Patrick: “An Epistle of Christ Written on Your Hearts with the Spirit of the Living God” Monday, Mar 17 2014

I am presuming to try to grasp in my old age what I did not gain in my youth because my sins prevented me from making what I had read my own.

[…] I am unable to explain as the spirit is eager to do and as the soul and the mind indicate. But, had it been given to me as to others, in gratitude I should not have kept silent.

And if it should appear that I put myself before others, with my ignorance and my slower speech, in truth, it is written: ‘The tongue of the stammerers shall speak rapidly and distinctly.’

How much harder must we try to attain it, we of whom it is said: ‘You are an epistle of Christ in greeting to the ends of the earth…written on your hearts, not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God.’

And again, the Spirit witnessed that the rustic life was created by the Most High. I am, then, first of all, countryfied, an exile, evidently unlearned, one who is not able to see into the future, but I know for certain, that before I was humbled I was like a stone lying in deep mire, and he that is mighty came and in his mercy raised me up and, indeed, lifted me high up and placed me on top of the wall.

And from there I ought to shout out in gratitude to the Lord for his great favours in this world and forever, that the mind of man cannot measure.

Therefore be amazed, you great and small who fear God, and you men of God, eloquent speakers, listen and contemplate. Who was it summoned me, a fool, from the midst of those who appear wise and learned in the law and powerful in rhetoric and in all things?

Me, truly wretched in this world, he inspired before others that I could be–if I would–such a one who, with fear and reverence, and faithfully, without complaint, would come to the people to whom the love of Christ brought me and gave me in my lifetime, if I should be worthy, to serve them truly and with humility.

According, therefore, to the measure of one’s faith in the Trinity, one should proceed without holding back from danger to make known the gift of God and everlasting consolation, to spread God’s name everywhere with confidence and without fear, in order to leave behind, after my death, foundations for my brethren and sons whom I baptized in the Lord in so many thousands.

Patrick (387?-493?): The Confession of St Patrick, 10-14.

One Response »

 

Patrick: Confessing the Wonders of God Before Every Nation Friday, Jul 12 2013

I, Patrick, a sinner, a most simple countryman…had for father the deacon Calpurnius…. He had a small villa nearby where I was taken captive. I was at that time about sixteen years of age.

I did not, indeed, know the true God; and I was taken into captivity in Ireland with many thousands of people, according to our deserts, for quite drawn away from God, we did not keep his precepts, nor were we obedient to our priests who used to remind us of our salvation.

And the Lord brought down on us the fury of his being and scattered us among many nations, even to the ends of the earth, where I, in my smallness, am now to be found among foreigners.

And there the Lord opened my mind to an awareness of my unbelief, in order that, even so late, I might remember my transgressions and turn with all my heart to the Lord my God, who had regard for my insignificance and pitied my youth and ignorance.

And he watched over me before I knew him, and before I learned sense or even distinguished between good and evil, and he protected me, and consoled me as a father would his son.

Therefore, indeed, I cannot keep silent, nor would it be proper, so many favours and graces has the Lord deigned to bestow on me in the land of my captivity.

For after chastisement from God, and recognizing him, our way to repay him is to exalt him and confess his wonders before every nation under heaven.

For there is no other God, nor ever was before, nor shall be hereafter, but God the Father, unbegotten and without beginning, in whom all things began, whose are all things, as we have been taught;

and his son Jesus Christ, who manifestly always existed with the Father, before the beginning of time in the Spirit with the Father, indescribably begotten before all things, and all things visible and invisible were made by him.

He was made man, conquered death and was received into Heaven, to the Father who gave him all power over every name in Heaven and on Earth and in Hell, so that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord and God, in whom we believe.

And we look to his imminent coming again, the judge of the living and the dead, who will render to each according to his deeds.

And he poured out his Holy Spirit on us in abundance, the gift and pledge of immortality, which makes the believers and the obedient into sons of God and co-heirs of Christ who is revealed, and we worship one God in the Trinity of holy name.

Patrick (387?-493?): The Confession of St Patrick, 1-4 @ Fr Luke Dysinger OSB.

Leave a Response »