May 19th - St. Dunstan.
Linda
Born at Baltonsborough near Glastonbury, England, c. 909; died 988.Dunstan,
born of a noble Anglo-Saxon family with connections to the ruling house of
Wessex, was one of the great figures in English history. He received his
early education from the Irish monks at Glastonbury. While still young, he
was sent as a page to the court of Athelstan.
He had already received the tonsure, and his uncle, Bishop Saint Alphege the
Bald of Winchester, encouraged him to join the religious life. Dunstan
hesitated for some time and nearly got married, but after recovering from a
skin condition he believed to be leprosy, he received the habit (in 934) and
holy orders from his uncle the same day as Saint Ethelwold circa 939.
He returned to Glastonbury and is thought to have built a small cell next to
the old church, where he engaged in prayer, study, and manual labor that
included making bells and sacred vessels for the church and copying or
illuminating books. He is said to have excelled as a painter, embroiderer,
harpist, bell-founder, and metal worker. As Dunstan would play the harp and
sing to the nuns of the abbey as they embroidered his designs. Once, it is
said, when he hung up his harp on the wall and left the room for a while,
the harp continued to play of its own accord, caused, no doubt, by a current
of air vibrating the strings. But the residents of the abbey took it to be
an omen of Dunstan's future greatness. Dunstan also loved the music of the
human voice: when he sang at the altar, wrote a contemporary, "he seemed to
be talking with the Lord face to face." As one skilled in the arts, Dunstan
stimulated the revival of church art.
Athelstan's successor, Edmund, called him to court to act as a royal
counselor and treasurer. In 943, King Edmund I narrowly escaped death while
hunting, he appointed Dunstan abbot of Glastonbury with the commission to
restore monastic life there and richly endowed the monastery. According to
the old Saxon chronicle, Dunstan was only 18 when he became abbot of
Glastonbury.
Dunstan restored the monastery buildings and the Church of Saint Peter. By
introducing monks among the priests already in residence, he enforced
regular discipline without making waves. He made the abbey into a great
center of learning. Dunstan also revitalized other monasteries in
Glastonbury.
The murder of King Edmund was followed by the accession of his brother
Edred, who made Dunstan one of his top advisors. Dunstan became deeply
embroiled in secular politics and incurred the wrath of the West Saxon
nobles for denouncing their immorality and for urging peace with the Danes.
In 955, Edred died and was succeeded by his 16-year-old nephew Edwy. On the
day of his coronation, Edwy left the royal banquet to see a girl named
Elgiva and her mother. For this he was sternly rebuked by Dunstan, and the
prince deeply resented the chastisement. With the support of the opposing
party, Dunstan was disgraced, his property confiscated, and he was exiled.
He spent a year then in Ghent, Flanders, and there he came into contact with
reformed continental monasticism. This experience fueled his vision of
Benedictine perfection that would inspire his work from then on.
A rebellion broke out in England; the north and east deposed Edwy and put
his brother Edgar the Peaceful on the throne. Edgar recalled Dunstan and
appointed him chief adviser, in 957 bishop of Worcester, and bishop of
London in 958. On Edwy's death in 959, the kingdom was reunited under Edgar,
who appointed Dunstan archbishop of Canterbury in 961. Together the two
initiated a policy of reform to solidify both the Church and the country. At
Canterbury, Dunstan founded an abbey east of the city and three churches:
Saint Mary, SS. Peter and Paul, and Saint Pancras.
In 961, Dunstan went to Rome to receive the pallium and was appointed by
Pope John XII a legate of the Holy See. With this authority, he set about
re-establishing ecclesiastical discipline, under the protection of King
Edgar and assisted by Saint Ethelwold, the bishop of Winchester, and Saint
Oswald, the bishop of Worcester and the archbishop of York. In those days,
English monastic life had almost vanished as a result of the Danish
invasions. They restored most of the great monasteries, such as Abingdon,
that had been destroyed during the Danish incursions and founded new ones.
Dunstan founded monasteries at Bath, Exeter, Westminster, Malmesbury, and
other places. He drew up rules for each to instill good order. Recalcitrant
secular priests were ejected and replaced by monks in Winchester, Chertsey,
Surrey, and Dorset. About 970 a conference of bishops, abbots, and abbesses
drew up a national code of monastic observance, the Regularis Concordia. It
was in line with continental custom and the Rule of Saint Benedict but had
its own features: the monasteries were to be integrated into the life of the
people, and their influence was not to be confined within the monastery
walls.
Clergy who had been living scandalous lives or boldly disregarding canonical
laws of celibacy were reformed. Dunstan remained firm in his moral
standards, even to deferring Edgar's coronation for 14 years-likely due to a
disapproval of Edgar's scandalous behavior. He modified the coronation rite,
and some of his modifications devised for Edgar's coronation in Bath in 973
survive to this day.
Through 16 years of Edgar's reign, Dunstan acted as his chief adviser,
criticizing him freely. One on occasion when the king had been guilty of
immorality, Dunstan withstood him to his face, refusing to take his
outstretched hand and turned abruptly from him with the words: "I am no
friend of the enemy of Christ." Later he imposed a penance that for seven
years the king was not to wear his crown.
Dunstan continued to direct the state during the short reign of the
succeeding king, Edward the Martyr, Dunstan's protege. The death of the
young king, connected with the antimonastic reaction following Edgar's
death, grieved Dunstan terribly. His political career now over, he returned
to Canterbury to teach at the cathedral school, where visions, prophecies,
and miracles were attributed to him. He was especially devoted to the
Canterbury saints, whose tombs he visited at night.
On the feast of the Ascension in 988 the archbishop was ill but celebrated
Mass and preached three times to his people, to whom he declared that he
would soon die. Two days later he died peacefully in his Cathedral of Christ
Church, where he is buried. He is considered the reviver of monasticism in
England. It has been said that the 10th century gave shape to English
history, and that Dunstan gave shape to the 10th century. He composed
several hymns, notably Kyrie Rex spendens (Attwater, Benedictines, Bentley,
Delaney, Duckett, Fisher, Gill, White).
In art, he is shown as a bishop holding the devil (or his nose) with a pair
of pincers; or with a crucifix speaking to him (White). He might also be
shown (1) holding the tongs; (2) working as a goldsmith; (3) playing a harp;
(4) with a host of angels near him; (5) with a dove; or (6) as a monk
prostrate at the feet of Christ (in a drawing said to be his own) (Roeder).
He is the patron saint of armorers, goldsmiths, locksmiths, jewelers
(Delaney, White), blacksmiths, musicians, and the blind (Roeder).
This Version taken from:
http://users.erols.com/saintpat/ss/ss-index.htm
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Martyrology
Today is the Feast of Pope St. Peter Celestine. St. Peter founded a
particular branch of the Benedictines; the Celestines. He was taken out of
his monastic seclusion when he was made Supreme Pontiff. After reigning for
a time, he was the first and only Pope to resign the Papacy to return to his
monastic life, and died in AD 1296.
At Rome, St. Pudentiana, virgin. She underwent innumerable trials. After
caring reverently for the burial of many destitute martyrs, and distributing
all her goods to the poor, she at length passed from earth to heaven. A
memory.
In the same city, St. Pudens, senator, father of the aforesaid St.
Pudentiana and of St. Praxedes, virgin. He was adorned for Christ in baptism
by the Apostles, and he guarded his robe of innocence without stain until
(he received) the crown of life.
Likewise in Rome, on the Appian Way, the birthday of SS. Calocerus and
Parthenius, eunuchs. The former was chamberlain to the wife of the Emperor
Decius, and the other chief officer of another office. They refused to offer
sacrifice to idols and were tortured in various cruel ways. At last, after
their necks had been broken with a red-hot bar, they gave up their souls to
God.
At Nicomedia, St. Philoterus, martyr, son of the proconsul Pacian. He
suffered much under the Emperor Diocletian, and received the crown of
martyrdom.
In the same city, six holy virgins and martyrs, of whom the most famous was
Cyriaca. She boldly rebuked the wickedness of Maximian. (She was grievously
beaten and mangled, and at last was burned to death, thus gaining martyrdom.
At Lovannec in Brittany, St. Ivo, priest and confessor who, for the love of
Christ, defended the cause of the orphan, the widow, and the poor.
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The Angelic Trisagion:
Holy, holy, holy Lord God of hosts! The earth is full of Thy Glory! Glory
be to the Father, Glory be to the Son, Glory be to the Holy Ghost. Amen.