Wisdom of Saints: St Cedd

The Feast of Cedd, Missionary, Bishop of the East Saxons, 664

O GOD, our heavenly Father, who by thy Son Jesus Christ didst call thy blessed Apostles and send them forth to preach thy Gospel of salvation unto all the nations: We bless thy holy Name for thy servant Cedd, whose labours we commemorate this day, and we pray thee, according to thy holy Word, to send forth many labourers into thy harvest; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

St Cedd is another British saint for whom little is known apart from what was recorded by St Bede in his Ecclesiastical History. He was born around 620 and died in 664. He was born into the northern kingdom of Northumbria to a noble family, the eldest of four brothers of whom one was St Chad of Litchfield, and the other two who also became priests. They were all chosen by King Oswald to become a priest and monastic to evangelize the area, and was sent to be educated in Lindisfarne at the priory there under the instruction of St Aidan who was then the bishop of Lindisfarne.

He was ordained a priest in 653 and shortly after began missionary work. The pagan East Anglian king Peada converted to Christianity in exchange for the hand of the daughter of the King of Northumbria in marriage. St Cedd was asked to travel to the kingdom to instruct the king in the Christian faith and to convert the people. He had significant success over the next year, and eventually returned to Lindisfarne.

In 654, owing to his success in converting the people of East Anglia, he was sent to Essex, where again the King of Northumbria’s political actions had opened the door for Christian missionaries. St Cedd was sent by the bishop of Lindisfarne to convert the people there. He began his mission and established two monasteries and several churches there, and upon returning to Lindisfarne again later that year was consecrated Bishop of Essex. As Bede records:

Cedd, having received the episcopal dignity, returned to his province, and pursuing the work he had begun with more ample authority, built churches in divers places, and ordained priests and deacons to assist him in the Word of faith, and the ministry of Baptism, especially in the city which, in the language of the Saxons, is called Ythancaestir, as also in that which is named Tilaburg. The first of these places is on the bank of the Pant, the other on the bank of the Thames. In these, gathering a flock of Christ’s servants, he taught them to observe the discipline of a rule of life, as far as those rude people were then capable of receiving it.

He returned south with newfound episcopal authority, ordaining deacons and priests and continuing to raise up many monks in his two monasteries. He re-established St Paul’s, London as his Cathedral, becoming only the second Bishop of London since the first, Mellitus, had been expelled from London by the East Saxon pagans in 616 shortly after establishing St Paul’s, after he himself had arrived in England with St Augustine of Canterbury in 598.

While St Cedd continued his work in the south, he made frequent return visits to the north. On one of these in 658, he was introduced to King Aethelwald of Deira who had been instructed in the Christian faith by one of St Cedd’s other brothers who had also become a monk with him at Lindisdarne. Finding St Cedd to be a godly man, the King gifted him with land at Lastingham on which he asked St Cedd to build a royal monastery and mausoleum. St Cedd ultimately agreed, but demanded that no construction begin until the area had been cleansed by prayer and fasting. He undertook himself in Lent of 658 to fast forty days, and as St Bede records:

All which days, except Sundays, he prolonged his fast till the evening, according to custom, and then took no other sustenance than a small piece of bread, one hen’s egg, and a little milk and water. This, he said, was the custom of those of whom he had learned the rule of regular discipline, first to consecrate to the Lord, by prayer and fasting, the places which they had newly received for building a monastery or a church. When there were ten days of Lent still remaining, there came a messenger to call him to the king; and he, that the holy work might not be intermitted, on account of the king’s affairs, entreated his priest, Cynibill, who was also his own brother, to complete his pious undertaking. Cynibill readily consented, and when the duty of fasting and prayer was over, he there built the monastery, which is now called Laestingaeu, and established therein religious customs according to the use of Lindisfarne, where he had been trained.

St Cedd spent much of the rest of his life living at his monastery in Lastingham, administering his see from there. He is noted to have served at the Synod at Whiby in 664, under the Abbess Hilda, and supported the Synod’s decision to adopt Romanizing customs for the Catholic Church in the Realm of England in an effort to unify the various kingdoms. Shortly after the synod, a plague broke out in England, and St Cedd died. He was buried at Lastingham.

St Cedd led a life destined for holiness. He was educated from an early age under the pious St Aidan of Lindisfarne and dedicated his life to the transmission of knowledge of God to others. He is commemorated as the evangelist of the Middle Angles and East Saxons, and played a critical role in the spread of the Christian faith throughout many of the English kingdoms, and provided a lasting example through his monastic devotion for generations to come.

Wisdom of Saints: St Mary Magdalene

The Feast of Mary Magdalene

ALMIGHTY God, whose blessed Son did sanctify Mary Magdalene, and call her to be a witness to his resurrection: Mercifully grant that by thy grace we may be healed of all our infirmities, and always serve thee in the power of his endless life; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, world without end. Amen.

Saint Mary Magdalene, the apostle to the Apostles, is one of the most famous people of the Scriptures and certainly the most famous woman next to the Blessed Theotokos herself. She is also significantly misunderstood and at the same time a wonderful example of saintly virtue to be followed.

There is extremely little biographical information on St Mary Magdalene, despite the fact that she played an important role in the Scriptures as a disciple of Christ. Because of the numerous persons named Mary in the Scriptures, and also unnamed women, there is some level of conjecture as to which passages actually refer to Mary.

Most clearly, however, St Mark’s Gospel identifies that Christ had cast seven demons out of her, and after which she had become a disciple of Christ, one of a number of women who had followed him and his Apostles during their missionary journeys and supported them. This includes standing at the cross with the other women during Christ’s crucifixion, seeking to attend to his body after his death and also being present with the Apostles in the upper room after the resurrection.

There is an association with St Mary Magdalene also having been a sinner, often even the sinner referred to in St Luke’s Gospel (Lk 7. 37), though a possible explanation for this seems to be the fact that Magdalena, the place of St Mary’s birth, had a reputation for evil among Jews. It is likely for similar reasons that St Mary is variously viewed or described as an adulteress or prostitute.

In more recent years, popular rumours have sought to suggest St Mary Magdalene was the wife of Jesus, however while the speculation that St Mary was a prostitute or adulteress may still be supported through some valid inferences based on the Scriptures, there is absolutely no evidence in the Scriptures that Jesus was married to anyone during his earthly life, and indeed the documents used in recent years to popularize this rumour have all been shown to have been false or improperly translated.

Yet it is sometimes this mystique of St Mary Magdalene as having not only been held in bondage by seven demons but also having been living in a sinful life that enhances the hope found in her. She goes from being bound by seven demons, potentially also living a life of sin, to being one of the chief disciples of Christ, and witness to his ministry. She was present at his crucifixion and was witness to his resurrection.

It is from the latter that she earns her title “apostle to the Apostles.” This in and of itself is often misunderstood. St Mary Madgalene, though an important disciple of Christ, was not one of the twelve. The title “apostle to the Apostles” becomes clearer when it is understood that apostle simply means “messenger” she was the messenger of the resurrection to the Apostles who were those commissioned by Christ to proclaim his gospel and bear witness to his ministry.

Her life and ministry is a testament to the power of Christ’s redemption and reconciliation. She went from being bound by demons to serving at the feet of Christ and bearing witness to his resurrection, just as we are all able to go from being bound in sin to serving Christ and bearing witness to the power of his resurrection in others.

Just as there is little biographical evidence of her origins, there is little in the way of evidence of what happened to St Mary Magdalen after the end of her Biblical accounts. Some evidence suggests she retired to Ephesus where she lived out her life, though there is no real strong evidence in favour of this understanding. Neither is it particularly important to her witness to the power of Christ, instead emphasizing only those parts of her life in which she was redeemed and called by Christ.

St Mary Magdalen is an important witness to the power of forgiveness and redemption and models the life all Christians aspire to, responding to our Baptism in Christ through faithful discipleship.