St Mazota--stepping into the aftermath of divisiveness

December 23rd St. Mazota of Abernethy
2 days left in Celtic Advent

When I first found the miniscule listing about the life of St. Mazota I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do with it. Most of the sites that mention Mazota are one or two-liners. She lived in the 8th century, was either Scots or Scots-Irish and went, along with several other maidens (usually 9 or 18) to live among the Picts and minister to them.

But then, thanks to google's digitalized on-line books I found a book about the "Ancient Church and Parish of Abernethy," written by Dugald Butler in 1897, and it all began to make sense. This requires me, however, to review what I learned about Scottish ecclesiastical history as it relates to Abernethy, which is in Central Scotland. The church in the area traces it's roots to St Ninian, the first missionary to the Picts in the 4th and 5th centuries. There is some tie-in also with the Irish monastery of Kildare, the focal point of St. Brigid's life, with some of her sisters from Kildare apparently having gone on mission to Abernethy. But it was with Columba's founding of the Abbey in Iona (see my post yesterday related to this) that Christianity really began to take off in the area.

Columba sent multiple missionaries to the Picts, converting large segments of the population and building or re-establishing churches. The church at Abernethy came under a Columban influence, and was considered one of the pre-eminent churchs in what was later to become Scotland. This pre-eminence of Abernethy and the influcence of the monks from Iona was not to continue however.

If you have been following this blog, think back (or look back) to Hilda of Whitby on November 17th. Hilda was the abbess who hosted the great synod of Whitby to decide which set of traditions of the church, either that of the Celtic church or that of Rome, was to prevail in the British Isles. The Romans won out.
But it wasn't an over night switch and there was a lot of turmoil in different areas of the Celtic world about this. The Picts held their own Synod late in the 690's to decide if they were going to tow the Roman line as outlined at Whitby. They also, probably for political reasons, voted to go with the Roman rite.

But the monastery at Columba not only held to its Celtic ways but actively tried to persuade many other areas to resist the Roman rites and hierarchy. This led, around 717AD, to the decision of the King of the Northern Picts to expell the Columban monks from his area, including those in Abernethy. The church there dwindled and the high position of the church there passed to Scone and St. Andrew's where it remains. So the climate in the mid 700's around Abernethy was one of fall out from a major church fight. I suspect much of the local populace felt confused or lost spiritually. It was into this situation that we find the nine virgin daughters of St. Donevald, a Scot-Irish hermit whose was living amongst the Picts around Ogilvey.

The most mentioned of the daughters was Mazota. They petitioned the king to set up a hermitage for themselves in the area, where they performed miracles, ministered to the local populace and lived a life of prayer and devotion. (They even, per one source, miraculously drove out group of obnoxious, noisy geese that were disturbing the residents--I know several golfers in Northern Colorado who probably would like Mazota's help when confronted with a flock of Canadians on the fairway.)

This was apparently exactly what this spiritually distraught population of Picts needed. Pilgrimages to the hermitage of the nine virgins increased, and continued to the well of St Mazota even after the deaths of the sisters. Their quiet devotion and sincerity met a need to re-ignite the church in the area.

We seem to be living in the America of 2013-2014 in a time of incredible factionalism. Political ideologies, religious beliefs, opinions about health care, guns laws and methods of oil exploration (fracking in our geographic area) continue to create tensions and arguments. Sometimes there seems to be no middle ground...in the spiritual realm this is particulary frustrating for me as my own church tradition, the Church of England, used to tout itself as the Middle way, the Via Media. But maybe I let myself get carried about by the arguing and posturing. Maybe what is important is the way of Mazota, which seems not disimilar now that I think about it, to the way of Mother Teresa of Calcutta: don't get to concerned with ideologies, just serve the people who need help and be Christ to them.

I think for the rest of Advent and the following 12 days of Christmas, I will turn off CNN and the McLaughlin report. (I still might sneak a look at John Stewart once and a while). Instead I will continue to focus on my own mission...am I walking my talk, and being the kind of Christian that a Celtic saint like Mazota would have approved of.

Lord, I know there will always be strife and human arguments, including in the church. Guide me, in the season of peace, to be centered, like Mazota and her sisters, in Your Peace, and trust that You are guiding us in the way that will most serve Your desires. Amen.