High
Days and Holy Days
1
January - The naming of Jesus
It
is Matthew and Luke who tell the story of how the angel
instructed that Mary’s baby was to be named Jesus -
a common name meaning ‘saviour’. And it
is probably no more than a delightful coincidence that
the Church recalls the naming of Jesus on 1 January -
seven days after 25 December. For in Jewish
tradition, the male babies were circumcised and named on
their eighth day of life.
For
early Christians, the name of Jesus held a special
significance. In Jewish tradition, names expressed
aspects of personality. Jesus’ name permeated his
ministry, and it does so today: we are baptised in
the name of Jesus (Acts
2
January - Basil the Great (c330-79)
Basil
was most people’s idea of the perfect diocesan
bishop. He was a theologian of distinction, who as a monk
devoted himself to much prayer and teaching. He
leapt to the defence of the church from the persecution
of the Arian emperor Valens, but also appreciated great
secular literature of the time, gave away his inheritance
to the poor, knew how to run a soup kitchen, and counted
thieves and prostitutes among his converts. Not
your everyday bishop!
Basil
came from a distinguished and pious family, and he had
the best education available at
Basil
loved his people – and was known for his generosity
and care for the poor – both through food and
medical care. He was a great preacher –
preaching both morning and evening to vast congregations,
and organising services of psalms before daybreak.
He
was interested in monastic legislation, and to this day,
nearly all monks and nuns of the Greek Church follow his
rule. His emphasis was on community life,
liturgical prayer, and manual work, rather than on
solitary asceticism. His rule allowed for
almsgiving, hospitals and guest-houses. Basil
wrote some important works on the Holy Spirit.
He
died at 49, worn out by austerities, hard work and
disease. He was so loved that even strangers
mourned his death, and in the centuries that followed,
many artists painted pictures of him. His cult
spread rapidly in the West, through Greek monks in
6
January - Epiphany
On
6 January we celebrate Epiphany - the visit of the wise
men to the baby Jesus. But who were these wise men?
No one knows for sure. Matthew calls them ‘Magi’,
and that was the name of an ancient caste of a priestly
kind from
25
January - The Conversion of
January
is a month of the beginning of great things! As
well as the naming of the Son of God, we celebrate the
conversion of the greatest ever apostle of the Christian
faith. Many books have been written on Paul, and
here is the briefest of introductions.
He
was a Jew, born as ‘Saul’ at
Saul
changed overnight. He took a new name, Paul, and
became an evangelist for the cause of Christ. He
became a leader in the early Church, and his special
calling was as an apostle to the Gentiles. He wrote
many epistles to the young churches he founded - and
thus, inadvertently, wrote a great part of the New
Testament.
Life
as the greatest apostle was hardly full of perks: he was
stoned, beaten, mobbed, homeless, hated, imprisoned, and
finally martyred. Tradition has it that he was
beheaded in
