NOVEMBER 23
IGNATIUS HAD TO FLEE FROM BARDAS FOR HIS LIFE (857)
“What means this eager, anxious throng, Which moves with busy haste along These wondrous gatherings day by day What means this strange commotion pray I...”
http://www.eaec.org/faithhallfame/irasankey.htm
Like Israel, the church is a chosen people (1843)
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the...
Events
615
Death of the Irish scholar and missionary Columbanus at Bobbio, Italy, in one of the many monasteries he had founded.
Authority for the date: New Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1967.857
Patriarch Ignatius of Constantinople is deposed and banished, having refused Holy Communion to the Emperor's uncle “Cesar” Bardas because he was living in incest with his daughter-in-law Eudocia. Photius is made Patriarch in his place, although Ignatius will eventually be restored.
Authority for the date: Fortescue, Adrian. “Photius of Constantinople.” Catholic Encyclopedia. Appleton, 1911.1406
Death of Nicodemus of Tismana. As a young nobleman he had gone to Mt. Athos in Greece where he became a monk and priest. Upon his return to Romania, he had established a monastic community, then moved to Vodita where he built a church. He attempted to reconcile Serbian and Byzantine churches and founded another monastery at Tismana whose monks copied books.
Authority for the date: New Encyclopedia of Saints.1585
(or 20th) Death in London of Thomas Tallis, composer of fine Christian music, including the highly regarded Lamentations of Jeremiah and a number of psalm settings.
Authority for the date: Britannica1654
French thinker Blaise Pascal undergoes a profound religious conversion, which he records on paper, giving the date and time, followed by the mystical words: “Fire. The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. Not of the philosophers and intellectuals. Certitude, certitude, joy, peace. The God of Jesus Christ...”
Authority for the date: O'Connell, Marvin Richard. Blaise Pascal; Reasons of the Heart. 1997.1826
Myra Wood writes in her journal that a number of single women have united in prayer and fasting to find a more useful sphere of action so as not to be guilty of “standing here idle.” She will become a missionary in India.
Authority for the date: Robert, Dana L. American Women in Mission.1846
James Evans, having served as a missionary to Canadian Indians, collapses unexpectedly while in England and dies instantly at forty-five years of age. He had been under tremendous strain from sexual allegations brought against him by liquor traders furious at his preaching. A memorable incident in his life had been his accidental shooting of an Indian convert. Friends urged him to flee. James, however, located the man’s family, explained what had happened and offered himself for adoption in the man’s place. The mother was so impressed that a white man would care about the feelings of an Indian family, she let James live. For the rest of his short life, James shared his income with her.
Authority for the date: MacLean, John. James Evans: Inventor of the Syllabic System of the Cree Language. Light and Life, 1984.1872
Death of John Bowering who wrote the hymn “In the cross of Christ I Glory.”
Authority for the date: Duffield, Samuel Willoughby. English Hymns: Their Authors and History. New York: Funk and Wagnalls, 1886.1906
Death of William Wrede, German Lutheran scholar who had taught New Testament at the universities of Gottingen and Breslau. He contended that the Gospels represented the theology of the primitive church rather than a true biographical history of Jesus and that Paul was the real founder of first-century Christianity.
Authority for the date: Standard encyclopedias.1938
Jeremiah Mahalu Kisula is sent to Kitengule-Mwibara where he begins his ministry as an ordained minister. He will become the first bishop of the Africa Inland Church of Tanzania.
Authority for the date: Dictionary of African Christian Biography.