the course of nature. Day and night, for example: the night falls asleep, and the day arises; day departs, and night returns. Or consider the planting of crops: How and in what manner does the sowing take place? The sower goes forth and casts into the earth each of the seeds. They fall into the dry and bare ground and decay. Then out of their decay the majesty of God’s providence raises them up, and from being one seed, many grow up and bring forth fruit.

Even more dramatically, recall that remarkable wonder which has been reported in eastern regions in the vicinity of Arabia, of a bird named Phoenix. This bird is said to be a unique species, living perhaps five hundred years. When the time of its dissolution and death arrives, it makes for itself a coffinlike nest of frankincense and myrrh and the other spices, into which, its time being completed, it enters and dies. But as the flesh decays, a certain worm is born, which is nourished by the juices of the dead bird and eventually grows wings. Then, when it has grown strong, it takes up that coffinlike nest containing the bones of its parent, and carrying them away, makes its way from the country of Arabia to Egypt, to the city of Heliopolis. There, in broad daylight in the sight of all, it flies to the altar of the sun and deposits them there, and then sets out on its return, which the priests who examine the records think occurs at the end of the five hundredth year.

With all these indications in nature, why should it surprise us that the creator of the universe might bring about the resurrection of those who have served him with holiness in the assurance of a good faith, seeing that he shows to us even by a bird the magnificence of his promise?

From 1 Clement 24.1-26.1, quoted in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament II, Mark, edited by Thomas C. Oden and Christopher A. Hall (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1998).

Daily Reading for November 24 • Cecilia, Martyr at Rome, c. 280 and Clive Staples Lewis, Apologist and Spiritual Writer, 1963 (transferred)

To anticipate the Enemy’s strategy, we must consider His aims. The Enemy wants to bring the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the fact, without being any more (or less) or otherwise glad at having done it than he would be if it had been done by another. The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbour’s talents—or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognize all creatures (even himself) as glorious and excellent things. He wants to kill their animal self-love as soon as possible; but it is His long-term policy, I fear, to restore to them a new kind of self-love—a charity and gratitude for all selves, including their own; when they have really learned to love their neighbours as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbours. For we must never forget what is the most repellent and inexplicable trait in our Enemy; He really loves the hairless bipeds He has created and always gives back to them with His right hand what He has taken away with His left.

From The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1942).

Daily Reading for November 25 • James Otis Sargent Huntington, Priest and Monk, 1935

Huntington, an Anglo-Catholic, was as theologically conservative as he was socially liberal. He taught that the sacramental life was the motivating force behind the reconciliation of all races and classes. He also embraced monasticism in large part because of his commitment to the world beyond the monastery walls. Only through rigorous self-denial and total devotion of self, he believed, could one truly serve the poor and work to ameliorate the problems of society. During the summer of 1889, he worked as a common laborer among farmworkers in western New York to understand their condition more fully. Huntington’s reading tastes were wide-ranging; he read not only theology and church history but also the latest work of socialist and progressive writers. He campaigned for better conditions for working men and women, and he longed to see the church become, in his words, “the great Anti-Poverty Society.” The church must be on the side of the poor, he said, “if she is going to live at all.”

From The Episcopalians by David Hein and Gardiner H. Shattuck, Jr. Copyright © 2004. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

Daily Reading for November 26 • Thanksgiving Day

According to an old Saturday Evening Post story, the Pilgrims had a custom of putting five grains of corn on each empty plate before a dinner of “thanksgiving” was served. Then those gathered around the table would each take turns picking up their grains and telling their family and friends about something for which they were thankful. “The practice reminded them of how the first Pilgrims were in such straits that their allowance was only five grains of corn per person each day,” the article said. “The Pilgrims had little, but they did possess gratitude.”

I find it interesting that the English word for “thanks” arose out of Indo-European words for “think” and “thoughtfulness.” Although I know there are times when I thoughtlessly say “Thank you” in response to another’s words or deeds, my sincerest expressions of gratitude are more thought filled. For example, over the years, I’ve made it a practice occasionally to stop and think of people in my past who unselfishly bestowed healing gifts of time, energy, presence, trust, confidence, truth, and love upon me. I then try to express my gratitude through hand-written letters, cards, emails, phone calls, visits, deeds, or donations in their honor. Recipients of these tokens have been relatives, mentors, friends, and even strangers.

Remember when the phrase “random acts of kindness” became popular? Many of these acts were very small, simple ones that made a difference in the recipient’s life. Professor Rudolph Arnheim tells this story about his lasting gratitude for one such kindness: “At a faculty reception, a British lady taught me how to tie my shoes with a double knot so that they keep tied more securely and still come apart in a jiffy,” he said. “Kneeling on the floor in the midst of the chattering sherry-sippers, she tied my shoes. I remember her twice a day ever since.”

From “Gratitude” in Healing Words for the Body, Mind and Spirit by Caren Goldman. Copyright © 2001, 2009. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for November 27 • Isaac Watts, Hymnwriter, 1748 (transferred)

Jesus shall reign wherever the sun
Does its successive journeys run;
His kingdom spread from shore to shore,
Till moons shall wax and wane no more.

To Jesus endless prayer be made,
And endless praises crown his head;
His name like sweet perfume shall rise
With every morning sacrifice.

People and realms of every tongue
Dwell on his love with sweetest song;
And infant voices shall proclaim
Their early blessings on his name.

Blessings abound wherever he reigns;
All prisoners leap and loose their chains;
The weary find eternal rest,
And all who suffer want are blessed.

Let every creature rise and bring
Honors peculiar to our King;
Angels descend with songs again,
And earth repeat the loud amen!

Hymn text by Isaac Watts; quoted in The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle (New York: Doubleday, 2000).

Daily Reading for November 28 • Kamehameha and Emma, King and Queen of Hawaii, 1864, 1885

Where, would you say, does God live? In heaven? On earth? Within us? All around us? When you pray, where do you imagine God?

Western theology has, generally speaking, emphasized God’s transcendence, separate from and above creation. Many have pointed out that this theology bears at least partial responsibility for Western culture’s view of the world as profane. God’s home is in heaven--so the world becomes a resource for human use and, as the hymn declares, “This world is not my home, I’m just passing through.” Western theology has also tended toward anthropocentrism, within which God’s reconciling action applies only to humanity; the rest of creation becomes the stage on which the human and divine drama plays out.

In emphasizing transcendence, however, we often lose sight of Christian theology’s insistence on God’s immanence. God is Emmanuel, with us; creation reveals God to us and the world becomes a sacred place, God’s home.

When God is primarily transcendent, the earth becomes a resource. As part of the earth we become valuable to the system primarily as labor. Communities (human and other-than-human) become valuable to the extent that they serve the well-being of the economy, and ecological systems suffer and eventually collapse. When transcendence is balanced with immanence, and we feel that immanence in our bones, the earth is sacred. Economic systems need to be nestled within the larger world. All creation reflects God’s image, and the economy is designed to serve the well-being of community.

From “Coming Home: Economics and Ecology” by Michael Schut, in Anglican Theological Review 91, no. 4 (Fall 2009).

Daily Reading for November 29 • The First Sunday of Advent

“Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. . . .”

The year begins with a bleak, eerie prayer, uttered in the darkness. The darkness terrifies us. It is no ordinary darkness. The scientists speak of a darkness that has no form or movement or will because it has no existence; it is neither good nor bad because it is nothing at all, the mere absence of light. But this is not the darkness of the scientists. This is a different kind of darkness, an energetic, aggressive malevolence seeking to envelop and consume us. In this darkness the seeds of self-will sprout and grow; they strangle what is left of our health. Cut off from light, we grow accustomed to the darkness; damp, stale air fills our lungs. We have stopped resisting the darkness. Perhaps it is normal, inevitable. Perhaps it is simply the way things are.

But God, I know that it need not be so. The darkness has not yet claimed every corner, and I can still dream of a different place and time. We all dream of it. We dream of a garden where we walk with you in the light of day, of a time of contentment with you and all your creatures. The dream is distant but clear. We long for it, as for a blessing remembered from long ago, from before we had succumbed to the works of darkness.

We would cast away the works of darkness, O God, but we lack the strength. And so we pray to you: “Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light.” We are helpless; the power to cast away the works of darkness must come from outside ourselves. It must come from you, O God. We beg for your grace, the power that you give to cast away the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. That is what we pray for, O God—grace to begin again.

From A Gracious Rain: A Devotional Commentary on the Prayers of the Church Year by Richard H. Schmidt. Copyright © 2008. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for November 30 • St. Andrew the Apostle

Someone may wonder: At the Lord’s beckoning, what or how much did these two fishermen, who scarcely had anything, leave behind? On this, my beloved, we should attend to one’s intention rather than one’s wealth. That person has left behind a lot who keeps nothing for himself, who, though he has little, gives up everything. We tend to be attached to those things we own, and those things we scarcely own, we carefully hold on to. Therefore Peter and Andrew left much behind when they left behind covetousness and the very desire to own. That person has left much behind who renounces with the thing owned the very coveting of that thing. Therefore those poor who followed Jesus left behind just as much as those less poor who did not follow him but were able to covet. So when you notice that some have left a great deal behind, you need not say to yourself, I want to imitate those who disdain this world, but sorry, I have nothing to leave behind. You will leave much behind, my brothers, if you renounce earthly desires. External things, however small they may be, are sufficient for the Lord, since he looks at the heart and not at our material goods. Nor does he judge by how much is involved in our sacrifice but from how much it is made. For if we judge by external goods, our holy merchants traded in their nets and vessels for the perpetual life of the angels.

From Forty Gospel Homilies 5.2 of Gregory the Great, quoted in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament Ia, Matthew 1-13, edited by Manlio Simonetti and Thomas C. Oden (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2001).