It is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception (depicted above on church vestments) for Roman Catholics around the world. Today, according to the feast, the Virgin Mary was conceived by Saints Joachim and Anna; and although the rest of us inherit original sin through being conceived in an act of passion, Mary escaped this handicap as her parents were either enabled to have sex without enjoying it at all, or conceived Mary just by kissing. The Catholic Church has gone it alone in defining this peculiar doctrine so intimately. There is nothing quite like it in Orthodoxy, or in any other Church tradition. Appropriately, the feast is exactly nine months before the Feast of the Nativity of Mary on 8 September.
John and Betty Stam, American missionaries in China, were murdered by Communist soldiers during the Chinese Civil War today in 1934. They had arrived at their mission station in what is now Jingde a few weeks earlier, with their baby daughter Helen. When the city fell into Communist hands on 6 December, all three of them were captured and imprisoned. Two days later, John and Betty were beheaded, along with a Chinese Christian shopkeeper who tried to save them. But before she was killed, Betty hid her daughter in a sleeping bag, where she was found by an evangelist, Lo, who took her to safety in a mission hospital.
‘Things happened so quickly this a.m. They were in the city just a few hours after the ever-persistent rumors really became alarming, so that we could not prepare to leave in time. We were just too late. The Lord bless and guide you, and as for us, may God be glorified whether by life or by death.’ John Stam, letter hidden with his baby daughter, 1934
The flag of Europe, sporting a circle of 12 golden stars on a blue background, was adopted today in 1955. One theory for the origin of the design is that it was lifted, consciously or subconsciously, from images of the Virgin Mary with a crown of stars surrounding her head. The depiction is drawn from the Book of Revelation which describes ‘a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head.’
Richard Baxter, the English Puritan theologian and hymn writer, died today in 1691. He was a moderate dissenter from the Church of England, setting his face against the ‘breakers’ and ‘fanaticks’ who loved causing separation and division, but also against the conformists who betrayed their principles so they could gain promotion and influence in the Church. He was imprisoned several times towards the end of his life for his beliefs. Baxter coined the phrase ‘mere Christianity’ some 250 years before CS Lewis popularised it.
‘I am a Christian, a Meer Christian, of no other Religion; and the Church that I am of is the Christian Church, and hath been visible wherever the Christian Religion and Church hath been visible: But must you know what Sect or Party I am of? I am against all Sects and dividing Parties: But if any will call Meer Christians by the name of a Party, because they take up with meer Christianity, Creed, and Scripture, and will not be of any dividing or contentious Sect, I am of that Party which is so against Parties.’ Richard Baxter, Church-History, 1680
Today in 1869 the First Vatican Council was officially opened by Pope Pius IX. With 744 members, it was the largest ecumenical council yet. It was also the longest-awaited, coming 300 years after the Council of Trent, which had met in the 1560s. It is best known for agreeing that the Pope is infallible, which might have meant that the council was effectively voting for its own abolition, since Popes alone could decide Church doctrine from now on. However, the council was eventually succeeded almost 100 years later by the Second Vatican Council, which met in the 1960s.
Image: Lawrence OP / CC BY-NC 2.0