The Faithful Forebearers

Today we will learn about our most famous forebearer yet: Francis of Assisi, also known simply as St. Francis. He is a man who was devoted to simplicity, poverty, nature, and most of all, his faith. He’s pretty hard not to like, which is why he was so honored then, and still is today.

Today we will discover a woman who defies categorization. Hildegard was a mystic, a theologian, an administrator, a composer, a playwright and a doctor. And she did all of this in the 1100s.

This episode we will discover the 10th Century playwright Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim. She is very distinguished as being both the first known Christian playwright, and the first known female playwright. She is also credited with bringing theatre back into the western world.

This episode we will jump ahead a little bit, to the 1000s. We’ll take a look at a great scholar, Anselm, the first of the “Scholastics” theologians. Anselm enjoyed diving deep into theology, but often was distracted by the new overlords of England, the Normans.

This episode we will look at two missionary brothers in the mid 800s AD.  These two brothers were born in the Byzantine Empire, and would have adventures throughout the known world. Due in great part to these brothers’ efforts, Christianity would spread through the Slavic world.

https://faithfulforebearers.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/John-of-Damascus-1.1-Normalized-and-fixed.mp3 In this episode we are going east, all the way to Syria.  Here we will meet John Mansur, more commonly known as John of Damascus.  We’ll see how John was a brilliant and brave writer, preacher, and poet.  And we’ll see why he is sometimes called “The Last Church...

This episode we will look at Alcuin, the great teacher of Charlemagne’s court, and the key part of a mini renaissance that took place in the late 700s and early 800s under Charlemagne’s reign.  We will see how he spread the learning from England all across Europe, and became good friends with the king and the whole royal family.

This Episode we will look at a student of the schools and monasteries of Theodore, a missionary named Boniface.  He will be very successful in his work, as he will become known as the “Apostle of Germany.”  He was joined by many other missionaries, including his niece, Leoba, who would become famous in her own right.

This episode we will look at the missionary work that Gregory started in England last episode.  We will see how these 3 men helped England move from paganism to Christianity, and how they turned England from a backwater corner of Europe, to the leader of European scholarship.

In this episode we look at Gregory the Great (540-604).  We’ll see how Gregory led the church from collapsing to thriving, and from the ancient world to the medieval world.