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Rev. Meg Barnhouse
March 17, 2019
First UU Church of Austin
4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756
www.austinuu.org
The Celts developed a Christianity that was intricately intertwined with the earth based faith of the land. Friendlier toward the body, toward women, and celebrating good beer, the Celts’ version of Christianity might be a delightful and refreshing insight into other possibilities than those some of us were raised with.
Call to Worship
M Scott Mumaday
“To encounter the sacred is to be alive at the deepest center of human existence. Sacred places are the truest definitions of the earth; they stand for the earth immediately and forever; they are its flags and shields. If you would know the earth for what it really is, learn it through its sacred places. At Devil’s Tower or Canyon de Chelly or the Cahokia Mounds, you touch the pulse of the living planet; you feel its breath upon you. You become one with a spirit that pervades geologic time and space.”
Reading
– Barbara Brown Taylor, Learning to Walk in the Dark
“Later, when I stood in front of an alter waving incense, I would remember standing in front of the bar at Dante’s waving cigarette smoke out of my face, and the exact same feeling of tenderness would wash over me, because the people in both places were so much alike. We were all seeking company, meaning, solace, self-forgetfulness. Whether we found those things or not, it was the seeking that led us to find each other in the cloud even when we had nothing else in common. Sometimes I wondered if it even mattered if our communion cups were filled with consecrated wine or draft beer, as long as we bent over them long enough to recognize each other as kin.”
Sermon
I arise today, through
The strength of heaven,
The light of the sun,
The radiance of the moon,
The splendor of fire,
The speed of lightning,
The swiftness of wind,
The depth of the sea,
The stability of the earth,
The firmness of rock.
I arise today, through
God’s strength to pilot me,
God’s might to uphold me,
God’s wisdom to guide me,
God’s eye to look before me,
God’s ear to hear me,
God’s word to speak for me,
God’s hand to guard me,
God’s shield to protect me,
God’s host to save me
From snares of devils,
From temptation of vices,
From everyone who shall wish me ill,
afar and near.
St. Patrick is said to have brought Christianity to Ireland, but it was already there when he got there. There was also a robust paganism. The word “pagan” just means “the religion of the countryside.” People traveled a lot in those days too, and the Celtic peoples were, at one time, living in northern Europe and France, and got driven up into England, Scotland and Wales by the encroachment of the Roman Empire. In the year 313, as you all know, Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire, By the fifth century, though, the empire was falling apart, and people in the far-from-Rome fringes of the empire were feeling freer to return to their pagan practices.
The man we know as St. Patrick was born to Roman parents who were probably functionaries for the Emperor in England. When he was 16, the story goes, he was kidnapped from his village by Irish invaders. Other people say he may have gone to Ireland himself because he didn’t want to become a tax collector like his father. His story is that he was enslaved as a shepherd for a tribal chieftan, starved and naked. He said he escaped with the help of God, traveled back to England, and became a priest. In middle age he requested to go back to Ireland, and began preaching Christianity.
Most of the people in Ireland were Celts, part of a vast group of tribes who had swept westward from Turkey (some say from India) through central Europe and into Gaul. The Romans called the Celts “Galli, and the Greeks called them “Keltoi.” Some say these were the Galatians to whom St Paul’s letter to the Galatians was written. They were fierce warriors whose men and women both fought in battle, naked, with their hair bleached with lime and spiked, sometimes with their bodies painted blue. Their religion was one of warrior-heroes, who were gods and human, both at the same time and in-between. When you died you went under the hills with the fairy-folk, who were able to pass between the world of the spirits and the human world. The Celtic gods were not particularly loving or kind, they were tricky and mean. The Roman historians claimed the Celts practiced human sacrifice. Other sources say that was propaganda. We do know they liked to cut off their enemies’ heads in battle, after which they would take the head home to its niche in the dining hall and on special occasions the heads were thought to have the power of speech. There were spirits in the rocks and trees, spirits in wells and springs, in animals and in the ocean.
Remember, the divinities were tricky and a bit capricious, so the spirits too, needed appeasing. The ones who were experts in this were the Druids. The Druids were a learned group of people in whose care was the oral tradition and knowledge of each tribe and clan. They frowned on writing, some say, but others say their writing was just secret. Tales of heroes were memorized and sung by the bard-druids, who were said to have the power of healing, killing in their poetry. The Bards would watch the court and write songs about the royals. They would observe battles from afar and write songs and poems about the bravery of their side. The Druids spoke in code and riddles, and took great delight in confusing and confounding rivals in riddle “slams.” In one old story, one Druid so overwhelmed and amazed his competitor that the loser just dropped dead.
It was into this arena that Patrick came. Familiar with the Irish language and culture, Patrick chose not to try to eradicate native Irish beliefs. Instead, he would incorporate traditional ritual into his lessons of Christianity. He used bonfires to celebrate Easter since the Irish were used to honoring their gods with fire. Holy wells were honored, and the churches were built next to them or on top of them. He also superimposed a sun, a powerful Irish symbol, onto the Christian cross to create what is now called a Celtic cross, so that veneration of the symbol would seem more natural to the Irish.
The Druids fought him, but the people took to his Christianity easily. They were primed for the message. They were used to all the paradoxes in Christianity. They were used to warriors who were divine and human, so they didn’t have a problem grasping that about Jesus. They were used to the idea of living forever, so they grasped that easily. They were used to the triple-faced goddess, the hag, the mother, and the maiden, so the trinity of father, son and Holy Spirit was not a new one. The reason we have three-leafed clovers on St. Patrick’s Day is that he used the three-leafed clover to explain the trinity to the people. Many of the Druids became the first priests.
The reason I wanted to talk about Celtic Christianity today is that it is a different kind of Christianity from the Roman version that so influences even Protestant churches today. The world-denying, flesh-is-evil, women are awful, sexuality is sin Christianity that took over for such a long time came from St. Augustine of Hippo. He was an African man whose mom was Christian, but he didn’t want any part of it. He had a mistress for 15 years who bore him a son, but then he got converted. His sexuality gave him the most trouble in his desire to become a spiritual person, he felt, so he became extremely anti-sexual. Anti-woman. He talked a lot about “concupiscience” the way that Original Sin is passed into the Human race. It seems the more lust one feels at the time of conceiving a child, the more Original Sin. the child has. So the best thing to do is not feel much passion at any time. That way you rid the human race of original sin. The Roman way took over Ireland eventually, but for a while the religion was world-embracing. Women were leaders in the faith, dancing and good beer was celebrated in ritual and song.
How did they escape that twistedness for a few centuries? Bad manners. A different Augustine was sent by Pope Gregory to convert the pagan Anlgo-Saxons, and he was installed as Archbishop of Canturbury. The Celtic bishops traveled to see him , first asking a wise hermit if they should follow him. “If he is of God, follow him,” the wise man said. “How will we know?” “If he rises courteously to greet you, then he is of God. If he is rude and proud, he is not. Augustine did not rise, insisted the Celts change their customs to concur with those of Rome, and lost the attention of the Celts that way.
So the Celtic Christians kept a love of creation, an acceptance of sexuality, and a respect for women unlike their Continental brothers and sisters in the church. Creation had a soul. Now some Christians are coming back to this in the church. Matthew Fox and his Creation Spirituality, Teilhard de Chardin saying “Every atom has consciousness” , Martin Buber saying we should have an “I- Thou” relationship with all of creation rather than an “I- it” relationship. There are movements within contemporary liberal Christianity that echo back to Celtic earth-loving green Christianity. Maybe the Christians and the pagans can sit down together after all and drink meade and ale in the halls of the believers in the summerland.
The Abess Brigid’s Grace
I should like a great lake of ale,
For the King of kings,
I should like a table of the choicest food
For the family of heaven.
Let the ale be made from the fruits of faith,
And the food be forgiving love.
I should welcome the poor to my feast,
For they are God’s children,
I should welcome the sick to my feast,
For they are God’s joy.
Let the poor sit with Jesus at the highest place,’
And the sick dance with the angels.
God bless the poor,
God bless the sick
And bless our human race.
God bless our food
God bless our drink,
All homes O God, embrace.
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