Stephen Morris's Blog, page 19

Top Blog Posts of 2019

Who doesn’t enjoy looking back over the highlights of the past year? These were my most popular blog posts during 2019. Click and revisit any of them or leave a comment to share which one–or any other post that didn’t make the “Most Popular” list–was your personal favorite.

Corpus Christi: Wafer vs. Bread … read it here

St. Panteleimon and His Liquid Blood … read it here

Bake an All Soul’s Cake … read it here

St. Agnes in Prague … read it here

Passiontide … read it here

Melchizedek, King of Salem … read it here

Conception of the Mother of God … read it here

Holy Week: The Death of Death … read it here

Resurrecting Easter … read it here

Dog Days, Part 2—with St. Roch … read it here

Which post was your favorite? What subject would you enjoy reading about in the upcoming year? Leave a comment below!

The post Top Blog Posts of 2019 appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

New Podcast Interview on “Byzantium and Friends”

A great podcast with fascinating episodes–especially the episode about the acoustics of Hagia Sophia and the experience of singing the Divine Liturgy there. Anthony, the host, recently interviewed me about When Brothers Dwell in Unity: Byzantine Christianity and Homosexuality (McFarland, 2016). Listen to the interview here.

The post New Podcast Interview on “Byzantium and Friends” appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

SS. Isaac and Symeon, “On the Nativity”

(Illumination from the “Golden codex” of Pułtusk, a town in Poland, that is one of the oldest, surviving medieval codices in Poland today.)

This Christmas night bestowed peace on the whole world;
So let no one threaten;

This is the night of the Most Gentle One –
Let no one be cruel;

This is the night of the Humble One –
Let no one be proud.

Now is the day of joy –
Let us not revenge;

Now is the day of Good Will –
Let us not be mean.

In this Day of Peace –
Let us not be conquered by anger.

Today the Bountiful impoverished Himself for our sake;
So, rich one, invite the poor to your table.

Today we receive a Gift for which we did not ask;
So let us give alms to those who implore and beg us.

This present Day cast open the heavenly doors to our prayers;
Let us open our door to those who ask our forgiveness.

Today the Divine Being took upon Himself the seal of our humanity,
In order for humanity to be decorated by the Seal of Divinity.

– St. Isaac the Syrian (7th century), “Sermon on the Nativity“

And from Saint Symeon the New Theologian:

…the Logos descended (Jn 10.36)

and dwelt entirely in the womb of the virgin,

and He was wholly in the Father and wholly in the womb,

and wholly in the universe, being uncontainable.

Not reduced, not diminished at all, He went entirely in

and remained unchanged. He took the form of a slave

and having been begotten He became human in every way (Phil 2.7).

The whole of Him went through the womb and He came into

the world;

again He was taken up from whence He was not separated (Mk 16.19).

Glory to You, Father, and Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Boundless Divinity, indivisible by nature,

prostrate, we all worship You in the Holy Spirit,

we who have your Spirit, as we have received from You.

Hymn 21, St. Symeon the New Theologian (excerpted from “Divine Eros: Hymns of St. Symeon the New Theologian”)

The post SS. Isaac and Symeon, “On the Nativity” appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

Conception of the Mother of God: East vs. West?

In this 16th century icon of the Conception of the Mother of God, SS. Joachim and Anna tenderly embrace, standing before a bed. Without being explicit, it tells us that the conception of St. Mary happened through natural means.
(In the corners of the icon, Joachim and Anna are shown separately. According to the Protoevangelium, in his grief Joachim retired to the desert in fasting and prayer for forty days, while Anna remained lamenting at home. An angel was sent to each of them to announce that their entreaties had been heard by God and that they should return to each other to conceive; the main scene shows the happy meeting.)

The Conception of the Mother of God by Saint Anna is commemorated by the Orthodox Church on December 9 while the Western Church celebrates on December 8. St. Anna, the mother of the Virgin Mary, was the youngest daughter of the priest Nathan from Bethlehem, descended from the tribe of Levi. She married St. Joachim, who was a native of Galilee. For many years, St. Anna was childless and the couple suffered much reproach for her barrenness. When they were in Jerusalem to offer sacrifice to God, the High Priest, Issachar, upbraided Joachim, “You are not worthy to offer sacrifice with those childless hands.” Both spouses gave themselves to fervent prayer, and the Archangel Gabriel announced to them separately that they would be the parents of a daughter who would bring blessings to the whole human race.

The Orthodox Church does not
accept the teaching of the Immaculate Conception,
but has also always believed that the Virgin Mary was, from her conception,
filled with every Grace of the Holy Spirit in view of her calling as the Mother
of Christ our God. The Immaculate Conception is a Western
Christian teaching which asserts
that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was preserved by God from the transmission of original sin at the
time of her own conception. Specifically the doctrine says she was not
afflicted by the privation of sanctifying grace which afflicts mankind, but was instead
filled with grace by God, and furthermore lived a life completely free from
sin. It is commonly confused with
the doctrine of the virginal conception of Christ, though the two doctrines
deal with separate subjects.

The feast is not exactly nine
months before the feast of the Nativity
of the Theotokos (September 8) as it is in the West, but one day
later. Many have taught this is to show that God alone is perfect.

The post Conception of the Mother of God: East vs. West? appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

St. Nicholas is Coming to Town!

An icon of St. Nicholas with scenes from his life around the edge. Christ and the Mother of God are shown returning his vestments to him, based on a dream-vision he had while he was in prison, deprived of serving his flock because the emperor disagreed with his theology.

St. Nicholas was a bishop in 4th-century
Turkey but is commonly known as “Santa Claus” in much of the Western World. He
brings gifts to good children on his feast day (December 6) or on Christmas
Day; in some places, he is said to take away bad children in his empty gift
bag. He is sometimes accompanied by a servant or devil who takes away the bad
children or leaves switches for their parents to beat them.

His tomb is in Myra (a small town
in modern Turkey) but many of the remains were stolen by Italian sailors and
taken to Bari in 1087. The sailors
from Bari only took the main bones of Nicholas’s skeleton, leaving all the
minor fragments in the grave. The city of Venice had interest in
obtaining the remaining fragments of his skeleton and, in 1100, a fleet
of Venetian ships sailed past Myra on their way to Palestine for the First Crusade. The Venetians took the remaining bones of
Saint Nicholas, and brought them to Venice. This story was lent credence in two scientific
investigations of the relics in Bari and Venice, which confirmed that the
relics in the two cities are anatomically compatible and may belong to the same
person.

In
the late 1950s, while the crypt was undergoing much-needed restoration, the bones were
removed from it for the first time since their interment in 1089. A
special Pontifical Commission permitted Luigi Martino, a professor of human
anatomy at the University of Bari, to examine the bones under the Commission’s supervision.
Martino took thousands of measurements, detailed scientific drawings,
photographs, and x-rays. These examinations revealed the saint to have
died at over seventy years of age and to have been of average height and
slender-to-average build. He also suffered from severe chronic arthritis
in his spine and pelvis.

Another
test in 2017 in Oxford involved radiocarbon dating, which confirmed that the bones
date to the fourth century AD, around the same time that Saint Nicholas would
have died, and are not a medieval forgery.

The post St. Nicholas is Coming to Town! appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

Happy Thanksgiving to Everyone!

The post Happy Thanksgiving to Everyone! appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

Suggested Advent Reading

A great introduction to the basic theology of the Incarnation and our experience of salvation.

Looking for a book to read this Advent? Look no further! A great introduction to the basic theology of the Incarnation and our experience of salvation, The Early Eastern Orthodox Church: A History (AD 60-1453), provides what you are looking for. Easy-to-read, user-friendly chapters give the background of the great controversies about how divinity and humanity are present in Christ. Excerpts from the leading theologians of the 4th to 7th centuries are given. Their ideas are discussed and explained in language modern readers can easily grasp.

What better way to prepare for Christmas than to spend time with St. Athanasius of Alexandria, St. Cyril of Alexandria, and St. Maximus the Confessor in order to better understand the mystery of God becoming human in Christ? The early Christian struggle to understand how Jesus is both 100% divine and 100% human is described. The vital role of Mary–and the importance of her title “Mother of God” as the way to adequately describe who her Son truly is–is the subject of one chapter as is the harmonization of our struggling, combative wills with Christ’s will for us.

Although Jesus is the unique God-made-human whose birth we celebrate at Christmas, we are able to share in His life.

“The Word of God, born once in the flesh (such is His kindness and His goodness), is always willing to be born spiritually in those who desire Him. In them, He is born as an infant as He fashions Himself in them by means of their virtues. He reveals Himself to the extent that He knows someone is capable of receiving Him. He diminishes the revelation of His glory not out of selfishness but because He recognizes the capacity and resources of those who desire to see Him. Yet, in the transcendence of mystery, He always remains invisible to all.” (St. Maximus the Confessor)

Get your copy of The Early Eastern Orthodox Church: A History (AD 60-1453) now and celebrate Christmas with a new or deeper understanding and appreciation for the coming together of humanity and divinity in the manger at Bethlehem.

The post Suggested Advent Reading appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

St. Martin’s Day, 2019

A cookie for St. Martin’s Day on display in a bakery window in Venice, Italy shows St. Martin on his horse ready to cut his cloak in half.

St. Martin of Tours was a Roman soldier in 4th century Gaul. He met a beggar one cold, snowy day who begged him for a rag or two to keep himself warm. St. Martin toook his sword and cut his cloak in half, giving a portion to the beggar. That night, he had a dream in which he saw Christ enthroned in glory, wearing the half of the cloak Martin had given to the beggar. “Where did you get such a cloak?” he heard the angels ask Christ. “My friend Martin gave it to me,” Christ replied.

When he awoke, Martin abondoned his duties as a soldier and became a monk. He attracted many disciples and became a famous monk. He insisted that his disciples always care for any poor person who came to the monastery gate because the monks would be serving Christ when they served the poor. He was made the bishop of Tours. Many hospices and hostels for the poor were dedicated in his honor. The ruins of one such hospice in Oxford–at the bottom of Carfax Tower–still has his image above what’s left of the front gate.

St. Martin’s feast day is November 11 and in many European countries that is the beginning of the “holiday season.” There was a 40-day fast before Christmas and St. Martin;s Day was the last important feast day before Christmas; families would often have a fancy goose dinner on St. Martin’s Day to mark the last occasion to have a big meat dinner before Christmas. (According to legend, Martin was reluctant to become bishop, which is why he hid in a stable filled with geese. The noise made by the geese betrayed his location to the people who were looking for him.) The goose dinner on St. Martin’s Day was a “rehearsal” for the goose dinner on Christmas Day, much as the turkey dinner on Thanksgiving in the United States is now often a “rehearsal” for the family dinner on Christmas Day.

In many European towns or villages a man dressed as St. Martin rides on a horse in front of a procession to celebrate St. Martin’s Day. The children sing songs about St. Martin and greet him as Americans greet Santa Claus at the end of the Thanksgiving Day parade in New York.

You can read my blog posts about St. Martin from years past here(2016), here(2013), and another from 2013 here.

The post St. Martin’s Day, 2019 appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

Bake an All Souls’ Cake!

Cakes for All Souls’ Day

A soul cake, also known as a “soul-mass cake,” is a small round cake which was traditionally made for All Souls’ Day to commemorate the dead in the Christian tradition. The cakes, which can also be known as “souls” for short, were given out to “soulers” who were mainly children and the poor, going from door to door singing and saying prayers for the souls of the dead. The practice in England dates to the Middle Ages and was continued there until the 1930s.

The practice of giving and eating soul cakes continues in some countries today, such as Portugal (where it is known as Pão-por-Deus and occurs on both All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day). Many see souling for cakes as the origin of the practice of trick-or-treating.

In many areas of the eastern Mediterranean or Central and Eastern Europe, the family of the deceased is expected to feed those who pray for the departed. Throughout Eastern Europe, food is left near the candles to be lit by those who pray for the departed; the poor can come into church, lit a candle for the dead and say a prayer, and take whatever food they need. (In one church of Minsk, I saw a dining room table covered with bags of food in the side chapel for these prayers!) The “memorial meal” or reception after a funeral in honor of the deceased is a modern version of this exchange of food for prayers for the deceased.

Any leftover soul cakes are shared among the distributing family or given to the poor the next day.

INGREDIENTS

1 cup (two sticks) butter

3 3⁄4 cups sifted flour

1 cup sugar

1⁄4 teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon ginger

1 teaspoon allspice

2 eggs

2 teaspoons cider vinegar

4 -6 tablespoons milk

powdered sugar, to sprinkle on top

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Cut the butter into the flour with a pastry blender or a large fork.

Blend in the sugar, nutmeg, ginger, cinnamon and allspice; beat eggs, vinegar, and milk together.

Mix with the flour mixture until a stiff dough is formed.

Knead thoroughly and roll out 1/4-inch thick.

Cut into 3-inch rounds and place on greased baking sheets. Prick several times with a fork and bake for 20-25 minutes.

Before Serving:

Sprinkle lightly with powdered sugar while still warm.

Want to print out the recipe? See the original post, with options for printing,here.

The post Bake an All Souls’ Cake! appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.

Agincourt, Oxford, and All Souls’ Day

Martyrdom of SS. Crispin and Crispinian

The battle of Agincort, made famous in Shakespeare’s play Henry V, took place on October 25, 1415 the commemoration of St. Crispin. See clips of the famous “Band of brothers” speech with reference to St. Crispin’s Day here.

Born to a noble Roman family in the 3rd century AD, Crispin and his brother Crispinian fled persecution for their faith, ending up at Soissons, where they preached Christianity to the Gauls while working as shoemakers and cobblers at night. They earned enough by their trade to support themselves and also to aid the poor. Their success attracted the ire of the governor of Gaul, who had them tortured and thrown into the river with millstones around their necks. They survived but were beheaded by the Emperor c. 285–286.

The college dedicated to All Souls in Oxford received its foundation charter in 1438 from King Henry VI. It is the only Oxford college to have only graduate students, no undergraduates. It was founded by Henry VI with the religious duty–in addition to academic research–to pray for those who had died at Agincort or in other battles during the Hundred Years War that England fought to control the crown of France. The number of the dead to be prayed for was overwhelming and the religious dedication was broadened to include all the departed, not just those slain in battle with the French. The college marks November 2, All Souls’ Day, as its name’s day; the commemoration of All Souls is 9 days after the commemoration of St. Crispin and his brother, thus including an allusion to the battle fought at Agincort which was the source the college’s original dedication..

All Souls has had many famous students, including Christopher Wren, William Blackstone, William Gladstone, and Lawrence of Arabia. British forces which fought at the Battle of Mons in August 1944 were said to have been protected by the ghosts of archers slain at Agincort.

All Souls College, Oxford with the dome of the Radcliffe Camera behind.

The post Agincourt, Oxford, and All Souls’ Day appeared first on Stephen Morris, author.