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SAINT BEDE THE VENERABLE

DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH

(735)

 

St. Bede was the first British historian. He had an uneventful life. He was a monk since he was seven years old. He spent his whole life in a monastery. First, in the monastery of Apostles Peter and Paul at Warmouth, where he started his education by St. Benedict Biscop. Then in the monastery at Jarrow by St. Ceolfrith. He was ordained a priest in 703. He devoted himself to study the Scriptures, and the discipline of the monastic life. He found a delight in the daily charge of singing, to learn, or teach, or write.

As he himself related: “ In my nineteenth year I was admitted to the deaconate and in my thirtieth to the priesthood…. From the time of my ordination up till my present fifty-ninth year I have endeavored, for my own use and that of the brethren, to make brief notes upon Holy Scriptures either out of the works of the venerable fathers or in conformity with their meaning and interpretation”. His outstanding writings include the chronology as wall as lives of the saints, such as St. Alban‘s biography. He considered his twenty-five works of Scriptures commentary were his most important, while many scholars regard his Ecclesiastical History of the English people, as more significant.

He spent his last days teaching and singing. Realized that his end was near, he was engaged with his disciple on the translation of St. John’s Gospel into English. He continued dictating to the last chapter, on the floor of his cell, singing, “Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost”, and then he departed before Easter of 735. He was declared a Doctor of the Church in 1899.

From his writing:

“O Truly blessed mother Church, whom the glorious blood of the victorious martyrs adorns, whom the white garment of virginity clothes with an inviolate confession of praise, neither roses nor lilies are wanting to thy garments”. - BEDE THE VENERABLE

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Saint Bede the Venerable (around 673-735), Monk, Doctor of the Church
Homilies on the Gospels I, 21

“Follow me.”

“Jesus saw a man named Matthew at his post where taxes were collected. He said to him, ‘Follow me.’” He didn’t see him so much with the eyes of the body as with the interior gaze of his mercy… He saw the publican, and because he saw him with a gaze that has mercy and chooses, “he said to him: ‘Follow me,’” that is to say, imitate me. By asking him to follow him, he invited him less to walk behind him than to live as he did; “for the man who claims to abide in him (must) conduct himself just as he [Jesus] did.” (1 Jn 2:6)

Matthew got up and followed him. There is nothing surprising in the fact that, at the Lord’s first pressing call, the publican abandoned his search for earthly profits and disregarding temporal goods, adhered to him whom he saw to be without any riches. It is because the Lord, who called him from outside by his word, touched him at the most intimate depth of his soul by spreading there the light of spiritual grace. That light must have made Matthew understand that the one who was calling him to leave his temporal goods on earth was able to give him an incorruptible treasure in heaven.
 

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"`Now these are the things you must take: gold and silver and bronze, blue and purple and scarlet twice dyed and fine linen, goats' hair and rams' skins dyed red, blue skins and acacia wood, oil for preparing lamps, spices for ointment and for sweet-smelling incense...' (Ex. 25:3-6). We offer gold to Him when we shine brightly with the splendor of the true wisdom which is in right faith; silver when with our mouth we make confession unto salvation, bronze when we rejoice in spreading that same faith by public preaching; blue when we lift us our hearts; purple when we subject the body to suffering; scarlet twice dyed when we burn with a double love (that is, for 'God and neighbor); fine linen when we shine with chastity of the flesh; goats' hair when we put on the habit of penitence and lamentation; rams' skins dyed red when as leaders of the Lord's flock we see ourselves baptized in His blood; blue skins when we hope to be clothed after death with spiritual bodies in heaven; acacia wood when the thorn-thickets of sin have been cleared away and we serve the Lord alone, pure in body and in soul; oil for preparing lamps when we shine brightly with the fruits of charity and mercy; spices for ointment and sweet smelling incense when our reputation for good deeds spreads far and wide among the multitudes as an example of living well."
The Venerable Bede.

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"We are the people of God who, liberated from the yoke of Egyptian servitude, passed through the Red Sea, for when we were baptized by water we received forgiveness of the sins which were oppressing us. In the midst of the hardships of the present life, as though in the dryness of a desert, we await the entry promised to us into our heavenly fatherland. In this desert we are in danger of wasting away from spiritual thirst and hunger, if our Redeemer's gifts do not strengthen us, if the sacraments of His incarnation do not renew us. He Himself is the manna which refreshes us with heavenly nourishment so that we may not waste away in the journey of this world. He Himself is the rock Who, when struck by the wood of the cross, pours forth from His side the drink which is life for us. Hence He says in the gospel, 'I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will not thirst.'"
The Venerable Bede.

 

 




 

 

 

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