Caucasian Writer Co-Authors Book on African American Ministry

Caucasian Writer Co-Authors Book on African American Ministry

*Note to My Blog Readers: Please feel free to forward this news release to your local newspapers.

The Elephant in the Room

When Bob Kellemen offers seminars on his new book Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction, he starts by addressing the proverbial “elephant in the room.” “Why did a white guy write a book about African American church life?”

As Kellemen explained, “First, I didn’t write it, I co-wrote it with Karole Edwards who is a wonderful African American friend and a graduate of the seminary where I teach. Second, we like to say that we didn’t co-author the book as much as we co-edited Beyond the Suffering. We wove together first-hand accounts of the amazing narratives concerning how African American Christians found courage and comfort in God and each other to move beyond the suffering of slavery to a place of healing hope.”

Kellemen continued, “But that still doesn’t address what prompted my interest in this fascinating topic. I grew up on 11th and Hovey in downtown Gary, IN. I’ve spent my whole life in a multi-cultural environment. Currently I teach at a school (Capital Bible Seminary in Lanham, MD) with no majority culture. God has called me to a life-long, multi-cultural ministry.”

A Mutual Passion

Kellemen’s co-author, Edwards, shared her own passion for Beyond the Suffering. “For me the journey began as I delved deeper into historical African American stories and discovered a cavern of invaluable truth. As I was being changed by the story unfolding before me, I wondered how others might also be changed by seeing God’s story unfolding through our history.”

Baker Books

According to the publisher, Baker Books, “Beyond the Suffering is the African American story told by African Americans for the benefit of all Americans. The African American Church has always helped hurting and hardened people through personal and corporate ministry. Beyond the Suffering uncovers the great spiritual riches of this African American Christian tradition.”

Kellemen concurred. “Beyond the Suffering desires to inspire today’s generation as they hear the voices of past African American Christians speaking through its pages. By listening to its historical narrative, readers learn to speak to today’s world with relevance. Beyond the Suffering assists African American and non-African American lay people, pastors, and Christian counselors to become more spiritually aware and skillful by deriving modern implications from these recovered resources. And it equips all believers for more effective cross-cultural ministry.”

Pulling the Rope in Unison

Of the 100s of real-life vignettes recorded in the book, Kellemen shared one story (“Pulling the Rope in Unison”) illustrative of the practical nature of the entire book. “Venture Smith was born in Guinea about 1729. Kidnapped at age eight, Robertson Mumford purchased him a year later. After living with Mumford for thirteen years, Venture married Meg at age twenty-two. They remained together for over forty-seven years, through many trials and tribulations, until parted by death.”

“Venture’s narrative contains an explanation for their marital faithfulness. On the occasion of their marriage, Venture threw a rope over his cabin and asked his wife to go to the opposite side and pull on the rope hanging there while he remained and pulled on his end. After they both had tugged at it awhile in vain, he called her to his side of the cabin and by their united effort they drew the rope to themselves with ease. He then explained the object lesson to his young bride. ‘If we pull in life against each other we shall fail, but if we pull together we shall succeed.’” According to Kellemen, “premarital couples, newlyweds, and seasoned married spouses would all do well to heed Venture’s guiding wisdom.”

Dr. Tony Evans

Internationally-known African American pastor and author, Dr. Tony Evans, in his Foreword to Beyond the Suffering noted that “Most students of history focus on the pain of the African American experience in America. There was a lot of pain! And we should not minimize that pain. However, as the title suggests, Beyond the Suffering goes further. It shows us how the pain experienced by people from the African American culture can be redeemed to give life to people from any race or culture. The captivating true stories and first-hand narratives have a therapeutic and healing quality for the reader and those they serve. After you read Beyond the Suffering, you will have a deeper understanding of how God forged character in people through their suffering and be able to apply many valuable insights to your personal life and future ministry.”

So About That Elephant?

So, about that elephant in the room? Kellemen said, “Regardless of the color of our skin, we are all human beings with similar struggles and suffering, hopes and dreams. Beyond the Suffering listens to the voices of a people who ministered in the crucible of suffering. Everyone, from every race, can benefit from hearing these voices, from reading and applying these courageous stories.”

To Order

Beyond the Suffering is available at Amazon.com, Barnes and Nobles, Wal Mart, and other bookstores and bookselling websites.

Dissecting the Controversial High Court Decision

Dissecting the Controversial High Court Decision[i]

Should society be color-blind? Is the US Constitution color-blind? These are the questions debated by the US Supreme Court in their controversial June 28, 2007, decision striking down two school integration programs. With its emotional and splintered decision, the Court wrestled with a question that has dogged the long fight over integration: "When will the nation be able to disregard an individual’s race entirely?"

A Conservative View

Some conservatives, citing Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s hope that people will one day be judged not “by the color of their skin but by the content of their character” and former Justice John Harlan’s opinion that “our Constitution is color-blind,” have long argued that the time has come to set aside racial preferences of any kind. The way to remedy discrimination against minorities, they insist, is not to endorse discrimination against whites.

Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., joined by the court’s three other conservatives, gave some hope Thursday to advocates of that approach. “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race,” Roberts wrote in perhaps the snappiest sentence of his opinion.

For decades, some conservatives have argued fiercely against atoning for the nation’s racial sins by explicitly favoring minorities, whether through affirmative action, contract set-aside programs, or desegregation plans. Society should be color-blind, they have contended, and perpetuating racial classifications is highly destructive.

A Moderate View

On the other hand, the moderate-conservative Justice Anthony Kennedy noted that a color-blind society may be a wonderful goal, but it ignores reality.”The enduring hope is that race should not matter; the reality is that too often it does,” Kennedy wrote. “As an aspiration, Justice Harlan’s axiom must command our assent. In the real world, it is regrettable to say, it cannot be a universal constitutional principle.”

A Liberal View

Liberals have argued with similar passion that after centuries of slavery, discrimination and racism, simply treating everyone equally now will not alleviate the inequality still suffered by blacks in housing, education and other areas.

“The Constitution cannot plausibly be interpreted to rule out categorically all local efforts to use means that are ‘conscious’ of the race of individuals,” Justice Breyer wrote. “The context here is one of racial limits that seek, not to keep the races apart, but to bring them together.”

The Constitutional Issue

The impassioned dispute that played out among the justices in the pages of their opinions often touched on what is generally regarded as the grandest civil rights case of all: Brown vs. Board of Education, the 1954 case that outlawed segregation and the doctrine of “separate but equal.”

Both sides Thursday claimed the mantle of Brown. Roberts and his camp claimed that Brown’s principle, that students cannot be discriminated against on the basis of race, was the one they were following.”When it comes to using race to assign children to schools, history will be heard,” Roberts wrote. “Before Brown, schoolchildren were told where they could and could not go to school based on the color of their skin. The school districts in these cases bear the heavy burden of demonstrating that we should allow this once again—even for very different reasons.”

That argument seemed to particularly anger the court’s four liberals, who reacted strongly against the notion of comparing the school districts in Louisville and Seattle, struggling for racial balance, to the racists and bigots of the nation’s past. “It is a cruel distortion of history to compare Topeka, Kan., in the 1950s to Louisville and Seattle in the modern day,” Breyer wrote.

Justice Stevens used similar language. “There is a cruel irony in the chief justice’s reliance on our decision in Brown vs. Board of Education,” he wrote. “It is my firm conviction that no member of the court that I joined in 1975 would have agreed with today’s decision.”

Not every case so visibly stirs the justices’ emotion. In most decisions, those in the minority conclude their opinions by writing “I respectfully dissent” or simply “I dissent.”Breyer’s dissent Thursday seemed impelled by a stronger force. “This is a decision that the court and the nation will come to regret,” he concluded his opinion. “I must dissent."

[i]Excerpted and edited with personal commentary by Bob Kellemen from the Chicago Tribune, June 29, 2007, by Naftali Bendavid, Washington Bureau Tribune staff reporters Michael J. Higgins, Carlos Sadovi, and Gary Washburn.

A Son Marries

On Saturday, June 23, 2007, Shirley and I had the joy of celebration the wedding of our firstborn son, Josh to his new bride, Andi.

Memories. Nostalgia. Josh's birth, first months in Winona Lake while completing seminary. Move to Elyria, OH and nine years of family and ministry there. K-4th grade. Moving to MD and a dozen years there in the pastorate and seminary with Josh in 5th-12th grade and college, wrestling, studying, friends. A year back in Indiana as Josh completes his Sr. year of college.

Meals together. Playing. Devotions. Vacations. Long walks. Great talks. Best friends. Story telling. Church life. Friends. Holidays. Holy days.
Cheers and tears. Love, faith, hope, grace, peace.

Where did the time go?

Fortunately, we made and by God's grace kept, the commitment to enjoy every moment, to focus on the family, to resist the tendency to allow ministry to drown out family.

Would we do anything differently? Well, of course, with 20/20 hindsight, there are always changes that could have been made. But, regrets? No, not really. Together, we lived life to the fullest. We were, and are, family.

The next step? Loving our adult son and our new adult daughter-in-law. New memories. New nostalgia. New commitments.

Three Books for My Birthday

Three Books for My Birthday

What more could I want for my next birthday than three books--especially if they are my own books! On August 1, my birthday, Beyond the Suffering will be released by Baker Books. That same day, BMH Books will release the revised third editions of Soul Physicians and Spiritual Friends. Quite the birthday present.

All three books, though unique in their own way, have one guiding theme: using the Word of God and the history of the Christian church to relate God's truth to our daily lives and ministry.

Soul Physicians provides a unique theology of Christian living.

Spiritual Friends builds upon this theology by offering a training manual for developing 22 skills of biblical counseling.

Beyond the Suffering highlights how lay and pastoral African Americans practiced soul care and spiritual direction to move one another beyond the horrible suffering of enslavement to a place of healing hope through Christ's resurrection power.

Yep, a pretty nice birthday present!

Tennis and Life

Tennis and Life

In the women’s fourth round of the 2007 French Open, Maria Sharapova saved two match points but drew jeers while beating Patty Schnyder 3-6, 6-4, 9-7.

Spectators turned on Sharapova at 7-7 in the final set, when she won a disputed point while serving at 30-love. Schnyder watched a serve land in, then complained she had held up a hand to call for time.

Mother Teresa As a Tennis Player

The chair umpire ruled the point would count, giving Sharapova her first ace of the tournament. Sharapova said later she didn’t see Schnyder’s hand until after hitting the ball—and had no regrets about what happened.

“It’s pretty hard being a tennis player and Mother Teresa at the same time,” Sharapova said. “You’re fighting for every single point out there.”

Sharapova As a Philosopher

By Sharapova’s reasoning, one might also conclude that it’s pretty hard being a human being in the world today and living like Jesus at the same time.

Actually, according to the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus would agree—it is hard to live a godly life in a godless world.

Of course, Jesus’ definition of “success” is worlds apart from Sharapova’s. Wasn’t that the whole point of His Sermon on the Mount? To turn the world upside down. To turn upside down our perspective on how we live and on why we live.

A Spiritual Friendship Pact

A Spiritual Friendship Pact

St. Teresa looked upon human friendship as a joint journey, a spiritual pilgrimage to the fatherland. To four trusted friends she extended this invitation:

“I should like the five of us who at present love each other in Christ to make a kind of pact that since others in these times gather together in secret against His Majesty to prepare wicked deeds and heresies, we might seek to gather together some time to free each other from illusions and to speak about how we might mend our ways and please God more since no one knows himself as well as others who observe him if they do so with love and concern for his progress. I saw we should gather in secret because this kind of talk is no longer in fashion.”

Not Only in Her Day

It was not only in her day that gathering for spiritual friendship was no longer in fashion. How seldom we gather for such purposes in our day.

What does it take? According to Teresa:

1. A Pact: A communicated commitment.

2. A Plan: A gathering together. Connecting.

3. A Purpose: To free each other from sin's deceitfulness, to mend our ways, and to please God.

4. A Passion: To know each other deeply enough and with enough care and concern to be able to provide loving feedback leading to self-awareness.

5. A Person: Jesus Christ. Human spiritual friendships always point to the ultimate Spiritual Friend--God.

Ministerial Abuse

Ministerial Abuse

In our current church climate, we often read of ministers abusing parishioners in one form or another. Less often, we read and ponder the abuse of ministers by their own parishioners and by outside critics.

History is replete with such accounts. The famous Baptist pastor from London, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, faced vicious criticism throughout his ministry, and it often led to severe bouts of self-doubt and spiritual depression.

Life and Death Are in the Power of the Tongue

Early in his ministry, his preaching became so famous, that his church could not hold the crowds. So his congregation rented the Surrey Music House. The first night someone yelled “Fire!” Some in the crowd fled in panic, with seven dying and dozens injured. Spurgeon urged everyone to stay and continued to preach, unaware that several people had already been crushed to death. Moments later, another panic arose. This time Spurgeon fainted and had to be carried away. Many even thought that he had died.

Experiencing guilt, and battered in the local press, Spurgeon plunged into depression. His wife, Susannah, wrote about their resultant mutual despair. “I wanted to be alone, that I might cry to God in this hour of darkness and death! When my beloved was brought home he looked a wreck of his former self—an hour’s agony of mind had changed his whole appearance and bearing. The night that ensued was one of weeping and wailing and indescribable sorrow. He refused to be comforted. I thought the morning would never break; and when it did come it brought no relief.”[1]

The ensuing days were no better, as Susannah recounts. “The Lord has mercifully blotted out from my mind most of the details of the time of grief which followed when my beloved’s anguish was so deep and violent that reason seemed to totter in her throne, and we sometimes feared he would never preach again. It was truly ‘the valley of the shadow of death’ through which we then walked; and, like poor Christian, we here ‘sighed bitterly’ for the pathway was so dark that oft times when we lifted up our foot to set forward, we knew not where or upon what we should set it next.”[2]

Recuperation and Healing from Spiritual Abuse

Friends took Spurgeon to the country town of Croydon where he stayed in the house of Mr. Winsor, one of his deacons, with Mrs. Spurgeon and their one-month-old twin baby boys. Mrs. Spurgeon’s biographer writes, “It was hoped that the rest and change of scene would aid in the restoration of his mental equilibrium, and although at first his spirit seemed to be imprisoned in darkness, light at last broke in.”[3]

Susannah shares her account of her husband’s recovery. “We had been walking together as usual, he restless and anguished; I sorrowful and amazed, wondering what the end of these things would be; when at the foot of the steps which gave access to the house, he stopped suddenly, and turned to me, and, with the old sweet light in his eyes (ah! how grievous had been its absence!), he said, ‘Dearest, how foolish I have been! Why! what does it matter what becomes of me, if the Lord shall but be glorified? And he repeated with earnestness and intense emphasis, Philippians 2:9-11.”[4] By an amazing inner working of the Holy Spirit, Spurgeon was able to take his eyes off his own agony, placing them instead on God and His glory.

Though Spurgeon began to recover his mental and spiritual equilibrium, upon his return to London even more critics began to write even more critical articles about him and his ministry. Spurgeon actually collected every critical article into a book, on the cover of which he wrote the title Fact, Fiction and Facetiae.
Of these, Susannah said years later: “At the time of their publication what a grievous affliction these slanders were to me. My heart alternatively sorrowed over him and flamed with indignation against his detractors.”[5] Every ministry spouse can relate.

Spiritual Healing through Scriptural Enlightenment

Caring deeply for her husband, Susannah set about the task of ministering to his soul. “For a long time I wondered how I could set continual comfort before his eyes, till, at last, I hit upon the expedient of having the following verses printed in large old English type and enclosed in a pretty Oxford frame: ‘Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you’ (Matthew 5:11-12). The text was hung up in our own room and was read over by the dear preacher every morning, fulfilling its purpose most blessedly, for it strengthened his heart and enabled him to buckle on the invisible armor, whereby he could calmly walk among men, unruffled by their calumnies, and concerned only for their best and highest interests.”[6]

Amazing. What men meant for evil, God wove into good.

How do ministers (pastors, counselors, teachers, missionaries, lay leaders) survive sadistic slander? Through confidence in God and God’s Word. Through the supernatural empowering and enlightenment of the Holy Spirit who teaches them that these falsehoods and lies result in great reward in heaven. Through spiritual friends who use scriptural insight to create a glowing neon sign reminding them that their present suffering is not worth comparing to their future glory.


[1]Charles Ray, “The Life of Susannah Spurgeon,” in Susannah Spurgeon: Free Grace and Dying Love, Carlisle PA: The Banner of Truth Trust, p. 165.
[2]Ibid., pp. 165-166.
[3]Ibid., p. 166.
[4]Ibid., pp. 166-167.
[5]Ibid., p. 168.
[6]Ibid., pp. 168-169.

Put Up the Cross for Your Sail

Sail On

Have the winds of life ruthlessly railed against you, blowing you like straw in a tornado?

Sail on.

Amma Syncletica left a life of luxury in the third century to face a life of storms in the desert. Known as one of the "Desert Mothers" of the ancient Church, she was born in Alexandria into a well-respected Christian family of Macedonian heritage. Well-educated, Syncletica had a reputation for her beauty.

Her two brothers died at a relatively young age and her sister was blind. At the death of her parents, she sold her possessions, giving them to the poor. She then moved with her sister to the family tomb outside Alexandria where she lived into her 80s.

Put Up the Cross for Our Sail

Offering sage spiritual direction toward the end of her life, Amma Syncletica provides us with fortitude for our journey.

“If you have begun some good work, you should not be turned from it by the enemy’s attempts to hinder you, indeed your endurance will overthrow the enemy. Sailors beginning a voyage set the sails and look for a favorable wind, and later they meet a contrary wind. Just because the wind has turned, they do not throw the cargo overboard or abandon ship; they wait a while and struggle against the storm until they can set a direct course again. When we run into headwinds, let us put up the cross for our sail, and we shall voyage through the world in safety”

Sail on!

The Day(s) After Easter

The Day(s) After Easter

After Easter, then what?

For Thomas, the disciple most like some of us, doubt.

Yes, even after Easter, Thomas doubted.

Even after being told by at least a dozen (ten disciples, two Marys), Thomas still doubted.

Even after the Old Testament Scriptures prophesied the resurrection.

Even after Jesus predicted His resurrection.

Thomas, like some of us, admitted his doubts.

Is Doubt Sin?

We chastise Thomas.

We think Jesus chastised Thomas.

Jesus did not.

Challenge him. Engage him. Invite him. Yes.

“Then Jesus told him [Thomas], ‘Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed’” (John 20:29).

For Thomas, “seeing is believing.” In fact, “touching is believing.” He required tangible evidence that demanded a verdict.

Jesus gave it to him. “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe” (John 20:27).

For Thomas, and those like him, empirical evidence is part of the wrestling match of faith.

Those who can believe without any empirical evidence, they truly are blessed. That childlike faith is wonderful.

Not all have such faith.

The Welcome Mat Out

Jesus understands.

He offers evidence that demands a verdict. He welcomes intellectual seekers. He invites exploration. He does not chastise doubt; rather, He enters it.

The act of inviting Thomas to touch His side signals that Jesus is keenly aware of the place of doubt in faith.

Lord Alfred Tennyson wrote “There is more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds . . ."

Doubt is not the opposite of faith.

Why?

Because faith is not certainty, or it would not be faith.

Faith is committing to believing when other competing beliefs still exist, still abound.

The Christian life, this side of heaven, is, for some (like Thomas), an ongoing candid, honest, intellectual conversation between faith and doubt.

Don’t check your mind at the door marked “faith.”

Easter: Holiday or Holy Day?

Easter: Holiday or Holy Day?

Growing up, Easter was about coloring eggs, chocolate bunny rabbits, marshmallow eggs, and toys from my Aunt. For much of Western culture, that’s still the “essence of Easter.”

Easter Meaning

As holidays go, for Americans and most American Christians, Easter is simply second-rate.

For me, now as a believer, Easter has more meaning than even Christmas.

Easter is not a holiday. It is a Holy Day.

Journeying the Ancient Paths

Evangelicals would do well to engage more of the historical traditions around the “Easter Holy Day Season.”

Forty days of focused spiritual disciplines . . .

Palm Sunday . . .

Passion week . . .

Maundy (or Holy) Thursday solemnly commemorating the institution of the Lord’s Supper.

Good Friday and somber remembrance . . .

Holy Saturday and the day of waiting . . .

Easter Sunday and the day of celebration . . .

Hope.

Joy.

New life.

Eternal Spring.

The Chronicles

In The Chronicles of Narnia, the White Witch cast her spell and “it was always Winter but never Christmas.”

In The Chronicles of Christ, because of Easter, we live in anticipation of the day when “it is always Spring and forever Easter.”

Nameless Saturday

Nameless Saturday

We have names for days leading up to Easter from Wednesday to Friday.

Evangelicals don’t have a name for Saturday.

The in-between day.

The day of waiting.

The day of faith-testing.

Never Ending Saturday

Imagine it, for the first time all over again.

Your Saviour has been brutally crucified. Your hopes dashed. Your heart sick.

Tick. Tick. Tick. Time ticks away but time does not heal all wounds.

Friday ends.

Saturday comes. Saturday seems to never end.

Perhaps we could call it Never Ending Saturday.

Or at least it feels like it.

Saturday Living

Life on planet earth is Saturday living.

The day in-between.

The day we wait.

The day before we see the reality of our faith.

What's So Good about Good Friday?

What’s So Good about Good Friday?

Good Friday. The day Christians memorialize death. God’s death. Christ’s crucifixion.

What’s so good about that?

In Evangelical Protestant circles, Good Friday is rarely seen as “good.” In fact, it’s often ignored. No services. Nothing.

I can recall establishing the first ever Good Friday service in my first year as Sr. Pastor. The church had a continuous history of over 200 years. Not only did we start a Good Friday service, we ended it in somber silence.

People were shocked!

“What? Where’s the Resurrection!”

My response . . .

“Wait.”

Like the Apostles had to wait.

As Mary the mother of Jesus waited.

As Jesus waited.

What’s so good about Good Friday. The obvious answer is that without Christ’s death we would have no salvation.

The less obvious but equally biblical answer is Good Friday reminds us to wait in humble, sad, somber, convicted silence. It reminds us just how horrible sin is.

Quiet.

Wait.

In a Coffin in Egypt

In a Coffin in Egypt

Consider the contrast between the first five and the last five words of Genesis. “In the beginning God created” (Genesis 1:1a). “In a coffin in Egypt” (Genesis 50:26b). Life east of Eden and this side of Heaven is guaranteed to be replete with suffering.

Though we intuitively and experientially recognize this reality, for some reason we shy away from it theologically. Theologians have developed well thought through models of Creation (anthropology), Fall (hamartiology), and Redemption (soteriology). Notice what’s missing? Sufferology—a biblical theology of suffering.

Of course, a brief e-news snippet is not the place to present a fully developed theology of suffering. But perhaps it could be the place today to whet our appetite, to encourage each of us as biblical counselors and soul physicians to delve more deeply into a practical theology of suffering.

In the early 60s, British Christian psychiatrist, Frank Lake explained that “clinical pastoral care has, as its introduction, the task of listening to a story of human conflict and need. To the extent that our listening uncovers a situation which borders the abyss or lies broken within it, we are nearer to the place where the Cross of Chris is the only adequate interpretive concept” (Clinical Theology, pp. 18-19).

Is any place closer to the abyss than a coffin in Egypt? God creatively uses suffering, separation, dying, and death to form us into His image. Walter Wangerin, in his healing book, Mourning Into Dancing, expresses more insight into death than any mortician. “Death doesn’t wait till the ends of our lives to meet us and to make an end. Instead, we die a hundred times before we die; and all the little endings on the way are like a slowly growing echo of the final Bang! before that bang takes place” (p. 26).

So why would our Good Shepherd shepherd us with suffering and sorrow? What are these “guides” supposed to teach us? Throughout Mourning Into Dancing, Wangerin explains that suffering and death are meant to teach us our need again. All the mini-casket experiences of life are God-sent invitations to depend upon the One who is the Resurrection and the Life.

The Apostle Paul says its best. “We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead (2 Corinthians 1:8-9). Life’s coffins cause us to cling to Christ and to celebrate His empty tomb.

Reconciliation Triangle

Reconciliation Triangle*

On 9th December 1999, as its final act of the Millennium, Liverpool City Council unanimously passed a motion apologizing for the city’s role in the Slave Trade, linked to a commitment to policies that would end racism and work to create a community where all are equally valued.

International Conference

In December 1999, at the invitation of President Mathieu Kérékou of the Republic of Benin, an International Conference was held in Benin, attended by people from Africa, the Americas and Europe affected by the Black Diaspora, including representatives from Richmond, Virginia, and Liverpool. The President apologized for his country’s role in selling Africans to the slave traders.

Racial Healing

At the Benin Conference Lord Alton of Liverpool presented a small maquette of the large public sculpture ‘Reconciliation’ created by Liverpool artist, Stephen Broadbent, which already stands in Liverpool, Belfast and Glasgow along with a statement signed by the Liverpool’s Lord Mayor, Councillor Joe Devaney and the Leader of the Council, Mike Storey.

In April 2000 a ‘Ceremony of Racial Healing‘ attended by 4 Government Ministers from Benin, took place in Richmond, Virginia, U.S.A. The intention was to extend the process of reconciliation.

As a next step, with encouragement at senior government level in Benin, Liverpool and Richmond, it was decided to raise funds to donate to Benin a 4 meter high bronze edition of the ‘Reconciliation’ sculpture, with specially designed panels by young people in Liverpool, Richmond and Benin. It was also decided that a further casting of the Reconciliation sculpture would be made to be sited on the slave trail route in Richmond.

The site for the sculptures erection in Benin was identified, a specially designed ‘Reconciliation Garden’ in the city of Cotonou was to be built. President Kerekou said “that it would establish a meaningful international connection which would reflect the infamous slave triangle. The three statues would be a physical and symbolic manifestation of a process of bringing together in an expression of repentance, forgiveness and reconciliation - the descendants of those that profited from the evil trade, those on the continent from which they were taken and those now living in the place to which many slaves were taken.”

Project chair, Joe Devaney was invited to an International Conference in Washington D.C. in the summer of 2001. The ‘Connecting Communities’ delegates welcomed the Reconciliation Triangle Project as a major initiative in the understanding and healing of slavery’s wounds.

Joe and artist Stephen Broadbent both visited Richmond in 2001, addressing the City Council and presenting the Mayor with a model of the original Reconciliation Sculpture. Representatives from Richmond visited Liverpool on three occasions. The city fully supports the project.

Broadbent, the sculptor, worked with fellow artist, Faith Bebbington, along with children from six of Liverpool’s inner city schools to incorporate new low-relief scenes on the four flat sides relating to the slave trade between Liverpool, Benin and the Americas.

The final sculpture, based on these designs, was finished by Liverpool artists Broadbent and Bebbington. The sculptures were then cast in bronze ready to be shipped to Benin and Richmond. In Liverpool it is hoped the bronze reliefs will be mounted and exhibited adjacent to the existing Reconciliation statue.

Beyond the Suffering

In October 2004, at a Civic ceremony hosted by the Maritime Museum on the dockside in Liverpool, a finished 'Reconciliation Sculpture' was handed over to representatives of the Benin Government, this significant event was also attended by a representative from Richmond. The leader of Liverpool City Council, quoted the words, ”the only way to bring reconciliation is to face the pain of history with courage, and then to change.” He went on to say, “We have begun that process of change, and this reconciliation initiative is one more step on that journey.”

*Article adapted from: http://www.reconciliationtriangle.org/#history

Under the Power of Melting Grief

Under the Power of Melting Grief

At times stringing together the words “grieving” and “ministry” can be oxymoronic. My mind recalls one pastor who lost his wife while she was giving birth to their second child. Because of congregational and peer pressure to “keep it together” and “be a good example,” outwardly he displayed no signs of grief. He even officiated at his own wife’s funeral.

Inwardly, privately, what a difference. He experienced ongoing hallucinations of his deceased wife and barely was able to care for his own needs, let alone those of his two children.

Where was this pastor, where are we, recruited into the unbiblical nonsense that grief is, well, unbiblical?

Biblical Sufferology

Many have developed splendid systematic theology models that counter this hideous idea that grieving is somehow less than Christian. Rather than duplicate their studies, in the brief space that we share together in this column, I’d like to share the true story of a prince of preachers and his response to the loss of his dear wife.

Many know the name Richard Baxter (1615-1691) as one of England’s foremost pastors, authors, and theologians. Fewer know of his wife, Margaret (1636-1681). Twenty-one years younger than her more-famous husband, Margaret struggled throughout her life as a fear-ridden, highly strung, overly-sensitive, painfully perfectionistic soul.

After nineteen years of marriage, Richard lost his soul mate when she passed at age forty-five after eleven days of delirium. Her reason had almost wholly left her, as she had longed feared it might.[1]

Less than a month later, her grieving husband—the world-renowned pastor—wrote to tell the world of his grief. First published as A Breviate of the Life of Margaret, The Daughter of Francis Charlton, and Wife of Richard Baxter, John T. Wilkinson reprinted it with the beautiful title Richard Baxter and Margaret Charlton: A Puritan Love Story.

Baxter prefaces his memorializing with the candid admission that it was, “. . . written, I confess, under the power of melting grief.”[2] Knowing the likely criticism for such openness, Baxter continues, “. . . and therefore perhaps with the less prudent judgment; but not with the less, but the more truth; for passionate weakness poureth out all, which greater prudence may conceal.”[3]

Did you catch his meaning? In our weakness, not only are we strong in Christ, we are all the more honest as Christians. In our grieving, we do not and should not conceal the truth of tears this side of heaven.

In Depth of Grief

Perhaps even more remarkable, it was not simply the shock and nearness of Margaret’s death that left her husband so frank. Years later in his autobiography, Baxter expresses how his wife’s death left him “in depth of grief.”[4] Interestingly, the original editor of Baxter’s autobiography suppressed this phrase. (Some things never changed.) Fortunately, truer historians have uncovered it—for the benefit of all who dare speak the truth about sorrow.[5]

Richard Baxter understood the truth that it’s normal to hurt—even for “full-time Christian workers.” His entire biography of dear Margaret is a tear-stained tribute to the affection they shared and the sadness he endured.

Mingled Hurt and Hope

Of course, Baxter also understood the truth that it’s possible to hope—for all Christians. Listen to his mingled hurt and hope.

She is gone after many of my choice friends, who within this one year are gone to Christ, and I am following even at the door. Had I been to enjoy them only here, it would have been but a short comfort, mixed with the many troubles which all our failings and sins, and some degree of unsuitableness between the nearest and dearest, cause. But I am going after them to that blessed society where life, light, and love, and therefore, harmony, concord, and joy, are perfect and everlasting.[6]

Perhaps one reason why we practice denial is our fear that entering our grief might so consume us that we will be overwhelmed with worldly sorrow. Baxter’s Christian experience reminds us that this doesn’t have to be the case.

We can look fallen life squarely in the eyes, admit the truth that it is a quagmire of pain and problems, and still live hopefully now if we also look toward life in our heavenly world to come.

In the last paragraph of his tribute to Margaret, Baxter succinctly combines these two realities. “Therefore in our greatest straits and sufferings, let us comfort one another with these words: That we shall for ever be with the Lord.”[7]

Shakespeare’s Romeo said, “He jests at scars, that never felt a wound.”

Baxter might add, “He fears facing scars who never embraces the truth that by Christ’s wounds we are healed.”


[1]J. I. Packer, A Grief Sanctified, Ann Arbor, MI: Servant Publications, 1997, p. 13.
[2]Ibid., p. 56.
[3]Ibid.
[4]Richard Baxter, Reliquiae Baxteriannae, 1696.
[5]Packer, p. 197.
[6]Ibid., p. 57.
[7]Ibid., p. 149.

Mothers of the Church Fathers, Part 4

Mothers of the Church Fathers, Part 4

What have we learned and what can we learn from the mothers of the church fathers? We learn to listen to the silenced voices.

Listening to the Silenced Voices

When we listen to the silenced voices of the forgotten Church Mothers we lean back hearing a megaphone blaring, “Women are worthy!” Remember, this was nearly 2,000 years ago—not exactly an era perceived to be the height of the women’s movement. Yet again and again, the great Church Fathers consistently testified to their spiritual debt to the great Church Mothers.

When we listen to the silenced voices of the forgotten Church Mothers we lean over to hear a calm, quiet voice whispering, “Women are God-empowered.” We do not detect even a trace of arrogance or anger in these powerful women. In fact, it seems that they would blush at the word “powerful.” Rather, they would choose the word “empowered.” These Church Mothers saw themselves as God-called and God-empowered lights in the darkness. They reflected the light of hope coming from the Son of God as they journeyed gently yet confidently with other women and with men.

Mothers of the Church Fathers, Part III

Mothers of the Church Fathers,

Part 3

When discussing the great Church Fathers, names like the three Cappadocian Fathers (Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus) come to mind, as do John Chrysostom, and Augustine. However, in most cases, we truly have forgotten their mothers: Emmelia, who we just considered; Nonna, the mother of Gregory of Nazianzus; Anthusa, the mother of John Chrysostom; and Monica, the mother of Augustine. It is to this lost tradition that we now turn our attention.

Monica: Spiritual Friend and Spiritual Director

The name of Monica, mother of Augustine, is perhaps the best known of the Church Mothers whose voices we have heard thus far. What we know about Monica we learn almost entirely from her son’s autobiography Confessions.

Monica was born in North Africa near Carthage in what is now Tunisia, perhaps around 331 AD, of Christian parents, and was a committed believer her entire life. She married an unbelieving husband, Patricius, a man of a hot temper who was often unfaithful to her. It was her greatest joy to see both him and his mother ultimately receive the Gospel. Monica also spent years suffering over her son’s pagan lifestyle until his conversion and commitment to Christian ministry.

Reconciling Her Family

In the Confessions, which Augustine addressed to God, we hear of her reconciling witness to her wayward son. “In fact, as a boy I had heard about the eternal life that had been promised to us through the humility of the Lord our God’s lowering himself to our pride, and already I was stamped with the sign of the his cross, already seasoned with his salt from the womb of my mother, who put great hope in You. . . . My fleshly mother was disturbed, because she more lovingly brooded over my eternal salvation, with a pure heart in Your faith.”[i]

Coming to faith, Augustine described a scenario to which every believing mother with an unbelieving husband can relate. “Thus already I believed, as did my mother and all the household, my father alone excepted, who nonetheless did not drive out the authority of my mother’s piety so that I did not believe in Christ, inasmuch as he did not yet believe. For my mother busied herself in order that You might be my Father, my God, rather than he, and in this matter You helped her so that she might overcome her husband, to whom she was subject . . .”[ii]

Christian mothers need to hear Monica’s voice. She confidently spoke and personified the reality that a mother’s piety can drown out a father’s irreverence. She also reminds mothers that they do not have to be both mother and father. In the absence of a believing father, Monica pointed her son to his ultimate Father, rather than trying to be a surrogate father.

Of course, none of this implies that Monica was indifferent to her husband’s spiritual plight. “She concerned herself to win him for You, speaking of You through her behavior, by which You made her beautiful, respectfully lovable, and admirable to her husband. Moreover, she thus endured the wrongs to her bed, so that she never had any feuding with her husband on account of this matter. She waited for Your compassion to come upon him, so that believing in You, he might become chaste.”[iii]

Monica lived to see the fruit of the seeds of life that she planted. “At last she won for You even her own husband, now at the end of his earthly life. In him as a believer she did not now bewail that which she endured when he was not yet one of the faithful.”[iv]

A Ministry Beyond Her Home

Monica’s ministry extended beyond her home. Journeying to join Augustine in Milan, the faith that she exercised with her family strengthened her to comfort, console, and bring courage even to sailors in a storm. “Already my mother had come to me, strong in her piety, following me over land and sea, secure in You against all dangers. For during the hazards at sea she comforted the sailors themselves (to whom inexperienced travelers at sea customarily go for consolation when they become anxious), promising them a safe arrival, because You had promised her this in a vision.”[v]

Augustine reserved his final testimonial to his mother’s spiritual direction for her spiritual conversations with him in her dying days and hours. “Thus we were talking alone together very sweetly, forgetting past events and stretching out to those ahead of us. We were seeking between us in the presence of truth, which You are, to think how the future eternal life of the saints would be, the life ‘which eye has not seen nor ear heard, nor had it entered the heart of man’ (Is. 64:4; 1 Cor. 2:9). We opened wide the mouth of our heart to the supernatural streams of Your fountain, the fountain of life, which is with You, so that being sprinkled from it according to our power of comprehension, w might in some way reflect on so great a thing.”[vi]

Picture it. Mother and son. Leaning on a window, viewing the garden of their house, talking of eternal hope, knowing that she would soon be leaving this world behind. Imagine the encouragement in the midst of sadness that Monica brought her son.

“And when our discussion arrived at the conclusion that the pleasure of the carnal senses, however great it may be, in however great corporeal light, seemed not comparable to the pleasantness of that life, indeed, not even worth speaking about, we raised ourselves by our more ardent passion toward Him, and we gradually traveled through all corporeal things and Heaven itself, whence sun and moon and stars shine above the earth. We were still ascending by our inner reflection and speech. We admired Your words. We came to our minds and transcended them, that we might reach the region of unfailing fruitfulness, where You feed Israel forever with the food of truth . . .”[vii] Nine days later, in the fifty-sixth year of her life, and in the thirty-third year of Augustine’s life, Monica passed from life to death to eternal life.

Augustine expressed his grief mingled with hope. “Then gradually did I call back my earlier feeling for Your handmaid, her devout conversation with You, her gentleness to and compliancy with us in holiness, of which suddenly I was destitute. It was pleasing to weep in Your sight for her and over her, for myself and over myself. And I released the tears which I had restrained, that they might flow as much as they wished, spreading them under my heart, which rested in them, since Your ears were there, not those of a man, who would interpret my weeping in a haughty spirit. And now, Lord, I will confess to You in writing. Let him read it who will, and let him interpret it as he will, and if he finds a sin in my weeping for my mother for a small part of an hour—a mother who was meanwhile dead to my eyes, who had wept over me for many years that I might live in Your eyes—let him not laugh, but rather, if he is a person of lofty charity, let him weep for my sins against You, the Father of all the brothers of Your Christ.”[viii]

Augustine wept. He lost his best spiritual friend. He lost the most important person in his life. He lost the earthly mother who led him to know his heavenly Father. Augustine grieved. But he grieved with hope because Monica had encouraged him with words of life.

[i]Clark, Women in the Early Church, pp. 246-247.
[ii] Ibid., p. 247.
[iii]Ibid., p. 252.
[iv]Ibid., p. 253.
[v]Ibid., p. 247.
[vi]Ibid., p. 254.
[vii]Ibid., pp. 254-255.
[viii]Ibid., pp. 257-258).

Mothers of the Church Fathers, Part 2

When discussing the great Church Fathers, names like the three Cappadocian Fathers (Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus) come to mind, as do John Chrysostom, and Augustine. However, in most cases, we truly have forgotten their mothers: Emmelia, who we just considered; Nonna, the mother of Gregory of Nazianzus; Anthusa, the mother of John Chrysostom; and Monica, the mother of Augustine. It is to this lost tradition that we now turn our attention.

Anthusa: Lamenting Loss, Gripping Grace

Endeared as one of the four great doctors of the Church, John Chrysostom was born in 347 AD in Antioch, Syria and was prepared for a career in law under the renowned Libanius, who marveled at his pupil’s eloquence and foresaw a brilliant career for him as statesman and lawgiver. But John decided, after he had been baptized at the age of twenty-three, to abandon law in favour of service to Christ. In his renowned pulpit ministry, he emerged as “Golden Mouth,” a preacher whose oratorical excellence gained him a reputation throughout the Christian world.

Unfortunately, we know little about John’s upbringing and even less about his mother, Anthusa. What we do know should resonate with every woman who has ever been left bereft of a husband.

Anthusa repeated her story of widowhood to her son when he planned to leave home at age twenty to share a residence with his best friend, Basil. John recounts the scene.

“But the continual lamentations of my mother hindered me from granting him the favor, or rather from receiving this boon at his hands. For when she perceived that I was meditating this step, she took me into her own private chamber, and, sitting near me on the bed where she had given birth to me, she shed torrents of tears, to which she added words yet more pitiable than her weeping, in the following lamentable strain.”[i]

An Emotional EKG

Anthusa then shared and bared her soul.

“My child, it was not the will of Heaven that I should long enjoy the benefit of thy father’s virtue. For his death soon followed the pangs which I endured at thy birth, leaving thee an orphan and me a widow before my time to face all the horrors of widowhood, which only those who have experienced them can fairly understand. For no words are adequate to describe the tempest-tossed condition of a young woman who, having but lately left her paternal home . . . is suddenly racked by an overwhelming sorrow, and compelled to support a load of care too great for her age . . .”[ii]

Though distressing, in many ways hearing Anthusa’s candor is refreshing. Sometimes we have the false impression that the “saints of old” sailed through life’s sorrows without a single word of complaint or even a blip on their emotional EKG. Anthusa reminds us that this is fictitious. She also modeled for us the great Old Testament tradition of lamentation, which is so vital in the sustaining process.

Grace from Above

Anthusa offered insight into the healing process as she shared with her son how she survived and eventually thrived.

“None of these things, however, induced me to enter into a second marriage, or introduce a second husband into thy father’s house: but I held on as I was, in the midst of the storm and uproar, and did not shun the iron furnace of widowhood. My foremost help indeed was the grace from above."[iii]

In the midst of the storm and uproar, our foremost healing help is always grace from above.

[i]John Chrysostom, Treatise on the Priesthood, book 1, paragraph 5, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series I, Vol. IX.
[ii]Ibid.
[iii]Ibid., emphasis added.

Mothers of the Church Fathers, Part 1

Mothers of the Church Fathers, Part 1

When discussing the great Church Fathers, names like the three Cappadocian Fathers (Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus) come to mind, as do John Chrysostom, and Augustine. However, in most cases, we truly have forgotten their mothers: Emmelia, the mother of Gregory of Nyssa; Nonna, the mother of Gregory of Nazianzus; Anthusa, the mother of John Chrysostom; and Monica, the mother of Augustine. It is to this lost tradition that we now turn our attention.

Nonna: Stirring Up the Gift of God

The two brothers, Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa, along with their close friend and fellow theologian, Gregory of Nazianzus, are the principal formulators of the classic doctrine of the Trinity. Gregory of Nazianzus was the son of Gregory and Nonna. He became the Bishop of Constantinople and a preacher of orthodoxy who wrote extensively on both theological and devotional topics. After the victory of Nicene Orthodoxy at the Council of Constantinople I in 381, Gregory of Nazianzus retired as a bishop and led a monastic life.

Long before he became famous, his lesser-known mother guided his spiritual life and that of his father. Nonna was born around 300 AD and passed away on August 5, 374 AD. Gregory described in glowing terms her holiness of life and the beautiful conformity of her actions to the highest standards of Christian excellence.

To her example, aided by her prayers, he ascribed the conversion of his father from a strange medley of paganism and a heretical Christian sect. Unwilling to accept his status as an unbeliever, Nonna “fell before God night and day, entreating for the salvation of her head with many fastings and tears, and assiduously devoting herself to her husband, and influencing him in many ways, by means of reproaches, admonitions, attentions, estrangements, and above all by her own character with its fervour for piety, by which the soul is specially prevailed upon and softened, and willingly submits to virtuous pressure.”[i]

Strong Medicine

When so many Christian wives today struggle with how to relate to a beloved unbelieving husband, Nonna’s example provides hope and direction. She certainly was no “wallflower.” Her method of reconciling combined the strong medicine of reproaches and admonitions with continual doses of character and piety. We see in her example the power of persistent prayer and the plan of God to combine prayer and action in all our reconciling relationships.

Her ministry to her newly saved husband did not end at reconciling. Gregory went so far as to attribute his father’s spirituality and ministry success to Nonna. “But she who was given by God to my father became not only, as is less wonderful, his assistant, but even his leader, drawing him on by her influence in deed and word to the highest excellence; judging it best in all other respects to be overruled by her husband according to the law of marriage, but not being ashamed, in regard to piety, even to offer herself as his teacher.”[ii]

Shepherding the Shepherd

Her spiritual guidance was so extensive and intensive that when Gregory the Elder became a bishop, he learned how to shepherd from her example. At his sister’s funeral, Gregory of Nazianzus said of his father and mother, “This good shepherd was the result of his wife’s prayers and guidance, and it was from her that he learned his ideal of a good shepherd’s life.”[iii] Here we have a Christian wife guiding her husband. More than that, we find a wife teaching her husband how to shepherd. In Church history, women have not taken a back seat to anyone in providing reconciling and guiding.

Nonna’s ministry did not stop with her husband, but continued with her son. Like Hannah with Samuel (1 Samuel 1:1-28), Nonna committed her son to the Lord and His service even before Gregory’s birth. Reflecting on it years later, Gregory noted about his mother, “That which concerns myself is perhaps undeserving of mention, since I have proved unworthy of the hope cherished in regard to me: yet it was on her part a great undertaking to promise me to God before my birth, with no fear of the future, and to dedicate me immediately after I was born. Through God’s goodness has it been that she has not utterly failed in her prayer, and that the auspicious sacrifice was not rejected.”[iv]

What enabled Nonna to maintain such a relentless prayer life? “These were the objects of her prayers and hopes, in the fervour of faith rather than of youth. Indeed, none was as confident of things present as she of things hoped for, from her experience of the generosity of God.”[v] Nonna believed in a good God with a good heart. She knew that her God was a generous rewarder of those who diligently seek Him (Hebrews 11:6). In the ebb and flow of soul care and spiritual direction, Nonna embodied the truth that it is our certainty about God’s generosity that leads to our capacity to minister steadfastly.


[i]Gregory of Nazianzus, Catholic Encyclopedia, “Funeral Oration on His Father,” oration 18, paragraph 11, emphasis added.
[ii]Gregory of Nazianzus, Catholic Encyclopedia, “Funeral Oration on His Sister Gorgonia,” oration 8, paragraph 11, emphasis added.
[iii]Ibid., oration 8, paragraph 5.
[iv]Gregory of Nazianzus, Catholic Encyclopedia, “Funeral Oration on His Father,” oration 18, paragraph 11.
[v]Ibid., paragraph 12.

The Legacy of Macrina the Elder

The Legacy of Macrina the Elder

Macrina the Elder learned the Christian life in the school of suffering. She was born sometime before 270 AD in Neocaesarea in Pontus (Asia Minor). During the persecution of Diocletian, Macrina fled the city with her husband and they lived in hiding in a forest near Pontus for seven years, nearly starving several times.

The family of Macrina is a fitting place to study women soul care-givers and spiritual directors. They are unique in the history of Christianity. Her grandsons, Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa, both Church Fathers, are the most well known of her lineage. However, they are not the sole reason why posterity has long revered Macrina’s family. She nourished three generations of Christian leaders passing the torch of faith from herself to her daughter Emmelia, and then to Emmelia’s children Macrina the Younger, Peter, Basil, and Gregory, all of whom history has honored as saints. Most importantly, “what is pertinent here is the fact that the family recognized the women to be the guides directing them all to their spiritual ends.”[i]

Truth and Life

Her grandson, Basil wrote admiringly of his grandmother’s mentoring. “What clearer proof of our faith could there be than that we were brought up by our grandmother, a blessed woman. I am speaking of the illustrious Macrina, by whom we were taught the words of the most blessed Gregory (Thaumaturgus), which, having preserved until her time by uninterrupted tradition, she also guarded, and she formed and molded me, still a child, to the doctrines of piety.”[ii]

What a fascinating concluding phrase, “formed and molded me . . . to the doctrines of piety.” Macrina’s discipleship model focused not just on doctrine, not just on piety, but on both—truth and life. In this, she followed in the heritage of the Apostle Paul who passed on the faith to Timothy with these words: “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them . . .” (1 Timothy 4:16a, emphasis added).

Like Macrina the Elder, her daughter Emmelia took an active role in the spiritual formation of her children, particularly her firstborn, Macrina the Younger. Gregory of Nyssa tells us in his vita of his sister: “The education of the child was her mother’s task; she did not, however, employ the usual worldly method of education . . . but such parts of inspired Scripture as you would think were incomprehensible to young children were the subject of the girl’s studies; in particular the Wisdom of Solomon, and those parts of it especially which have an ethical bearing. Nor was she ignorant of any part of the Psalter, but at stated times she recited every part of it.” Indeed, “When she rose from bed, or engaged in household duties, or rested, or partook of food, or retired from table, when she went to bed or rose in the night for prayer, the Psalter was her constant companion, like a good fellow-traveler that never deserted her.”[iii]

Like mother, like daughter. Emmelia’s guiding emphasized truth and life by inculcating the “ethical bearing” of Proverbs. She also followed the pedagogical insight and teaching methodology of Deuteronomy 6:7, “Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home, and when you walk along the road, when you lied down and when you get up.”

From Generation to Generation

Her life lessons stuck. Macrina the Younger discipled her younger brother, Peter. She “took him soon after birth from the nurse’s breast and reared him herself and educated him on a lofty system of training, practicing him from infancy in his holy studies” and eventually became “all things to the lad—father, teacher, tutor, mother, giver of all good advice.”[iv]

In turn, Peter applied well his sister’s life lessons. “Scorning to occupy his time with worldly studies, and having in nature a sufficient instructor in all good knowledge, and always looking to his sister as the model of all good, he advanced to such a height of virtue that in his subsequent life he seemed in no whit inferior to the great Basil. But at this time he was all in all to his sister and mother, co-operating with them in the pursuit of the angelic life.”[v] In later years, Peter and Macrina the Younger administered the double monastery at Annesi, discipling yet another generation of young believers.

Again, Macrina’s family followed the discipleship model of the Apostle Paul who exhorted Timothy, “And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others” (2 Timothy 2:2). Macrina the Elder’s family mentored four generations and beyond. Macrina the Elder provided guidance to Emmelia; Emmelia provided spiritual direction to Macrina the Younger; Macrina the Younger discipled Peter; Peter mentored those at the double monastery; and those at the monasteries passed the torch of truth to still others.

[i]Ranft, p. 26.
[ii]Ibid.
[iii]Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Saint Macrina, paragraphs 962c-964a.
[iv]Ibid., paragraph 972c.
[v]Ibid., paragraph 972d.