Timeline of Orthodoxy in Britain

Source of chart: http://megumitoai.wordpress.com/2008/10/31/the-orthodox-christian-church-is/

The early Christian writers Tertullian and Origen mention the existence of a British Church in the third century AD and in the fourth century British bishops attended a number of councils, such as the Council of Arles in 314 and the Council of Rimini in 359.

The first member of the British church whom we know by name is Saint Alban, who, tradition tells us, was martyred for his faith on the spot where St. Albans Abbey now stands.

The British Church was a missionary church with figures such as St Illtud, St Ninian and St Patrick evangelising in Wales, Scotland and Ireland, but the invasions by the pagan Angles, Saxons and Jutes in the fifth century seem to have destroyed the organisation of the Church in much of what is now England. In 597 a mission sent by St Gregory the Dialogist and led by St Augustine of Canterbury landed in Kent to begin the work of converting these pagan peoples.

What eventually became known as the "Church of England" [1] was the result of a combination of three traditions, that of Augustine and his successors, the remnants of the old Romano-British traditions and the Celtic tradition coming down from Scotland and associated with people like St Aidan and St Cuthbert.

These three traditions came together as a result of increasing mutual contact and a number of local synods, of which the Synod of Whitby in 664 has traditionally been seen as the most important. The result was an English Church, led by the two Archbishops of Canterbury and York, that was fully assimilated into the mainstream Church. This meant that it was influenced by the wider development of the Christian tradition in matters such as theology, liturgy, church architecture, and the development of monasticism.

Regarding the British Isles, what is known about the state of the Church there at the time of the Great Schism is that subsequent to the Norman Invasion in 1066, Church life was radically altered. Native clergy were replaced, liturgical reform enacted, and a strong emphasis on papal church control was propagated. As such, it is probably safe to say that, prior to 1066, the church of the British Isles was Orthodox, and the Normans brought the effects of the Great Schism to British soil. As such, it is probably proper to regard King Harold II as an Orthodox Christian.

It also meant that after King Harold II, the English Church continued under the authority of the "Pope" and not with Orthodoxy and this article does not consider the historical development of the "Church of England" after this date.

Orthodoxy was reintroduced, by the Church of Greece and by Russia.

The greatest contributor towards documenting the ecclesiastical and political history of England is attested to St. Bede, who completed in 731 five volumes of his best known work The Ecclesiastical History of England.

Pre-Roman Britain (55 B.C. - 43 A.D.)
55 BC Julius Caesar's first expedition to Britain, gaining a foothold on the coast of Kent.

54 BC Julius Caesar's second invasion of Britain, resulting in many of the native celtic tribes paying tribute and giving hostages in return for peace.[2]

5 AD Rome acknowledges Cymbeline, King of the Catuvellauni, as king of Britain.

Roman Britian: Introduction of Christianity (43-410)
Apostolic Era: According to the compilers of the Synaxarion, three members of the Apostolic Church had been responsible for preaching the Gospel in Britain:

Apostle Peter who, after visiting Milan, had "passed over to the island of Britain, now called England, (where) he spent many years and turned many erring Gentiles to faith in Christ";

Apostle Aristobulus (brother of St. Barnabas), who is called the Apostle of Britain and who was its first bishop; and

Apostle Simon the Canaanite and Zealot. In these Islands, the Celtic Church had shone forth - especially during the glorious period known as the "Age of Saints" when its missionaries preached throughout much of Europe, becoming 'Equals to the Apostles'.

Apocryphal legend claims that Joseph of Arimathea accompanied the Apostle Philip, Lazarus, Mary Magdalene & others on a preaching mission to Gaul.

Eusebius of Caesarea, (AD 260-340) Bishop of Caesarea and father of ecclesiastical history wrote: "The Apostles passed beyond the ocean to the isles called the Britannic Isles."

Ireland had been a place of refuge for monks fleeing from iconoclastic persecution; so, later, it was referred to as "the New Thebais" on account of the number of its monasteries.

43 Roman Emperor Claudius conquers England at Richborough (Kent), making it part of the vast Roman Empire; London is founded.

51 Caratacus, British resistance leader is captured and taken to Rome.

61 Boudicca, queen of the Iceni, led uprising against the Roman occupiers but was defeated and killed by the Roman governor, Suetonius Paulinus.

63 Joseph of Arimathea, travels to Britain and lands in Glastonbury [3] on the first Christian mission to Britain; Aristobulus, consecrated as first bishop to Britain.

ca.75-77 The Roman conquest of Britain is complete, as Wales is finally subdued; Julius Agricola is imperial governor (to 84).

122 Construction of Hadrian's Wall.

133 Julius Severus is sent to Palestine to crush the revolt.

140 Romans conquer Scotland.

ca. 155-222 Tertullian wrote that Britain had received and accepted the Gospel in his life time. [4]

167 Most commonly held date that Phagan and Deruvian sent by Eleutherius to convert the Britons to Christianity

ca. 170-236 Hippolytus of Rome [5] identifies Apostle Aristobulus listed in Romans 16:10 with Joseph of Arimathea and states that they ended up becoming Shepherds of Britain.

180 Protomartyr of Wales, St. Dyfan of Merthyr martyred at Merthyr Dyfan, Wales, May 14.

208 Tertullian writes that Christ has followers on the far side of the Roman wall in Britain where Roman legions have not yet penetrated.

283-305 Protomartyr of England, St. Alban [6][7], June 22.

304 Repose of Amphibalus at Verulamium (St Albans), Hertfordshire, June 25; Julius and Aaron [8] martyred at Caerleon, Britain, July 1 under the persecutions of the Emperor Diocletian; Socrates and Stephanus martyred in Monmouthsire, September 17 under the persecutions of the Emperor Diocletian [9]

307 The Church in Britain enjoys peace from the persecutions

313 "Edict of Toleration" (Milan), Christianity is made legal throughout the empire.

314 Council of Arles, for the first time, three British bishops attend a council.

325 First Ecumenical Council of Nicea convened by the Roman Emperor Constantine.

337 Constantine received "Christian" baptism on his deathbed. Joint rule of Constantine's three sons: Constantine II (to 340); Constans (to 350); Constantius (to 361)

350 Ninian establishes the church Candida Casa at Whithorn in Galloway, Scotland, beginning the missionary effort to the Picts.

380 Pelagius [10] enters Britain from Rome and introduces the Heresy of Pelagianism.[11]

383 Rome appoints Magnus Maximus as emperor in Britain while conquering Gaul, Spain and Italy

390 Patrick born at Kilpatrick, Scotland.

395 Death of Theodosius, the last emperor to rule an undivided empire, leaving Arcadius, emperor in the East and his other son, Honorius, emperor in the West; the office of Roman Emperor changes from a position of absolute power to one of being merely a head of state.

403 Abduction of Patrick to Ireland to serve as a slave; Victricius, Bishop of Rouen, visits Britain for the purpose of bringing peace to the island's clergy, who were in dispute over the Pelagian heresy.

406 Invasion of Gaul by Germanic tribes, severing contact between Rome and Britain [12].

410 Escape of Patrick back to Britain; Emperor Honorious recalls the last legions from Britain; Britain gains "independence" from Rome [13]; The Goths, under Alaric, sack Rome

Early British Kingdoms: Era of Celtic Missionaries (410-597)
410 Probable end of Roman occupation of Britain; Pelagian is driven out of Britain by the Goths of Alaric and moves to Palestine.

412 Patrick of Ireland has a vision of God informing him that he will leave for Ireland.

415 Pelagianism is attacked at the Council of Diospolis

418 Pelagianism is condemned at the Council of Carthage

419 King Brychan of Brecknock born, circa 419, in South Wales.

429 Celestine I dispatches prominent Gallo-Roman Bishops Germanus of Auxerre and Lupus of Troyes to Britain as missionary bishops and to combat the Pelagian heresy.

430 Patrick ordained by St. Germannus, Bishop of Auxerre.

431 Augustine and Pelagius;

432 Patrick sent from Aesir in Gaul to mission to Ireland.

440 Materiana born in Gwent of Wales.

445 Founding of monastery at Armagh in northern Ireland.

447 Germannus returns to Britain with Severus and heals a lame youth, condemns Pelagian heretics.

450 First monasteries established in Wales; Anglo-Saxon invasion of Britian.

455 Germanic Saxons and Angles conquer Britain, founding several independent kingdoms.

459 Repose of Auxilius of Ireland[14]

461 Repose of the Holy Hierarch St. Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland, at Saul, Downpatrick, Ireland March 17 [15]

484 Brendan the Navigator born at Tralee in Kerry, Ireland.

490 Brigid of Kildaire founds monastery of Kildare in Ireland.

493 Gildas the Wise born in the lower valley of the Clyde in central Scotland [16].

521 Birth of Columba of Iona.

525 Repose of St. Brigid of Kildaire, February 1; Gildas the Wise studies under St. Illtyd and travels to Ireland with David of Wales and Cadoc, here he is ordained to the priesthood.

530 Brendan the Navigator lands in Newfoundland, Canada, establishing a short-lived community of Irish monks.

540 Kentigern appointed bishop to Strathclyde Britons (modern Glasgow).

545 Synod of Brefi at Llandewi Brefi in Wales condemns Pelagianism; Saint David of Wales moved the Primatial See of Britain from Caerleon to Menevia (St. David's).

546 Columba founds monastery of Derry in Ireland.

547 Saint David of Wales does obeisance to the Patriarch of Jerusalem.

550 Repose of St. Jarlath of Tuam, first Bishop of Tuam, June 6; Aed of Ferns born at Inisbrefny, Ireland.

553 Kentigern, Bishop of Glasgow and Strathclyde exiled by pagans fleeing to Menevia, Wales.

556 Columba founds monastery of Durrow in Ireland.

557 Brendan the Navigator founds monastery at Clonfert, Ireland.

560 Gildas the Wise returns to Ireland at the invitation of King Ainmeric.

563 Columba arrives on Iona and establishes monastery there, founding mission to the Picts.

564 Death of Petroc.

569 David of Wales holds Synod of Victoria to re-assert the anti-Pelagian decrees of Brefi.

570 Repose of Gildas the Wise, January 29, his relics allowed to drift; relics of Gildas the Wise recovered and translated to the church in Rhuys, April 29.

573 Kentigern returns to Scotland after exile; Kentigern evangelises Galloway and Cumberland.

580 Aedan of Ferns returns to Ireland after studying under Saint David of Wales in Wales.

581 Kentigern returns to Glasgow.

577 Repose of St. Brendan the Navigator, May 16.

587 Repose of St. David of Wales, March 1.

597 Repose of Columba of Iona, enlightener of Scotland, June 9.

Anglo-Saxon England: The English Orthodox Church (597-1066)
According to historians, during this period St. Non, the mother of St. David of Wales, and the daughter of the nobleman Cynyr of Caer Goch of Pembrokeshire, reposed and St. Materiana of Cornwall, April 9, reposed early 6th-century at Minster of Cornwall.

597 Gregory the Great sends Augustine [17] and forty monks to Britain to convert the Kingdom of Kent; Augustine first preaches in the Isle of Thanet to King Ethelbert, receiving license to enter the Kingdom of Kent; King Ethelbert is converted and on Christmas day 10,000 of the king's subjects were baptized; Augustine was consecrated Abp. at Arles, and establishes the See of Canterbury.

598 Brandon mac Echac (d. 603) convence a synod at which the Diocese of Ferns is made an episcopal see and Aedan of Ferns is made the first Bishop; Glastonbury Abbey founded; the Church in the British Isles numbers 120 bishops, hundreds of monasteries and parishes organized under a Primate with his See at Menevia.

7th century Celtic missions are launched in Northumbria (Aidan, Cuthbert).

601 Death of David of Wales, Bishop of Menevia; Gregory sends the St Augustine Gospels to Augustine of Canterbury[18]

602 Augustine repairs the church of our Saviour and builds the monastery of St. Peter the Apostle, "Peter" is the first abbot of the same.

603 Repose of Kentigern of Glasgow, January 11; Ethelfrid, king of the Northumbrians, having vanquished the nations of the Scots, expels them from the territories of the English.

604 First Bishop of London, Mellitus consecrated by Augustine in the province of East Saxons; Repose of Saint Augustine of Canterbury "Apostle to the English" May 26; Saint Laurence of Canterbury consecrated as the second Archbishop of Canterbury; Bp. Mellitus founded the first St. Paul's Cathedral, traditionally said to be on the site of an old Roman Temple of Diana (although Christopher Wren in the 17th c. found no evidence of this).

612 Repose of Dubricius of Caerleon, Archbishop of Caerleon and Wales, November 14.

618 Repose of abbot Donnan & his monk companions in Eigg, April 17.

619 Repose of Laurence of Canterbury, February 3; Mellitus consecrated as third Archbishop of Canterbury.

624 Repose of Mellitus , first Bishop of London, April 24.

628 Benedict Biscop born in Northumbria.

630 Audrey of Ely born in West Suffolk.

632 Repose of Aed of Ferns, [19] Bishop of Ferns in Ireland, January 31.

635 Cuthbert born in Britain.

640 Repose of Beuno the Wonderworker, Abbot of Clynnog, April 21 [20].

647 Repose of Felix of Burgundy, Apostle of East Anglia, March 8.

650 (Fursey of Lagny, January 7)

651 Cuthbert of Lindisfarne witnesses the soul of St. Aidan of Lindisfarne reposing as a light in the night sky and leaves for Melrose Abbey to become a monk; Repose of St. Aidan of Lindisfarne, enlightener of Northumbria of Northern England, August 31.

653 Benedict Biscop and Wilfred the Elder set off to visit Rome.

661 Cuthbert of Lindisfarne and Eata join a monastery at Ripon.

664 Synod of Whitby; Cuthbert stricken by the great pestilence; repose of St. Boisil, abbot of Melrose Abbey, Scotland, February 23 [21].

668 Gerald of Mayo follows Colman and settles in Innisboffin.

669 Theodore of Tarsus arrives in Kent at the age of seven.

670 Colman founds an English monastery, separate to the irish, the "Mayo of the Saxons"[22], with Gerald of Mayo as the first abbot.

672 Repose of Chad of Lichfield and Mercia, March 2.

673 Historian Bede born.

675 Repose of Ethelburgh, first abbess of the Convent of Barking

676 Cuthbert becomes a solitary on Farne Island.

679 Repose of Audrey of Ely.

680 Repose of Botolph of Iken, June 17; Repose of St. Hilda of Whitby, November 17; Sussex is the last part of England to be converted to Christianity.

681 Repose of Caedmon, February 11 [23]

685 Cuthbert of Lindisfarne consecrated Bishop of Lindisfarne, March 26, by St. Theodore

686 Repose of Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, March 20.

689 Repose of Benedict Biscop, abbot, in Wearmouth, Co Durham, January 12.

690 Repose of Theodore of Tarsus, eighth Archbishop of Canterbury, September 19

694 Repose of Sebbe, founder of the monastery of Westiminster.

693 Repose of Erconwald, Bishop of London.

696 Incorrupt body of Audrey of Ely found.

697 Gerald of Mayo resigns as abbot of the "Mayo of the Saxons" in favour of St. Adamnan; Relics of Cuthbert of Lindisfarne revealed to be incorrupt.

703 Gerald of Mayo resumes the abbacy of the "Mayo of the Saxons".

709 Repose of Wilfrid, Bishop of Hexham, April 24.

714 Repose of Guthlac of Crowland, the hermit, April 11.

716 Repose of Donald of Ogilvy, confessor of Scotland, July 15..

731 repose of Gerald, Bishop of Mayo and english monk, March 13; Bede writes "The Ecclesiastical History of the English People"'

735 Repose of Venerable Bede, May 25.

Viking Age (793-1066)
869 King Edmund of East Anglia, martyred November 20.

870 Repose of Ss. Beocca and Hethor, the two martyrs of Chertsey.

890 Bede's Ecclesiastical History was translated into Old English at the insistence of Alfred the Great.

899 Repose of King Alfred the Great, October 26.

903 Relics of King Alfred the Great [24] translated to New Minster Abbey.

934 Death of Birnstan of Winchester.

935 Relics of St. Branwallader (or Brelade translated by King Athelstan to Milton Abbey [25].

955 Repose of King Edred of England, November 23.

988 Repose of St. Dunstan of Canterbury, Bishop of London.

ca.988-1023 The "Bosworth Psalter" is compiled at Canterbury, including a calendar of the Orthodox Church from among the Saints of Western, especially English origin who reposed before the West fell away from Orthodoxy.

1002 Repose of St. Wulsin, renewer of the Monastery of St. Peter.

1012 Repose of St. Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury martyred to the east of London at Greenwich, April 19.

1030 Relics of St. Boisil (Boswell), Prior of Melrose (+661), are translated to Durham Cathedral by the priest Ælfred.

Roman Catholic Period (1066-1534)
Anglo-Norman Britain: Latin Continental Ecclesiology Formalized (1066-1154)
1066 Repose of the last Orthodox King of England, Harold of England, October 14.

1072 On October 15, the last English Orthodox bishop, Ethelric of Durham, after anathematizing the Pope, died in prison at Westminster.

1104 Relics of Cuthbert of Lindisfarne translated [26] from Lindisfarne to Durham Cathedral, September 4.

ca.1136 Geoffrey of Monmouth writes his chronicle Historia Regum Britanniae ("History of the Kings of Britain").

Plantaganet Era (1154-1485)
This period witnessed the continual struggle between the English Kings and the Church in Rome for the legal high ground.

1170 Abp. of Canterbury Thomas Becket is assassinated in December in Canterbury Cathedral, after having excommunicated the Abp. of York and the Bps. of London and Salisbury, who had held the coronation of Henry the Young King in York in June, in breach of Canterbury's privilege of coronation.

1202-04 Nobleman Simon de Montfort, 5th Earl of Leicester achieved prominence in the Fourth Crusade.

1215 Magna Carta is issued, arguably the most significant early influence on the extensive historical process that led to the rule of constitutional law and democracy today in the English speaking world.

ca.1220 English Bp. Richard Le Poore is said to have been responsible for the final form of the "Use of Sarum", which had the sterling reputation of being the best liturgy anywhere in the West.

1221 The Dominican Friars (known as Black Friars) arrive in England, appearing in Oxford.

1265 Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester calls the first English parliament.

1295 King Edward I summons the Model Parliament, including members of the clergy and the aristocracy, as well as representatives from the various counties and boroughs.

1337-1453 Hundred Years' War between England and France.

1347 Death of William of Ockham, English Franciscan friar and scholastic philosopher and a supporter of the doctrine of Apostolic poverty, which was held by fundamentalist Franciscan and mendicant orders, bringing them into conflict with the pope; also the author of Occam's Razor.

1349 Death of Richard Rolle, English religious writer and mystic, Bible translator, and hermit.

1393 Julian of Norwich, thought of as one of the greatest English mystics, writes The Sixteen Revelations of Divine Love, chronicling her prolonged states of ecstasy when she saw visions of the sufferings of Christ and of the Trinity.

1438 Margery Kempe, a "religious enthusiast"[27] and laywoman, completes her autobiography The Book of Margery Kempe, chronicling her spiritual experiences, visions, and extensive pilgrimages to various holy sites in Europe.

1453 The Hundred Years War ends, England loses all its territory in France except for Calais.

1455-1485 Wars of the Roses, a series of dynastic civil wars between supporters of the rival houses of Lancaster and York, for the throne of England.

1476 William Caxton introduces the printing press into England, setting up a press at Westminster; the first book known to have been issued there was an edition of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.

Tudor Era (1485-1603)
1521 Pope Leo X rewards King Henry VIII for his written attack on Luther by granting him the title "Defender of the Faith".

English Reformation (1534-1660)
1534 Act of Supremacy by which the Parliament of England declared King Henry VIII as 'the only supreme head on earth of the Church in England', and affirming the legal sovereignty of the civil laws over the laws of the Church in England.

1536-1541 Dissolution of the Monasteries, nunneries and friaries in England, Wales and Ireland.

1549 First Book of Common Prayer is introduced.

1550 Vestments controversy begins as John Hooper called for the elimination of vestments; the controversy was ostensibly concerning vestments, but more fundamentally concerned with English Protestant identity, doctrine, and various church practices, shedding much light on the development of English forms of Puritanism and Anglicanism.

1553-1558 Restoration of Roman Catholicism by Queen Mary I; Queen Mary I restored the Sarum rite in 1553 and promulgated it throughout England, but it was finally abolished by Elizabeth I in 1559.

1558-1603 Elizabethan Era, final break with the Roman Church.

1560 Scottish Reformation marks Scotland's formal break with the Papacy in 1560; the Reformation Parliament repudiated the pope's authority, forbade the celebration of the Mass and approved a Protestant Confession of Faith, being made possible by a revolution against French hegemony.

1563 The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion were established, the historic defining statements of Anglican doctrine in relation to the controversies of the English Reformation.

1564-1660 The Era of Puritanism.

1603-1625 Jacobean Era.

1625-1642 Caroline Era.

1649-1660 Interregnum: Commonwealth of England: Anglicanism was disestablished and outlawed, and in its place, Presbyterian ecclesiology was introduced in place of the episcopate; the 39 Articles were replaced with the Westminster Confession, and the Book of Common Prayer was replaced by the Directory of Public Worship.

English (Stuart) Restoration (1660-1689): Orthodox Presence Re-established
Anglicanism was restored in a form not far removed from the Elizabethan version. However the ideal of encompassing all the people of England in one religious organisation, which was taken for granted by the Tudors, had to be abandoned. The religious landscape of England assumed its present form; the Anglican was the established church occupying the middle ground; Roman Catholics and those Puritans and Protestants who dissented from the Anglican establishment, too strong to be suppressed altogether, had to continue their existence outside the National Church rather than controlling it.

1662 Major revision of the Book of Common Prayer is published, remaining the official prayer book of the Church of England up until the 21st century (when an alternative book called Common Worship largely displaced it in Anglican parishes).

1670 Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain established by priest Daniel Voulgaris first Greek Orthodox Community in London, re-establishing an Orthodox presence in Great Britain.

1676 Arrival of Joseph Georgerines, Archbishop of Samos.

1677 "Greek St Church to the Panagia" erected for the Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain [28]

1684 "Greek St Church to the Panagia" confiscated and handed over to Huguenot refugees from France. Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain forced to worship for the next 150 years in the Imperial Russian Embassy.

1688 The Glorious Revolution (Revolution of 1688), overthrew King James II of England (VII of Scotland and II of Ireland) by a union of Parliamentarians with an invading army led by William III of Orange-Nassau.

1689 Act of Toleration, partially restores civil rights to Nonconformists who dissented from the Church of England, such as Baptists and Congregationalists, allowing them their own places of worship and their own teachers and preachers, subject to acceptance of certain oaths of allegiance; however this did not include Roman Catholics, Quakers or non-trinitarians.

The Revolution Entrenched (1689-1707)
1700 The Parliament of England passed Popery Act 1698, intended to prevent the Growth of Popery, imposing a number of penalties and disabilities on Roman Catholics in England.

United Kingdom of Great Britian (1707-1801)
1714-1837 Georgian Era.

1738 Print 'Noon' [29] by William Hogarth[30] shows evidence of a crowd exiting a Greek Orthodox church.

1778 The Parliament of Great Britain enacted the Papists Act 1778, the first Act for Roman Catholic Relief, reversing some of the penalties imposed in Popery Act 1698.

1780 The Gordon Riots, an anti-Catholic uprising against the act of 1778, which became an excuse for widespread rioting and looting.

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1801-1927)
1815-1914 Pax Britannica.

1827 A Byzantine silk depicting the Earth and the Ocean was found in the tomb of St. Cuthbert Bp. of Lindisfarne, when it was uncovered in May at Durham; the personified Earth is shown emerging from the waters with ducks and fishes, fishing being an allegory in Church art of apostolic mission of preaching the Gospel.

1837-1901 Victorian Era.

1837 Imperial Russian Embasy offers hospitality in Finsbury Park, London to the Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain community for their religious activities.

ca. 1840-1927 St. Arsenios of Cappadocia prophesised that "The Church in the British Isles will only begin to truly grow again when it begins to venerate once more its own saints".

1850 Greek Orthodox church built in London Street in the City.

1868 Tsar Nicholas Alexandrovich Romanov born May 6.

1877 Greek Orthodox Church of the Divine Wisdom (St Sophia) in Bayswater built.

1884 Nicholas II of Russia meets Princess Alice Victoria Helen Louise Beatrix von Hessen-Darmstadt

1899 Bede is made a "Doctor of the Church" [31] by Leo XIII.

1901-1910 Edwardian Era.

1906 Greek Orthodox Church of Saint Nicholas built in Cardiff.

1908 Oecumenical Patriarchate transfers its rights for four Greek Orthodox community churches to Church of Greece.

1914 By this time in Great Britain there existed four thriving Greek Orthodox Communities, all centred around a Greek Church of their own: London (Saint Sophia), Manchester (The Annunciation), Liverpool (Saint Nicholas), and Cardiff (Saint Nicholas).

1918 The family of Tsar Nicholas, Alexandra and their five children are lined up in their basement and shot, July 16.

1922 Holy Synod of the Oecumenical Patriarchate recognises the Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain with London as its seat; Germonos (Strinopoulos), former Rector of the Halki Theological Academy, is chosen as the first Bishop and Metropolitan of Thyateira.

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (1927-Present)
1941 Death of Evelyn Underhill, an English Anglo-Catholic writer and pacifist known for her numerous works on religion and spiritual practice, in particular Christian mysticism.

1948 HRH Princess Elizabeth, the present Queen, married the Greek Orthodox Prince Philip, the present Duke of Edinburgh; he was officially required to cease to be Orthodox, although he never ceased to make the Orthodox sign of the cross in public.

1951 Death of Germonos (Strinopoulos); Succeeded by Abp. Athenagoras (Cavadas).

1958 Elder Sophrony (Sakharov) seeks a monastic life in Essex of London; Timothy Ware converted from the Church of England to the Greek Orthodox Church.

1959 Patriarchal Stavropegic Monastery of St. John the Baptist founded by Elder Sophrony in Tolleshunt Knights, Maldon, Essex under the jurisdiction of Metr. Anthony (Bloom) of Sourozh.

1962 Repose of Athenagoras (Cavadas); Diocese of Sourozh is founded by Metr. Anthony (Bloom) of Sourozh.

1964 Gregorios (Theocharous) appointed Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Thyateira.

1965 Patriarchal Stavropegic Monastery of St John the Baptist moved under the Ecumenical Patriarchate; Nicholas Couris ordained a priest for ROCOR in Ireland.

1966 Timothy Ware is ordained to the priesthood and tonsured as a monk, receiving the name Kallistos; repose of St. John Maximovitch, Archbishop of London July 2.

1970 Gregorios (Theocharous) consecrated Bishop of Tropaeou, December 12; Chrysostomos (Mavroyiannopoulos) made auxiliary Bishop of Kyanea, December 19; acquired in 1960, St. Luke's Greek Orthodox Church in Glasgow, Scotland, is elevated to a Cathedral by the Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria, Nicholas VI (Valeropoulos), with the blessing of the Ecumenical Patriarchate.

1973 Anglican-Orthodox dialogue began, when the Anglican-Orthodox Joint Doctrinal Discussions (A/OJDD) held its first meeting in Oxford.

1975 Repose of Metr. Nikolaos of Halkis in a London hospital; the Greek Orthodox community of Saint Panteleimon of Harrow is established;[32] Abp. Athenagoras (Kokkinakis) publishes The Thyateira Confession: The Faith and Prayer of Orthodox Christians.

1976 The first phase of the Anglican-Orthodox dialogue was concluded by the publication of The Moscow Agreed Statemen.

1977 Death of Fr. Nicholas Couris; the New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha - Revised Standard Version (Expanded Edition) is published, endorsed by Abp. Athenagoras (Kokkinakis) of Thyateira and Great Britain.

1978 Diocese of Sourozh buys the Cathedral of the Dormition and All Saints, in London's Ennismore Gardens.

1979 Repose of Abp. Athenagoras (Kokkinakis) succeeded by Abp. Methodios (Fouyias); Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia appointed.

1980 The Antiochian Orthodox Society is established to serve the Arabic speaking and believing community.

1981 Redundant Anglican Church of St. Mary in Mary Street, Dublin handed to the Greek Orthodox Community of Dublin and Ireland, blessed and dedicated to the Holy Annunciation by Abp. Methodius (Fouyias of Thyateira, Great Britain and Ireland, May 24.

1982 Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia consecrated as Bishop for the Thyateira and Great Britain; the Church of St. Edward the Martyr is founded in Brookwood, Surrey, England, under the authority of (OODE note: Schismatic) Metr. Cyprian of Oropos and Fyli , to care for the sacred relics of Saint Edward the Martyr.

1984 The second phase of the Anglican-Orthodox dialogue was concluded with the publication of The Dublin Agreed Statement.

1988 Abp. Methodios (Fouyias) is succeeded by Abp. Gregorios (Theocharous) who is elected Abp. of Thyateira and Great Britain and enthroned at the Cathedral of Sophia in West London, April 16.

1989 The third phase of the Anglican-Orthodox dialogue began, when the commission was re-constituted as The International Commission for Anglican-Orthodox Theological Dialogue (ICAOTD), under the chairmanship of Metr. John of Pergamon and Bp. Henry Hill (succeeded in 1990 by Bp. Mark Dyer).

1990 The Friends of Mount Athos society is formed by people sharing a common interest for the monasteries of Mount Athos, with Metr. Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia being the President of the society, also including Prince Philip (Duke of Edinburgh) and Prince Charles (Prince of Wales and Heir Apparent to the British throne) among its members.

1991 The body of Nicholas II of Russia is exhumed in Yekaterinburg, Siberia.

1993 Death of Elder Sophrony (Sakharov), July 11.

1995 Death of Philip Sherrard, theologian May 30; establishment of the Antiochian Orthodox Deanery of the United Kingdom and Ireland.

1996 St. Aidan's Antiochian Orthodox Church in Manchester consecrated by Metropolitan Gabriel (Saliby); Richard Swinburne, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford and a very influential proponent of natural theology, converted from the Church of England to the Greek Orthodox Church.

1997 Friends of Orthodoxy on Iona founded.

1998 Nicholas II of Russia and family properly laid to rest.

1999 The Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies is founded in the ancient university city of Cambridge with the blessing of all Orthodox hierarchs in Western Europe, being a full member of the Cambridge Theological Federation; the Philokalia, Volume 4 published by Faber&Faber.

2000 Theodoritos (Polyzogopoulos) of Nazianzos elected and consecrated Bishop of Nazianzos; the council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church unanimously recognise Nicholas, Alexandra and their five children as saints; Archdiocese of Thyateira annual Youth Conference held at Wood Green, North London, April 21; Monachos.net [33] online discussion community set up by M.C. Steenberg; Institute of Byzantine Studies established at Queens' University, Belfast, Ireland.

2001 Bishop Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia retires.

2005 Mission in Macclesfield dedicated to St. Theodore of Canterbury opens in September.

2006 Bp. Basil (Osborne) was accepted into the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate on June 8 and accorded the title of Bishop of Amphipolis as head of the Episcopal Vicariate of Great Britain and Ireland, within the Patriarchal Exarchate for Orthodox Parishes of Russian Tradition in Western Europe.

2007 The Holy Synod of the Moscow Patriarchate officially released Bp. Basil (Osborne) from its jurisdiction on March 27; the Abp. of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams welcomed Patriarch Bartholomew I to Westminster Abbey to celebrate the publication of The Church of the Triune God: The Cyprus Agreed Statement, taking over 16 years to produce, concluding the third phase of the Anglican-Orthodox international theological dialogue; Diocese of Diokleia is elevated to a Metropolis and Bp. Kallistos (Ware) to Titular Metropolitan of Diokleia; Bp. Elisey of Sourozh consecrated; death of Metr. Gabriel (Saliby) of Western Europe (Antiochian).

2008 Enthronement of Metr. John (Yazigi) of Western and Central Europe for the Antiochian Orthodox Deanery of the United Kingdom and Ireland; partnership between Monachos.net (Patristic and Monastic website) and Ancient Faith Radio, launching a series of weekly internet podcasts entitled "A Word From the Holy Fathers".

2009 With the retirement of Bp. Basil (Osborne) of Amphipolis, the Episcopal Vicariate of Great Britain and Ireland became the Deanery of Great Britain and Ireland, coming directly under the omophorion of Abp. Gabriel (de Vylder) of Komana (Patriarchal Exarchate for Orthodox Parishes of Russian Tradition in Western Europe)



Notes
Some of these dates are necessarily a bit vague, as records for some periods are particularly difficult to piece together accurately.

The division of Church History into separate eras as done here will always be to some extent arbitrary, though it was attempted to group periods according to major watershed events.

This timeline is necessarily biased toward the history of the Orthodox Church, though a number of non-Orthodox or purely political events are mentioned for their importance in history related to Orthodoxy or for reference.

G. E. Palmer, Philip Sherrard and Bishop Kallistos Ware translate and publish four volumes of the Philokalia into English; Bishop Kallistos Ware and Mother Mary produced English translations of the Lenten Triodion and Festal Menaion.

Grand Duchess St. Elizabeth (a grand-daughter of Queen Victoria and a great-aunt of Prince Philip) and St. John Maximovich, who have been associated with them in the recent past.

The memory of Brother Lazaros, killed (some would say, martyred) within the Cathedral at Camberwell, remains vivid...

Monastery of St. John the Baptist in Essex, which depends directly on the Oecumenical Patriarchate and whose Founder was the saintly Archimandrite Sophrony, a pupil of St. Silouanos of the Holy Mountain.

External links
Greek Orthodox Church in Great Britain

Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain - Orthodoxy in the British Isles

ANASTASIS. The web pages of Archimandrite Ephrem Lash.

Russian Orthodox Church in Great Britain

Diocese of Sourozh under the Patriarchate of Moscow

Russian Orthodox Church in Ireland

Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese of Western and Central Europe

http://www.antiochgreekorth.co.uk/

http://www.antiochian-orthodox.co.uk/index.html

http://www.london.antiochian.org.uk/default.asp

http://www.yorkthodox.org.uk

Wikipedia

Christianity in the United Kingdom: Eastern Orthodox Churches.

Britons (historical).

Timeline of Anglo-Saxon settlement in Britain.

Norman conquest of England.

Timeline of British history.

General

Orthodox England (Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia: Diocese of Great Britain and Ireland).

Timeline of Orthodox Christianity in the British Isles.

A SERVICE TO ALL SAINTS OF BRITAIN; AN ENGLISH ORTHODOX CALENDAR; DEATHBED PROPHECY OF KING EDWARD THE CONFESSOR.

Timeline of British History at Britannia.com.

An Anglican Timeline (AD. 44-2000)

Timeline of the English Reformation and Development of the Anglican Church (1517-1726).

Christianity in the UK at BBC News.

Published Works
Bede, Ecclesiastical History of the English People, excerpts (from the Internet Medieval Sourcebook)

Judith Pinnington. Anglicans and Orthodox: Unity and Subversion 1559-1725. Gracewing Publishing, 2003. 260 pp. ISBN 9780852445778 (Forward by Rowan Williams, Abp. of Canterbury; Introduction by Kallistos Ware, Bp. of Diokleia)

References
1. ↑ The "Church of England" (the Ecclesia Anglicana - or the English Church)

2. ↑ The British forces are led by Cassivellaunus.

3. ↑ St. Philip sent Joseph of Arimathea, with twelve disciples, to establish Christianity in the most far-flung corner of the Roman Empire: the Island of Britain. The year AD 63 is commonly given for this "event", with AD 37 sometimes being put forth as an alternative.

4. ↑ Tertullian wrote that Britain had received and accepted the Gospel in his life time: "All the limits of the Spains, and the diverse nations of the Gauls, and the haunts of the Britons--inaccessible to the Romans, but subjugated to Christ."

5. ↑ Hippolytus was considered to have been one of the most learned Christian historians and is the one who identifies the seventy whom Jesus sent in the Gospel of Saint Luke

6. ↑ The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles list the year of St. Alban's execution as 283 not as 305.

7. ↑ St. Alban is first mentioned in "Acta Martyrum", and also by Constantius of Lyon in his Life of St. Germanus of Auxerre, written about 480

8. ↑ The earliest authority for their existence is St. Gildas in De Excidio Britanniae.

9. ↑ Ss. Socrates and Stephanus appear in the Martyrologion Hieronymianum MS.50 from Trinity College, Dublin (11th-century) and one of the earliest amplifications of Bede's martyrology. Tradition holds them to be disciples of St. Amphibalus.

10. ↑ St. Jerome suggests that this Pelagius was of Scottish descent but in such terms that it is uncertain as to whether he was from Scotland or Ireland. He is also frequently referred to as a British monk and Augustine has been documented as referring to him as "Brito" to distinguish him from Pelagius of Tarentum.

11. ↑ http://www.seanmultimedia.com/Pie_Pelagius_Synod_Lydda_415AD.html

12. ↑ In early January, 406, a combined barbarian force (Suevi, Alans, Vandals & Burgundians) swept into central Gaul, severing contact between Rome and Britain. In autumn 406, the remaining Roman army in Britain decided to mutiny. One Marcus was proclaimed emperor in Britain, but was immediately assassinated.

13. ↑ Emperor Honorius tells Britain to attend to its own affairs, effectively removing the Roman presence.

14. ↑ St. Auxilius of Ireland: The date of death is also given as 454 or 455, see Sabine Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints (J. Hodges, 1898), 275.

15. ↑ When he came to Ireland, as its enlightener, it was a pagan country; when he ended his earthly life some thirty years later, about 461, the Faith of Christ was established in every corner." (Great Horologion) The work of St Patrick and his brethren has been called the most successful single missionary venture in the history of the Church.

16. ↑ The date of St. Gildas' birth can only tentatively be placed to the decades either side of the beginning of the Sixth Century. St. Bede indirectly suggests the year 493 for this event and this is the date adopted for this article.

17. ↑ Saint Augustine of Canterbury is also called the "Apostle to the English".

18. ↑ The "St Augustine Gospels" manuscript is the oldest surviving Latin illustrated Gospel book in existence.

19. ↑ A bronze reliquary in which the relics of St. Aed of Ferns are kept is currently preserved in Dublin.

20. ↑ St. Beuno the Wonderworker, Abbot of Clynnog, was uncle to St. Winefride of Treffynon, November 3, whom he also restored to life.

21. ↑ Almost all that is known of St. Boisol or Boswell, is learn from St. Bede (Eccles. Hist., IV, xxvii, and Vita Cuthberti).

22. ↑ The Mayo (Magh Eo, the yew plain), known as "Mayo of the Saxons". St. Bede writes of this monastery: "This monastery is to this day (731) occupied by English monks... and contains an exemplary body who gathered there from England, and live by the labour of their own hands (after the manner of the early Fathers), under a rule and canonical abbot, leading chaste and single lives."

23. ↑ Cædmon is said to have taken holy orders at an advanced age and it is implied that he lived at Streonæshalch at least in part during Hilda’s abbacy (657–680). Book IV Chapter 25 of the Historia ecclesiastica appears to suggest that Cædmon’s death occurred at about the same time as the fire at Coldingham Abbey, an event dated in the E text of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle to 679, but after 681 by Bede.

24. ↑ Considered a local Saint by the Orthodox church of England but not formally canonised.

25. ↑ The proper name of Milton Abbey is the Abbey Church of St. Mary, St. Samson and St. Branwalader.

26. ↑ His [St. Cuthbert of Lindisfarne] body was still found to be untouched by decay, giving off "an odour of the sweetest fragrancy", and "from the flexibility of its joints representing a person asleep rather than dead.

27. ↑ Margery Kempe (ca.1373-ca.1439) stands very much alone in the English mystical tradition. Indeed, she is thought by some to be outside this tradition because of the lack of depth in her revelations, the highly personal level of her visions, and the extremes of her behaviour. If she is a mystic, it is certainly not in the same sense as her better known contemporaries such as Richard Role or Julian of Norwich.

28. ↑ "In the year of salvation 1677 this Temple was erected for the nation of the Greeks, the Most Serene Charles II being King, and the Roual Prince Lord James being commander of the foreces, the Right Reverend Lord Henry Compton being Bishop, at the expense of the above and other Bishops and Nobles and with the concurrence of our Humility of Samos Joseph Georgeirenes, from the island of Melos." - Inscription from tablet carved in Greek preserved on the west wall of the church Charing Cross Road. This site is now occupied by St Mary's of Kenton a non-Orthodox denomination.

29. ↑ From the series entitled "The Four Times of the Day".

30. ↑ In Hogarth’s time the portion of the street where the church stood was called Hog Lane. It was later renamed Crown Street and was demolished when Charing Cross Road was widened.

31. ↑ The position of "Doctor of the Church" is a position of theological significance; St. Bede is the only man from Great Britain to achieve this designation (Anselm of Canterbury, also a Doctor of the Church, was originally from Italy

32. ↑ http://www.st-panteleimon.org/

33. ↑ Monachos: http://www.monachos.net/


Source: http://en.orthodoxwiki.org/index.php?title=Timeline_of_Orthodoxy_in_Britain&oldid=90078

Saint Ursula

Saint Ursula ("little female bear" in Latin) is a British Christian saint. Her feast day in the extraordinary form calendar of the Orthodox Church is October 21. Because of the lack of sure information about the anonymous group of holy virgins who on some uncertain date were killed at Cologne.

Her legend, is that she was a Romano-British princess who, at the request of her father King Dionotus of Dumnonia in south-west England, set sail to join her future husband, the pagan Governor Conan Meriadoc of Armorica, along with 11,000 virginal handmaidens. However, a miraculous storm brought them over the sea in a single day to a Gaulish port, where Ursula declared that before her marriage she would undertake a pan-European pilgrimage. She headed for Rome with her followers, and persuaded the Pope, Cyriacus (unknown in the pontifical records), and Sulpicius, Bishop of Ravenna, to join them. After setting out for Cologne, which was being besieged by Huns, all the virgins were beheaded in a dreadful massacre. The Huns' leader shot Ursula dead, supposedly in 383 (the date varies).

Greek Version

Η Αγία Ουρσούλη ή Αγία Ούρσουλα είναι Αγία της Δυτικής Εκκλησίας. Ήταν πριγκίπισσα κόρη του Βασιλιά της Βρετάνης Δεονάτου. Εχριστιανίσθηκε στη Γαλατία και στις Χώρες του Ρήνου. Θανατώθηκε από τους Ούνους το 453. Η μνήμη της εορτάζεται, από τη Δυτική Εκκλησία στις 21 Οκτωβρίου.

Υπό τη προστασία της Αγίας Ουρσούλης δημιουργήθηκε τον 6ο αιώνα το γνωστό γυναικείο μοναχικό Τάγμα Ουρσουλινών (καλογριών).

Προς τιμή της Αγίας και παρθένου Ούρσουλας ο Χριστόφορος Κολόμβος ονομάτησε τις νήσους που ανακάλυψε στο δεύτερο ταξίδι του το 1493, τις γνωστές Νήσοι Παρθένου ή Νήσοι Παρθένων (Virgin islands) στη Καραϊβική.

THE ANCIENT CELTIC CHURCH

THE ANCIENT CELTIC CHURCH had intimate ties with the same Desert Fathers of Egypt, Syria, and Palestine who fostered the ascetic literature and monasticism of the Byzantine and Slavic Orthodox Churches. This essay attempts to elucidate Celtic Christian spirituality and monasticism in the light of Orthodox Christian monastic and ascetic tradition. Specific points are illustrated with salient examples drawn from the Celtic Saints, the ancient Christian East and, for a perspective closer to our own times, from nineteenth-century Russian Orthodox monasticism, along with commentary from contemporary Orthodox writers. These flourishings of monastic sanctity, separated by great distances in space and time, manifest a deep internal kinship and harmony.

Introductory Remarks. At the present time, there is an increasing interest in Celtic Christianity in Western Europe and North America. Various problems of the present age naturally compel thoughtful and sensitive individuals to ponder what wrongs have been committed throughout history and why Western civilization faces such problems, be they practical or spiritual in nature. There appears to be a nostalgia for a unified perspective, a renewed vision and approach to both the spiritual and the material world. Perhaps, without being fully understood, this nostalgia, as such, finds a refreshing spring of pure water in Celtic Christianity, in the saintly personalities and poetry of its monks. Here, the searching soul comes upon a new perspective and unified vision of reality. But this pleasing discovery is not always accompanied by the realization that Celtic Christians found this same renewed perspective only through a long, arduous, and often painful spiritual struggle—one which opens the way for Divine Grace to effect the interior changes that enable a person to see reality in such a wholesome way.

In his day, Julius Csar noted that the entire Gallic nation was very religious.1 Of course, he was speaking about pagan Celts, but a deep religiosity has been a characteristic of the Celts in general over the centuries, and especially during the Christian era. Alexander Carmichael, who collected folklore in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland during the nineteenth century, is another, more recent witness to the deep religiosity of the Celts. He observed that the music of their hymns had a distinct individuality, which resembled, but was clearly distinct from, the old Gregorian chants of the Church. He ventured the opinion that this peculiar and beautiful music was that of the old Celtic Church.2 Nor have the Celtic Saints been forgotten:

Isabel Mac Eachainn said that a widow woman at Tabal, Mull, had a cow ill with the tarbhan (swelling from surfeit), and she was wringing her hands and beating her breast to see her beloved cow in pain. At that moment she saw Calum Cille, Columba, and his twelve disciples in their curachan (little boat or coracle), rowing home to Iona. The widow ran down to the rudha (point) and hailed Calum Cille, and asked him to heal her cow. Calum Cille never turned a dull ear to the poor, to the penitent, to the distressed, and he came ashore and made the ora to the white cow, and the white cow rose upon her feet and shook herself and began to browse upon the green grass before her.

Go thou home, bronag, and have faith in the God who made thee and in Christ the Saviour who loved thee and died for thee, and in thine own self, and all will go well with thee and with thy cow.

Having said this, Calum Cille rejoined his followers in the curachan and resumed his journey to Hi. There was no one like Calum Cille, no one, my dear. He was big and handsome and eloquent, haughty to the over-haughty and humble to the humble, kind to the weak and wounded.3

Ireland and the other regions inhabited by Celts abounded in churches and monasteries during the first millennium of the Christian era. Celtic Bishops and Priests led their flocks to spiritual perfection, to holiness. Of course, not everyone attained such heights, but there were surprisingly many who did; it was not without reason that Ireland was called Insula Sanctorum (the Island of Saints). The Celtic spiritual Fathers (anamcharas and periglours) helped to heal the interior wounds of their spiritual children; they gave them strength and courage for further spiritual struggles. On the ancient Celtic holy sites in Ireland, Wales, Scotland, and elsewhere rested the glow of that cleste Lumen (heavenly light), shining from the faces of the Celtic monks who had advanced in spiritual life and attained theosis (deification).

Celtic clergy helped to spread the Christian Faith in a peaceful and blessed way. Some time toward the end of the sixth century, there began an exodus from Ireland of the Scotti peregrini, among whom was St. Columbanus. They contributed greatly to a spiritual and cultural renaissance on the European continent. It is possible that their missionary efforts reached as far as the territory of the present Czech Republic. One might say that all of this was too beautiful to last forever. The Holy Spirit, at work in the local Celtic Churches, produced this wonderful blossoming, which gave form to the very best and most beautifully distinctive qualities and gifts of the Celtic peoples. Yet, one of the greatest tragedies of Church history is the withering of this very special blossom of Celtic Christianity on the stalk of the Church.

As I became more deeply acquainted with Celtic Christianity, through reading the ancient lives of Celtic Saints and visiting the holy sites in Ireland, Wales, Scotland, and England, I became convinced of a deep inner spiritual unity between Celtic Christianity, which has almost vanished, and Orthodox Christianity. This deep inner unity is not surprising; spirituality is living dogmatic theology, dogmatic theology reified in life. The confession of the Orthodox Faith formed the same spirituality in the Celtic peoples that it did in other peoples and cultures that confess Orthodox Christianity. Thus, Celtic Christianity has not perished completely. Its holy places retain their unique spiritual atmosphere and a pilgrimage to them can enrich anyone who is appropriately motivated and spiritually sensitive. The Celtic lands produced numerous Saints who are alive in God and who are helping those who turn to them with faith in their prayers.

The Origins of Monasticism in the West
Gilbert Hunter Doble has written that, "the most characteristic feature of the Celtic Church was its preference for the monastic and eremitic life," and that, "the history of the Celtic Church is largely a history of monks and monasteries." 4 Monasticism, like Christianity, has its origin in the East and quickly spread through Palestine, Egypt, and Syria to the West. In the fourth century, monasticism reached Gaul, through the efforts of St. Martin of Tours (ca. 315-397). St. Martin lived as a hermit on an island off the Ligurian coast. In 360, he became a member of the clergy surrounding St. Hilary at Poitiers. In LigugÉ, not far from Poitiers, he founded a semi-eremitical community, the first monastery in Gaul. In 370 or 371, he was consecrated Bishop of Tours. He lived in a solitary place nearby, where another monastery was soon founded, Marmoutier. His example led to the establishment of other monastic communities elsewhere.5

The influence of another monk, St. John Cassian, was also very important in Gaul. St. John spent a number of years as a monk in Bethlehem and Egypt, and was thus familiar with the life and teachings of the Desert Fathers. About the year 415, he established a monastery and a convent at Marseilles. In his Institutes, he related the traditions of monastic life and also analyzed the eight cardinal passions. In the Conferences he recorded his talks with the Egyptian spiritual Fathers. His writings on monastic life were studied by the Celtic monks on the British Isles.6 A contemporary of St. John Cassian, St. Honoratus (ca. 350-429), founded a monastery on one of the islands of Lérins (now St. Honorat) off Cannes in the south of France, where he settled after a pilgrimage to Greece and Rome around the year 410. St. Lupus of Troyes also became a monk here, and later accompanied St. Germanus of Auxerre to Britain in 429. It is possible that St. Patrick, the Apostle of the Irish, lived for a time on Lérins.7

St. Athanasios of Alexandria, the defender of Orthodoxy at the First Œcumenical Synod in Nica, in 325, had a profound knowledge of monastic life. In 336-337, he was exiled to the West, to Trves (Trier). It was probably at the request of the monks in the West, to whom he dedicated this work, that he wrote his famous Life of St. Anthony, during his third exile in Upper Egypt between 356 and 362. The life of St. Anthony was translated into Latin around 380 and profoundly influenced and contributed to the development of monastic life in the West. This work was read on Iona, and St. Anthony and St. Paul of Thebes are depicted on several Irish high Crosses.

A disciple of St. Martin of Tours, St. Victricius, Bishop of Rouen, visited Britain in about 396. In Rouen, there was a monastery of men and a chorus virginum at the end of the fourth century. According to his biographer, St. Victricius may have borrowed his monastic Rule from Trves. It is quite likely that Saints Ninian and Patrick, both Roman Britons, were influenced by the monastic movement in Gaul, which also influenced St. Germanus of Auxerre, whose two missions to Britain not only strengthened the British Church in Orthodoxy, but also contributed to the development of monasticism in Britain. The British Church maintained close contact with the Church on the Continent. This contact was later impaired, but not entirely broken, by the Anglo-Saxon incursions. In the days of St. Jerome, Britons travelled to the holy sites of Palestine and some visited the Desert Fathers in Egypt. We learn from the Historia Religiosa of Theodoretos of Cyrrhus (fifth century) that many Britons also flocked to the pillar of St. Symeon the Stylite.8 The old Irish litany of Saints mentions seven Egyptian monks who were buried in Dysert Ulaidh in Ireland.9

Thus, the monastic ideal and practice of spiritual life reached the British Isles through the Gallican Church, through pilgrims who traveled to the East, through spiritual literature (e.g., the Life of St. Anthony and the writings of St. John Cassian), and perhaps also through pilgrims who traveled from the East to the West, such as the seven Egyptian monks buried in Ireland.

The Significance of Monasticism
Even in the Old Testament times, the members of the Old Testament Church, that is the people of Old Israel, were called to holiness, as it is written in the Book of Leviticus (19:1-2): "And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the congregation of the children of Israel, and thou shalt say unto them, Ye shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am Holy." In the New Testament, members of the Church are called to spiritual perfection, as we read in the Gospel according to St. Matthew (5:48): "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father Which is in Heaven is perfect." This Commandment indicates the path which all true Christians are to follow, without expecting it to "end" at any point.10 This is the path of spiritual perfection. Those who persevere through the trials of this life will continue to travel this path in the future life beyond the grave.

All true Christians, without exception, are called to this ideal. There are not two ideals: one for the laity and another for monastics. St. John Chrysostomos gives the following instructions to a Christian parent: "You are very mistaken if you think that one thing is expected of lay people and something else from a monastic. The difference between them is that one enters into marriage and the other does not; in everything else they have the same responsibilities."10a A saintly Bishop in Russia during the nineteenth century, Ignatius (Brianchaninov), wrote that what is important is Christianity and not monasticism; monasticism is important only insofar as it brings the monk to perfect Christianity.

When the rich young man asked the Savior what good thing he should do in order to inherit eternal life, the Lord Jesus Christ replied to him, that if he wanted to enter into eternal life, he had to keep the commandments. When the young man persisted in his questioning, the Lord told him, "If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven, and come and follow Me" (St. Matthew 19:21). The Savior also speaks about those who do not live in marriage, because they have renounced it for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven, and adds: "He that is able to receive it, let him receive it" (St. Matthew 19:12).

The Apostle Paul writes, in his First Epistle to the Corinthians: "He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord; but he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife. There is difference also between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman careth for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit; but she that is married careth for the things of the world, how she may please her husband." The Apostle then says: "And this I speak for your own profit, not that I may cast a snare upon you, but for that which is comely, and that ye may attend upon the Lord without distraction" (7:32-35).

Thus, while all Christians are called to spiritual perfection, whether they are married or not, these citations from the New Testament clearly show that poverty (non-attachment to material things) and purity are effective means for attaining spiritual perfection in this life, with the help of God.

From the beginning of the life of the early Christian Church, there were those who longed for spiritual perfection, for total commitment to their Lord, and for undivided service and consecration to God. Outward solitude and quiet, a life apart from the world, and living in a community of like-minded Christians are other aids and means for attaining this noble goal. Gradually, some deserts and uninhabited regions were settled by spiritual warriors. Some lived in small groups, others in larger communities: cœnobitic monasteries. Others, whose spiritual state corresponded to such a way of life, lived completely alone as anchorites. Various rules regulating the monastic life were soon developed and ascetic literature began to be recorded and circulated. Bishop Ignatius (Brianchaninov) notes that monasticism was thus established in the early Church by the Holy Spirit, and the holy Elder Barsanuphius of Optina says that monks are called to be the light of the world and, in the future life, to be kings and Priests.

The various monastic rules, pertaining to clothing, diet, and a special way of life separated from the world, are tools employed to attain a spiritual goal. But sometimes these outward things, while in themselves good and important, may be misapplied and hinder a person on the spiritual path. Elder Barsanouphius of Optina wrote:

There are two kinds of monasticism: outward and inward. The outward one is easy to acquire, but it is difficult to become a monk inside. Outward monasticism includes the practice of external asceticism, such as fasting and vigils; it also includes orderly attendance at the Divine services and sobriety. One cannot dispense with outward monasticism, but one must never be satisfied with it alone. Outward monasticism without the inner may even be harmful.

Elder Barsanuphius goes on to speak about the Prayer of Jesus as an important factor in the formation of the inner monk:

The Prayer of Jesus sanctifies the entire interior life of the monk; it gives him strength in combat. Inner monasticism is the purification of the heart from passions and the struggle with thoughts. Outward monasticism on its own does not bring spiritual profit; interior fire is required.11

So, a person may spend his entire life in a monastery without making any progress on the path of interior purification. One may even lead a worse life in a monastery than in the world. True monasticism is very difficult; it is the university of spiritual life.

Theosis: Mans Purpose and His Fallen State
In the book of Genesis we read: "And God said, Let Us make man according to Our image and likeness" (Genesis 1:26). The Church Fathers, since ancient times (e.g., St. Irenus of Lyons), have distinguished between the Divine image and likeness. Man was created in the image of God, but he had yet to attain His likeness, to become like God, to achieve full theosis. However, man fell. The first man, Adam, prior to his fall, possessed an internal unity through God's Grace (charis, gratia). He was turned Godward in love. But when he sinned, he lost this special Grace which had protected and united him. The good order of his soul was corrupted, and a corrupt and sinful man came into existence.12 The passions that overcame man were not outside forces which entered from without and which must be uprooted. Rather, they are energies of the soul which have been distorted and need to be transformed. In the human soul, there are three faculties: the intelligent (logistikon), appetitive (epithymetikon), and the incensive (thymikon). These three faculties must be directed toward God. When they turn away from Him, they become sinful passions. A sinful passion is therefore a movement of the soul contrary to nature.13

The first man did not carry out the task which lay before him, "to cultivate and to keep" (Genesis 2:15), to strengthen himself in goodness and coöperate with Divine Grace to attain full deification and become god by Grace. Because of the fall, the Divine œconomy for man had to be adapted; however, the goal for which man was created did not change. St. Athanasios of Alexandria states that God became man so that man might become god.13a This teaching about theosis is to be found in the writings of the Church Fathers from the earliest times; it has Biblical origins.

The idea of personal and organic union between God and man— God dwelling in us and we in Him—is set forth in the Gospel according to St. John and the Epistles of St. Paul. The latter sees the Christian life mainly as a life in Christ. The same idea is expressed also in the Second Epistle of St. Peter: "According as His Divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness..., that by these ye might be partakers of the Divine Nature" (II St. Peter 1:3-4). In Orthodox theology, man's salvation and redemption mean his deification. This teaching must always be understood in the light of the distinction between God's Essence and His Energies. Union with God means union with the Divine Energies, not with the Divine Essence.14

An early witness to this teaching about the distinction between the Divine Essence and Energies is provided by St. Basil the Great, one of the Cappadocian Fathers of the fourth century. In "Letter 234," he writes: "We know our God from His Energies, but we do not claim that we can draw near to His Essence. For His Energies come down to us, but His Essence remains unapproachable."14a This teaching was later developed by one of the greatest theologians of the Orthodox Church, St. Gregory Palamas.15 The union between God and man is a true union, in which man retains his full personal integrity and personal characteristics without ceasing to be human.

Deification involves the body also. "Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit," wrote the Apostle Paul (I Corinthians 6:19). At the Resurrection, the bodies of the Saints will be transfigured by Divine Light, as the body of the Lord was transfigured on Mount Tabor. Even in this present life, some Saints have experienced the beginning of this visible and bodily glorification. In the Apophthegmata Patrum, a collection of sayings of the Desert Fathers, we read of Abba Pambo: "Just as Moses received the image of the glory of Adam, when his face was glorified, so the face of Abba Pambo shone like lightning, and he was as a king seated on his throne."15a The body is sanctified and transfigured together with the soul. The Divine Grace present in the Saintsbodies during their lifetime on earth remains active in their Relics after their death, which is the reason behind the veneration of holy Relics in the Church.16

By His Incarnation, Passion, Resurrection, and Founding of the Church, the Lord opened for His most precious creature, man, the path to his true goal, to theosis. In the Mysteries of Baptism and Chrismation, a person receives the fullness of the Grace of the Holy Spirit. But he must still make this Grace "his own"; he must go through the process of acquiring the Holy Spirit. St. Mark the Ascetic says that Christ as Perfect God gave to the Baptized the perfect Grace of the Holy Spirit, which is revealed and manifested insofar as a person lives the Divine commandments.17

According to St. Gregory of Sinai, there are two ways to achieve the activity (energeia) of the Holy Spirit which a person receives in Baptism. The first way is for a person to struggle to fulfill the commandments over a long period of time, with great labor and effort (the active life, praxis). The second way is noetic prayer, "the continual and skillful invocation of the Lord Jesus." St. Gregory also describes certain external techniques for interior prayer, including bodily posture and breathing while offering up the Jesus Prayer.18

The call to sanctity and spiritual perfection is directed to all Christians and therefore all true Christians do everything that is in their power to acquire the Holy Spirit and to achieve inner unification and the healing of the passions. They discover that there are various steps of spiritual ascent to purification of the heart and illumination, when the intellect (nous) is united with the heart, in ceaseless prayer, to achieve theosis.19

The process of spiritual advancement is not something mechanical or magical, however, as if by certain actions we can "force" Divine Grace to effect our internal transformation. Divine Grace brings about this internal change when the time is ripe. But it can also be said that it works in correspondence with a persons own struggle and efforts in repentance and humility. "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him?" (St. Luke 11:13). The coöperation (synergy) of Divine Grace with a persons own free will is thus required.

Monasticism: Martyrdom and Militia Christi
Great effort is necessary to enable a believer to traverse the path of spiritual perfection. A degree and form of spiritual combat (askesis) is required of all Christians. The path to theosis is difficult. It is truly the way of the Cross, a narrow path leading to life everlasting. In fact, St. Athanasios the Great compares the ascetic or eremitic life of St. Anthony the Great to a daily martyrdom.19a A homily in archaic Irish, probably dating from the last quarter of the seventh century, also speaks of martyrdom:

Now there are three kinds of martyrdom, which are accounted as a cross to a man, to wit: white martyrdom, green (glas) and red martyrdom. White martyrdom consists in a man's abandoning everything he loves for God's sake, though he suffer fasting or labor thereat. Green martyrdom consists in this, that by means of fasting and labor he frees himself from his evil desires, or suffers toil in penance and repentance. Red martyrdom consists in the endurance of a cross or death for Christs sake, as happened to the Apostles in the persecution of the wicked and in teaching the law of God.20

This division of bloodless martyrdom into "white" and "green" is peculiar to Irish monasticism, "white" representing the first great step in renunciation of the world, and "green" the practice of exceptional austerity within the ascetic life.20

The comparison of monasticism with martyrdom is very apt and is related to the concept of spiritual life as combat: the struggle with ones self and with the fallen spirits who assail true Christians who labor for spiritual perfection. For this reason the Celtic tradition regarded monasticism as the Army of Christ (Militia Christi) and the monk as a soldier of Christ (miles Christi).21 Young men, in their effort to emulate the heroism of their ancestors, entered monasteries. Instead of fighting in the Fianna (the Celtic army), they joined the Militia Christi to wage war against the evil spirits and sin.22

Spiritual Guidance
Spiritual life in the Orthodox tradition is very practical and sober. It can bring its adepts to great heights of spiritual perfection. But the path is very arduous and demanding. Orthodox monasticism has been called the "science of sciences" and "art of arts." This science and art must be learned from a master who is thoroughly conversant in it, if indeed one can find such a genuine teacher or Elder. Here is the rôle of the institution of Eldership: True Eldership is a special gift (charisma) of the Holy Spirit. Atrue Elder knows Gods will, insofar as it is revealed to him, and is thus able to guide the person who entrusts himself to his spiritual guidance to spiritual perfection in God without hindrance.

People often suffer because they do not know how to make decisions, what they should do, and which path they should follow.A spiritual guide can protect his disciple from making wrong decisions and taking a wrong step, if the disciple consults and heeds his guide in the spirit of humble and loving submission. A three-way relationship can be established: the Elder is enlightened by Divine Grace, the disciple is strengthened by the Grace of God, and the Holy Spirit thus works in both. The gift of spiritual guidance by a God-bearing Elder is not always available to a Christian, and Bishop Ignatius (Brianchaninov) issues the following warning:

An indispensable condition of such submission is a Spirit-bearing guide who by the will of the Spirit can mortify the fallen will of the person subject to him in the Lord, and can mortify all the passions as well. Mans fall and corrupt will implies a tendency to all the passions. It is obvious that the mortification of a fallen will which is effected so sublimely and victoriously by the will of the Spirit of God cannot be accomplished by a directors fallen will when the director himself is still enslaved to the passions....

It is a terrible business, out of self-opinion and on ones own authority, to take upon oneself duties which can be carried out only by order of the Holy Spirit and by the action of the Spirit. It is a terrible thing to pretend to be a vessel of the Holy Spirit when all the while relations with satan have not been broken and the vessel is still being defiled by the action of satan! It is disastrous both for oneself and ones neighbor; it is criminal in God's sight, blasphemous.

It will be useless to point out to us that Saint Zachariah who was living in obedience to an inexperienced elder, his natural father Karion, attained to monastic perfection, or that Saint Acacius found salvation while living with a cruel elder who drove his disciple with inhuman floggings to an untimely grave. Both were in obedience to incompetent elders, but they were guided by the counsels of Spirit-bearing Fathers and the most edifying examples which were in abundance before their eyes. Therefore, they could only have remained in outward obedience to their elders. These cases are outside the general rule and order. The mode of action of Divine Providence, said St. Isaac the Syrian, is completely different from the common human order. You should keep the common order.

Perhaps you retort: A novices faith can take the place of an incompetent elder.

It is untrue. Faith in the truth saves. Faith in a lie and in diabolic delusion is ruinous, according to the teaching of the Apostle.23

There have been, and continue to be, many situations where believers cannot reap benefit from a God-bearing spiritual guide. Yet this does not mean that the path to spiritual perfection is closed. In these cases, the Christian struggling for perfection must then turn to studying the Holy Scripture and the writings of the Church Fathers—especially that which corresponds to his situation and spiritual condition—and also seek out the advice of like-minded persons with more experience in spiritual life. But even such advice should also be checked with the teachings of the Holy Fathers.

Such a path is naturally more arduous and fraught with greater dangers. But if a person conducts his spiritual life aright, in repentance and humility, and fights the spiritual battle lawfully (cf. II Timothy 2:5), he gradually comes to understand himself and to become aware of the extent of his corruption and sinfulness. This confirms him in the basic principles of true humility and ever-deepening repentance. He wages a prolonged and persistent struggle against his passions, bad habits, and weaknesses. Each day he takes account of his weaknesses and failures, learning inner prayer, confessing his sins to the Priest whom God provides for him, and partaking of the Holy Mysteries.

The Apostle Paul regarded himself as the chief among sinners, and any person who is living a proper spiritual life reaches the same conclusion about himself. Such a person begins to taste of humblemindedness and the deep state of repentance known as joy-creating lamentation, the first steps in the purification of ones conscience and the attainment of inner peace and that living faith which opens the way to spiritual joy and freedom from the tyranny of the passions. The Kingdom of God begins to rule within such a person. Because of serious failings and faults, Divine Grace often hides its operation, in part for didactic reasons, that is, to demonstrate ones total dependence on God's help and to effect a direct experience of the truth of the Saviors words: "Without Me ye can do nothing" (St. John 15:5). This experience leads a person to cry out with all of his heart, entreating the Lord Jesus Christ to have mercy on him.

In the Christian monastic tradition, the institution of spiritual Fathers and Elders existed from the earliest times. There were a number of God-bearing Elders among the Egyptian Desert Fathers, and such holy spiritual Elders can be found throughout the history of the Orthodox Church down to the present day. Celtic monasticism was also adorned by such holy spiritual guides, such as St. Columba of Iona. In the Celtic Church there existed the very important institution of spiritual Fathers, who in Ireland were called anamchara ("soul-friends," anamcara, from the Latin animae carus); in Welsh, periglour. Each monk had his spiritual guide, anamchara, to whom he was to open his heart, confess his thoughts, and reveal his conscience (manifestatio conscientiae). An ancient Irish saying comments that a person without a soul-friend is like a body without a head.24 Through his writings, St. John Cassian was a teacher of spiritual life in the British Isles. He also instructs his readers concerning the benefits of revealing ones thoughts to the Fathers, though not indiscriminately. (One should, he says, consult spiritual Elders who have spiritual discernment [diakrisis].) In the Life of St. David of Wales we find additional evidence of the practice of the confession of thoughts. In 28, it is recorded that the monks in St. Davids monastery revealed their thoughts to the spiritual Father.25

I.M. Kontzevitch has left an account of his visits to the Optina Hermitage in pre-Revolutionary Russia, where Elder Anatoly (Potapov) heard the monks confessions of thoughts. He describes the impressive scene of the concentration and reverence with which the monks, one after another, would approach the Elder, kneel, receive his blessing, exchange a few short sentences with him, and leave calm and consoled. This happened twice a day, in the morning and in the evening. Thus, life in Optina was truly without grief and all the monks were kind, joyful, and concentrated, immersed within themselves.26 Here we see that the same practice that was followed in the monasteries of Wales in the sixth century was in use in Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century. The efficacy of this universally applied custom is captured in a Celtic proverb: "As the floor is swept every day, so is the soul cleansed every day by confession."

The Celtic spiritual Fathers helped and counselled not only monks, but also the lay people who had recourse to them. The soulfriend was to be a guide who helped in all the trials and difficulties of spiritual life. The purpose of this revelation of conscience was to heal the wounds inflicted by sin and enable one to continue his path to unification with God. A truly wise soul-friend was one who had learned humility. Everyone was recommended to choose a humble and experienced soul-friend.27 In responding to this widespread recommendation, these spiritual Fathers often made use of penitential manuals which enumerated the penances for various sins.28

External Asceticism
Celtic Christians took the spiritual life very seriously, and to attain their spiritual goal they employed various forms of external asceticism, such as standing in cold water, "cross vigils" (cross figell, from crux vigilia), or the "ascetic practice of praying all night long with arms outstretched in the form of a Cross,"29 and prostrations (slectain), that is, kneeling down and touching ones forehead to the ground. "There was an anchorite in Clonard, a man of great asceticism. He made two hundred prostrations at Morning Prayer, a hundred at each hour of prayer, and a hundred at vigils. In all, he made seven hundred each day."30 "In a Culdee text from around the eighth century we learn that monks were normally not to perform more than two hundred prostrations daily."31 Such prostrations continue to be a part of the liturgical life and prayer rule of both monks and lay people in the Orthodox Church.

In addition, regulations concerning fasting have always been an important part of the external asceticism of monastics. Abstaining from meat and discretion in drinking wine were monastic traditions from the earliest times in the Christian East, and in the Rule of Cormac Mac Ciolionain (ca. 900) it is stated that a monk should renounce meat and wine.32

Prayer: Praxis and Theoria
The heart of monastic life was prayer: private prayer and participation in the communal Divine services in Church. According to John Ryan, "Avery large proportion of the Irish monks progressed so far in prayer that they were capable of unbroken contemplation. The evidence for this is the growth of the anchoretical habit."33 Although we do not find in Irish sources a description of the method of interior prayer, the fruits of the spiritual struggles of the Celtic monks indicate that noetic prayer was learned from the same sources that have been preserved and elaborated upon in the Orthodox East. This ascetic tradition distinguishes between two aspects of the spiritual life: praxis and theoria. Praxis consists in the purification of the heart from passions, with the help of prayer, obedience, fasting, vigil, silence, the chanting of Psalms, and patience in tribulations. This corresponds to the process of purification, the first degree of the spiritual life. Theoria is the illumination of the intellect (nous) and the vision of the uncreated glory of God. According to St. Gregory the Theologian, praxis is the way to theoria. Theoria is identified with the vision of uncreated Light, uncreated Divine energy, the union of man with God, theosis. Thus, theoria, vision, and theosis are closely related. There are various degrees of theoria: illumination, Divine vision, or a prolonged vision which may last for hours, days, weeks, or even months. Noetic prayer is the first stage of theoria. A person is granted theoria through praxis, and when this state of theoria ceases, he resumes praxis anew.34

The biographer of St. Samson of Dol says that the Saint never ceased to pray either during the day or during the night (cf. I Thessalonians 5:17). Like some Desert Fathers, St. Samson sometimes appeared transfigured. Once, when certain persons went to call him to a council, they saw his face shining like that of an Angel. The same is recorded about the Egyptian Desert Fathers Abbas Or and Theonas.35 According to St. Gregory Palamas, Adam, before his fall into sin, was originally clothed in the garment of glory, of Divine Light and splendor. He participated in the Divine Light. The light at the Transfiguration of Christ on Mount Tabor manifested to the Apostles not only the future glory of the Kingdom of God, but also this lost state of the beatitude of Adam in Paradise before the fall. Before the fall, the natural elements did not harm man. Animals looked to man as to their King and rendered him service. In the Saints, those who attained the illumination and deification lost by Adam, the same phenomenon is observed: wild animals are not afraid of them, do not harm them, and serve them faithfully. They recognize their King in the Saints, as it was in the beginning. Many such accounts are found in the lives of Celtic Saints.36

Theosis: Uncreated Divine Light
Some Celtic Saints reached a very high degree of spiritual life. Revelations of the uncreated Divine Light (cleste lumen, divina lux) accompanied St. Columba of Iona, as recorded in the Saints Life written by St. Adomnan. Here are two such instances:

At another time when the holy man was living in the island of Hinba, the Grace of the Holy Spirit was poured out upon him abundantly and in an incomparable manner, and continued marvelously for the space of three days, so that for three days and as many nights, remaining within a house barred, and filled with heavenly light, he allowed no one to go to him, and he neither ate nor drank. From that house streams of immeasurable brightness were visible in the night, escaping through chinks of the door leaves, and through the key-holes. And spiritual songs, unheard before, were heard being sung by him. Moreover, as he afterwards admitted in the presence of a very few men, he saw, openly revealed, many of the secret things that have been hidden since before the world began. Also everything that in the Sacred Scriptures is dark and most difficult became plain, and was shown more clearly than the day to the eyes of his purest heart. And he lamented that his foster-son Baithene was not there, who if he had chanced to be present during those three days, would have written down from the mouth of the blessed man very many mysteries, both of past ages and of ages still to come, mysteries unknown to other men, and also a number of interpretations of the sacred books.37

In a second narrative, St. Adomnan speaks about a disciple of the Saint named Berchan, who, contrary to the Saints prohibition, came at night to his cell and saw through the key-hole that his lodging was filled with the glory of heavenly brightness (clestis splendore claritudinis).38

The Life of St. Basil the Great contains a similar account of persons to whom it was granted to behold the Saint at prayer in his cell totally illuminated in the uncreated Light of God, the Light of Divine Grace.39 The same manifestation of spiritual life occurred in sixthcentury Ireland and in fourth-century Asia Minor; one can find numerous examples in the monastic Saints of the Orthodox Church throughout the centuries up to present times. This phenomenon is explained by Metropolitan Hierotheos in his book on St. Gregory Palamas. When man attains to the vision of the uncreated Light, he is deified. Deification is man's union with God. This union offers Divine knowledge, which surpasses human knowledge. There are many degrees of vision of the Divine Light, but there is no end to perfection. The degree of vision depends on the persons spiritual condition and on God's gift.40

St. Columba passed through the first stage of spiritual ascent, purification of the heart; he was released from all evil thoughts. He attained a higher level, the illumination of the intellect (nous), which is related to the acquisition of unceasing, noetic prayer, wherein a person is delivered from ignorance and forgetfulness and is therefore constantly aware of God, and finally attained vision of God. Thus, the words of the Gospel were fulfilled in him: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God" (St. Matthew 5:8).41

Selfless Love, Spiritual Freedom, Spiritual Realism
When a person attains purity of heart, his selfish love is transformed into selfless love for God and his fellow man. He loves others without expecting anything in return. He loves independently of whether others love him. When selfish love is changed into selfless love, the spiritual struggler becomes a real human being. The cure of man consists in this transformation.42 With this higher level of spiritual life comes spiritual freedom and a true, rather than a legalistic or external, understanding of monastic life. This can help elucidate the behavior of the Celtic monks—for example, their travels (peregrinatio) during the days when Celtic Christianity was flourishing. All outward things served them as means for attaining a spiritual goal.

Metropolitan Hierotheos observes that many people think that the rigor of the ascetic struggle makes a man hard and insensitive to the problems of life, as well as indiscreet in giving advice. But in fact, the opposite is true. When one lives the ascetic life in a godly way, in deep humility, he removes the mask of fragmentation and becomes a real man. Then he acts naturally, understands the questions and problems of others, and can provide practical and realistic guidance.43 Thus, it was written of the Optina Elder St. Ambrose (1891), that he knew that everything in life has its value and its consequences; thus, there was no question which he would not answer with compassion and goodwill. For example, he advised an old woman about how to care for her turkey-hens.44 When another woman asked another Optina Elder, St. Nektary (1928), about how she should serve the Lord, the Elder replied: "From the time that you entered into lawful marriage, you have continuously served the Most Holy Trinity. For a woman, lawful marriage is the beginning of her service to the Most Holy Trinity."45

St. Adomnan also preserved an interesting story from the life of St. Columba. The wife of a certain man named Lugne, who lived on the island of Rechru (Rathlin), had an aversion to her husband, because he was very ugly. She did not want to enter into marital relations with him. When the Saint learned about this, he tried to talk to her, but she told him that she was prepared to do anything, if only he should not ask her to do that. She even expressed her willingness to enter a convent. The Saint replied: "What you suggest cannot rightly be done..., for it is forbidden to separate what God has lawfully joined together." St. Columba proposed that all three of them should fast and pray to the Lord. The Saint prayed for them during the night. The next day, St. Columba asked her if she was ready to enter a convent, and she confessed that during the past night her heart had been changed from hate to love.46 The few examples cited here demonstrate that spirituality is a living dogmatic theology. Because, in the first millennium for the Christian age, the Celtic Churches confessed the same orthodox Faith as the Orthodox Church, it is not surprising to find a deep inner unity between Celtic Christian spirituality and traditional Orthodox spirituality.

Endnotes
1. Anna Bauerov, Zlaty vek zeme Bju [The Golden Age of the Land of Boii] (Prague: 1988), p. 182. [The name "Bohemia" is derived from a Celtic tribe called the Boii—Authors note.]

2. Alexander Carmichael, Carmina Gadelica [Gaelic Poetry] (Edinburgh: 1997), p. 29.

3. Ibid., pp. 655-656.

4. G.H. Doble, Lives of the Welsh Saints, ed. D. Simon Ewans (Cardiff: 1971), p. 45.

5. Donald Attwater, Dictionary of Saints (London: 1983), p. 227.

6. Ibid., p. 193; The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (London: 1979), p. 246. St. John Cassian is mentioned in the poem, "Amra Choluimb Chille," which was composed around the year 600. At least some parts of the Conferences [Collationes] were known by the author of the poem, "Altus Prosator," which may have been written by St. Columba himself (T.O. Clancy and G. Markus, Iona: The Earliest Poetry of a Celtic Monastery [Edinburgh: 1995], p. 217). The writings of St. John were read by St. Columbanus, too. They are also an important source for hymns and collects in the "Antiphonary of Bangor" (Jane Stevenson, "Introduction," in F.E. Warren, The Liturgy and Ritual of the Celtic Church [Woodbridge: 1987], p. xlii, n. 200).

7. Attwater, Dictionary, pp. 169-170.

8. A.M. Allchin, Celtic Christianity: Fact or Fantasy? (Wales: 1993), pp. 12, 22; Ian Bradley, The Celtic Way (London: 1993), p. 10; Doble, Lives of the Welsh Saints, pp. 43-45.

9. About this litany, see N. K. Chadwick, The Age of the Saints in the Early Celtic Church (Felinfach, Wales: 1960), p. 113.

10. In this vein, see the comments of St. Maximos the Confessor: "He who thinks that he has achieved perfection in virtue will never go on to seek the original source of blessing, for he has limited the scope of his aspiration to himself and so of his own accord has deprived himself of the condition of salvation, namely God. The person aware of his natural poverty where goodness is concerned never relaxes his impetus towards Him who can fully supply what he lacks. He who has perceived how limitless virtue is never ceases from pursuing it, so as not to be deprived of the origin and consummation of virtue, namely God, by confining his aspiration to himself. For by wrongly supposing that he had achieved perfection he would forfeit true being, towards which every diligent person strives" (St. Maximos the Confessor, "Third Century of Various Texts," 14-15, in The Philokalia [London: 1981], Vol. II, pp. 212-213). 10a. Third Discourse, "To the Believing Father," 14, in Works [in Russian] (St. Petersburg: n.d.), pp. 109-110.

11. Nadezhda, No. 8 (Frankfurt am Main: 1982), p. 107.

12. I.M. Kontzevitch, Stjazhanije Ducha Svjatago v Putjach Drevnej Rusi [The Acquisition of the Holy Spirit in the Ways of Ancient Russia] (Paris: 1952), pp. 11-12.

13. Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos, O rthodox Spirituality (Lebadeia, Greece: 1996), pp. 236-237. 13a. "On the Incarnation," ch. 54, 3, Patrologia Græca, Vol. XXV, col. 192B.

14. Timothy Ware (Bishop Kallistos), The Orthodox Church (Harmondsworth, England: 1986), pp. 236, 237. 14a. "Epistle 234," 1, Patrologia Græca, Vol. XXXII, col. 869AB.

15. Ware, The Orthodox Church, pp. 29, 77. 15a. Pambo 12.

16.. Ibid., pp. 237-239.

17. Monks Kallistos and Ignatios, "Nastavlenije bezmolstvujushchim" ["Instructions for Hesychasts"], in Dobrotoljubije (Jordanville, NY: 1966), Vol. V, p. 221.

18. David Balfour (ed.), Saint Gregory the Sinaite: Discourse on the Transfiguration (Athens: 1982; offprint from Theologia,Vols. LII, No. 4-LIV, No. 1 [1981-83]), pp. 138-158.

19. See Metropolitan Hierotheos, Orthodox Spirituality, p. 44. "In ascetic theology the heart is the essence of the soul and the intellect (nous) is the energy of the soul. When the intellect enters the heart and acts therein, there exists a unity between the intellect-nous (energy) and the heart (essence) of the soul" (ibid., pp. 34-35). 19a. Life of St. Anthony, 47, Patrologia Graeca, Vol. XXVI, col. 912B.

20. John Ryan, Irish Monasticism (Dublin: 1992), pp. 197-198.

21. Ibid., p. 196.

22. Hugh Conolly, The Irish Penitentials (Dublin: 1995), p. 9.

23. [St. Ignaty Brianchaninov], The Arena: An Offering to Contemporary Monasticism, trans. Archimandrite Lazarus (Jordanville, NY: 1983), pp. 43-45.

24. Conolly, Irish Penitentials, p. 14.

25. A.W. Wade-Evans, Vita Sancti David per Ricemarchum [The Life of St. David by Ricemarchus] (U.K.: 1904), p. 50.

26. Kontzevitch, Stjazhanije Ducha Svjatago, pp. 31-32. On Eldership, see pp. 30-40.

27. Conolly, Irish Penitentials, pp. 15-16.

28. On extant penitential manuals of Irish origin, see Conolly, Irish Penitentials, pp. 32-33; see also J.R. Walsh and T. Bradley, A History of the Irish Church 400-700 A.D. (Dublin: 1991), pp. 111-125.

29. Father Gregory Telepneff, The Egyptian Desert in the Irish Bogs (Etna, CA: 1998), p. 35.

30. "The Rule of Tallaght," 103, in The Celtic Monk: Rules and Writings of Early Irish Monks, trans. Uinseann O Maidin (Kalamazoo, MI: 1996), p. 129.

31. See Oliver Davies, Celtic Christianity in Early Medieval Wales (Cardiff: 1996), p. 154, n. 61; cf. St. John Cassian, "Conference X," 10, 14.

32. The Celtic Monk, pp. 53-55.

33. Ryan, Irish Monasticism, pp. 331-332.

34. Metropolitan Hierotheos, Orthodox Spirituality, pp. 26, 60-61. "Noetic prayer is the state when the intellect (nous) returns within the heart and prays there"; "Nous is a word used in various ways by the Church Fathers. It indicates either the soul or the heart or also an energy of the soul. Nous is primarily the eye of the soul, the purest part of the soul. Nous is not identified with reason; in English translations of Orthodox ascetic works it is often rendered by the word intellect" (idem, A Night in the Desert of the Holy Mountain [Lebadeia, Greece: 1998]), pp. 189-190.

35. Davies, Celtic Christianity, pp. 14-15. Cf. Acts 6:15: "And all that sat in the council, looking steadfastly on him, saw his face as it had been the face of an angel."

36. Kontzevitch, Stjazhanije Ducha Svjatago, pp. 11-12; Elissa R. Henken, The Welsh Saints: A Study in Patterned Lives (Cambridge: 1991), p. 108.

37. Adomnans Life of Columba, ed. and trans. A.O. Anderson and M.O. Anderson (Oxford: 1991), p. 209.

38. Ibid., p. 213.

39. Archimandrite George, Deification as the Purpose of man's Life (Thessaloniki: 1997), pp. 46-47.

40. Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos, Saint Gregory Palamas as a Hagiorite (Lebadeia, Greece: 1997), p. 351.

41. Ibid., p. 352.

42. Idem, Orthodox Spirituality, p. 64.

43. Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos, Saint Gregory Palamas, p. 97.

44. I.M. Kontzevitch, Optina Pustyn i jeja vremja [Optina Monastery and Its Era] (Jordanville, NY: 1970), p. 269.

45. Ibid., p. 511.

46. Adomnans Life of Columba, p. 165.

From Orthodox Tradition, Vol. XVIII, No. 4 (2001), pp. 12-29. English translation edited by the Fathers of the Holy Monastery of Sts. Cyprian and Justina, Fili, Attika, Greece.

St. Ninian, Enlightener of the Picts

Ninian lived at a time when monasticism was sweeping the Roman Empire and attracting many of the most serious Christians. He settled in what is now southwestern Scotland; in the IV Century, "Alba", the country north of Hadrian's Wall, was an ethnically and culturally heterogeneous territory inhabited by non-Indo-European Picts, Q-Celtic-speaking "Scots" from Ireland, P-Celtic-speaking North Britons, Latin-speaking Romans, and possibly the first waves of English-speaking Saxons.
St. Ninian built a monastery at Casa Candida (known since the early Middle Ages by the Old English equivalent "Whithorn"). Besides pursuing the ascetic life, he and his brethren attempted to revive the faltering Romano-British churches of the North, and reached out to the pagans as well, especially it would seem to the Picts. The extremely ancient Pictish Orthodox churches dedicated to St. Ninian or to St. Martin of Tours, the patron saint of the Whithorn community and Ninian's role model, in places as remote as the Orkneys and Shetland attest that this missionary outreach must have been both rapid and amazingly extensive.

After St. Ninian's repose, Whithorn continued for centuries as one of the most important monastic and educational centres of Orthodox Alba. During the period of Anglo-Saxon rule, St. Bede's mention of Ninian in the Ecclesiastical History made the saint famous all over Europe, and his relics were one of the three chief objects of pilgrimage in mediæval Scotland. (Unfortunately, they were destroyed by the Calvinists.)

Norman Hugh Redington

St. Hilda of Whitby

by Fr. Gregory Hallam

St. Hilda of Whitby (icon by Aidan Hart)

The recovery of the Saxon, that is, broadly speaking, the Old English Church in the minds of the contemporary English is a vital task. In so far as the English once found their place within a religious and social pluralism that included the Celts then perhaps we should be optimistic about the recovery of an English identity within contemporary Britain. No one bats an eye at the Scots, Irish or Welsh recovering their identities. This is much praised but not so, unfortunately, with England. Maybe this is because England is associated in the minds of the politically correct with the oppressor. If there is an oppressor to be reckoned with here it is surely William the Conqueror who put an end to the golden age of English culture. So complete is the propaganda associated with the Conquest that no one really thinks that anything worthwhile existed before William breathed fire through the land nearly 1000 years ago. The Normans brought the Dark Ages and then induced everyone to believe that their reign was "light" in comparison with the so-called "Dark Ages" that had gone before.

It is difficult to define the English Church since "England" really consisted of many different kingdoms, races and peoples. Many understand the word "English" to be coterminous with the Anglo-Saxon culture and this is fair to a point. So how did these Germanic and Danish peoples, the Angles, the Saxons, the Jutes and others become Christians?

Well, we should not rob St. Augustine of Canterbury of his fare share of this work. Here was an Orthodox Christian bishop who with a small band of 40 monks stayed 7 years at the turn of the 7^th Century and converted King Ethelbert and His Kingdom in Kent to the Faith of the Apostles. The names of Augustine, Pope Gregory the Great who sent him, and the Apostles Peter and Paul were ever to be revered by the English but no less so than the Celtic missionaries who had evangelised the North of England and lowland Scotland (as is now) from the West. The English Church had such a profusion of saints in the 400 years before the Schism that it’s difficult now to adjust our expectations of England today to this high water mark.

Orthodoxy is not, however, concerned to recover some sort of lost racial consciousness, a place "forever England." That would be to violate the vision of our forefathers whom God used as architects of the Kingdom of God, a nation that knows no boundaries. Pre-eminent among these "English" fathers for example is St. Theodore of Tarsus, Archbishop of Canterbury, (668-690), a Greek pastor who lovingly welded the Celtic and Anglo Saxon Orthodoxy of many scattered kingdoms into a truly united Church for all races under Christ. His was a true Orthodox pluralism not based on English national identity, (for such a thing did not exist), but on the commonwealth of Heaven. England, like Zion, is not a nation, she is an attitude of mind, a presence in the heart, a rustle of wind amongst the people, the trace of the Holy Spirit. When the Normans came under a new and confusing papal banner and laid waste to England’s innocence at Hastings and thereafter, they did not destroy England, but they did subvert its national life, replacing the flowers of Eden with the thorns of efficiency and grandeur. Much of that legacy endures today in the British establishment.

For a while, perhaps, we have been seduced by the pompous grandeur of a "greater" Britain. The Scots, the Irish and the Welsh won’t put up with it anymore. Isn’t it about time that the English didn’t either? But, we should be aware. We must not play the Norman mentality at its own game. Orthodox England will not be rebuilt by her politicians, but, as ever before, by her saints. We by the mercy of God, have been called to play our part in this recovery of the heart of England which is Christ and the land which, according to our tradition, is Mary’s dowry. Let us be worthy of such a high calling. Sometime, perhaps in the far distant future, or perhaps next year, Orthodox England will live again. God knows. For us it is sufficient to sing and to work; to love and to pray. May Christ our God have mercy on our souls, Amen!