The Venerable Bede A Celebration
Monday 25 May 2020 5.15 p.m. The Venerable Bede
Bede served in the monastery of Wearmouth-Jarrow for all his life, and died in Jarrow in 735 aged about 62. In 1020, his body was brought to Durham to be placed with the body of St Cuthbert. Bede’s body was brought to its final resting place in the Galilee Chapel in 1370.
Introit Christ is the Morning Star
Christ is the Morning Star who when the night of this world is past brings to his saints the promise of the light of life and opens everlasting day. Alleluia.
The Venerable Bede Richard Lloyd
The Dean welcomes the people
Hymn We sing to God in praise of Bede (tune NEH 431)
We sing to God in praise of Bede, The prince of scholars in his age, Christ’s servant, lover of God’s word, Once monk of Jarrow, priest and sage.
For his example we give thanks, His zeal to learn, his skill to write; Like him we long to know God’s ways And in God’s word drink with delight.
Grant us, good Lord, one day to come To you, all wisdom’s fountainhead, With Bede to stand before your face, Our Saviour, living from the dead.
Teach us, O Lord, like Bede to pray, To make the word of God our joy, Exult in music, song and art, In worship all your gifts employ.
O Christ, our glorious Morning Star, Come with the passing of the night, Bring to your saints th’eternal day, The promise of your life and light.
Rosalind Brown Samuel Sebastian Wesley
3 Psalm 114
When Israel came out of Egypt : and the house of Jacob from among the strange people, Judah was his sanctuary : and Israel his dominion. The sea saw that, and fled : Jordan was driven back. The mountains skipped like rams : and the little hills like young sheep. What aileth thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest : and thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back? Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams : and ye little hills, like young sheep? Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord : at the presence of the God of Jacob. Who turned the hard rock into a standing water : and the flint-stone into a springing well. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son : and to the Holy Ghost; As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be : world without end. Amen.
Collect
Almighty God, maker of all things, whose Son Jesus Christ gave to thy servant Bede grace to drink in with joy the word which leadeth us to know thee and to love thee: in thy goodness grant that we also may come at length to thee, the source of all wisdom, and stand before thy face; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
4 First Lesson [Exodus 25. 1 - 9]
A reading from the Book of Exodus.
The Lord said to Moses: Tell the Israelites to take for me an offering; from all whose hearts prompt them to give you shall receive the offering for me. This is the offering that you shall receive from them: gold, silver, and bronze, blue, purple, and crimson yarns and fine linen, goats’ hair, tanned rams’ skins, fine leather, acacia wood, oil for the lamps, spices for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense, onyx stones and gems to be set in the ephod and for the breastpiece. And have them make me a sanctuary, so that I may dwell among them. In accordance with all that I show you concerning the pattern of the tabernacle and of all its furniture, so you shall make it.
Middle Voluntary
Second Lesson [John 6. 1 - 9]
A reading from the Gospel according to St John.
The passage Bede was translating when he died, breaking off at verse 9.
Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, also called the Sea of Tiberias. A large crowd kept following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing for the sick. Jesus went up the mountain and sat down there with his disciples. Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near. When he looked up and saw a large crowd coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “Six months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish. But what are they among so many people?”
5 Bede’s commentary on Exodus 25
All these things that the Lord directed to be offered to him in a material fashion for the making of a sanctuary by the people of earlier times should also be offered with spiritual understanding by us who desire to be the imitators of the people who saw God. For it is through freewill oblations of this sort that we may merit for him to make in us a sanctuary for himself and that he may deign to abide in our midst, that is to say, that he may consecrate a dwelling-place for himself in our hearts.
We offer gold to him when we shine brightly with the splendour of the true wisdom which is in right faith; silver when with our mouth we make confession unto salvation; bronze when we rejoice in spreading that same faith by public preaching; blue when we lift up our hearts; purple when we subject the body to suffering; and scarlet twice dyed when we burn with a double love, that is, of God and neighbour.
The tabernacle that was shown to Moses on the mountain is that heavenly city which we believe to have existed at that time for the holy angels alone, but which after the passion, resurrection and ascension into heaven of Christ now receives the countless multitude of radiant and holy souls. Now if we aspire to fellowship with the angels in heaven, we who are on earth should always imitate their life. They love God and their neighbour; imitate this. They come to the aid of the unfortunate; imitate this. Build a sanctuary for the Lord in accordance with the pattern that was shown to Moses on the mountain, and when our Lord and Saviour comes he and the Father will make a home with you, and then after this life he will bring you into that blessed tabernacle which you have always imitated.
6 Hymn Ring Christ, ring Mary, Benedict and Bede
Ring Christ, ring Mary, Benedict and Bede, With Michael, till our hearts from sin be freed; Ring Cuthbert, Oswald, Margaret and Hild, Till, blessed Lord, our hearts with joy be filled.
Let bells peal forth the universal fame, Creator Lord, of thy mysterious name; Conscience within, the boundless heavens above, Disclose to faith the hidden name of Love.
Loudly proclaim with each insistent chime How thine eternity redeems our time; Past sins forgiven, and future hopes restored, Reveal thy presence with us, gracious Lord.
Spirit divine, re-cast our faulty ways, Make them ring true and echo to thy praise; Through every change of circumstance and choice May we confess thee with a single voice.
Call us to worship, call us to obey, Call us to pilgrimage along life's way; Rouse us from sleep; renewed in mind and heart, Call us to love thee, Lord, since Love thou art.
Ring Christ, ring Mary, Benedict and Bede, With Michael, till our hearts from sin be freed; Ring Cuthbert, Oswald, Margaret and Hild, Till, blessed Lord, our hearts with joy be filled.
Peter Baelz Walter Greatorex
7 The Commemoration The Shrine of The Venerable Bede
The Venerable Bede, in the Preface to his History of the English Church and People, writes: “If history records good things of good men, the thoughtful hearer is encouraged to imitate what is good: or if it records evil of wicked men, the devout religious listener or reader is encouraged to avoid all that is sinful and perverse and to follow what he knows to be good and pleasing to God.”
Bede lived on the edge of the world, in a land with no tradition of learning and converted to Christianity only half a century before. He had no books except for the collection that had been assembled by his first abbot, Benedict Biscop. It was a collection that contained most of the writing, theological, scriptural, scientific and literary, that had been filtered down from the legacy of the Roman Empire. With this collection Bede made himself the most learned man in western Europe. In the words of one of Bede's own prayers, let us pray together:
All Open our hearts, O Lord, and enlighten our minds by the grace of your Holy Spirit, that we may seek what is well-pleasing to your will; and so order our doings after your commandments, that we may be found ready to enter into your unending joys; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
8 Bede taught himself to write Latin accurately and fluently, and in that Latin he wrote commentaries on the gospels and other Scriptures. These commentaries were as influential as those of St Augustine.
In order to calculate the Easter cycle, and so bring peace to a divided Church, Bede mastered the mathematics and astronomy of his day. For centuries his books remained the main authority for European chronology. His last books were the History of the English Church and People and the Lives of St Cuthbert and his own abbots. He is often called ‘the Father of English history’.
We remember the places of learning of our land; particularly praying for the schools, colleges, universities and training facilities of our region.
All We entreat you, O Lord, that as in your mercy you have given us grace to drink in with joy the Word that gives knowledge of you: so in your goodness, grant us to come at length to yourself, the source of all wisdom, and to stand before you for ever, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. from Chapter 13 of Book 2 of Bede’s History of the English Church and People:
“Your majesty, King Edwin, when we compare the present life of man on earth with that time of which we have no knowledge it seems to me like the swift flight of a single sparrow through the banqueting-hall where you are sitting at dinner of a winter’s day with your chiefs and counsellors. In the midst there is a comforting fire to warm the hall; outside, the storms of winter snow or rain are raging. This sparrow flies swiftly in through one door of the hall, and out through another. While he is inside, he is safe from the winter storms; but of what went before this life or of what follows, we know nothing. Therefore if this new teaching has brought any more certain knowledge, it seems only right that we should follow it.” So said the thane, and the other elders and counsellors of the king, under God’s guidance, gave similar advice.
9 The Choir sings this Ascensiontide antiphon—words that Bede sang in his last hours to comfort his companions
Anthem O Rex gloriae
O Rex gloriae, Domine virtutum, qui triumphator hodie super omnes caelos ascendisti, ne derelinquas nos orphanos; sed mitte promissum Patris in nos Spiritum veritatis. Alleluia.
O King of glory, Lord of power and might, who has this day as Conqueror ascended into the highest heavens, leave us not comfortless; but send the promise of the Father upon us, even the Spirit of truth. Alleluia.
Antiphon for Ascension Day Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina
A reading from the account of Bede’s death
“All is finished now. Take me to the place where I used to pray, where I now long to be. There let me sit and call upon my Father. Take my head in your hands”. So sitting down on the floor of his cell he sang “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.” And he died.
The Choir echoes the final words of Bede
Choir Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
Thomas Tallis
10 O God, we have heard with our ears, and our ancestors have told us: All The noble works that you did in their days, and in the years before them.
They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts; In that day when I gather all nations into my Kingdom.
You shall show me the path of life: In your presence is the fullness of joy.
O God, the hope of our ancestors: look graciously upon your children; and grant that, taught by your servant Bede, we may also in our time discern the working of your providence and trust in your continuing power to strengthen and guide us; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.
The Blessing
God give you grace to share the heritage of Bede and all the saints in glory; and the blessing of God almighty, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always. All Amen.
Voluntary
11 Material in this order of service is reproduced under the Christian Copyright Licensing Scheme, and produced under CCL No 68670; MRL No 720413. Extracts from NRSC © 1989 National Council of Churches of Christ, USA
The Cathedral Office, The College, Durham DH1 3EH Tel: (0191) 386 4266 Fax: (0191) 386 4267 [email protected] www.durhamcathedral.co.uk
Please take this order of service away with you. 12