Ecclesiam tuam, quaesumus, Domine, gratia caelestis amplificet: quam beati Ioannis Chrysostomi Confessoris tui atque Pontificis illustrare voluisti gloriosis meritis et doctrinis. Per Dominum. We beseech thee, O Lord, that heavenly grace may increase your Church: which you willed to illumine by the merits and teachings of the blessed Confessor and Bishop John Chrysostom. Through the Lord.
St John Chrysostom (344-407), Bishop, Confessor and Doctor of the Church, whose Feast we celebrate today, was rightly named the ''Golden-mouthed'' (Χρυσόστομος, that is Chrysóstomos), on account of his profound genius and eloquence. One of the only real saints to have occupied the See of Constantinople, he remains engraved in the memories of both the Western Church and the Eastern churches as the most perfect preacher and theologian.
The celebrated genius Fr Adrian Fortescue says of him:
''The day on which his relics were brought back (January 27) is his feast among his own Byzantines and to us Latins. They sing: 'The holy Church rejoices mystically at the return of thy sacred relics, and receives them as a golden treasure. She never ceases teaching her children to sing of thee, and of the grace obtained by thy prayers, John of the Golden Mouth.'
''She never does cease. She teacher her Latin children, too, on that day to sing of the 'High Priest who in his day pleased God. For there is none other like him who kept the law of the Most High. Blessed is the man who suffered hardship, because when he has been tried he shall receive a crown of victory.' And when we sing of Chrysostom in our language while they praise him in theirs, we may look out across the sea and think of his people, his own Byzantines, cut off by this lamentable schism from the throne that defended him, and groaning under the heel of the unbaptized tyrant whose presence still defies the city of eighty Roman Caesars. If anything can trouble the peace of the saints, he must be troubled to see his successors rebel against those of Innocent, and to hear the Mu'ezzin cry from the place he would not have defiled by Eudoxia's statue. And if any saint has a special reason to pray to God for the end of these evils, it is John who appealed to Old Rome as lawful Bishop of New Rome, who, where Islam is now preached, spoke for the gospel of Christ with his golden mouth.'' (Adrian Fortescue, The Greek Fathers, Chapter IV).
St John appealed to an Old Rome which was Orthodox.
ReplyDeleteWho are you to decide who was a "genuine saint"?
I guess I am in no position to decide who is more saintly and heroic than the next man, but I know this much: St John Chrysostom was more of a Saint than ''saint'' Constantine I, a pagan his whole life then on his deathbed baptized by an Arian bishop (so the formula of his Baptism can hardly be considered orthodox). Almost every Emporer who did not openly persecute the Church, almost every Patriarch who was not a heretic was canonized. To name a few - St Theododius II, St Leo I (the Emporer that is), St Theodora, the Monophysite dancing woman, St Justinian II, St Constantine IV...
ReplyDeleteIf you'd like to continue this by email, my email address is on my Blogger Profile.
-Let not the blind vehemence of Fortescue overtake you. Some of the saints you contemn on the basis of a biased book are also venerated by our "uniate" or "sui generis" brethren. What do you make of Gregory Palamas and the Holy Mountain of Athos?
ReplyDelete-And Dandolo the old blind Doge of Venice, among the first to disembark from the Crusader fleet at the sack of Constantinople(1204)and who rushed off to the palaces and churches- went to St Sophia and felt with his claws the gold and porphyry. A tomb bearing his name is found there.
-A re-appraisal of the 17th cent would be very important. To a martian observer it looks like the Ultramontane "sect" subdued the rest of the Western Church from the 18th onwards. The eradication of the diocesan and regional uses then complete.
Adrian Fortescue described Pius X as "an Italian lunatic" in a letter to the Jesuit Herbert Thurston. Fortescue was so appalled by Pius X that he seriously considered leaving ministry.
ReplyDeletePerhaps Fortesuce would not regard Pius X as a "real saint"? After all now it seems mere election to the papacy is enough to start the canonisation process.
Pius X was a madman; everyone knows that. But there are other people in the Martyrology, such as Hildegard of Bingen, whose personal sanity might nowadays be called into question. I don't know much about Pius X to judge whether he was clinically insane or just an extreme fanatic but I recognise him as a real saint - even if I have practically no devotion to him whatsoever. At any rate, for all his doctrinal conservatism, he is responsible for the mutilation of the Psalter and Breviary reforms.
ReplyDeleteAs to other modern Popes being canonized, I think the Church ought to seriously consider the benefits of liturgical reform carried out under so many of them before they even think about making them saints. Personal piety is one thing - actually humbly adhering to one's ministry for the good of the Church is another.
Patricius
ReplyDeleteThe Arians used the Catholic Baptismal formula. St Basil the Great insisted that former Arians should not be re-baptised. Constantine postponed his baptism because he took it seriously, according to his lights. Don't you believe a newly illumined soul "in the state of grace", as you would put it, goes straight to heaven? Don't you believe in the possibility of repentance and renewal (Theodosia) or in the wisdom of attempting to reach out sympathetically to those in error, in a language they understand and recognise (the Monophysites)?
I'm unsure about the profit to either of us of continuing our discussions on this theme. Eventually, God willing, you'll come to a place where callow caricatures and triumphalistic narratives no longer seem sufficient. Perhaps then.
...that should be "Theodora", of course. Duh!
ReplyDelete