December 4, 2022 - "St. Bede the Venerable"

Today we continue our series on the Doctors of the Church.  Today we are looking at St. Bede the Venerable (672? -735), who was named a Doctor of the Church by Pope Leo XIII in 1899.
 
The collapse of the Roman Empire in the West had exposed Britain to invasion by various Germanic tribes from the continent.  For over two hundred years before the birth of Bede, conflict between the invaders and the native Briton as well as subsequent conflicts among the various Germanic kingdoms rocked the island.  The conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity, which was brought about both from the north by Celtic missionaries and from the south by bishops and monks sent from Rome had done little to change their bellicose nature in any notable fashion.  Even so, monasticism flourished in those troubled times.  The monks served as agents of evangelization and monasteries served as centers of culture.
 
It was into this environment that Bede was born and in which he lived from childhood.  Bede was sent to be a student of Benedict Biscop, a nobleman who had founded an abbey at Wearmouth in 672.  As a young student Bede was sent along with a group under the care of Coelfrith to start a second foundation at Jarrow in 684.  Bede always maintained a great loyalty to his monastic teachers. He thrived in the monastery, being ordained a deacon in 692 and a priest sometime after 700.  Bede describes his life in the monastery in these terms: “From the time I became a priest until the fifty-ninth year of my life I have made it my business, for my own benefit and that of my brothers, to make brief extracts from the works of the venerable fathers on the holy scriptures, or to add notes of my own to clarify their sense and interpretation.”
 
A very pressing need in the disturbed centuries after the collapse of the Roman Empire in the West was the necessity of preserving the wisdom of the past, especially the theological sciences.  Bede’s name stands out as a monk who handed on the heritage of the fathers to later generations so that this heritage could flower when times became more stable.  The writings of Bede fall into three categories: scientific and educational works; historical works; and biblical works.  We also have poems, homilies, letters, and writings on the saints written by Bede.  In order to be able to read the bible and the fathers, monks at the time of Bede cultivated the several liberal arts and the textbooks necessary for learning them.  Monks also needed to know how to calculate time so that they could determine the proper date for Easter each year.  Bede contributed noteworthy books in support of all these efforts.
 
Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People is regarded by many as being a work of decisive importance in both the art and science of writing history.  It also helped to prepare Western Christianity to assimilate the non-Roman north.  Bede recognized the opening of a new day in the life of the church even as it was occurring.
 
Although Bede was eagerly sought by kings and other nobles, even Pope Sergius, Bede managed to remain in his own monastery until his death.  The only time that he left was when he was to teach for a few months at the school of the archbishop of York.
 
Bede died praying his favorite prayer: “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.  As it was in the beginning, so now, and forever.”
 
C. Plummer, an editor of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History wrote this assessment of Bede, which will provide an appropriate ending for this column: “We have not, it seems to me, amid all our discoveries, invented as yet anything better than the Christian life which Bede lived, and the Christian death which he died.”
Until next week,
Fr. John