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A few days from the church calendar -
May 24 Jackson Kemper born Dec 24, 1789, he became the first missionary bishop of the Episcopal Church in The United States of America. Known for working with Native American people, his first official act as Missionary Bishop, in what would become Wisconsin, was laying the cornerstone for a new frame church building for Hobart Church, Duck Creek, which served the Oneida Indian Mission. He founded parishes in Indiana, Wisconsin, Missouri, Nebraska, and Minnesota. Bishop Kemper founded Nashotah House, an Episcopal seminary, and Racine College in Wisconsin, and from 1859 until his death served as the first bishop of the Diocese of Wisconsin. He also founded the mission parish that became the Cathedral Church of All Saints in Milwaukee. He died on this day in 1870.
May 25 The Venerable Bede He was bron in 672 or 673, he was a scholar and author. His master work was Ecclesiastical History of the English People. He tried to compute the date for Easter and helpoed popularize the practice of dating from the birth of Christ (Anno Domini – AD). Bede died on the Feast of the Ascension, Thursday, 26 May 735, on the floor of his cell, singing "Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit". This five line poem is attributed to him on his deathbed, though not everyone agrees -
Before setting forth on that inevitable journey,
none is wiser than the man who considers
—before his soul departs hence—
what good or evil he has done,
and what judgement his soul will receive after its passing.
Here’s another translation -
Fore the enforced-walk ‖ none comes to be
wise to malice ‖ more than him that must
with mindfulness think back, ‖ before his going hence,
/ on what his breath’s ‖ bad, good, right or evil,
after death-day’s ending, ‖ on judgement comes to be.
May 26 Augustine of Canterbury He was a monk who became the first Archbishop of Canterbury in 597, and something of the father of the English Church.. (He was not Augustine of Hippo. I do not know which Augustine Bob Dylan dreamed he saw.) He was sent by Pope Gregory the Great to convert King Ethelberht and his kingdom (Kent) from paganism.
May 27 Bertha and Ethelberht – Queen and King of Kent. (Appropriate!) Bertha was a Frankish princess and a Christian. She married Ethelberht (pagan king of Kent) with the condition that she be allowed to continue to practice her faith. Along with Augustine, she influenced Ethelberht to become the first English king to convert.
May 28 John Calvin a theologian, pastor, and reformer in the Protestant Reformation. He believed in predestination and God’s absolute sovereignty in saving human soul from death and eternal damnation. (Ok, I don’t get it either.) Congregational, Reformed, and Presbyterian denomination hold him as the main expositor of their beliefs.
Also on May 28 Mechthild of Magdeburg She was a Christian mystic in the 1200’s, the first to write in German.
May 30 Joan of Arc Soldier? Prophetic witness? Saint? Heretic? In any case, an amazing story.
Also on May 30 this year – the Sunday after Pentecost is observed as Trinity Sunday – the one Sunday of the year based on a doctrine rather than an event in the life of Jesus or the life of the early church.
Here’s a collect -
Eternal God,
you lovingly enfold us in your parental arms,
you meet us on the back roads of our lives and call us to follow you,
you inspire us with love and courage and a longing for peace.
May the time of your peace come soon.
In your name, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit;
In your name, Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer;
In your name, Love, we pray.
And some days from the world/earth calendar -
May 24
+ Aldersgate Day – this is a big deal for Methodists and United Methodists. On this day in 1738, John Wesley (who was already a priest in the church of England) went “most unwillingly” to a meeting in Aldersgate Street. While he was listening to someone reading from Luther's Preface to the Epistle to the Romans, he felt his "heart strangely warmed." Wesley wrote in his journal that at about 8:45 p.m. "while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death." And here’s an interesting little bit – one of the other scriptures read that night was Acts 2. Another was Ps 130 “Out of the depths”. Sounds like the stage was set! Anyway, the link shows a plaque suggesting this was the beginning of Methodism. That’s maybe a bit strong, but it certainly was a significant event. Probably one of the main reasons that when United Methodists try to sort out things, they turn to scripture, reason, tradition, and experience – the “Wesley Quadrilateral”.
+ Bob Dylan turns 80 today. Sobering question – who do you suppose had a bigger influence on the world - Bob Dylan or John Wesley? Here’s Dylan singing Mr Tambourine Man with The Byrds in 2014. I’m not sure it’s the best version ever, but kind of fun. Here he is singing it at Newport in 1964. I sure spent a lot of time singing it. How about you – have a favorite song, or period? A good day to haul out the records and tapes and cd’s and mp3’s and listen. Or to “dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand wavin’ free….” Here’s his Nobel Prize acceptance speech.
+ Mary Had A Little Lamb” (by ______________, the Thanksgiving lady, one of the first bobbleheads in the New Hampshire History Center collection) was published in 1830.
+ the first telegraph message was sent in 1844. In 1843 Morse obtained financial support from the U.S. government to build a demonstration telegraph system 60 km (35 miles) long between Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, Md. Wires were attached by glass insulators to poles alongside a railroad. The system was completed and public use initiated on May 24, 1844, with transmission of the message, “What hath God wrought!” This inaugurated the telegraph era in the United States, which was to last more than 100 years.
So – “My heart strangely warmed”, “Blowin in the wind”, “Mary had a little lamb”, and “What hath God wrought!” Quite a day.
May 25
+ Gustav Holst died in 1934. He was an English composer – I don’t know why, but with a name like Holst I didn’t place him in England! His ancestors were Swedish, Latvian, and German. His most famous work was The Planets, though he wrote many other pieces in a variety of genres. He wrote music for poems by Thomas Hardy and Walt Whitman.
+ Star Wars (the first film, later titled A New Hope) was released in 1977. “Obi Wan – we need you even more today!” Remember where you saw it? I think I saw it in St Ignace, of all places.
+ Here’s some guy suggesting a Holst influence on John Williams – The Planets vs Star Wars
May 26
+ The Dow Jones Industrial Average was first published in 1896. I don’t know what it was on that day. It ended the year at 29.56.
May 27
+ it’s the birthday of Rachel Carson (1907) and Tony Hillerman (1925)
+ Niccolo Paganini died in 1840. He was a violin virtuoso. He wrote and popularized 20 variations on The Carnival of Venice. I usually think of that as a trumpet/cornet piece.
May 28
+ Amnesty International was founded in 1961. I remember writing letters when they used to solicit them.
+ Alan Turing submitted a paper for publication “On Computable Numbers” in 1936
May 29
+ Benjamin Netanyahu became Prime Minister of Israel in 1996.
+ in 1953, Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit of Mt Everest. It was Norgay’s birthday! Tom Bourdillon and Charles Evans had come within 100 meters three days earlier. (A hundred meters?) Apparently Evans’ oxygen system failed. Seems like you could do the “Lloyd Bridges routine” where you share a tank – but I guess not.)
May 30
+ Memorial Day massacre of Steelworkers in Chicago in 1937. (The police shot and killed 10 protesters/strikers.) The newsreel of the event produced by Paramount Pictures for their Paramount News series, was illegally banned from being shown in Chicago by the Chicago Police Department for fear of causing unrest, and later the Paramount News company agreed to refrain from screening the event elsewhere. In 1997, the film was deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.
+ Boris Pasternak died in 1960. Despite only a small notice appearing in the Literary Gazette, handwritten notices carrying the date and time of the funeral were posted throughout the Moscow subway system. As a result, thousands of admirers braved Militia and KGB surveillance to attend Pasternak's funeral in Peredelkino.
That’s what I got for now…..
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