The Finding of St Stephen the First Martyr

Today is the feast of the Finding of St Stephen the First Martyr. This took place in the year 415, when the teacher of St Paul, Gamaliel, who is named twice in the Acts of the Apostles (5, 34-40 and 22, 3) appeared in a vision to a priest of Jerusalem named Lucian, on three successive Fridays, and named the location of the burial. Gamaliel further revealed that he himself had taken charge of Stephen’s body after his martyrdom, and buried him on his property near a village that bore his own name, Caphargamala; and that he himself was later buried in the same place, along with his son Abibas, and Nicodemus, who is mentioned in three places in the Gospel of John. (“Abibas” is the Hellenized form of the name “Habib”, which means “beloved” and is very common in Semitic languages.)

St Stephen Mourned by Gamaliel and Nicodemus. Attributed to the anonymous painter known as Pensionante del Saraceni (active 1610–1625), a follower of the Venetian painter Carlo Saraceni (1579–1620); ca. 1615. Public domain image from the website of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.

Gamaliel ordered Lucian to tell what he had seen in these visions to John, the bishop of Jerusalem, who then sent Lucian to investigate the site. In due course, the graves were discovered, with inscriptions to confirm the identity of the persons buried therein. John was then attending a synod at Lydda (the place of St George’s martyrdom); on receiving word of the discovery from Lucian, he hastened to the site, attended by two other bishops and a large multitude of people. When the coffin of St Stephen was opened, the ground shook, and “an odor of such sweetness and fragrance came forth therefrom, … that (those present) thought they were in the delight of Paradise”; seventy-three persons were healed of possession and a great variety of physical ailments. The relics were then translated to a church on Mt Sion, which Lucian’s letter, the first source for this story, anachronistically describes as the place “where Stephen was ordained as archdeacon.”

From there, portions of the relics were subsequently sent out to many other places, as attested inter alia by a sermon of St Augustine. “His body lay hidden from (the time of his martyrdom) until these days; but recently appeared, as the bodies of the holy martyrs are wont to appear, by the revelation of God, when it pleased the Creator. And indeed, it was revealed to him who showed these very things when they had been found; for the place was shown beforehand by signs, and the discovery made just as had been told by revelation. Many have received relics from there, because God willed it so, and these have come here.” (Sermon 318, 8) At the end of the 5th century, Gennadius, a priest of Marseille, wrote a continuation of St Jerome’s book On Illustrious Men, in which he states that “Lucian the priest, a holy man, to whom God revealed the place of the burial and the relics of St Stephen the First Martyr, in the time of the Emperors Honorius and Theodosius, wrote down (the story of) the revelation to all the churches, in Greek”, which a Spanish priest named Avitus then translated into Latin. (capp. 46-47; PL 58 1084B).

A reliquary for the hand of St Stephen from the cathedral of Genoa, Italy.

Prior to the Tridentine reform of the Breviary, it was far more common for the lessons of a Saint’s life to occupy all the lesson of Matins, and readings from Scripture on feast days were very rare. Therefore, in the Roman Breviary of 1529, the lessons of August 3rd tell the story as above, with a number of other less important details, in six lessons which occupy the first two nocturns of Matins. In the third nocturn, a homily of St Jerome on the Gospel of the day, Matthew 23, 34-39, is repeated from St Stephen’s main feast day.

In 1568, however, the lessons are reordered according to a pattern which was made universal by the Breviary of St Pius V, in which those of the first nocturn are always Biblical, those of the second are either a Patristic sermon or the life of a Saint, and those of the third a homily on the day’s Gospel. In the case of today’s feast, the lessons of the third nocturn remain the same, while those of the first are repeated from St Stephen’s octave day, Acts 7, 51 – 8, 2, the end of his speech and the account of his death and burial.

The story of the discovery of the relics by Lucian would normally then be compressed into the three lessons of the second nocturn, as was done for countless other Saints. However, they are actually reduced to two lessons, while the sixth is taken from the last book of St Augustine’s City of God.

“When the bishop Projectus was bringing the relics of the most glorious martyr Stephen to the waters of Tibilis, a great concourse of people came to meet him at the shrine. There a blind woman entreated that she might be led to the bishop who was carrying the relics. He gave her the flowers he was carrying. She took them, applied them to her eyes, and immediately saw. Those who were present were astounded, while she, with every expression of joy, preceded them, pursuing her way without further need of a guide. Lucillus (bishop of Sinita), in the neighborhood of the colony Hippo, was carrying in procession some relics of the same martyr, which had been deposited in the castle of Sinita. A fistula under which he had long suffered … was suddenly cured by the mere carrying of that sacred burden.” (De Civ. Dei 22, 8)

These are only two of the many miracles which St Augustine attributes to the relics of St Stephen in this chapter; he goes on to list several others, and more still which took place in the towns of Calama and Uzali, which also had relics of the Saint, miracles of which he had personal knowledge. “I cannot record all the miracles I know; and doubtless several of our adherents, when they read what I have narrated, will regret that I have omitted so many which they, as well as I, certainly know. … I beg these persons to excuse me, and to consider how long it would take me to relate all those miracles … For were I to be silent of all others, and to record exclusively the miracles of healing which were wrought in the district of Calama and of Hippo by … the most glorious Stephen, they would fill many volumes.”

St Augustine, by Giuseppe Antonio Pianca, ca. 1745

As is so often the case (see here, here, and here) the inclusion of this passage in the Breviary is part of the Church’s response to the Protestant reformation. The early reformers frequently claimed to find in the writings of the Church Fathers proof that their novelties were in fact the original teachings of Christ and the Apostles, long obscured by medieval corruptions, and happily restored by themselves. On this score, St Augustine was frequently appealed to especially in matters pertaining to the doctrine of grace; John Calvin famously stated about him “totus noster est – he belongs entirely to us” (a typically gross exaggeration), while Luther himself had been an Augustinian.

It hardly needs to be said that apologists on the Catholic side had an easy rejoinder to this, namely, that the same Church Fathers frequently and enthusiastically taught and practiced things which the reformers themselves rejected. St Jerome, for example, was the only authority to whom they could appeal in support of their rejection of the Deuterocanonical books of the Bible, but he was also a fierce defender of the Papacy, of asceticism, monasticism, celibacy and virginity, all of which made him particularly distasteful to Luther. Likewise, here we see St Augustine, the supposed Protestant doctor of grace, unreservedly promoting not just devotion to the Saints (which many Protestants could accept in some form), but also the importance of relics.

There were, of course, many dubious or manifestly false relics in circulation at the time of the Reformation; it also true that in some places, clerical avarice benefitted greatly from the laity’s devotion by charging them to see or touch the relics kept in churches, a frequent matter of Protestant complaints. True reformers rightly wished to see such abuses put to an end, and the problem was raised and effectively dealt with at the final session of the Council of Trent. But passages such as the one from St Augustine added to the Breviary show the complete rejection of relics on the part of the reformers for what it truly was, a radical break with a universally held tradition, one with roots in the Bible itself, and faithfully passed on by the Fathers.

Folio 113r of the Saint-Sever Apocalypse, a mid-11th century manuscript which contains inter alia the Commentary on the Apocalypse of St Beatus of Liébana (ca. 730-800). This page represents the words of Apocalypse 6, 9-11, “I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, ‘How long, O Lord (holy and true) dost thou not judge and revenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?’ And white robes were given to every one of them one; and it was said to them, that they should rest for a little time, till their fellow servants, and their brethren, who are to be slain, even as they, should be filled up.” The golden T in the upper right corner of the picture is the altar (labelled ‘ara aurea - the golden altar’) and the birds beneath it are labelled ‘the souls of the slain.’ In the lower part, the caption reads ‘to these were given white stoles.’ (Bibliothèque nationale de France. Département des manuscrits. Latin 8878)

In another example of its classic liturgical conservatism, the Roman church kept the feast of the Finding of St Stephen with almost the same liturgical texts as his principal feast on December 26th. The lessons of Matins described above are the only proper feature of the Office; the Mass is exactly the same, apart from the change of a single word in the Collect: “Grant us, we beseech thee, O Lord, so to imitate what we revere, that we may learn to love even our enemies; for we celebrate the birth/finding of him who knew how to pray for his very persecutors to our Lord.”

There was however, a completely proper Office for the feast, based on the text of Lucian’s letter, which was used in many other parts of Europe. Here are the three antiphons for the Gospel canticles.

Folio 312v of an antiphonary produced for the abbey of St Maur in France in the last quarter of the 11th century, with the first part of the proper Office of the Finding of St Stephen. (Bibliothèque nationale de France. Département des manuscrits. Latin 12584)

Ad Magn. Aña in I Vesp. Ostendit * sanctus Gamaliel per visum Luciano sacerdoti tres calathos aureos rosis refertos, et quartum argenteum croco plenum, et dixit: Hi sunt nostri loculi, et nostræ reliquiæ: hic autem sanguineas habens rosas, loculus est sancti Stephani, qui solus ex nobis martyrio meruit coronari. – The holy Gamaliel showed the priest Lucian in a vision three golden baskets filled with roses, and a fourth of silver, filled with saffron, and said, ‘These are our coffins, and our relics; and this one that hath roses the color of blood is the coffin of Saint Stephen, who alone among us merited to be crowned with martyrdom.” (In the letter, Gamaliel explains that the saffron represents the purity of his son Abibas, who died very young, and that they were buried together, hence there are only three coffins.)

Ad Bened. Ex odoris * mira fragrantia sanitas ægrotis emanavit maxima: septuaginta namque et tres tunc a variis languoribus curati sunt homines in Inventione corporis Stephani dilectissimi Martyris, Deum benedicentes. – From the wondrous fragrance of the smell, very great healing came forth unto the ill; for seventy-three persons were then healed of various ailments at the finding of the body of Stephen, the most beloved martyr, as they blessed God.

Ad Magn. in II Vesp. Hodie * Joannes Pontifex cum maximo cleri plebisque tripudio, pretiosas Protomartyris Stephani reliquias in sanctam transtulit ecclesiam Sion, ubi quondam Archidiaconi functus est officio: cujus pia apud Deum sit pro nobis, quæsumus, intercessio. – Today, bishop John, with very great rejoicing of the clergy and people, translated the precious relics of the First Martyr Stephen to the holy church of Zion, where once he fulfilled the office of archdeacon; and we ask that his holy intercession may stand for before God.

The Third Sunday after Easter

On this third Sunday, and on the two that follow before the Ascension, the Church exhorts us to rejoicing and exultation for the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ, for which reason, the introit of this Sunday begins, ‘Shout with joy to God, all the earth.’ And there follows Alleluia, because this shout of joy is the exultation which the mind has for eternal things, and is to be made only to God; then ‘Sing a psalm to His name’, that is, praise him with cheerful work, and again a single Alleluia, because all other things arise from a single root, which is charity. Then is sung ‘Give glory to His praise’, and at the end a triple Alleluia, because from the power of the Father, and the wisdom of the Son, and the goodness of the Holy Spirit does it come about that He delivered us through His Passion and Resurrection, and therefore is God to be praised. But although there is exultation, nevertheless fear is also inculcated, lest hope without fear grow wanton unto presumption. (William Durandus, Rationale Divinorum Officiorum, 6, 94, 1)

Introitus (Ps 65) Jubiláte Deo, omnis terra, allelúia: psalmum dícite nómini ejus, allelúja: date glóriam laudi ejus, allelúja, allelúja, allelúja. V. Dícite Deo, quam terribilia sunt ópera tua, Dómine! in multitúdine virtútis tuæ mentientur tibi inimíci tui. Glória Patri. Sicut erat. Jubiláte Deo.

Introit Shout with joy to God, all the earth, alleluia, sing ye a psalm to His name, alleluia; give glory to His praise; alleluia, alleluia, alleluia. V. Say ye unto God, How terrible are thy works, o Lord! in the multitude of thy strength thy enemies shall lie to thee. Glory be to the Father... As it was in the beginning... Shout with joy to God...

This Psalm has in the title the inscription, ‘For the end, a song of a psalm of resurrection’. When you hear ‘for the end’ (in the titles of various psalms), understand it to mean ‘for Christ’, as the Apostle says, ‘For the end of the law is Christ, for righteousness to every one that believeth.’ (Rom. 10,4) ... ‘Jubilate unto God every land.’ What is jubilate? Break forth into the voice of rejoicings, if you cannot break forth into words. For jubilation is not of words, but the sound alone of men rejoicing is uttered, as of a heart laboring and bringing forth into voice the pleasure of a thing imagined which cannot be expressed. ... ‘Say ye to God, How to be feared are Your works!’ Wherefore to be feared and not to be loved? Hear another voice of a Psalm (2, 11): ‘Serve the Lord in fear, and exult unto Him with trembling.’ What does this mean? Hear the voice of the Apostle: ‘With fear, he says, and trembling, work out your own salvation.’ Wherefore with fear and trembling? He has also given the reason: for God it is that works in you both to will and to work according to good will. (Phil. 2, 12-13) If therefore God works in you, by the Grace of God you work well, not by your own strength. (St Augustine, Treatise on Psalm 65. The term ‘a psalm of resurrection’ is in the title of the Greek and Latin translations of the Psalter.)

St Augustine, ca. 1465, by Piero della Francesca (1415-92)

Saints Perpetua and Felicity

For over a millennium before the birth of St Thomas Aquinas, March 7th was the feast day of Ss Perpetua and Felicity, two young women who were martyred in the stadium at Carthage on this day in the year 203. Their feast is already noted on the Philocalian Calendar in the mid-4th century, and they are first among the women named in the Communicantes of the Roman Canon, since they predate the other five. They have a Mass in the Gelasian Sacramentary (750 AD) and the Gellone (780 AD), although they are missing from many other liturgical books of the same era, perhaps because March 7 almost always falls in Lent, when the Roman tradition discourages the keeping of too many feasts. They are included in the ordinal of Innocent III (1198-1216), the ancestor of the Tridentine liturgical books.

Ss Perpetua and Felicity (in the middle, directly above the medallion portrait of a bishop), depicted in the company of many other holy women in a 6th century mosaic in the basilica of Sant’ Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna. (Image from Wikimedia Commons by Sailko, CC BY-SA 3.0)

St Thomas died on their feast day in 1274, and was canonized in 1323. Between then and the Tridentine reform, some places moved the martyrs to either the day before or after for his sake, while others moved Thomas for theirs. However, on the calendar of St Pius V’s liturgical books, they are reduced to only a commemoration on Thomas’ day, and so they remained until 1908, when St Pius X restored their full feast, and assigned it to March 6.

The primary source for our knowledge of them is their original passion, which the revised Butler’s Lives of the Saints rightly describes as “one of the greatest hagiological treasures that have come down to us.” This is not only because it gives us an eye-witness account of their martyrdom, one which is universally acknowledged to be authentic, but also because it incorporates a diary which Perpetua kept while she was in prison awaiting execution.

Both women were still catechumens at the time of their arrest alongside three others, Saturninus, Secundulus, and Revocatus, the last a slave like Felicity. (The Roman liturgical tradition, however, celebrates only Perpetua and Felicity by name.) Their catechist, a man named Saturus, soon joined the group voluntarily. Perpetua was only twenty-two, a woman of a noble family, recently married to a prominent man, and a new mother. In her diary, she describes how her father came to visit her, and grew very angry with her when she refused to abandon the Faith; later on, he would return to her and plead with her to take pity on him for the sake of his old age, and likewise on her infant son, whom she was still nursing.

Felicity was in her eighth month of pregnancy, and anxious that she might be deprived of the chance to die as a martyr, since Roman law forbade that a pregnant woman be put to death. The soon-to-be martyrs prayed for her, and after much travail, she was safely delivered of a baby girl, who would then be raised by her sister. While she was in her birth-pangs, one of the prison-guards asked her how she could hope to face the pain of being attacked by wild beasts. To this she replied, “I myself now suffer that which I suffer, but there (i.e. in the stadium) Another shall be in me who shall suffer for me, because I am to suffer for Him.”

The diary also includes extensive accounts of the visions which were vouchsafed to Perpetua during her imprisonment. In one of these, she beheld a ladder of bronze reaching to heaven, fitted out along its rungs with various dangerous weapons, and a serpent at its base, representing the combat she was about to undertake.

A Dutch engraving of St Perpetua’s vision, 1740.

In another, she beheld her brother Dinocrates, who had died very painfully of some kind of ulcer or cancer on his face when he was only seven. In the first vision, he appeared still disfigured, in a dark place, hot and thirsty, but unable to drink from a fountain which was too tall for him to reach, and separated from her “by a great gulf”, (certainly a reference to the story of Lazarus and Dives). From this vision, she knew that she was supposed to pray for him, which she did assiduously, and after several days, she beheld him again, now healed, and able to drink from the fountain, “And being satisfied he departed away from the water and began to play as children will, joyfully.” This is, of course, an incredibly important testimony to the early Christians’ belief in the efficacy of their prayers for the dead.

This was followed by another vision of herself, as if she were a male gladiator in combat, triumphing as the leader of a troop over a large Egyptian and his supporters. Saturus also had a vision of their company in the presence of God and some other martyrs who had recently been burnt alive or died in prison.

The account of the martyrdom itself that follows these visions was written by an anonymous eyewitness. (Some scholars have posited that the author may have been the apologist Tertullian, but this is far from widely accepted.) On their last night, they were given a final meal, which they kept as a Christian agape feast. This was held in a place where people were able to come and gawk at them, but many were deeply moved by their words and behavior, and wound up converting to the Faith.

The Martyrdom of Ss Perpetua, Felicity and Companions, depicted in the Menologion of Basil II (ca 1000 A.D.)

When they were brought to the stadium, the soldiers in charge wished to dress them in the clothing of pagan priests, but backed off from this at Perpetua’s forceful remonstration. Because of their general attitude of rejoicing and bold acceptance of their face, the crowd grew enraged against them, and when they spoke of God’s judgment against the man in charge of the games, the governor Hilarian, he had them scourged, but this only brought them to give thanks at the opportunity to share in one of the sufferings that the Lord Himself had endured.

The men were set upon by wild beasts, a leopard, a bear and a wild boar, but the latter turned upon its keeper and fatally wounded him, while the bear refused to come out of the pen where it was kept, even when Saturus was tied up to a pole in front of it. He was then killed by the leopard. The women were trampled on and tossed about by a savage cow, and after being badly injured, given the coup-de-grace by gladiators. But the soldier assigned to kill Perpetua was inexperienced, and she had to guide his sword to her own throat. The account of their death ends with these poignant words: “Perhaps so great a woman, one who was feared by the unclean spirit, could not otherwise have been slain, had she not herself so willed it.”

Four sermons which St Augustine preached on their feast day have been preserved. In the first of these, he begins by making a play on the martyr’s names, speaking of their joy in heaven, and also refers to the custom which prevailed in many places by which the acts of the martyrs were read during the Mass.

“This day, as an annual recurrence, reminds us, and in a certain way, sets before us the day on which the holy servants of God, Perpetua and Felicity, adorned with the crowns of martyrdom, flourished unto perpetual felicity, holding onto the name of Christ in their combat, and at the same, time, finding also their own names (i.e. “perpetual felicity”.) as a reward. As the account was being read, we heard how they were encouraged by divine revelations, and the triumphs of their passion; we have listened, we have beheld in our minds, we have honored with devotion, we have praised with charity all of their words, as explained and clarified for us.”

The Life of St Augustine, by Benozzo Gozzoli (Part 2)

The first part of this, which was published on Thursday, the feast of St Augustine, ended with the scene of his conversion; here we pick up the story from his baptism. As in the first part, these public domain images are all taken from the Wikimedia Commons page on the choir chapel of the church of St Augustine in San Gimignano, Italy, where these frescoes were done by the Florentine painter Benozzo Gozzoli between 1463 and 1467.

Eleventh scene: St Augustine is baptized by St Ambrose. In accordance with the tradition that the Te Deum was composed by them both on this occasion, the first words of it are painted on the wall behind them. Until 1913, the header “Hymnus Ss Ambrosii et Augustini” was printed in the breviary above it. In keeping with a common artistic convention of the period, after this, the Saint always appears anachronistically clothed in the habit of medieval Augustinian friars, which Gozzoli makes dark, but not black, which would clash too strongly with the color scheme of the whole.

Twelfth scene: on the left, the famous (and apocryphal) story that Augustine, after finishing his book on the Trinity, went walking on the seashore, where he saw a boy trying to pour the ocean into a hole in the sand. When he told the boy that this was impossible, the boy replied that it was also impossible to fully explain the Trinity, and disappeared. In the background is represented a medieval tradition of Italian Augustinians that he once visited a group of hermits on Mt Pisano, about 40 miles to the north-west of San Gimignano. (The absence of any reference to a visit to Tuscany in his own writings was ingeniously explained as a lapse of memory, brought on by grief over the death of his mother, St Monica.) On the right, St Augustine is shown as a friar among friars, giving them the Augustinian Rule.

Thirteenth scene: the death of St Monica. This event, which is described in one of the most moving passages of the Confessions (book 9, 11-12), took place in the Roman port city of Ostia, well before Augustine returned to Africa and began to live in a monastic community. His departure is shown through the colonnade on the right. The Augustinian friar who commissioned these paintings, Fr Domenico Strambi, stands at the foot of the bed with an inscription underneath him to indicate who he is. St Monica was buried in Ostia, and her relics were kept there in the church of St Aurea until 1430, when they were transferred to the Roman basilica named for her son.

Fourteenth scene: St Augustine (barely visible on the right where the plaster has been damaged) blesses the people of Hippo after becoming their bishop.

Fifteenth scene: St Augustine converts a priest of the Manichean sect named Fortunatus. Note that he continues to wear his Augustinian habit under his cope.

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The Life of St Augustine, by Benozzo Gozzoli (Part 1)

In 1463, the Florentine painter Benozzo Gozzoli (1421-97) left his native city, then suffering from an outbreak of plague, and settled in the little town of San Gimignano about 30 miles to the south and west. During his stay, which lasted for four years, he was commissioned to decorate the choir of the local Augustinian church with a fresco cycle of the life of St Augustine, whose feast is today. Gozzoli had been a student of Fra Angelico, but unites to the typically Florentine style of his teacher, which tends towards the use of relatively simple backgrounds, the richly decorative style known as the International Gothic. The result is justly considered one of the best narrative cycles in fresco of its era. We begin with some overview photos, and then closer images of each individual panel of the narration. There are also several portraits of Saints on the pillars of the chancel arch, with Christ and the Twelve Apostles, and Ss John the Baptist and Elijah on the arch itself. (All public domain images from the Wikimedia Commons page about this chapel.)

A frontal view of the chapel; Augustinian religious communities tended to be quite small, as we can see from the size of the choir.

The left wall; the stories run around the chapel from left to right, first through the whole bottom band, then the middle, then the top.

The middle and top bands on the back wall.

This photograph gives a more complete view of the back wall, although it does no justice to Benozzo’s brilliant colors. I include it because it shows the whole arrangement more clearly, and includes the panel under the window, of which no other image seems to be available, St Augustine’s voyage from Carthage to Rome.

The right wall.

The vault, with the Four Evangelists (clockwise from the top, Luke, Mark, John and Matthew), and Christ and the Twelve Apostles in medallions on the chancel arch.

First scene: Augustine’s parents, Patricius and St Monica, bring him to his first day of school in his native town of Tagaste in north Africa. The kindness of his teacher is emphasized by the way he pats the boy’s cheek; note that Monica is dressed as a wealthy matron in a beautiful white dress, where below, after she is widowed, she appears more like a nun. On the right side, Augustine studies his letters, while another boy is beaten; the Latin inscription at the bottom notes that he quickly made remarkable progress in his studies. (Tagaste is now a town called Souk Ahras in eastern Algeria, about 55 miles from the Mediterranean coast. It has been a see in partibus since the later 15th century, and is currently held by the recently-retired nuncio to Portugal.)

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The Feast of St Augustine, According to the Order Formerly Known as the Hermits of St Augustine

Lost in Translation #138

Saint Augustine of Hippo, whose feast we celebrate tmorrow, left an indelible mark on the theology of Western Christianity, as well as on the priesthood and religious life. Augustine was one of the earliest bishops to establish what were later called Canons Regular, originally, priests that live with their bishop and share a common life, and his Rule led to the formation of several religious orders. The largest and most familiar of these is the Order of Saint Augustine (OSA), founded in 1244 and originally known as the Hermits of Saint Augustine (OESA). Our current Pontiff, Pope Leo XIV, is the only member of this order to have assumed the throne of Peter.

Before Vatican II, the old Augustinians kept several feasts of their own, including a vigil on August 27 in preparation for St. Augustine’s feast day (August 28) and an octave in his honor that ended on September 4. Here are the Orations and Preface for the festal Mass on August 28.

The Collect is:

Deus, qui abditiora sapientiae tuae arcana beato Patri Augustino revelando, et divinae caritatis flammas in ejus corde excitando, miraculum columnae nubis et ignis in Ecclesia tua renovasti; concede: ut ejus ductu mundi vortices feliciter transeamus, et ad aeternam promissionis patriam pervenire mereamur. Per Dominum.

Which I translate as:

O God, who by revealing the more hidden secrets of Your wisdom to blessed Father Augustine and who by fanning in his heart the flames of divine charity, You renewed in Your Church the miracle of the pillar of cloud and fire: grant that by his leadership we may happily pass through the world’s eddies and be worthy of reaching the eternal and promised homeland. Through our Lord.

There is a clever parallelism between Augustine’s clarifying wisdom (dispelling, we imagine, the fog of ignorance) and his ardent heart on one hand and the biblical pillar of cloud and fire on the other. That pillar led the Hebrews in the wilderness, and this Collect asks God to make Augustine our leader (ejus ductu can also mean “by his generalship”) as we pass through the eddies of life (the Red Sea?) to reach the Promised Land. Augustine is thus both a new pillar and a new Moses.

I also note that here in the Collect as well as in the Secret and Postcommunion, all the second-person-singular verbs in the perfect past tense (which, addressing God, describe what He has done) are syncopated. [1] In Latin, a syncopated verb is when a ‘v’ is dropped and a vowel contracted. Although it can be compared to an English contraction such as “can’t,” there is no whiff of informality as there is in English. And although syncopated verbs are not unheard of in the ancient Roman Orations, they are not as concentrated as they are here. I suspect this concentration betrays the influence of the times, after the reintroduction of classical Latin during the Renaissance.

The Secret is:

Omnipotens sempiterne Deus, qui praeclaro sapientiae lumine, beati Patris nostri Augustini mentem illustrasti, et sancti amoris jaculo ejusdem cor transverberasti: da nobis famulis tuis; ut illius doctrinae et caritatis participes effici mereamur. Per Dominum.

Which I translate as:

Almighty, everlasting God, who illuminated the mind our blessed Father Augustine with the splendid light of wisdom and transfixed his heart with the dart of holy love: grant to us Your servants that we may be worthy of being made partakers of his teaching and charity. Through our Lord.

The Secret retains the theme of Augustine’s brilliant intellect and his charitable heart. Christian art often portrays Augustine holding his heart pierced by a dart or arrow.

Symbol of the Order of Saint Augustine, which His Holiness Pope Leo XIV incorporated into his coat of arms.

The Mass also has its own Preface:

Vere dignum et justum est, aequum et salutare, nos tibi semper et ubique gratias agere, Domine sancte, Pater omnipotens, aeterne Deus: Quia vas electionis tuae et lux Doctorum mellifluus Augustinus, toto terrarum orbe radio mirae claritatis infulsit: et Ecclesiam sanctam fidei orthodoxae vere Augustinus illustravit: destruxit haereses; errores repulit: haereticosque prostravit: ac status fidelium universae christianae vitae, Augustinus moribus decoravit. Clericos docuit; laicos monuit; devios in viam veritatis reduxit; cunctorumque conditionibus salubriter providendo, tuam in hoc mari naviculam Augustinus provide gubernavit. Et ideo cum Angelis et Archangelis, cum Thronis et Dominationibus, cumque omni militia caelestis exercitus, hymnum gloriae tuae canimus, sine fine dicentes:

Which I translate as:

It is truly meet and just, right and salutary, that we should at all times and in all places, give thanks to You, O holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God; because the vessel of Your Election and the light of the Doctors, the mellifluous Augustine, enlightened the entire world with a ray of marvelous brilliance. And Augustine illuminated the Holy Church with a truly orthodox Faith; he destroyed heresies; he refuted errors; he brought low the heretics; and the status of all the faithful of a Christian life, Augustine decorated with his deeds. He taught the clergy; he admonished the laity; the returned the wayward to the Way of truth; and by salubriously providing in all conditions, Augustine providently piloted Your ship in this sea. And therefore, with the Angels and Archangels…

With its numerous short sentences and almost random placements of Augustine’s name, this Preface is far from being a model of the genius of the Roman Rite. But it does provide a fairly accurate (albeit meandering) biography of the Saint, who famously battled several heresies as well as the Donatist schism. The one glaring omission is mention of Augustine’s notorious past as a sinner. Perhaps it is indecorous when speaking of our Blessed Father to bring up his wild youth.

The Postcommunion is:

Fove, Domine, familiam tuam muneribus sacris, quam caelesti libamine recreasti: et, ut solemnia sancti Patris nostri Augustini devote concelebret; infunde lumen supernae cognitionis et flammam aeternae caritatis. Per Dominum.

Which I translate as:

Foster, O Lord, Your family, which You have revived with [these] sacred offerings and heavenly libation; and, so that it may celebrate devoutly the Feast of our holy Father Saint Augustine, pour onto it the light of supernal thinking and the flame of eternal charity. Through our Lord.

Again we see the double theme of Augustine’s intellect and will, both of which his spiritual children wish to emulate. “Light of supernal thinking” is an awkward translation of lumen supernae cognitionis; I chose “supernal” because it simply means “from above” rather than something more theologically specific, such as “supernatural” or “infused.” Augustine saw the world through the eyes of God, from a divine viewpoint, and we wish to do so as well. I also chose “thinking” rather than “thought” because I assume it is better to have a habit of thinking and of discovery that makes one a better knower rather than a series of thoughts that are injected into the mind.

But since the greatest thinkers are nothing without charity, we also ask for Augustine’s impassioned love of God and neighbor. Augustine’s first biographer Possidius wrote that as impressive as Augustine’s writings were, they pale in comparison to his daily deeds:

From his writing assuredly it is manifest that this priest, beloved and acceptable to God, lived uprightly and soberly in the faith, hope and love of the Catholic Church in so far as he was permitted to see it by the light of truth, and those who read his works on divine subjects profit thereby. But I believe that they were able to derive greater good from him who heard and saw him as he spoke in person in the church, and especially those who knew well his manner of life among men. For not only was he a “scribe instructed unto the kingdom of heaven, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old,” and one of those merchants who "when he had found the pearl of great price, sold all that he had and bought it," but he was also one of those of whom it is written : “So speak ye and so do,” and of whom the Saviour said: “Whosoever shall so do and teach men, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” [2]

Notes

[1] The verbs are renovasti in the Collect, illustrasti and transverberasti in the Secret, and recreasti in the Postcommunion.

[2] Possidius, Sancti Augustini vita, trans. Herbert Theberath Weiskotten, (Princeton University Press, 1919), 143-44.

A Proper Hymn for St Augustine

Despite his overwhelming importance to Western theology, there was very little liturgical devotion to St Augustine in the Roman Rite during the first millenium. His feast does not appear in the majority of ancient liturgical books; his day was originally kept in Rome itself as that of an obscure martyr named Hermes, who is still celebrated as a commemoration on August 28th in the traditional rite. Towards the end of the eleventh century, however, as the great reform movement within the Western Church gained momentum, there emerged a huge number of new religious congregations of the sort which we now call canons regular, followed within a few generations by the mendicant friars. [1] Many of these, such as the Premonstratensians and Dominicans, took the Rule of St Augustine as their own, since it is very simple, and permitted a wide variety of adaptations and additional customs. Augustine himself then began to be honored in the liturgy as the great legislator of canonical life, just as St Benedict had long been honored as the great legislator of monastic life.

Sometime in the 12th century, a proper Office was composed for him, and widely adopted by many of the Augustinian orders in their various kinds. Here is the hymn which the Dominicans sing at Vespers and Matins, the Premonstratensians at Vespers and Lauds. The prose translation given below is my own.

Magne Pater Augustine, Preces nostras suscipe, Et per eas Conditori Nos placare satage, Atque rege gregem tuum Summum decus Praesulum.	Great Father Augustine, receive our prayers, and by them, seek thou to reconcile us to the Creator, and rule thy flock, o highest glory of bishops.
Amatorem paupertatis Te collaudant pauperes: Assertorem veritatis Amant veri judices: Frange nobis favos mellis De Scripturis disserens.	The poor praise thee as one who loved poverty: true judges love thee as a defender of the truth; share with us the sweetness as thou expound the Scriptures.
Quae obscura prius erant Nobis plana faciens, Tu de verbis Salvatoris Dulcem panem conficis Et propinas potum vitae De Psalmorum nectare.	Making plain to us what was once obscure, thou makest sweet bread from the Saviour’s words, and offer us the drink of life from the nectar of the Psalms.
Tu de vita clericorum Sanctam scribis regulam Quam qui amant et se-    quuntur Viam tenent regiam Atque tuo sancto ductu Redeunt ad patriam.	Thou didst write the holy rule for the life of clerics; and they that love and follow it, keep the royal way, and under thy holy leadership return to the Father’s land.
Regi regum salus, vita, Decus et imperium: Trinitati laus et honor Sit per omne saeculum: Qui concives nos adscribat Supernorum civium. Amen.	To the King of kings be life, salvation, glory and rule: to the Trinity praise and honor be through every age: and may He make us fellow- citizens of those that dwell in heaven. Amen.

The Office also includes a full complement of proper antiphons and responsories; here is the antiphon for the Magnificat at Second Vespers, set as a polyphonic motet by Sulpizia Cesis (1577-1619 ca.), an Augustinian nun from Modena, Italy.

Aña Hodie gloriosus pater Augustinus, dissoluta hujus habitationis domo, domum non manufactam accepit in caelis, quam sibi, cooperante Dei gratia, manu, lingua fabrefecit in terris, ubi jam quod sitivit internum gustat aeternum, decoratus una stola securusque de reliqua. – Today our glorious Father Augustine, the earthly house of this habitation being dissolved, received a house not made by hands in heaven, which he built for himself with his hand and tongue, helped by God’s grace, where now he tastes within himself forever that for which he longed, graced by one stole, and sure of the other. (i.e., of the final resurrection.)

[1] See the introduction (p. 430) to the article “On the Prose Historia of St Augustine” by Janka Szendrei, in “The Divine Office in the Latin Middle Ages: Methodology and Source Studies, Regional Developments, Hagiography”, edited by Margot Fassler and Rebecca Baltzer; Oxford Univ. Press, 2000.

The Feasts of Saint Monica and a New Conjecture about Her Dies Obitus

The feast of Saint Monica is celebrated in the traditional calendar on May 4 and in the new calendar on August 27. As the Calendarium Romanum, promulgated in 1969, explains:

In the fifteenth century, the Augustinian Order celebrated May 5 as the feast of St. Augustine’s conversion. Since the birthday of Monica was unknown, the Order celebrated it on May 4. About 1550, the feast was assigned to the same date in the Roman calendar. [1]

As we pointed out in an earlier article, the Order of Saint Augustine (formerly known as the Hermits of Saint Augustine) celebrated May 5 as the anniversary of Augustine’s reception into the Catholic Church by St. Ambrose during the Easter Vigil of 387. It was only natural, then, to assign Saint Monica’s feast to May 4. Monica not only lived to see her wayward son cleansed of his sins in the saving waters of baptism (along with her illegitimate grandson Adeodatus); she was more instrumental in his conversion than any other human agent. Augustine writes that it is through Monica’s merit that he is all that he is,[2] and that “from the blood of my mother’s heart, sacrifice for me was offered Thee day and night by her tears, and Thou didst act with me in marvellous ways.” [3] After his conversion, Augustine and his fellow neophyte friends and son lived together in community. He recalls that Monica “took as much care as if she had been the mother of us all, and served us as if she had been the daughter of us all.” [4]

Augustine’s Baptism

As far as I can tell, no one knows whether May 5 was chosen for the celebration of Augustine’s conversion out of a belief that it was the actual anniversary of his baptism or for some other reason. In any event, in the twentieth century, scholars determined that the night of April 24/morning of April 25 were the dates on which the Easter Vigil was celebrated in Milan in 387. Accordingly, the Augustinians have celebrated the feast of St. Augustine’s Conversion on April 24 since at least 1953. 

In 1969 the decision was made to move Monica’s feast day to August 27, the day before the main feast of her son, the anniversary of his death on August 28, 430. I suspect that the liturgical reformers did not leave Monica’s feast on May 4 because May 4 was no longer in close proximity to the Feast of Augustine’s Conversion, and I suspect that they did not consider moving it to the day before the new date of April 24, since this Augustinian feast was not on the universal calendar.

Still, it seems wiser to me to have left Monica’s feast on May 4. Whether or not Augustine was received into the Church on May 5, the month of May is always in Paschaltide and thus a reminder of his Holy Saturday conversion. The Church could have also added the May 5 feast to the universal calendar as a commemoration or optional memorial, for after that of Saint Paul, Augustine’s conversion is the most important in the history of the Church and therefore worthy of liturgical recognition. And even if April 24 is the more accurate date for Augustine’s conversion, one could have kept the May 4 date for the sake of historic continuity and tradition. It would not be the first time that the Church calendar and historical accuracy have failed to align perfectly, but so what.

The Vision at Ostia

Further, there is an affective consideration. When one thinks of Saint Monica, one thinks of her influencing her son in the springtime of his youth and of raising him, interceding for him, joyfully assisting at his baptism, and finally, experiencing the Vision at Ostia with him. But when one thinks of Saint Augustine’s final days, one thinks of a vastly different scene. Monica has been dead for forty-three years, and during those four decades Augustine has gone from being a Catholic intellectual layman eager to withdraw from the world into an irenic, semi-monastic community, to a priest and bishop polemically embroiled in some of the greatest theological and political controversies of his age. And as he laying dying in Hippo Regius, the barbarians were literally at the gates, an army of 80,000 Vandals laying siege to the city and poised to destroy Roman civilization in North Africa.

The Death of St. Augustine

Dating Saint Monica’s Death

But there is a third possibility for determining Monica’s feast day, which I do not recommend but nonetheless find intriguing: arriving at a reasonable estimate of Monica’s dies obitus.

We know that Monica passed away some time after Augustine’s reception into the Church, which she witnessed on April 24-25, 387, and some time before his thirty-third birthday on November 13, 387. [5] We also know that she passed away at least fourteen days after her arrival in the port town of Ostia. [6] The earliest that Augustine and his companions could have left Milan after his baptism was Easter Monday, April 26. But it is more likely that they stayed for the “Octave of the Infants,” when neophytes received further instruction in the Faith during the Easter Octave. An early departure date of Monday, May 3, then, is a more reasonable assumption. But they could have also lingered in Milan for weeks after Easter Sunday and still be in Ostia in time for the high point of the sailing season in the ancient Mediterranean, which was from May to October.

The distance between Milan and Ostia Antica is approximately 378 miles on land. The group could have journeyed by land to Genoa and then sailed to Ostia, or they could have journeyed entirely on land. Augustine’s word choice may suggest the former since he describes their journey to Ostia as a longum iter (which can also mean a long march), and he seems to contrast this journey with the forthcoming navigatio by sea (9.10.23). A Roman legion could cover twenty miles a day, but Augustine and his companions were in no such hurry, and at fifty-six-years old, Monica was considered an old woman. If the group did travel by foot, it is not unreasonable to speculate that they averaged ten miles a day and that their journey therefore took thirty-eight days.

Putting all these suppositions together: if the group left Milan on Monday, May 3, they may have arrived in Ostia around June 11. The Vision at Ostia would have taken place within the next few days (June 12-15?), Monica’s fever would have begun around June 18, and her death would have occurred around June 27. Her family--her sons Augustine and Navigius and grandson Adeodatus--would have buried her soon after and then tearfully departed Ostia for their North African home during the height of the Mediterranean sailing season.

This article is dedicated to my dear sister-in-law Hilary Ryan Tucker, whose birthday falls on the traditional feast day of St. Monica.

Notes

[1] The Roman Calendar: Text and Commentary (Washington, DC: United States Catholic Conference, 1976), 50.

[2] De beata vita 1.6.

[3] Confessions 5.7.13, trans. Frank Sheed (Hackett, 2005).

[4] Confessions 9.9.22.

[5] Augustine states that his mother was present at his baptism, and he states that she passed away when he was 32, that is, before his 33rd birthday on November 13, 387.

[6] She and her son Augustine experienced their famous “Vision at Ostia” while they were recovering from their “long journey” from Milan and preparing to set sail (the day after their arrival? Two days after?). Five days later she fell into a fever (possibly malaria), and nine days after that, her “devout and holy soul was released from the body.” (Conf. 9.11.28)

Schmemann’s Critique of the West (Part 2): Placing the Lateran Council in Context

The Fourth Lateran Council, from Johannes de Columna o.p., “Mare historiarum” (source)

Last week I summarized Schmemann’s fundamental critique of Western sacramental and liturgical theology. Today I address the question: Did the Fourth Lateran Council give a bad and unpatristic definition of “real” as opposed to “mystical”?

A helpful historical resource for these questions is Fr James O’Connor’s book The Hidden Manna (which will be cited as HM). Although the Fathers did not contrast “reality” with “symbol” using exactly those words, they did contrast the “true” with the “figure.” For example, St Ambrose says:

Now consider which is more excellent, the bread of angels or the Flesh of Christ which is indeed the body of life. That manna was from heaven; this is from above the heavens. … The former was given in umbra; the latter is given in veritate. (HM 37–38)

This is similar to the contrast St. Cyril of Jerusalem draws regarding the “truth” of the oil of Chrismation and the “type” that its Old Testament precursors were. This contrast did not prevent St. Cyril from referring to the Eucharist as a “type” of the body of Christ; it was a helpful contrast, but not a carefully demarcated system of words.

It was Ratramnus of Corbie (d. 868) who first set out a stark opposition between “figure” and “truth,” and on that basis said some rather unclear things about the Eucharist. For example:

Figure is a kind of hiding … of what is meant to be shown. For example, … when Christ in the Gospel says, “I am the living Bread who have come down from heaven”, or when he calls himself the vine and his disciples the branches … all these things say one thing but imply another. Truth is the manifest setting forth of a reality such that it is not hidden by any images or shadows, or, to speak more clearly, it is the setting forth of things in their pure, open, and natural signification, as is the case when one says that Christ was born of the Virgin, suffered, was crucified, died, and was buried. In these cases nothing is hidden by figures that are obscure; the truth of the reality is set forth by the significance of the natural words; nothing other than what is said is to be understood. But in the cases mentioned above [when speaking of “figure”] it is not thus. Substantially the bread is not Christ or the vine Christ or the branches Apostles. Therefore these are a figure. (HM 92)

Berengarius took up the writings of Ratramnus and spoke unclearly in turn. The “Berengarians” were a diverse group according to contemporary report, and one Guitmund, Bishop of Aversa, avers that some of the Berengarians said “there is nothing at all of the Body and Blood of the Lord present in these Sacraments but that they are only umbras et figuras (HM 105). By this point, the original language used to affirm our faith in the Eucharist—the contrast between truth and figure—was being used to deny our faith in the Eucharist.

Lazzaro Baldi, “St Bruno defending the Sacraments against Berengar of Tours at the Council of 1079,” c. 1684 (source)

The East never endured a crisis around the Eucharist parallel to the Western Berengarian crisis (even as the West never endured a crisis around the divinity of the Holy Spirit parallel to the Eastern Macedonian crisis that prompted the insertion of a consecratory epiklesis in the Byzantine rite). Consequently, the East never experienced the weaponization of the venerable patristic “truth”/“figure” contrast. In the West, however, the faith had to be reasserted in terms of a denial that the Eucharist is merely a figure: for if it were, the New Testament Eucharist would not exceed the Old Testament figures of the Eucharist.

To complete the response, however, this simple reassertion of the Patristic contrast was not enough. There is indeed something symbolic about the Eucharist, as St. Cyril seems to indicate. So the West borrowed language from Augustine, language familiar from On Christian Doctrine: the distinction between (mere) “sign” and (full) “reality.” Again, it is worth noting that this distinction hails from one of the great Fathers—even if from a Father held in suspicion by (some in) the East.

In Book IV, Distinction X of his Sentences, Peter Lombard takes up the heresy of those who say that the body of Christ is on the altar in sacramento, id est, in signo, et tantum in signo manducari a nobis (in sacrament, that is, in sign, and only in sign is it eaten by us). Here “figure” has been replaced by “sign,” but it’s the same position we saw in the Berengarians. In response Lombard asserts the Catholic belief that “the true body of Christ is in the sacrament of the altar,” still staying close to the Patristic phrasing, but he also leverages the Augustinian distinction to distinguish between the sacramentum and the res sacramenti (often translated as the “reality of the sacrament”) and says that the res is the body of Christ. Also following Augustine, he says that “the bread is thus called the body of Christ, since it is truly the sacrament of the body of Christ which was placed on the cross.” Here we have “reality” [res] contrasted with “sign,” but (nota bene) in such a way that the Eucharist includes both, in different respects.

At the time of Lombard, no one has yet used the phrase “real presence” in reference to the Eucharist. In fact, the phrase “real presence” does not occur even in the works of St Thomas Aquinas! We’re getting close to that phrase with the res et sacramentum distinction, but we’re not there yet.

So what language does St. Thomas use? In the Summa, he raises the question: “It seems that the body of Christ is not in this sacrament secundum veritatem (according to truth, i.e., in truth), but only secundum figuram or as in signo (according to figure or as [meaning is] in a sign).” As we have seen, this is exactly the language the heretics have used to deny the faith.
 

The Angelic and Eucharistic Doctor (detail from an embroidered banner of St Dominic’s, Newcastle) Photo by Fr Lawrence Lew (source)

In his reply, St. Thomas first goes back to the old Patristic contrast between the Old Law and the New: since the Old Law already contained Christ’s passion in figura, it was necessary that the New Law should have something more, “namely, that it should contain Christ himself, the one who suffered, not only in signification or in figure, but also in the truth of the thing [in rei veritate].” Here we have the Patristic “truth” but with the addition of the word rei [“thing” or “reality”], seemingly to distinguish this “truth” from other ways in which the sacrament could be “true.” St. Thomas goes on to add a more medieval meditation:

Second, this belongs to Christ’s love, out of which for our salvation he assumed a true body of our nature. And because it is the special feature of friendship to live together with friends, as the Philosopher says (Ethic. ix), he promises us His bodily presence as a reward, saying (Matt. 24, 28): Where the body is, there shall the eagles be gathered together. Yet meanwhile in our pilgrimage he does not deprive us of his bodily presence; but unites us with himself in this sacrament through the truth of His body and blood. Hence (John 6, 57) he says: He that eats my flesh, and drinks my blood, abides in me, and I in him. Hence this sacrament is the sign of supreme charity, and the uplifter of our hope, from such familiar union of Christ with us.

Notice that St. Thomas uses the word “presence,” which is not a major word in the Church Fathers, and we find this word in the phrase “bodily presence.” Taken by itself, “bodily presence” could lead to misunderstanding, but Aquinas rephrases it as a union of Christ with us “through the truth of His body,” thus going back to traditional wording as the final explanation.

Aquinas’ use of “bodily presence” brings us close to what O’Connor claims is the first use of “real presence” in history, namely, Pope Urban IV’s bull Transiturus of 1264, extending the feast of Corpus Christi to the entire Western church. Urban IV says:

This is the memorial most sweet and salvific in which we gratefully recall the memory of our redemption, in which we are drawn from evil, strengthened in good, and secure an increase in virtues and graces, the memorial in which we attain the corporeal presence [corporali praesentia] of the Savior himself. Other things whose memory we keep we embrace spiritually and mentally [spiritu menteque complectimus]: we do not thereby obtain their real presence [realem praesentiam]. However, in this sacramental commemoration of Christ, Jesus Christ is present with us in his proper substance [propria substantia], although under another form. (HM 194)

What does “real presence” mean here? In this text, the term “real presence” is used in parallel with “bodily presence” and with the phrase “present in his proper substance,” in contrast with things present to us in such a way that we can (only) embrace them with our mind or spirit. His point lines up with the second argument quoted above from Aquinas, because Aquinas is speaking in the context of friendship and Urban is speaking in terms of what we “embrace” in a memorial. When we commemorate other things, we embrace them in mind or in spirit, but when we commemorate Christ’s death we embrace Him with the body. (As we know, Urban entrusted Aquinas with composing the office for the feast of Corpus Christi, so he may even have relied on him for some of the text of Transiturus—this possibility cannot be ruled out.)

It seems that the Augustinian res / sacramentum distinction may have prepared the way for Urban’s use of realis praesentia. The obvious meaning of realis praesentia would be a presence “through the res,” and Urban puts this in parallel with corporali praesentia, which seems to be presence through the body itself. Perhaps we are supposed to see this against the background of the common view, expressed by Lombard in the text I quoted above, that the body is the res of the Eucharist. But since the contrast with realis here is not sacramentalis but memories embraced by the mind, the Augustinian language does not completely cover Urban’s usage.

To pull this all together, it seems that the contrast between Old Testament “figure” and New Testament “truth” was a normal way to speak about Christ in the Eucharist from Patristic times through the High Middle Ages. Heretics took up the contrast to say that the Eucharist is but a figure and not the true body, and in response, orthodox thinkers reasserted that the New Testament has the truth and not just a figure; they also worked out new distinctions, including the distinction between “res” and “sacramentum” (“reality” and “sacrament”). The word “presence” does not come up much prior to Urban, although St. Thomas’s reference to “bodily presence” does bring the word in, and his wording is reflected in Urban’s bull. Urban first uses the phrase “real presence” to indicate that Christ’s presence in the sacrament of the altar goes beyond the presence of other things or persons we commemorate in other commemorations, which he characterizes as embraced in mind and spirit. In short: “real” is not contrasted with “fake” but with “mental” or “spiritual.” (He does not use the term “real presence” in the context of the old contrast of figure/sign and truth, so it is hard to know whether he saw the term as helpful for that context.)

Nevertheless, the phrase “real presence” later became the dominant name for this mystery in the West. So dominant is the phrase “real presence” in later theology that translations tend to import it. For example, the Catechism of the Council of Trent quotes St. Hilary, who says, “There is no room for doubt regarding the truth of Christ’s body and blood,” but the TAN translation of the Catechism renders that “regarding the real presence of Christ’s body and blood.” Countless times I have found translations of older texts replacing “truly” with “really.”
 

Aristotle (source)

As an aside, Schmemann is mistaken to attribute a definition of “real” to the Lateran Council. Perhaps there is a concept of reality behind the language of the council, but neither the word “real” nor the word “mystical” come up in the council. I think what Schmemann is objecting to is the very notion of transubstantiation. And how ironic that would be, considering that the Eastern Orthodox Church’s 1672 Synod of Jerusalem clearly taught the doctrine of Eucharistic metaousiosis (that is, change of substance or change of being), which was already taught more commonly under the equally telling expression metastoicheiosis or “change of elements.”

Nor is it legitimate to say one is “merely rejecting” the Aristotelian physics behind the term, for, as Paul VI pointed out, Aristotle’s distinction between substance and accident (whatever you wish to name them—the underlying thing and its logically posterior incidental or changeable features) is an inescapable concept in any realist philosophy whatsoever. The only alternatives are the philosophical systems of materialism and idealism. The former is patently absurd, since it can make no room for and give no account of the very concept of itself; and the latter, while defensible on its own terms, is impossible to reconcile either with an orthodox theology of creation or with an orthodox Christology, since it would obliterate the distinction between spirit and flesh, and thus give the lie to (among other things) the constant insistence of St John that the Word was made flesh.

St Augustine and the Translation of His Relics

Many Augustinian congregations, both canons and friars, have traditionally celebrated October 11th as the feast of the Translation of the Relics of St Augustine. For centuries, the Premonstratensians even kept this feast with an octave, although this was suppressed after Pope St Pius X’s breviary reform.

The calendar for October from a Premonstratensian Breviary printed in 1490. The Translation of St Augustine is marked on the 11th; note that because the octave day, the 18th, is permanently impeded by the feast of St Luke the Evangelist, it is permanently anticipated to the 17th. (This may seem like an odd thing to do, but it was a common enough practice once upon a time, and the same is done with St Ursula and Companions on the 21st, since their octave is impeded by Ss Simon and Jude.)

St Augustine died on August 28, 430 A.D., as the barbarian Vandals were besieging the city of Hippo, where he had ruled as bishop for thirty-five years. The Vandals were Arians who often persecuted the Catholics of north Africa, and about 50 years later, their king Huneric expelled many of the Catholic bishops from his territory. Several of them fled to Sardinia, bringing Augustine’s relics with them to Cagliari on the south of the island, its major port and largest city. By the early 8th century, the Saracens had seized control of several coastal cities of the western Mediterranean, including Cagliari, while subjecting many others to continual raids and plunder. The king of the Lombards in northern Italy, one Liutprand, was able to ransom the relics from them in 724, and bring them to his capital city of Pavia, about 21 miles south of Milan. Since that time, they have been kept in the romantically-named church of San Pietro in Ciel d’Oro, “St Peter in the Golden Heaven,” where Liutprand himself is also buried.

From about 1360 to 1400, a monumental reliquary tomb for the Saint was made, of the type which is called an “arc.” (‘Arca’ in Italian; in the past we have shown similar arcs made for Ss Dominic and Peter Martyr.) It is attributed to a group of sculptors working under the brothers Matteo and Bonino da Campione, and Balduccio da Pisa. Originally kept in the sacristy, it was dismantled during the Napoleonic wars, and reassembled as the church’s altarpiece only in 1900. At four meters high, and covered with 90 statues, it is one of the most impressive monuments of late Gothic sculpture in Italy, with a remarkable richness of iconography. These photos were all taken by Nicola de’ Grandi.

Inside the altar is a silver box made by Liutprand for the relics of St Augustine, which were moved to a reliquary in 1833. They are exposed for the veneration of the faithful twice a year, on his principal feast day, August 28th, and the feast of his Conversion, April 24.

Inside the central register of the arc is depicted the death of St Augustine, who is shown in pontifical robes, with a Bible in his hand, surrounded by six deacons who hold his funeral veil. Above him, on the “ceiling”, as it were, of the open space, Christ appears to him, surrounded by Angels and Saints who are about to receive him into heaven. (Details can be seen by clicking the photo to enlarge it.)

The lower register shows the virtues of Faith (with the upside-down cross of the church’s titular Saint, the Apostle Peter, and a chalice), Hope (looking up to heaven), Charity (with a baby) and Religion, (founded on a rock, another reference to Peter.) On the panels between them are paired Ss Peter and John, James the Lesser and Andrew, Thomas and Bartholomew, each holding a scroll with a few words of the Apostles’ Creed. On the upper register are the episodes of St Augustine’s conversion: listening to the preaching of St Ambrose; the famous “Tolle, lege” episode; and the reading of St Paul’s words “Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh in its concupiscences.” (Romans 13, 14) In the triangles at top are shown various miracles of St Augustine.

On the lower register of the left side are Chastity, Ss Stephen, Paul the Hermit and Lawrence, and Obedience (holding a copy of a religious rule.) In the center, St Ambrose and St Possidius, bishop of Calama, are seen from behind; the latter was an eyewitness to St Augustine’s death, and later wrote a biography of him. The upper register depicts Augustine when he was a teacher of rhetoric at Milan.

St Ambrose died 33 years before Augustine; he is represented as present, along with Ss Jerome and Gregory the Great on the opposite side, to make up the company of the four Saints first recognized as Doctors of the Church. (St Jerome died about 10 years before Augustine, while Gregory was born about a century after his death.)

On the right side, the lower register depicts Meekness with a lamb, and the Evangelists Mark and Luke, with St Paul between them, and Poverty on the right. Above them, Ss Jerome and Gregory the Great (with a dove on his shoulder) are seen from behind. In the upper register, the panel on the right shows Liutprand bringing the relics from Sardinia, and then on the left, into Pavia.

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