What the Theologians Say 8

Bede, 672/673 – 26 May 735, also known as Saint Bede or the Venerable Bede, an English monk at the monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth and the monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow, Tyne and Wear, (both of which were then in the Kingdom of Northumbria) is well known as an author and scholar. His most famous work, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (The Ecclesiastical History of the English People) gained him the title ‘The Father of English History’. In 1899, Bede was made a Doctor of the Church by Pope Leo XIII; he is the only native of Great Britain to achieve this title. He was a skilled linguist and translator - his work made the Latin and Greek writings of the early Church Fathers more accessible to his fellow Anglo-Saxons, contributing significantly to English Christianity. Here is some of his wisdom:

He alone loves the Creator perfectly who manifests a pure love for his neighbor.

We abide in God insofar as we do not sin.

Unfurl the sails, and let God steer us where He will.

I think the Mother is gradually revealing itself to me and taking over. But it is not the Mother alone. It is the Mother and the Father, the male and the female, sort of gradually having their marriage.

The ultimate Mystery of being, the ultimate Truth, is Love. This is the essential structure of reality. When Dante spoke of the 'love which moves the sun and the other stars', he was not using a metaphor, but was describing the nature of reality. There is in Being an infinite desire to give itself in love and this gift of Self in love is for ever answered by a return of love....and so the rhythm of the universe is created.

This life of man appears for a short space, but of what went before, or what is to follow, we are utterly ignorant.

I was no longer the centre of my life and therefore I could see God in everything.

The inspiration came suddenly again to surrender to the Mother. It was quite unexpected: And so somehow I made a surrender to the Mother. Then I had an experience of overwhelming love. Waves of love sort of flowed into me.

All the ways of this world are as fickle and unstable as a sudden storm at sea.