Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity - Athanasius

Holy Trinity

Peter Paul Rubens 

Trinity Sunday

Fr. Hugh attended the Deanery Seminar on the new Roman Missal. The Introductory Rites texts are trimmed fastidiously. (Quote: I was uneasy to think myself too fastidious, whilst I fancied dr. johnson quite satisfied).

However, we are powerfully reminded of the Mass greetings to the Eucharist.

This Reading powerfully reminds  us of the familiar (so far) greeting by the words of Athanasius and of St. Paul;

“The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
 and the love of God
and the fellowship communion of the Holy Spirit
be with you”.

and carries the correction happily.

Night Office.

First Reading

From the first letter of Paul to the Corinthians (2:1-16)

Responsory  See Ephesians 1:17-18; 1 Corinthians 2:12

 May the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, give us a spirit of wisdom to penetrate his revelation

and bring us to full knowledge of him.

- May he enlighten the eyes of our minds to see the great hope of our calling,

the wealth of glory he has laid up for the saints.

We have not received the spirit of this world. but the Spirit who comes from God

- May he enlighten ...

Second Reading:

From the first letter to Serapion by Saint Athanasius (Ep. 1,28-30: PG 26,594-595.599)

The first letter to Serapion is one of four written in 359 or early 360. In the Arian controversy the question of the divinity of the Holy Spirit was intimately connected with that of the divinity of the Son Athanasius shows that the life given by the Holy Spirit is in fact the work of each of the three Persons and that it is a share in the divine life of the Holy Trinity.

It will not be out of place to consider the ancient tradition, teaching, and faith of the Catholic Church, which was revealed by the Lord. proclaimed by the apostles, and guarded by the fathers. For upon this faith the Church is built. and if anyone were to lapse from it. that person would no longer be a Christian either in fact or in name.

We acknowledge the Trinity, holy and perfect, to consist of the Father, the Son. and the Holy Spirit In this Trinity there is no instrusion of any alien element or of anything from outside, nor is the Trinity a blend of creative and created being. It is a wholly creative and energizing reality, self-consistent and undivided in its active power, for the Father makes all things through the Word and in the Holy Spirit. and in this way the unity of the Holy Trinity is preserved. Accordingly in the Church one God is preached, one God who is above all things and through all things and in all things. God is above all things as Father, for he is principle and source; he is through all things through the Word; and he is in all things in the Holy Spirit

Writing to the Corinthians about spiritual matters, Paul traces all reality back to one God, the Father, saying: Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of working, but it is the same God who inspires them all in everyone.

Even the gifts that the Spirit dispenses to individuals are given by the Father through the Word. For all that belongs to the Father belongs also to the Son, and so the graces given by the Son in the Spirit are true gifts of the Father. Similarly, when the Spirit dwells in us, the Word who bestows the Spirit is in us too, and the Father is present in the Word. This is the meaning of the text: My Father and I will come to him and make our home with him. For where the light is, there also is the radiance; and where the radiance is, there too are its power and its resplendent grace.

This is also Paul's teaching in his Second Letter to the Corinthians: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. For grace and the gift of the Trinity are given by the Father through the Son in the Holy Spirit. Just as grace is given from the Father through the Son so there could be no communication of the gift to us except in the Holy Spirit. But when we share in the Spirit, we possess the love of the Father, the grace of the Son, and the fellowship of the Spirit himself.

Monastic Lectionary

Responsory

Let us adore the Father, and the Son. and the Holy Spirit; - let us praise and exalt God above all for ever.

Blessed be God in the firmament of heaven;

all praise, all glory to him for ever.

- Let us praise and exalt God above all for ever. 

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Alternative Reading         

From a poem by Saint Gregory Nazianzen
(1,1-4.21-34; 2, 1.2.60-64.7s-84: 3, 1-9.42-45.51: PC 37, 397-411)

Gregory's poems were written at the end of his life, during his retirement at Arianzum. The defense of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity was one of his life­long preoccupations. In this reading he gives a summary of his thought and teaching on the subject.

To speak of the Godhead is, I know, like crossing the ocean on a raft, or like flying to the stars with wings of narrow span. Even heavenly beings are unable to speak of God's decrees or of his government of the world. But enlighten my mind and loosen my tongue, Spirit of God, and I will sound aloud the trumpet of truth. so that all who are united to God may rejoice with their whole heart.  

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity - Benedict XVI

Community Chapter  Sermon. Saturday 18 June 2011

Each year, 1000s of the faithful appear to see and hear the Holy Father at the Sunday Holy Trinity ANGELUS address by the Pope St Peter's Square, Vatican.

The brief message is distinct by his distillation of theology of the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity.

Talking to the 1000s attending, Benedict, the theologian, is not taking prisoners. The sacred spectacle of the ANGELUS, greeting, address and prayer, in the Piazza, envelopes the special experience. Later, words will be remembered and follow deeper in the thought and insights of Benedict..

Thorters Reservoir, Castle Moffat, Nunraw

  http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/angelus/2009/documents/hf_ben-xvi_ang_20090607_en.html 

BENEDICT XVI

ANGELUS

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity
Saint Peter's Square
Sunday, 7 June 2009

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

• After the Easter Season which culminated in the Feast of Pentecost, the liturgy provides for these three Solemnities of the Lord: today, Trinity Sunday; next Thursday, Corpus Christi which in many countries, including Italy, will be celebrated next Sunday; and finally, on the following Friday, the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Each one of these liturgical events highlights a perspective by which the whole mystery of the Christian faith is embraced: and that is, respectively the reality of the Triune God, the Sacrament of the Eucharist and the divine and human centre of the Person of Christ. These are truly aspects of the one mystery of salvation which, in a certain sense, sum up the whole itinerary of the revelation of Jesus, from his Incarnation to his death and Resurrection and, finally, to his Ascension and the gift of the Holy Spirit.
  
• Today we contemplate the Most Holy Trinity as Jesus introduced us to it. He revealed to us that God is love "not in the oneness of a single Person, but in the Trinity of one substance" (Preface). He is the Creator and merciful Father; he is the Only-Begotten Son, eternal Wisdom incarnate, who died and rose for us; he is the Holy Spirit who moves all things, cosmos and history, toward their final, full recapitulation. Three Persons who are one God because the Father is love, the Son is love, the Spirit is love. God is wholly and only love, the purest, infinite and eternal love. He does not live in splendid solitude but rather is an inexhaustible source of life that is ceaselessly given and communicated. To a certain extent we can perceive this by observing both the macro-universe: our earth, the planets, the stars, the galaxies; and the micro-universe: cells, atoms, elementary particles.  
  
• The "name" of the Blessed Trinity is, in a certain sense, imprinted upon all things because all that exists, down to the last particle, is in relation; in this way we catch a glimpse of God as relationship and ultimately, Creator Love. All things derive from love, aspire to love and move impelled by love, though naturally with varying degrees of awareness and freedom. "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!" (Ps 8: 1) the Psalmist exclaims. In speaking of the "name", the Bible refers to God himself, his truest identity. It is an identity that shines upon the whole of Creation, in which all beings for the very fact that they exist and because of the "fabric" of which they are made point to a transcendent Principle, to eternal and infinite Life which is given, in a word, to Love. "In him we live and move and have our being", St Paul said at the Areopagus of Athens (Acts 17: 28). The strongest proof that we are made in the image of the Trinity is this: love alone makes us happy because we live in a relationship, and we live to love and to be loved. Borrowing an analogy from biology, we could say that imprinted upon his "genome", the human being bears a profound mark of the Trinity, of God as Love.
  
• The Virgin Mary, in her docile humility, became the handmaid of divine Love: she accepted the Father's will and conceived the Son by the power of the Holy Spirit. The Almighty built n her a temple worthy of him and made her the model and image of the Church, mystery and house of communion for all human beings. May Mary, mirror of the Blessed Trinity, help us to grow in faith in the Trinitarian mystery.

---

Father Son & Holy Spirit

Letter of Blessed Joseph-Marie Cassant to his parents

Joseph Cassant ocso

Thursday, June 17, 2011 Memorial
Blessed Joseph-Marie Cassant ocso
Fr. Hugh introduced the Mass. 

Fr. Hugh He commented on the long period of Cistercians not being canonised. Most recently four Beatifications took place. Three of them were young, in their twenties. They had in common that they suffered illness of tuberculosis.
They are distinguished by holiness in the two marks of youth and illness.
See:
http://www.ocso.org/index.

Bienheureux Cyprien Michaël Iwene Tansi ( 3 Files )Bienheureuse Maria Gabriella Sagheddu ( 3 Files )S. Raphaël Arnáiz Barón ( 3 Files )Bienheureux Marie-Joseph Cassant ( 3 Files )

  

Letter of Blessed Joseph-Marie Cassant to his parents

23 December 1902 / 24 May 1903).

Everything for the Heart of Jesus!

My dear Parents,

Christmas is here, like dawn of the new year; let us not let it pass without examining our thoughts. First, it must be said that this year has been a year of graces for the whole family: on 22 February the diaconate opened the door to the priesthood and on 12 October we saw the fulfillment of all our longings.We would be most ungrateful if we didn't see in all this the special protection of the Heart of Jesus.

For such a long time we hoped against hope to be able to have the whole family together after my ordination so as to share the joy of being present and receiving communion together at my first Mass. The good Lord heard our deepest wishes. It now remains to us to thank him and to enter more and more deeply into the greatness of the priesthood. Let us never dare to equate the Sacrifice of the Mass with earthly things.

So I wish you all a good, happy and holy New Year, in every way. No more worries! You all know that I am a priest now and will never forget you.

Let us be resolved to take advantage of the time given us in this life, which can be compared to water which flows away, to a puff of smoke which the smallest breath scatters, or to a flash of lightning which splits the clouds and then vanishes. Nevertheless, this brief time on earth must be well spent. To this purpose, we must do all out of love, being one with the Heart of Jesus, and rejecting any useless worries.

The best thing I can hope for is that you ever abide as one in the Heart of Jesus. Thank you for your letter, written by your very heart!

I have just received the beautiful photos, and I thank you. They will make a fine family memento. May the Heart of Jesus be praised in all this. I want you always to revere this Heart, which is enshrined in your house. Let us be one in the Heart of Jesus as we beg his protection.

As for my health, it is always problematic. I am very well cared for. I am not going to any of the community exercises, but still, with the heat, my breathing is somewhat difficult. I also have a cold which is making me cough. All for the Heart of Jesus!

I end with the wish that we always be one in the Heart of Jesus, on earth as in Heaven. 

Desert Abbey Cross

Website

abbayedudesert.com

St. Lutgarde Mass & Nignt Office Reading from Preface of Merton

(NAB) For I am jealous of you with the jealousy of God, since I betrothed you to one husband to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. (2Co 11:2).

----- Forwarded Message ----
From: Nivard …. 
Sent: Thu, 16 June, 2011 11:40:17
Subject: Lutgarde Addenda

St Lutgarde, 11^th wk.  The ‘Our Father’.

Paul says in the First Reading, ‘I betrothed you to one husband to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.’ This fits in well as we commemorate the Virgin, Lutgarde. The story of Lutgarde, with her exchange of hearts with Jesus, underlines the message of today’s Gospel. The message is that God wants to have an intimate relationship with each and every human being.

It is through the gift of the Holy Spirit that we can know God personally and call God “Abba, Father”, “Daddy, my daddy”, (Romans 8:15). We can approach God our Father with confidence and boldness because Jesus Christ has opened the way to heaven for us through his death and resurrection. When we ask God for help, he fortunately does not give us what we deserve. Instead, he responds with grace and favour and mercy. He loves generously and forgives mercifully. When he gives, he gives more than we need, so we will have something to share with others in their need. St. Lutgard loved the Father especially for his gift to us of the Sacred Heart of his divine Son.

St Lutgarde - 16 June

St Lutgarde was born in 1182 in the Flemish town of Tongres. She joined the community of nuns who educated her but later transferred to the monastery of Cistercian nuns at Aywieres. near Brussels. She was afflicted  with total blindness for the last eleven years of her life. She died in 1246.

The following Reading is taken from a book by Thomas Merton

• Some four hundred years before St Margaret Mary Labcured , prayed and suffered for the institution of the feast of the Sacred Heart, St Lutgarde had .entered upon the mystical life with a vision of the pierced side of the Saviour. But there are other facts besides which make Lutgarde of interest to the theologian, the Church historian, and to the general Christian. She was a contemporary of St Francis of Assisi, the first recorded stigmatic, and she too received a mystical wound in her heart which historians have not hesitated to class as a stigma. The life of St Lutgarde introduces us to a mysticism that is definitely extraordinary, yet her mysticism springs from the purest Benedictine sources. Lutgarde's mystical contemplation, like that of St Gertrude and St Mechtilde, is nourished almost entirely by the liturgy. Above all it centres upon the sacrifice of Calvary and upon the Mass which continues that sacrifice among us every day.
  
• The charm of St Lutgarde is heightened by a certain earthly simplicity which has been preserved for us unspoiled in the pages of her medieval biography. She was a great penitent but she was anything but a fragile wraith of a person. Lutgarde, for all her ardent and ethereal mysticism, remained always a living human being of flesh and bone. As a young girl she seems to have been particularly attractive; no doubt we could see some resemblance of her beauty in the well-proportioned Flemish faces which we find in the great paintings of her countrymen in later ages.  
  
• The love of God, penance and reparation, intercession for mankind, were very much present in Lutgarde's life. But it cannot be too much stressed that in St Lutgarde, as in all the early Cistercians, the love that embraces penance and hardship for the sake of Christ is never merely negative, never descends to mere rigid formalism, never concentrates on mere exterior observance of fasts and other penitential rigours.
• The fire of love that consumed the heart of Lutgarde was something vital and positive, and its flames burned not only to destroy but to rejuvenate and transform.

(What are these Wounds? (Clonmore and Reynolds) 1948, pp. IX, X, XII.)

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Vultus Christi 

http://vultus.stblogs.org/2010/06/draw-me-to-thy-pierced-side-1.html

Draw Me to Thy Piercèd Side

By Father Mark    on June 16, 2010 

The feast of Saint Lutgarde, a Cistercian, and one of the first mystics of the Sacred Heart, occurs on June 16th. Some years ago I was given a piece of her wooden choirstall: one of my most treasured relics ...

Community Monthly Memorial of the Dead

Office of the Dead

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Month Memorial.

Fr. T. introduced the Mass for the Memorial of the recent deceased brethren, relatives and benefactors.

Night Office Reading from
Thomas Merton
Fr. Louis Speaks to us about
SILENCE, Poverty and Death

• IF, at the moment of our death, death comes to us as an unwelcome stranger, it will be because Christ also has always been to us an unwelcome stranger. For when death comes, Christ comes also, bringing us the everlasting life which He has bought for us by His own death. Those who love true life, 'therefore, frequently think about their death. Their life is full of a silence that is an anticipated victory over death. Silence, indeed, makes death our servant and even our friend. Thoughts and prayers that grow up out of the silent thought of death are like trees growing where there is water. They are strong thoughts that overcome the fear of misfortune because they have overcome passion and desire. They turn the face of our soul, in constant desire,' toward the face of Christ
• A whole lifetime of silence is ordered to a final utterance; by this I do not mean that we must all contrive to die with pious speeches on our lips. It is not necessary that our fast words should have some· special or dramatic significance worthy of being written down. Every good faith, every death that hands us over from the uncertainties of this world to the unfailing peace and silence of the love of Christ, is itself an utterance and a conclusion. It says, either in words or without them, that it Is good for life to come to its appointed end, for the body to return to dust and for the spirit to ascend to the Father, through the mercy of Our Lord Jesus Christ
• A silent death may speak with more eloquent peace than a death punctuated by vivid expressions. A lonely death, a tragic death, may yet have more to say of the peace and mercy of Christ than many another comfortable death.
• For the eloquence of death is the eloquence of human poverty coming face to face with the riches of divine mercy. The more we are aware that our poverty is supremely grea.t, the greater will be the meaning of our death: and the greater its poverty. For the saints are those who wanted to be poorest in life, and who, above all else, exulted in the supreme poverty of death

Solemnity Pentecost 2011 Chapter Sermon

----- Forwarded Message ----
From: Nivard
Sent: Sun, 12 June, 2011 15:06:13
Subject: Pentecost 2011

Three insights of St Augustine re. working of the Holy Spirit.

Pope Benedict XVI in Sydney, World Youth Day, 2008

Pentecost 2011 Chapter Sermon

 

The Holy Spirit "has been in some ways the neglected person of the Blessed Trinity. A clear understanding of the Spirit almost seems beyond our reach."

Benedict XVI recalled that as a young boy he learned of the Holy Spirit, but never quite understood the third person of the Trinity until he was a priest and began to study St. Augustine's writings.

Augustine had "three particular insights about the Holy Spirit as the bond of unity within the blessed Trinity: unity as communion, unity as abiding love, and unity as giving and gift."

These three insights are not just theoretical. They help explain how the Spirit works.

"In a world where both individuals and communities often suffer from an absence of unity or cohesion, these insights help us remain attuned to the Spirit and to extend and clarify the scope of our witness."

Unity:  Augustine's first insight came from reflecting on the words "Holy" and "Spirit," which "refer to what is divine about God, what is shared by the Father and the Son -- their communion."

"So, if the distinguishing characteristic of the Holy Spirit is to be what is shared by the Father and the Son, Augustine concluded that the Spirit’s particular quality is unity. It is a unity of lived communion: a unity of persons in a relationship of constant giving, the Father and the Son giving themselves to each other."

"We begin to glimpse, how illuminating is this understanding of the Holy Spirit as unity, as communion. True unity could never be founded upon relationships which deny the equal dignity of other persons.

"In fact, only in the life of communion is unity sustained and human identity fulfilled: We recognize the common need for God, we respond to the unifying presence of the Holy Spirit, and we give ourselves to one another in service."

Love: Augustine’s second insight was "the Holy Spirit as abiding love."

 John says "God is love." Augustine suggests that while these words refer to the Trinity as a whole, they express a particular characteristic of the Holy Spirit.

"The Holy Spirit makes us remain in God and God in us; yet it is love that effects this. The Spirit therefore is God as love!"

Love is the sign of the presence of the Holy Spirit! Ideas or voices which lack love -- even if they seem sophisticated or knowledgeable -- cannot be 'of the Spirit.'

"Furthermore, love has a particular trait: Far from being indulgent or fickle, it has a task or purpose to fulfil: to abide. By its nature love is enduring."

"Again, we catch a further glimpse of how much the Holy Spirit offers our world: love which dispels uncertainty; love which overcomes the fear of betrayal; love which carries eternity within; the true love which draws us into a unity that abides!"

Gift:  Augustine's third insight -- the Holy Spirit as gift -- was derived from the Gospel account of Christ’s conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well.

Here Jesus reveals himself as the giver of the living water, which later is explained as the Holy Spirit.

"The Spirit is 'God’s gift' -- the internal spring, which truly satisfies our deepest thirst and leads us to the Father."

"Augustine concludes that God sharing himself with us as gift is the Holy Spirit."

Again we catch a glimpse of the Trinity at work: the Holy Spirit is God eternally giving himself; like a never-ending spring he pours forth nothing less than himself.

"In view of this ceaseless gift, we come to see the limitations of all that perishes, the folly of the consumerist mindset. We begin to understand why the quest for novelty leaves us unsatisfied and wanting.

"Are we not looking for an eternal gift? The spring that will never run dry? With the Samaritan woman, let us exclaim: give me this water that I may thirst no more!"

"We have seen that it is the Holy Spirit who brings about the wonderful communion of believers in Jesus Christ. True to his nature as giver and gift alike, he is even now working through us. Inspired by the insights of St. Augustine: Let unifying love be our measure; abiding love our challenge; self-giving love our mission!"

Reality:  "There are times [...] when we might be tempted to seek a certain fulfilment apart from God," and asked the question Christ himself asked of the Twelve Apostles: "Do you also wish to go away?"

"Such drifting away perhaps offers the illusion of freedom. But where does it lead? To whom would we go? For in our hearts we know that it is the Lord who has 'the words of eternal life.'" "To turn away from him is only a futile attempt to escape from ourselves."

"God is with us in the reality of life, not the fantasy. It is embrace, not escape, that we seek! So the Holy Spirit gently but surely steers us back to what is real, what is lasting, what is true. It is the Spirit who leads us back into the communion of the Blessed Trinity!"

 

St Barnabas Apostle 11th June

Act 13:1 In the church at Antioch the following were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen, who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul.

  

San Barnabas Altarpiece - detail (Madonna Enthroned with Saints)
Saint Barnabas with the Virgin and Child
Sandro Botticelli 1490
Tempera on wood, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Mass Intro:
Saint Barnabas, Apostle, is Memorial. I am surprised it is not a Feast.
Benedict XVI gives us two interesting points.
One, that Barnabas was the leader of the Apostle's First Missionary Journey.
Second, that it is not improbable that Barnabas wrote the Letter of Hebrews.
Both tell us, and so much from the NT, how large the stature of Barnabas among the Apostles.

His name is included in the Roman Canon (Eucharistic Prayer I).

• The Church of Antioch sent Barnabas on a mission with Paul, which became known as the Apostle's first missionary journey. In fact, it was Barnabas' missionary voyage since it was he who was really in charge of it and Paul had joined him as a collaborator, visiting the regions of Cyprus and Central and Southern Anatolia in present-day Turkey, with the cities of Attalia, Perga, Antioch of Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe (cf. Acts 13-14). 
   
• Tertullian attributes to him the Letter to the Hebrews. This is not improbable. Since he belonged to the tribe of Levi, Barnabas may have been interested in the topic of the priesthood; and the Letter to the Hebrews interprets Jesus' priesthood for us in an extraordinary way.

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2007/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20070131_en.html  

St Barnabas - Apostle

 BENEDICT XVI audience 31 Jan 2007

GENERAL AUDIENCE

Wednesday, 31 January 2007

Barnabas, Silas (also called Silvanus), and Apollos

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Continuing our journey among the protagonists who were the first to spread Christianity, today let us turn our attention to some of St Paul's other collaborators. We must recognize that the Apostle is an eloquent example of a man open to collaboration: he did not want to do everything in the Church on his own but availed himself of many and very different colleagues.
We cannot reflect on all these precious assistants because they were numerous. It suffices to recall among the others, Epaphras (cf. Col 1: 7; 4: 12; Phlm 23); Epaphroditus (cf. Phil 2: 25; 4: 18), Tychicus (cf. Acts 20: 4; Eph 6: 21; Col 4: 7; II Tm 4: 12; Ti 3: 12), Urbanus (cf. Rm 16: 9), Gaius and Aristarchus (cf. Acts 19: 29; 20: 4; 27: 2; Col 4: 10). And women such as Phoebe, (Rom 16: 1), Tryphaena and Tryphosa (cf. Rom 16: 12), Persis, the mother of Rufus, whom Paul called "his mother and mine" (cf. Rom 16: 12-13), not to mention married couples such as Prisca and Aquila (cf. Rom 16: 3; I Cor 16: 19; II Tm 4: 19).
Among this great array of St Paul's male and female collaborators, let us focus today on three of these people who played a particularly significant role in the initial evangelization: Barnabas, Silas, and Apollos.
Barnabas means "son of encouragement" (Acts 4: 36) or "son of consolation". He was a Levite Jew, a native of Cyprus, and this was his nickname. Having settled in Jerusalem, he was one of the first to embrace Christianity after the Lord's Resurrection. With immense generosity, he sold a field which belonged to him, and gave the money to the Apostles for the Church's needs (Acts 4: 37).  
It was he who vouched for the sincerity of Saul's conversion before the Jerusalem community that still feared its former persecutor (cf. Acts 9: 27).
Sent to Antioch in Syria, he went to meet Paul in Tarsus, where he had withdrawn, and spent a whole year with him there, dedicated to the evangelization of that important city in whose Church Barnabas was known as a prophet and teacher (cf. Acts 13: 1).
At the time of the first conversions of the Gentiles, therefore, Barnabas realized that Saul's hour had come. As Paul had retired to his native town of Tarsus, he went there to look for him. Thus, at that important moment, Barnabas, as it were, restored Paul to the Church; in this sense he gave back to her the Apostle to the Gentiles.
The Church of Antioch sent Barnabas on a mission with Paul, which became known as the Apostle's first missionary journey. In fact, it was Barnabas' missionary voyage since it was he who was really in charge of it and Paul had joined him as a collaborator, visiting the regions of Cyprus and Central and Southern Anatolia in present-day Turkey, with the cities of Attalia, Perga, Antioch of Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe (cf. Acts 13-14).  

Maqam of Barnabas The Maqam of St Barnabas, Famagusta, North Cyprus The tomb of St Barnabas discovered by the Archbishop is still on site, a catacomb cut down into the rock consisting of two chambers. Walk into the modern mausoleum built over the top, and down the steps into the two small chambers, originally designed to hold six dead bodies apiece. The tomb of St Barnabas, North Cyprus is far older than Christianity itself, so like the nearby rock tombs of the Cellarga, the tomb was probably reused to house the remains of the saint. Nowadays, the faithful, from both North and south Cyprus leave offerings and candles here.

http://www.saddiqirose.com/landmarks.htm

Together with Paul, he then went to the so-called Council of Jerusalem where after a profound examination of the question, the Apostles with the Elders decided to discontinue the practice of circumcision so that it was no longer a feature of the Christian identity (cf. Acts 15: 1-35). 

St Columba 9 June 2011

See back to Blog, Post at Tuesday 9 June 2009  

http://nunraw.blogspot.com/2009/06/clare-melinsky-artist-1400th.html 

Clare Melinsky, artist, 1,400th. Commemoration Stamp, used by Royal Mail 1997.

Sancta Maria Abbey, NUNRAW, 8 June 2011

Many thanks to Stephen.
It was his first experience of a Microlight flight. 

He succeeded taking aerial view photographs of Nunraw.