Magic Statistics

Latest in an occasional series of prayers by Christians of ages past.  Previous entry here; complete list of entries here.

Father, I abandon myself into your hands;
do with me what you will.
Whatever you may do, I thank you,
I am ready for all, I accept all.
Let only your will be done in me,
and in all your creatures—
I wish no more than this, O Lord.
Into your hands I commend my soul,
I offer it to you with all the love of my heart,
for I love you, Lord,
and so need to give myself,
surrender myself into your hands,
without reserve,
and with boundless confidence,
for you are my Father.

Blessed Charles de Foucauld (1858-1916),
Priest, Martyr, Missionary to Muslims

Charles de Foucauld was born into an aristocratic French family in Strasbourg and, by his own account, lived an idle and dissolute youth.  Yet, he inspired the formation of over a dozen religious communities and associations.  He was venerated by Pope John Paul II in April 2001 and beatified by Pope Benedict XVI on 13 November 2005.

Baptised as an infant, de Foucauld renounced the faith at age 15.  He later flunked out of school and was dishonourably discharged from the French army.  After growing tired of his debauched and licentious existence, he became one of the first explorers of Morocco, at the time a territory so hostile to foreigners that he travelled in disguise for months.

Upon returning to France, his cousin Marie de Bondy gently prodded him about his skepticism.  In 1886, he decided to approach a priest for religious instruction.

What follows is from a 1979 Christianity Today article by Dr Klaus Bockmühl, Professor of Theology and Ethics at Regent College until his passing in 1989.  (The article is not available online, unfortunately, so no link.)

The priest whom he approached about lessons, however, with a sudden spiritual insight led him into the confessional, asked him to confess his sins, then invited him to the eucharist.  That day de Foucauld became reconciled with God.

De Foucauld found more.  As with Peter and Paul, he experienced both salvation and calling together.  He wrote: "As soon as I came to believe there was a God I saw I could not do anything except live for him.  Faith and the religious vocation came to me at the same hour."

Charles lived in several Trappist houses for the next decade, and then moved to Nazareth to live as a hermit.  After returning to France for ordination in 1901, he went to the French Sahara, where he dwelled for the rest of his life.

Based near the Moroccan-Algerian border, he lived among the nomadic Tuaregs, who knew him as “the follower of Jesus”.  He learned their language, translated the Gospel, and read it to them.  He devoted himself to their service, visiting and caring for the sick, showing hospitality, and offering counsel as requested.  He also used money sent from France to buy food for them and redeem those taken into slavery.  In letters to friends in France, he denounced slavery as “an injustice, a monstrous immorality”.

The contrast between the poverty of North Africa and the affluence of France made plain to Charles that materialism and secularism were overpowering the Christian West.  Thus he wrote:

"We need to return to the Gospel.  If we do not live out of the Gospel, Jesus does not live in us.  We must return to Christian simplicity.  What impressed me most during the few days I spent in France, having been abroad for nineteen years is the growing taste for expensive luxury which . . . becomes a natural habit of all classes of society, especially the middle classes and even of good Christian families.  And with it goes a carelessness and rage for worldly and frivolous amusement that is absolutely out of place in difficult times like ours, in times of persecution, and in no way consistent with the Christian life.  The peril is in us and not in our adversaries.  Our enemies at best can help us to victories. . . .  Return to the Gospel, that is the cure which we all stand in need of."

In that regard, apparently, nothing has improved since a century ago.  The spiritual vacuum he saw at the heart of Western civilisation has indeed become worse.

Dr Bockmühl wrote about Charles de Foucauld to challenge Christianity Today’s evangelical Protestant audience.  He sought to encourage evangelicals to read pre-Reformation saints and to take seriously the examples of post-Reformation Catholic figures.  He presented Charles de Foucauld as a case in point, calling him a “saint for our day”.

Our time, noisy and affluent, finds it difficult to handle his challenge.  But evangelicals need to be set aflame with the fire that burned in Charles de Foucauld, when from the desert he wrote to a friend: "I am infinitely weak.  But however I examine myself, I find no other desire in me than this one: Thy Kingdom Come!  Hallowed be Thy Name!"

Charles was shot to death by a passing band of Muslim marauders on 1 December 1916 at Tamanrasset, Algeria.  He is considered a martyr of the Church.

Within twenty years of Charles’s death, his example had inspired the foundation of the orders of the “Little Brothers of Jesus” and “Little Sisters of Jesus”.  They live and work among the poor of Europe, North Africa, and elsewhere.

Above quotations, except for prayer, from: Klaus Bockmühl, “Saint for Our Day: Charles de Foucauld”.  Christianity Today, 5 January 1979.

Source of prayer: Praying With the Saints, by Woodeene Koenig-Bricker.

Latest in an occasional series of prayers by Christians of ages past.  Previous entry here; complete list of entries here.

I implore you, good Jesus, that as in your mercy you have given me to drink in with delight the words of your knowledge, so of your loving kindness you will also grant me one day to come to you, the fountain of all wisdom, and to stand for ever before your face.  Amen.

St Bede the Venerable (673 – 735),
Monk, Doctor of the Church, Father of English History

St Bede was born and, as far as we know, lived his entire life in the north of England, yet he became perhaps the most learned scholar in all of Europe.  At the age of 7, he was sent to Wearmouth Abbey for his education; at age 11, he continued his education at the new monastery at Jarrow, eventually becoming a monk and remaining there until his death.  He lived a routine and outwardly uneventful life of prayer, devotion, study, writing, and teaching.

Bede’s writings cover a very wide range of interests, including natural history, orthography, chronology, and biblical translation and exposition.  He was the first to translate the Bible into Old English.  In his view, his 25 volumes of Scripture commentary were his most important writings.  His best-known book is Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731.  This work earned him the popular title “Father of English History”, and not just because it was the first attempt to write a history of England.  His historical research was thorough and far-reaching.  For example, he asked friends traveling to Rome to bring him copies of documents relevant to English history, and he made use of oral traditions when written materials were not available.  The book provides much historical information that can be found in no other source.

His pupil Cuthbert, later Abbot of Jarrow, has left a moving eyewitness account of St Bede’s last hours. Bede fell ill shortly before Easter 735, when he was in the midst of translating the Gospel of John into the Anglo-Saxon language.  Everyone realised that the end was near, but he was determined to complete the translation.  Between Easter and Ascension Day, he persisted in the task while continuing to teach his students at his bedside.

After a restless night, he resumed dictating the translation on the morning before the Ascension.  That afternoon he called the priests of the monastery to him to distribute his remaining earthly possessions.  Seeing they were overcome with grief, he comforted them with these words:

"If it be the will of my Maker, the time has come when I shall be freed from the body and return to Him Who created me out of nothing when I had no being.  I have had a long life, and the merciful Judge has ordered it graciously.  The time of my departure is at hand, and my soul longs to see Christ my King in His beauty.”

The young man who had been writing down the translation said there was still one sentence remaining, and Bede dictated the final words.

After a short while the lad said, "Now it is finished.”

"You have spoken truly," he replied. "It is well finished. Now raise my head in your hands, for it would give me great joy to sit facing the holy place where I used to pray, so that I may sit and call on my Father."

And thus, on the floor of his cell, he chanted “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit" to its ending, and breathed his last.

When he received word of the great scholar’s death, St Boniface, who had used Bede’s Bible commentaries, said, “The candle of the Church, lit by the Holy Spirit, has been extinguished”.  Within a generation or two, St Bede was being called “Venerable”.  His bones were translated from Jarrow to Durham Cathedral in the mid-11th century; in 1370 they were placed in the cathedral’s Galilee Chapel.  (A photo of the tomb can be found about halfway down this page).

St Bede is the only Englishman named in Dante’s Paradise.  He is also the only English Doctor of the Church.

More information can be found on the internet at the Venerable Bede Page, the Christian History Institute, and Bede’s World.

Source of prayer: The final words of Ecclesiastical History of the English People, as copied on the prayer card at right.  The picture at the top of this post shows Bede sharpening his quill, from a codex at Engelbert Abbey, Switzerland.  (The immediate source is the cover of my copy of the Ecclesiastical History.)

John Calvin, Reformer of Geneva, died on this day in 1564.  In his honour, Todd Granger, The Confessing Reader, has posted a collect and several links to online information about this seminal figure in Protestant Christianity.

Calvin had a much more pervasive influence on Protestantism than did Luther or any other Reformation leader.  As Harold O. J. Brown has said, “Without Luther, Protestantism could hardly have begun; without Calvin, it could hardly have survived.”

He emerged as a religious leader while still in his 20s, and he was recognised even during his own lifetime as a pre-eminent theologian.  Like Luther, he was Augustinian in theology; both men placed utmost importance on God’s sovereignty and the doctrines of grace and election.

Not only was he the great systematiser of Protestant Reformed theology, Calvin has also had a major impact on the development of Western thought in general.  His ideas on aesthetics, science, history, and civil society have been immensely influential in the post-Reformation West and remain so today.  He must be regarded as one of the formative influences in the development of Western culture and civilisation.

A prayer of John Calvin:

Grant, almighty God, that as we do not at this day look for a redeemer to deliver us from temporal miseries, but only carry on a warfare under the banner of the Cross until he appear to us from heaven to gather us into his blessed kingdom — O grant that we may patiently bear all evils and all troubles, and as Christ once for all poured forth the blood of the new and eternal covenant, and gave us also a sign of it in the Holy Supper, may we, confiding in so sacred a seal, never doubt that he will always be propitious to us, and render manifest to us the fruit of this reconciliation, when, after having supported us for a season under the burden of those miseries by which we are now oppressed, you gather us into that blessed and perfect glory which has been procured for us by the blood of Christ our Lord, and which is daily set before us in his Gospel, and laid up for us in heaven, until we at length shall enjoy it through Christ our only Lord. Amen.

Previous related posts:

• What if St Augustine appeared on Oprah?
• Clarifying free will

Latest in an occasional series of prayers by Christians of ages past.  Previous entry here; complete list of entries here.

Hold dominion over my heart, O Lord:
Keep it as your inheritance.
Make your dwelling in me,
Along with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
Widen in me the cords of your tabernacle,
Even the operations of your Most Holy Spirit.
For you are my God, and I will praise you,
together with the Eternal Father,
And our quickening Spirit,
Now, henceforth and forever.
Amen.

St John of Damascus (c. 675 – c. 749),
Monk, theologian, Doctor of the Church

Also known as John Damascene, St John was a Greek theologian and the last of the great Eastern fathers.  Born into a wealthy Christian family in Damascus about a generation after the armies of Islam had conquered the area, he lived his entire life under Muslim rule.  He inherited his father’s positions as chief financial officer for the caliphs of Damascus and chief representative of Christians in the city.  In 716, however, he left (or was compelled to leave) the court and became a monk at Mar Saba, a monastery in the hills near Jerusalem, where he was later ordained a priest.  Most of the rest of his life was spent writing hymns and theological treatises.

The Iconoclastic Controversy was raging around the time St John entered Mar Saba.  The earliest of his theological works was a series of three "Apologetic Treatises against those who decry the Holy Images”, written in response to an edict issued by the Byzantine emperor forbidding veneration of images or their exhibition in public places.  An online article in Christian History & Biography summarises John’s defence of images:

From his distant post in the Holy Land, John challenged this policy [iconoclasm] in three works. He argued that icons should not be worshiped, but they could be venerated. (The distinction is crucial: a Western parallel might be the way a favorite Bible is read, cherished, and treated with honor—but certainly not worshiped.)

John explained it like this: "Often, doubtless, when we have not the Lord's passion in mind and see the image of Christ's crucifixion, his saving passion is brought back to remembrance, and we fall down and worship not the material but that which is imaged: just as we do not worship the material of which the Gospels are made, nor the material of the Cross, but that which these typify."

Second, John drew support from the writings of the early fathers like Basil the Great, who wrote, "The honor paid to an icon is transferred to its prototype." That is, the actual icon was but a point of departure for the expressed devotion; the recipient was in the unseen world.

Third, John claimed that, with the birth of the Son of God in the flesh, the depiction of Christ in paint and wood demonstrated faith in the Incarnation. Since the unseen God had become visible, there was no blasphemy in painting visible representations of Jesus or other historical figures. To paint an icon of him was, in fact, a profession of faith, deniable only by a heretic!

"I do not worship matter, I worship the God of matter, who became matter for my sake and deigned to inhabit matter, who worked out my salvation through matter," he wrote. "I will not cease from honoring that matter which works for my salvation. I venerate it, though not as God."

After prolonged controversy, political intrigue, and bloodshed, the Second Council of Nicaea decided the issue in 787.  John’s position was accepted: iconoclasm was condemned and a statement produced which justified icons by reference to the tradition of the church and quotations from the Fathers.

The most important of John’s theological works is The Fount of Wisdom, the last part of which, Exposition of the Catholic Faith, was immensely influential in both the East and the West.  A work of research and synthesis rather than original thought, it collected views of the Greek Fathers and presented them in a systematic and logical manner.  It was a compendium of respected theological understandings.  After being translated into Latin in the 12th century as De Fide Orthodoxa, it was cited by authoritative medieval theologians Peter Lombard and Thomas Aquinas.  The De Fide was thus a valuable source in the formulation of Western medieval theology.

Among St John’s hymns is one that is frequently sung at Easter, “The Day of Resurrection”.

The day of resurrection! Earth, tell it out abroad;
The Passover of gladness, the Passover of God.
From death to life eternal, from earth unto the sky,
Our Christ hath brought us over, with hymns of victory.

Our hearts be pure from evil, that we may see aright
The Lord in rays eternal of resurrection light;
And listening to His accents, may hear, so calm and plain,
His own “All hail!” and, hearing, may raise the victor strain.

Now let the heavens be joyful! Let earth the song begin!
Let the round world keep triumph, and all that is therein!
Let all things seen and unseen their notes in gladness blend,
For Christ the Lord hath risen, our joy that hath no end.

St John of Damascus is sometimes regarded as the last of the Church Fathers.  He was declared a “Doctor of the Church” in 1890 by Pope Leo XIII.

A portal to the writings of St John of Damascus is found here.

There are differences of opinion regarding important dates in St John’s life.  Several online sources say he entered Mar Saba in 726 or later but, according to the three books I have at hand, that happened in 716.  This post is based on the latter:

• J. D. Douglas, gen. ed. New International Dictionary of the Christian Church (Zondervan, 1978).
• David Farmer, Oxford Dictionary of Saints, 5th ed. (Oxford UP, 2004).
• Bert Ghezzi, Voices of the Saints (Doubleday, 2000).

Source of icon: Anno Domini: Jesus Through the Centuries, an online exhibition from Virtual Museum Canada; Theme 7: Jesus, the True Image; Jesus, the Image of God in John of Damascus.

Source of prayer: Praying With the Saints, by Woodeene Koenig-Bricker.

In honour of St Patrick's Day, here is the prayer attributed to him, "St Patrick's Breastplate". It was translated from the Gaelic by Cecil F. Alexander in 1889 and set to music by Charles V. Stanford in 1902.

I bind unto myself today
The strong Name of the Trinity,
By invocation of the same
The Three in One and One in Three.

I bind this today to me forever
By power of faith, Christ’s incarnation;
His baptism in Jordan river,
His death on Cross for my salvation;
His bursting from the spicèd tomb,
His riding up the heavenly way,
His coming at the day of doom
I bind unto myself today.

I bind unto myself the power
Of the great love of cherubim;
The sweet ‘Well done’ in judgment hour,
The service of the seraphim,
Confessors’ faith, Apostles’ word,
The Patriarchs’ prayers, the prophets’ scrolls,
All good deeds done unto the Lord
And purity of virgin souls.

I bind unto myself today
The virtues of the star lit heaven,
The glorious sun’s life giving ray,
The whiteness of the moon at even,
The flashing of the lightning free,
The whirling wind’s tempestuous shocks,
The stable earth, the deep salt sea
Around the old eternal rocks.

I bind unto myself today
The power of God to hold and lead,
His eye to watch, His might to stay,
His ear to hearken to my need.
The wisdom of my God to teach,
His hand to guide, His shield to ward;
The word of God to give me speech,
His heavenly host to be my guard.

Against the demon snares of sin,
The vice that gives temptation force,
The natural lusts that war within,
The hostile men that mar my course;
Or few or many, far or nigh,
In every place and in all hours,
Against their fierce hostility
I bind to me these holy powers.

Against all Satan’s spells and wiles,
Against false words of heresy,
Against the knowledge that defiles,
Against the heart’s idolatry,
Against the wizard’s evil craft,
Against the death wound and the burning,
The choking wave, the poisoned shaft,
Protect me, Christ, till Thy returning.

Christ be with me, Christ within me,
Christ behind me, Christ before me,
Christ beside me, Christ to win me,
Christ to comfort and restore me.
Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ in quiet, Christ in danger,
Christ in hearts of all that love me,
Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.

I bind unto myself the Name,
The strong Name of the Trinity,
By invocation of the same,
The Three in One and One in Three.
By Whom all nature hath creation,
Eternal Father, Spirit, Word:
Praise to the Lord of my salvation,
Salvation is of Christ the Lord.

Source of St Patrick icon: Byzantines.net

Lent & Beyond has begun a collaborative series of meditations for Lent. The complete set of entries can be accessed here.

Today's meditation, the sixth in the series thus far, is by the remarkable Binky, the chief Web Elf at Classical Anglican Net News (CaNN). Check out this thought- and prayer-provoking reflection on today's Gospel reading, St Matthew 4:1-11.

Who can tell what a day may bring forth? Cause us therefore, gracious God, to live every day as if it were to be our last, for we know not but that it may be. May we be found in Christ, who is our only Saviour and Redeemer. Amen.

Thomas a Kempis

Latest in an occasional series of prayers by Christians of ages past. Previous entry here; complete list of entries here.

May God the Father who made us bless us.
May God the Son send his healing among us.
May God the Holy Spirit move within us and give us
eyes to see with, ears to hear with, and hands that your work might be done.
May we walk and preach the word of God to all.
May the angel of peace watch over us and lead us at last
by God's grace to the Kingdom.

St Dominic (c. 1170-1221),
Founder of the Order of Preachers

The Order of Preachers (O.P.) founded by St Dominic is generally known as the Dominicans or Black Friars.

Born at Caleruega in Old Castile, Spain, not far from the abbey of St Dominic of Silos, after whom he was named, Dominic de Guzman was the youngest of four children. Spain at that time was still struggling to free itself from centuries of rule by Muslim Moors, so life during Dominic's childhood was austere and uncertain. He was trained for the priesthood from his youth. In 1199, he was appointed canon at Osma Cathedral, then ordained a priest, and rose to the position of sub-prior.

In 1203 he accompanied his bishop, Diego de Azevedo, on official business to Denmark. This journey proved a turning point in Dominic's life. Traveling through the south of France, he came in contact with the Cathari, a heretical sect based on teachings derived from Mani who lived in Persia in the third century. The Cathari, meaning pure ones in Greek, were known by other names in different parts of Europe. In France, they were called Albigensians because the centre of their greatest strength was the town of Albi in Languedoc.

The Albigensians taught a gnostic and dualistic religion, with a god of light (Truth, the god of the New Testament) and a god of darkness (Error, the god of the Old Testament). Life on earth was a struggle between those gods and their principal forces, spirit and matter. The good life for man required purification from matter. They therefore embraced extreme asceticism and condemned marriage, procreation, war, eating food (or, at least, meat), and the use of anything material in worship. Rejecting the medieval church and the sacraments, they had their own episcopal organisation. Their success was largely due to their austerity, commitment, and organisation; the simplicity and seeming holiness of the lives of Albigensian spiritual leaders formed a stark contrast to the worldliness of many orthodox Christians. The south of France at the end of the 12th century was in fact the centre of a flourishing Provençal culture based on the dominant influence of Albigensianism.

Dominic believed that the highly organized and idealistic Albigensians could be combated by forming communities of disciplined and intellectually equipped men and women to spread the light of the Christian gospel among the people. The first Dominican community was established in 1206 in Prouille, France, made up of a group of devout women converts from Albigensianism who were assigned the task of educating and evangelising girls and young women in the area. Dominic also gathered together a group of carefully chosen men whom he trained as preachers. He and his followers organised public debates with Albigensian leaders that the orthodox often won.

In 1208, an agent of the Albigensian ruler of Toulouse murdered a papal legate, provoking a twenty-year crusade led by Simon de Montfort that crushed the heresy. St Dominic took no part in the violence but worked to reconcile heretics and bring them back into the church. He realised that the long-term solution to the challenge of Albigensianism was to provide better-educated and -trained clergy along with itinerant preachers. He received papal approval in 1216 to found the Order of Preachers with the then-novel vocation of study and preaching.

St Dominic spent the rest of his life traveling in Spain, Italy, and France, establishing communities of preachers and teachers with the mission of reviving the spiritual life of Christians. He was recognised as a devout man with firm faith, a passion for winning souls, and gifts for leadership and organisation. St Dominic saw the need to use all resources of human learning in the service of Christ, and he was convinced that preaching without prayer would not be effective. The Nine Ways of Prayer of Saint Dominic was written sometime between 1260 and 1288 based on testimonies of those who had known St Dominic. This is from the second way of prayer:

Saint Dominic used to pray by throwing himself outstretched upon the ground, lying on his face. He would feel great remorse in his heart and call to mind those words of the Gospel, saying sometimes in a voice loud enough to be heard: "O God, be merciful to me, a sinner." With devotion and reverence he repeated that verse of David: "I am he that has sinned, I have done wickedly."

St Dominic encouraged no cult of personality in the order he founded, believing that the best way to honour his memory was to carry on "the holy preaching". He was canonized by Pope Gregory IX in 1234. His feast day is 8 August.

Source of prayer: Praying With the Saints, by Woodeene Koenig-Bricker.

Karen B. at Lent & Beyond has this evening posted news and prayer requests from our brothers at Classical Anglican News Net. Here is her post in full:

All, I received an e-mailed prayer request from Mike Daley, the CaNN Tech Elf, tonight. Mike is the tech genius behind the scenes who does so much to make the whole Classical Anglican Net web empire possible. He and Binky (aka the Lord High Webelf) very much need our prayers right now. Binky has been very sick (and the CaNN main site has thus been offline since November 18th), and Mike is juggling an incredible number of important responsibilities.

In addition to praying for the Lord’s outpouring of grace and strength for our brothers, Mike is also specifically requesting prayer for an assistant. Please pray that the Lord would raise up additional technical support team members for the CaNN websites. If any of you might be tech-savvy and interested in volunteering, or know others who might qualify, please send an e-mail to: mdaley[at]anglicanunderground[dot]net

Also perhaps you might want to send a get-well card and some encouragement to Binky at: binks.webelf[at]gmail[dot]com

I found this prayer for strength and refreshment on a site with quotes from St. Augustine. May Jesus indeed be the strength of our dear brothers at CaNN, may they find Christ’s power to be revealed in their weakness and may our merciful Lord pour out daily refreshment and lavish grace in their lives:

O God, the deathless hope of all, we rejoice that You support us both when little and even to gray hairs. When our strength is of You, it is strength indeed; but when our own only, it is feebleness. With You are refreshment and true strength.

And from the BCP, a prayer for healing for Binky:

O God of heavenly powers, by the might of your command you drive away from our bodies all sickness and all infirmity: Be present in your goodness with your servant, that his weakness may be banished and his strength restored; and that, his health being renewed, he may bless your holy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

On a personal note, I have followed Binky's website for a long time; his was one of those that inspired me to start my own blog. (But don't hold that against Binky.) CaNN provides an invaluable service to Christians across Canada and around the world. Please pray for full and speedy recovery for Binky and for technical support for CaNN.

From Lent & Beyond:

Lord Jesus,
Master of both the light and the darkness,
send your Holy Spirit upon our preparations for Christmas.
We who have so much to do
seek quiet spaces to hear your voice each day.
We who are anxious over many things
look forward to your coming among us.
We who are blessed in so many ways
long for the complete joy of your kingdom.
We whose hearts are heavy
seek the joy of your presence.
We are your people, walking in darkness, yet seeking the light.
To you we say, "Come Lord Jesus!"

The prayer blog Lent & Beyond has a new category on Advent Devotionals. Definitely worth visiting during this season of Advent.

Latest in an occasional series of prayers by Christians of ages past. Previous entry here; complete list of entries here.

O merciful God, be unto me a strong tower of defence; give me grace to await your leisure and patiently to bear what you are doing to me; nothing doubting or mistrusting your goodness towards me; for you know what is good for me better than I do. Therefore do with me in all things what you will; only arm me, I beseech you, with your armour, that I may stand fast; above all things, taking to me the shield of faith; praying always that I may refer myself wholly to your will, abiding your pleasure and comforting myself in these troubles which it shall please you to send me, seeing such troubles are profitable for me; and I am assuredly persuaded that all you do cannot but be well; and unto you be all honor and glory; Amen.

Lady Jane Grey (1537-1554), Great-granddaughter of King Henry VII;
Charged with treason and beheaded.

At the age of 16, Lady Jane Grey was proclaimed Queen of England and Ireland, apparently against her wishes. A pawn in a religious and political power struggle following the death of the boy king Edward VI, she was deposed after nine days on the throne, imprisoned in the Tower of London, and executed the following year.

The Church of England separated from the Roman Catholic Church under Henry VIII. When Henry died in 1547, his only son Edward ascended to the throne at the age of 9. Because he was a minor, the country was actually governed by the Lord Protector, though the king took a keen interest in national business. Edward became a convinced Lutheran in theology, and his reign was marked by determined efforts to make England a thoroughly Protestant nation.

As the king’s health deteriorated in the early 1550s, he and the Lord Protector, John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, worried that the cause of Protestantism would be jeopardized if Henry’s eldest daughter Mary, a staunch Roman Catholic, became queen. So, the Lord Protector persuaded the king to will the throne to his cousin Lady Jane Grey, even though she was not first in line to the throne. (She followed after Edward’s two half-sisters Mary and Elizabeth, and perhaps others as well). The Duke of Northumberland had an ulterior motive for this illegal manoeuvre–to advance his family's ambitions. His son Lord Guildford Dudley had married Lady Jane.

Lady Jane Grey was crowned Queen on 10 July 1553. Her father-in-law and other members of the nobility were, however, shocked to see that Mary had the support of the people. Mary marched to London with an army to claim the throne; Lady Jane was deposed without a struggle and imprisoned on 19 July.

About six months later, a failed rebellion against Queen Mary convinced her that Lady Jane Grey had to be neutralized as a threat to her sovereignty. Lady Jane was offered the option of converting to Roman Catholicism, which carried with it recognition of Mary’s claim to the throne. Even though she desperately wanted freedom to live a normal life, Lady Jane could not be persuaded to accept Catholic doctrines. She was beheaded at Tower Hill on 12 February 1554.

Several web sites have extensive information on Lady Jane Grey. Two of the best are located here and here.

No known portraits of Lady Jane Grey are universally accepted as authentic. The picture posted here is supposed to be contemporary, and so has some claim to be accurate.

Paul Delaroche’s beautiful 1833 painting The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, a very evocative and romantic work, is inaccurate, unfortunately.

Source of prayer: The Communion of Saints: Prayers of the Famous, edited by Horton Davies.

UPDATE (17 Jan. 2006): A purportedly authentic portrait has been discovered, but that claim is under dispute.

UPDATE (6 Mar. 2007): Another portrait has been identified as authentic.

Latest in an occasional series of prayers by Christians of age past. Previous entry here; complete list of entries here.

My Lord, I have nothing to do in this world but to seek and serve thee. I have nothing to do with my heart and its affections but to breathe after thee. I have nothing to do with my tongue and pen but to speak to thee and for thee, and to publish thy glory and thy will. Amen.

Richard Baxter (1615-91),
Puritan divine, Nonconformist

Richard Baxter is remembered as a godly pastor and a man of moderate church views in an age that tended to extremes. Among his many influential writings, three classics of Reformed literature stand out: The Saints’ Everlasting Rest (1650), The Reformed Pastor (1656), and A Call to the Unconverted (1658).

Born into a poor family in Rowton, Shropshire, Baxter had little formal education, but made use of opportunities for self-instruction and private study. In his early twenties, he read theology under nonconformist (see below for fuller explanation of this term) ministers, and in 1641 became pastor at Kidderminster, Worcestershire. He remained there for nineteen years, accomplishing a great work of reformation in that city. He was a gifted teacher and conscientious pastor, deeply concerned for the spiritual welfare of those in his flock. At that time, he also became interested in controversies over church reform and soon rejected episcopacy, becoming a moderate nonconformist. All forms of church government were, in his view, of much lesser importance than the true purposes of religion.

While Baxter was preaching in the West Midlands, English politics was heading toward crisis in London. Confrontation between Charles I and Parliament led to the outbreak of the Civil War in 1642. Baxter was generally sympathetic with the Parliamentarians, although he did not agree with all of Oliver Cromwell’s aims. Worcestershire was on the side of the king, so Baxter departed, becoming an itinerant chaplain in the Parliamentary Army. His chief motivation was to foster reconciliation between the Anglicans and the Puritans. At the end of the war, he returned to Kidderminster as parish vicar.

When Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660, Baxter was made chaplain to the king. However, after refusing to agree to the terms of the 1662 Act of Uniformity, he was ejected from the church pastorate. Between 1662 and 1687, he was subject to frequent persecution. He continued to preach and minister to people despite the penalties for preaching without a licence. A meeting house he had built for himself was closed after he had preached there only once. His goods and books were seized, and he was repeatedly dragged into court. In 1685, at the age of 70, Baxter was convicted and fined on the dubious charge of libelling the Church of England. Sentenced to prison because he couldn’t pay, he spent 18 months behind bars in appalling conditions. His health, which had never been strong, steadily deteriorated. Still, he continued to preach: "I preached as never sure to preach again," he wrote, "and as a dying man to dying men."

Yet it was during these years that Baxter’s writing became most prolific. His books and other writings flooded England. Despite official persecution, his reputation grew throughout his life. Befitting a man who deeply lamented the divisions of the church in his day, his funeral was attended by clergy from all denominations.

Nearly two hundred years after his death, a memorial statue was placed in his honour near the centre of Kidderminster. A photo of the memorial can be found near the bottom of this page.

More biographical information is located here and here. For a biography focusing specifically on the style and content of his writings, click here.

Source of prayer: Pocket Prayers, compiled by Christopher Herbert.

Note:

Nonconformism referred to the doctrine and practices of those who refused to submit to the 1662 Act of Uniformity, which required all to conform to the Church of England and the Book of Common Prayer. As a result, about 2000 Presbyterian, Independent, and Baptist ministers were ejected from the Church of England. The Act was made practically inoperative by the 1689 Act of Toleration. Nonconformism was also used more loosely to refer to the belief that episcopacy is not the sole legitimate form of church government. Richard Baxter would qualify as a nonconformist in both senses.