I enjoyed a conversation about saints with my sister (-in-law) Irena and her boyfriend Tim Friday night. She raised several interesting objections to the veneration of and attempted communion with the saints. I think it helped me clarify my thoughts about how saints help some folks identify spiritually. Today's saints, Gervase and Protase, are a helpful example.
But first, let's cover what little is known about them. They were twin sons of martyrs, perhaps the first martyrs of Milan. Their bodies were revealed to St. Ambrose of Milan by a vision -- they were dug up and translated to the cathedral, where they remain preserved in the crypt with Ambrose (at his request). The photo shows them.
Now to consider how saints are helpful. First, I think that some folks find an omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and eternal God too remote. How can an infinite being with a universal plan be interested in my particular concerns? Why would a God that allows tsunamis and plagues and genocide care if I had a rash or a fever or a stutter? However, someone whose experience was human may well care. He could relate, and if he has already secured his spot in the House of the Lord forever, he might put in a good word for me. In this way, designating these saints as helping with the discovery of thieves provides a religious venue for a concern somewhat below God's cares. I suspect this stems from the inability to fathom the fully divine and the need for intercession. Not all folks feel this, but this is a comfort for those who do.
Second, in a very practical way, the saints provided a bridge to help polytheists embrace Christianity. The Ice Saints (Mamertus, Pancras, and Servatius, maybe with Boniface and Sophia) are a good example, all standing in for German deities. Protase and Gervase became identified with the Greek polytheist myth of Castor and Pollux.
A related third use is that invented saints can become palimpsests for the classic stories of polytheistic traditions. Just as Beowulf had a layer of Christianity laid over it to improve its acceptability to the monastic copyists and later to the Church censors, so too did other stories survive through Christianized retellings. I don't mean to imply that the early monasteries needed something Christianized in order to preserve it -- in truth, they copied just about everything they could from Greek and Roman civilizations, which is much to their credit. But their desire to make all things for Christ led to saintly versions of pre-Christian myths.
A fourth use of saints, perhaps the earliest and closest to the Jewish side of the Christian practice, is the role model. For some Christians, especially those of the blended Protestant traditions, saints are just exemplars of religious virtue. The Puritans desired all covenanted Church members to live as saints, and they referred to the best among them as Visible Saints.
There is not a single, doctrinal demand for the use of the saints. There is doctrine, of course, among the churches that have doctrine. But no Christian is obligated to venerate saints, to bow before icons, or to wear iconic images. As with Hinduism and Shinto, some find it useful to connect with particular aspects or avatars of the universal Oversoul while others prefer to connect directly.
As a twenty-first century New Englander, I feel that toleration of the other person's path to the Divine is a more important indicator of spiritual enlightenment than either a scrupulous adherence to the Second Commandment or a slavish devotion to a pantheon of demi-gods.
That part of the Apostle's Creed always struck as deserving careful exegesis. My Latin was never any good and as the old Roman insult used to go I "have no Greek", but here are a few things that deserve some thought in the wee hours of the morning:
ReplyDelete1) "sanctorum communionem" might translate better as communion OF the saints than as communion WITH the saints.
2) in the Greek version, "αγίων κοινωνίαν" might translate better as holy communion which yet a third possibility for what was really meant.
This raises a series of concerns:
a) metaphysically, communion OF the saints might imply an intermediate collective state that is supra-human but short of absolute identity with the Godhead. Other references and early art suggest as much.
b) in the alternative meaning of communion WITH the saints, was this meant in the intercessory sense and if so why wasn't it plainly stated as such or with clearer declension? Same would apply to a fraternal communion meaning such as "communion of the faithful" or "fellowship of the believers" which could be better rendered in Latin.
c) finally if a profession of belief in holy communion, then it would be a reiteration of the transcendence of sacramental communion and not just with the saints.