Community of Aidan & Hilda For the healing of the land through children, women and men who draw inspiration from the Celtic Saints EAST ANGLIA REGION NEWS |
From Holy Island to Tilbury - The Lindisfarne Gospels and the Essex
Connection
King of the East Saxons?
The Hallowing of England
The English Saints - East Anglia
Sixty Saxon Saints
The Eye of the Eagle - the Video
Flying Free
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'From Holy Island to Tilbury - The Lindisfarne Gospels and the Essex Connection'
Michelle Brown's lecture titled 'From Holy Island to Tilbury -
The Lindisfarne Gospels
and the Essex Connection' is at St. Laurence church, Eastwood (near Southend Airport) on
Friday 13th June 2008 at 7.30pm. Tickets are £6 and include a glass of wine and nibbles. They are
available from Anne Robinson, tel. 01702 477729.
Michelle, Curator of Illuminated Manuscripts at the British Library for nearly 20 years, is now
also Professor of Mediaeval Manuscripts at the University of London, visiting professor at Leeds,
and a Lay Canon of St. Paul's Cathedral. She is a world-wide authority on the Lindisfarne Gospels
and her lectures are both informative and entertaining; she imparts to the audience her great
enthusiasm for the subject in a very warm and embracing way. Last May she spoke to the
Chelmsford Cathedral Theological Society about the four English brothers Cedd, Chad, Cynebill
and Caelin who were trained on Lindisfarne by Aidan.
Cedd, of course, became our very own
Saint here in Essex and set up his monastery at
Bradwell
from where he set out on his mission among the East Saxons. He also founded a monastery at
Tilbury, near to the site of the present St. Catherine's church, but any remains of which are
now most probably lost below the present high-tide level. We're sure that, like the Theological Society evening, this one with Michelle will also be an excellent one.
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'King of the East Saxons?'
The recent discovery and excavation of an undisturbed Saxon Burial Tomb in Southend in Essex
leaves archaeologists and historians an interesting task of study and interpretation in order to
place some understanding on the significance of the find. The site is about 200 metres to the
east of the remains of Prittlewell Priory, a former Cluniac monastery founded sometime around
1110. It is thought that at that time there was already a small religious community on the site
which adjoined the 6th/7th century Saxon village of Prittlewell. The burial chamber was located
adjacent to an existing Anglo-Saxon cemetery of high status and is believed to date from the
early 7th century. The chamber was filled with everything a princely person might need in the
afterlife, a practice that was not incompatible with Christian belief in that period. The
presence of two gold Latin crosses suggests that the burial was that of a newly converted
Christian. They are quite plain in design and were probably custom-made for the burial ceremony
and must have simply been laid on the body after it was placed in the tomb. Historians believe
the tomb may be that of either of
King Saebhart or of
King Sigeberht II.
Saebhart ruled the province of the
East Saxons under the suzerainty of
King Ethelbert
and received the Faith in 604 through
Mellitus, Bishop of London.
Ethelbert
reigned in Kent and his domains extended northwards to the river Humber which formed the boundary
between the north and south Angles.
Saebhart was the first
East Saxon King to convert to
Christianity but after his death in 616 his three sons, all pagans, expelled the Christian
Missionaries and the province returned once more to Paganism.
Sigeberht II, was a friend
of Oswald, the Christian King of Northumbria, and was very much influenced by him. On his
succession to the kingship in 653 he asked Oswald for a missionary to be sent from Lindisfarne
to evangelise the East Saxons. The Saxon monk
Cedd who had been trained by Aidan was sent and,
after sailing down the East Coast, landed at the former Roman Fort of Othona on the River
Blackwater in Essex. He built his monastery among the ruins of the old fort and his church,
St. Peter's-on-the-Wall,
remains to this day. Cedd was made Bishop of
the East Saxons in 654 and went on to found other monasteries in the southeast, including one at
Prittlewell. John Keeling By tradition Saebhart was buried in Westminster Abbey, which he supposedly founded; a tomb said to be his (also that of his consort Ethelgoda) is located in the South Quire. However, on the evidence of dating of the artefacts, the Saxon burial tomb found in Prittlewell in the autumn of 2003 may be the burial chamber of Saebhart. Several foil crosses, perhaps sewn into his shroud, correlate with the accepted history that he was a convert to Christianity. Other funereal goods, such as glass and copper alloy bowls, indicate a continuation of pagan beliefs.
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'The Hallowing of England'Book Review
These words of John Masefield appear at the start of the Foreword to the third edition of this excellent guide on the pre-conquest saints in England. In the Old English period we can count over 300 saints, yet today their names and exploits are largely unknown. They are part of a forgotten England which, though it lies deep in the past, is an important part of our national and spiritual history. Although the holy relics of the saints and the churches they built are long gone, the sites where they laboured are still here and their presence can still be sensed in those places. Wherever we are in England, we are never far from places hallowed by these saints. Each journey through our land can, if we so choose, become a pilgrimage. The main aim of this book is a pilgrimage to the saints who directly hallowed the English land. It includes a list of 260 saints, an alphabetical Pilgrim's Guide to over 300 places with which they are associated, and a Julian calendar of saints' feast days. A Shire and Kingdom Index list each of the places under their Counties. 50 of the places in the Pilgrim's Guide are in the East Anglia Region. Fr. Phillip draws the book to a close with a piece of his own:
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'The English Saints - East Anglia'
by Trefor Jones
Book Review The English Saints - East Anglia, is the first of a new a series planed to cover the whole country. Beginning with the Anglia Region's conversion to Christianity, volume one deals with Felix, Fursey, Pega, Botolp, Adulph, Adulph, Edmund and others, who have become ikons of Christianity for succeeding ages.
Trefor Jones is an Orthodox priest living in Wells-next-Sea, Norfolk.
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'Sixty Saxon Saints'Book Review
Who are the saints and why are they worthy of our interest? Some would see in them no more than men and women of compelling strength of character who attracted a superstitious veneration from the ignorant. For others, the mainstream orthodox believers, the saints are people who, exceptionally imbued with the grace of God, have risen to a higher plane of being and so wield more than natural powers even after death. It is a bold claim. The purpose of this complilation is to see some justice done to the English saints who lived before the Normal Conquest. They were men and women of differing types and temperaments though predominantly drawn from noble if not royal families. They took with them from the secular into the religious life the native English ideals of loyalty to one's Lord and, if necessary, sacrificial service in his cause. My original idea was to limit this selection to those of native English birth and culture but feared that this might seem to reflect a naive racism. It was however on strictly rational grounds that another ten or so 'foreigners' (indicated by asterisks) were added to the basic list because the story of English Christianity could not sensibly be told without including such men as the Irish Scot Aidan or the Italian who became Austin. One certainly fictitious lady (Margaret of Antioch) is also included because of the hold her strange story took on the English imagination. There is also King Alfred who should have been a saint but never quite made it. Read and judge for yourselves what manner of people these were. A.W.S.
'Sixty Saxon Saints' is published by:
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'The Eye of the Eagle'
Video Highlights of the
featuring interviews with
Dave Bainbridge, David Fitzgerald, Extracts from the Video Box Sleeve: 'The Eye of the Eagle' is a video recording bringing to life a unique musical and spiritual experience. The World Premier of this work is set within the architectural and acoustical splendour of one of Englands finest and most beautiful Cathedrals. A moving, visually stimulating experience, augmented by interviews with the composers Dave Bainbridge and David Fitzgerald and the writer of the book which inspired them, David Adams, former Vicar of St. Mary's Church, Lindisfarne. David Adam's book 'The Eye of the Eagle', based on meditations on the Celtic hymn 'Be Thou My Vision', takes us on a journey through landscapes of word-pictures revealing God, the creator of the universe, who is within our grasp. This book was destined to become the inspiration for this project. Through this work our generation can listen to God's voice speaking from our rich Celtic Christian past to help us see once again with the keen sharp eye of the eagle, God's spirit, insights from centuries other than our own.
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'Flying Free' A new book from the Region
A collection of Judi's deeply moving poems
ABOUT THE POET Judi was born in Hythe, Kent, in 1946. She has two adult sons, Tim and Steven. After training as a General Nurse and Midwife, she spent seven years in Lesotho, Southern Africa. She now works as a Warden for elderly residents in sheltered housing. Her writing reflects her own spirituality in the many different aspects of her life. At the present time, Judi is training for non-Stipendary ministry in the Anglican Church and is a student on the East Anglia Ministerial Training Course.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
David was born in Norwich in 1947 and born again in 1987, becoming a member of
Bowthorpe Church, where he, Jane his wife and Bethany their daughter (born that year)
then lived. They now live in Costessey and describe themselves as Christians who enjoy the
spontaneity, joy and freedom in Christ, that today is often referred to as Celtic.
PREFACE I first met Judi and David on separate occasions when they came as guests to All Hallow's Convent, Ditchingham. I was very privileged to be invited by each of them, subsequently, to be a companion on their spiritual journey. Each in time found expression of God's truth through creativity, and longed to be able to share the fruits of their journey more widely, and so the idea for this book was born. The two met in 1996 and connected immediately, and poems and pictures came together. The outcome is a tribute to the courage of each as they have faced their own weaknesses, fears and need of God's grace, and grown to know the depth of His love for them. It is offered humbly in hope that others might catch a glimpse of that Love and know that it is for them too.
I am grateful for all the blessings I have
and from the book
Thankyou Lord, for this new day,
You showed me clearly on my way,
Diamonds of dew shone so bright,
The skylark was singing so high above,
I stood in this splendour and thanked God above,
Copies of the Book can be obtained directly from: Any profit made from the sale of this book
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This page is under continuous development.
All information is provided in good faith.
Last Update: 14th August 2009