In message <v01510100ae67cdd56f15@[199.224.71.191]>, Richard Chapin
<[log in to unmask]> writes
>To add to the info. requested about St. Ambrose, from "The Calendar of
>Saints", etc.:
>He was such an excellent Roman governor (Ligouria) that, when the old
>bishop died, he went to the election and a child called out "Abrose for
>Bishop!"; then all the people in the cathedral demanded that he become
>their Bishop.  Not yet baptized as a Christian, he finally agreed, gave the
>governing over to his brother and his property to charity, and studied for
>baptism, diaconate, priesthood and episcopate.  He drove out the Arian
>heretics, reproved vice, tended the sick and redeemed captives.  He wrote
>many works about the Faith, and the Incarnation.  When the Emperor allowed
>a massacre of 7,000 people, Ambrose excommunicated him until he had done
>public penance.  Ambrose's most famous convert was St. Augustine.  It is
>claimed that his relics are in the Church of San Ambrogio in Milan.
>
>Can't find the reference now, but recall something about a legend that he
>had something to do with a beehive as a young child, and was not harmed by
>the bees.  His statues and his likenesses on holy cards usually have a skep
>at his feet, and he is considered the Patron Saint of all beekeepers.
>I'll bet Larry Connors has a book about him :)
>
>  (\
> {|||8-
>  (/
You were asking about Saint Ambrose. Here are a few facts about his
life.
 
He was born in Gaul, where his father was highly placed as a praetorian
prefect.  There is a story associated with his childhood that, as he lay
asleep in a court of his father's palace, a swarm of bees flew around
his cradle, some of them creeping in and out of his open mouth, before
rising up and flying away.  This was seen as an omen of his future
greatness and eloquence - sweet words would come out of his mouth. (The
same story is told of Plato.)
 
After his father's death the family returned to Italy, where he
practiced law in the Roman Courts and about the year 370 he was
appointed governor of the province of which Milan was the capital.
About this time he became a catechumen, which is the stage where one
receives instruction in the Christian faith before being baptised.  In
374 the see of Milan became vacant.  It had been usurped and held
tyrannically for almost 20 years by Auxentius, an Arian (a heresy which
denied the true divinity of jesus Christ).  milan was now torn apart by
the two factions, with some clergy and laity wanting another Arian
bishop, whilst others wanted one who was a main stream catholic.
 
As  governor, Ambrose felt it his duty to go to the church where the
assembly was being held, where he urged both parties to proceed
peaceably to the election of a new bishop.  The story goes that, while
he was still speaking, a child cried out "Ambrose Bishop" - a cry which
was taken up by the whole assembly.  Ambrose wanted to decline the call,
fleeing and hiding, but he could not escape.  He was baptised, and
shortly afterwards, on 7th December 373, he was consecrated Bishop.
His 22 years as Bishop of Milan (he died on 4 April 397 ) were busy
ones. He instructed the flood of new converts to Christianity, and at
the same time withstood paganism and Arianism.  When a group of senators
wanted to have a statue of the goddess of victory restored to the senate
house in Rome, Ambrose intervened and persuaded the young emperor
Valentinian II not to give permission. Latwer, when the empress- regent,
Justina, ordered him to hand over a building to the Arians for a church
he refused.
He was the first teacher in the west to make extensive use of hymns,
both as a means of praise and of instruction.
 His literary works have been acclaimed as masterpieces of Latin
eloquence, and his musical accomplishments are remembered in his hymns.
Ambrose is also remembered as the teacher who converted and baptized St.
Augustine of Hippo, the great Christian theologian, and as a model
bishop who viewed the church as rising above the ruins of the Roman
Empire.
Ambrose's reputation after his death was unchallenged. For Augustine, he
was the model bishop: a biography was written in 412 by Paulinus, deacon
of Milan, at Augustine's instigation. To Augustine's opponent, Pelagius,
Ambrose was "the flower of Latin eloquence." Of his sermons, the
Expositio evangelii secundum Lucam (390; "Exposition of the Gospel
According to Luke") was widely circulated. Yet, Ambrose is a Janus-like
figure. He imposed his will on emperors. But he never considered himself
as a precursor of a polity in which the church dominated the state: for
he acted from a traditional fear that Christianity might yet be eclipsed
by a pagan nobility and Catholicism uprooted in Milan by Arian
courtiers. His attitude to the learning he used was similarly old-
fashioned. Pagans and heretics, he said, "dyed their impieties in the
vats of philosophy"; yet his sermons betray the pagan mysticism of
Plotinus in its most unmuted tints. In a near-contemporary mosaic in the
chapel of S. Satiro in the church of S. Ambrogio, Milan, Ambrose appears
as he wished to be seen: a simple Christian bishop clasping the book of
Gospels. Yet the manner in which he set about his duties as a bishop
ensured that, to use his own image, the Catholic Church would rise "like
a growing moon" above the ruins of the Roman Empire.
 
Here ends the Lesson
Very best regards
Allister C. Guy
Secretary
Edinburgh and Midlothian
Beekeepers Association.
 
--
Allister C. Guy
 
--
Allister C. Guy