The most important day in the Christian Church year, Easter Sunday, the day that fulfilled God's Promise that His Son would rise again from death. But God, His Son and the Holy Spirit are the Trinity that is so much a part of the Christian Church. It is the Miracle around which the Disciples of Christ elevated to Apostles found the will and strength to create the Christian Church which has existed through more than 2000 years of Homo sapiens existence. When one goes to St Paul Outside the Wall in Rome and gazes upon the pictures of the Popes that are all around the walls on the inside, one gets this sense of continuity although there were times when the Church was fractured but always came back together and stronger. Although the Anglican Church (Church of England) was long ago excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church, yet they continue in dialogue even to this day. Will they ever be one again? I have no idea really but the roots of the Church of England lie in the Celtic Christian Church first noted in the historical records at the Council of Arles in 314 with three British Bishops attending. The council called by Constantine following the Edict of Milan (313) when Christianity became a legal religion. Earlier information on the Christian Celtic Churches in the British Isles is mostly folklore handed down by word of mouth generation after generation. My grandfather greatly believed that Joseph of Arimathea brought Christianity to England not long after the Resurrection of Our Lord and when we were at Glastonbury the stories that my grandfather told to me were once again brought to my attention and I was amazed at how the story that I had learned as a child was once again in pretty much the same words learned by me at that visit. The art of passing information through families in those ancient times and even up into the latter part of the 1800s was very efficient.
Although the Anglican Church was long ago excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church, the Pope remains in my mind and heart the head of the Christian Church on Earth. What God has wrought can not be put asunder - the Pope, to my mind, will always be the head of the Christian Church on Earth.
It was in the Tomb that Joseph of Arimathea had built for himself that Jesus was buried. Joseph was a wealthy Jew who regularly visited Cornwall to purchase tin. It is said that Joseph (said to be the uncle of Mary the mother of Jesus Christ) brought Christianity to Britain having been sent there by St Philip (Apostle and Disciples of Jesus Christ). He was also said to have brought the Holy Grail to England and hid it in a well at Glastonbury (the Chalice Well). All of this I learned as a child and as we wandered about on our tour the feeling of being on Holy Ground was very much in my mind to be honest. This trip, like my pilgrimage to Rome in 2001, was a fulfillment of a childhood desire to go and be there including my grandfather's home town of Upper Clatford which I also went to as well as the Church of All Saints also in Upper Clatford. Standing beside the font felt like a trip home to where my grandfather was baptized.
Once I had done all of these things and the first two trips I made to Europe concluded that dream I must admit to losing the desire to continue going back but my husband found his wings across the ocean on that first trip to England with me and from then on it was he who led the way for all those trips later. Interesting really in retrospect.
Church a little later and a few things to do first. Prayers for the World as always; may peace come to our world. Prayers for Artemis II as they continue their path to the moon.
No comments:
Post a Comment