Today is St Bartholomew's Day (the only apostle who doesn't have an Anglican church in Sydney named after him). Being the feast of St Bart makes today the anniversary of the massacre in France 435 years ago (1572), when thousands upon thousands of protestant Christians (the Huguenots) were massacred by their fellow French-men. Although occurring at the height of the French religious war, which was to linger on almost to 1600, the massacre was the straw that broke the camel's back for French protestantism. Although winning official tolerance with the ascension of Henry IV, the Huguenots were became weak, divided and within one hundred years of the Edict of Nancy, the French Protestants were outlawed and force to flee to other European countries and South Africa.
Remember the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre. It was so horrendous that even Ivan the Terrible of
Russia is said to have denounced it.France today is a country that has a deep need Spirit of God to work at work in transforming people's lives. 70% of the national is (nominally) Roman Catholic, 10% is Muslim, and less than 3% would describe themselves as evangelical Christian. Please pray for the Lord of the Harvest to raise up laborers to work in the Harvest. Please pray that communities of the risen Lord Christ would be gathered together and shine the light of the gospel into France - the gospel that brings new life, new meaning, new hope and new creation.
4 comments:
St Bartholomew's Prospect Hill, although now not used as a place of worship, was once well within the Sydney Diocese! It's the spooky church on the hill on your way from the city to the mountains along the M4 as you pass Blacktown.
Hey Marty - I know about the old St Bart's, stuck between the M4 and the Great Western Highway. But it isn't consecrtaed any more, so I don't think it counts.
There is a St Thaddeus' Anglican Church?
(And don't you go running to St Jude's Dural!)
I was planning to go running to St Judes Dural. I think when I checked that fact out, I was under the impression that Jude and Thaddaeus were the one and the same person.
What about St Jude's Bowral. Surely he must be the Jude who isn't the brother of Jesus.
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