20th June, 2009 - Posted by Archbishop Mark - 1 Comment
The island of Rhodes has a long and colourful history, much of which is on show as you stroll through the town and visit its monuments as we did today. In places like Rhodes, you realise that the ancient world didn’t vanish. It may have been demolished in a sense, but the bits and pieces were all gathered up and reconfigured in later times. We have no idea, for instance, what happened to the Colossus of Rhodes after its destruction in an earthquake well before the Christian era. It was so huge (and even huger if we includes pedestals etc) that it couldn’t simply have vanished. In all likelihood, its many fragments were reincorporated in various ways into the town we now see. It’s the same with the pagan gods. They didn’t vanish; they were reconfigured.
23rd June, 2009 - Posted by Pilgrims - No Comments
From Neil:
Comment from Neil at the end of the day “We have just had one of our major exeperiences as we visited the monasteries of Meteora” (see “Messages”)
From Ted:
From Fr Warrick Tonkin
After the majesty of the monastic communities of Meteroea we are now traversing the central Macedonia, the home territory of Phillip and Alexander the Great. St. Paul knew this area well. While we are travelling by air-conditioned coach, Paul went on foot, and the landscape is far from flat. The apostle to the Gentiles was nothing if not fit. Soon we will celebrate Mass at Berea, where Paul also stopped and preached.
24th June, 2009 - Posted by Archbishop Mark - No Comments
We have made it to the edge of Europe - or at least to the edge of Europe as the Roman Empire understood it. We are at Kavala which used to be Neapolis, the port at which Paul first set foot upon the soil west of the Dardanelles (or the Hellespont as it was the called). This is the thin stretch of water which separated Roman Europe from the province of Asia Minor which included much of the western part of Turkey. Not far from here was the city of Philippi where Paul founded his first European community.
In the Acts of the Apostles, we’re told that Paul came here after a vision of a Macedonian man pleading that Paul come across the water to help them. The vision was convenient because it certainly matched Paul’s sense that he had received a divine commission to preach the Gospel where no-one else had been. At this stage, Christianity had certainly reached Rome, though we’re not too sure how and when. But Macedonia was virgin territory for Christian missionary work.
Whatever about the vision, the decision to launch a European mission was a huge one for Paul and his team. I can imagine long team meetings discussing the pros and cons. Then once the decision was made, there must have been more meetings discussing the strategy - who would go where and when and how they would operate once they reached European soil. The risks were enormous. How would they be received? What if the whole thing came to nothing? Would they even survive, given the likelihood of persecution? What would the Church in Jerusalem think? What would be the response of Paul’s opponents who had created such havoc in Asia Minor? These were surely some of the questions that Paul, Silvanus and Timothy discussed. (more…)
