184 comments on “2013 Bracket -- Accepting Nominations!”

1. I'd like to nominate Saint Kassiani, a Byzantine abbess, poet, composer, and hymnographer who most notably authored the Hymn of Kassiani, sung every Holy Wednesday in the Orthodox church. She had a fascinating personal life, coupled with great talent.

2. Nominees for 2013 (hoping for at least 2 out of 5 🙂 )
   1. Madeleine L'Engle
   2. St. Hilda, Abbess of Whitby
   3. Felicity
   4. St. Augustine of Canterbury
   5. Titus

   Thank you!

3. And just for fun, St. Cornelys, patron saint of horned cattle, who still has a sacred fountain in the wilds of Brittany.

4. Support for Martin Luther, JS Bach, St. Swithin and St Guinefort

5. I just read a very good BBC article about US Army Chaplain Father Emil Kapaun, being considered both for sainthood and the Congressional Medal of Honor. It's an amazing story of bravery and being the face of Christ under horrific conditions.

   1. Definitely! Fr. Kapaun's story should be much better known.

6. Frances Perkins
   Augustine of Canterbury
   Florence Li Tim-Oi
   Anne Hutchinson
   Eric Liddell
   Martin Luther King Jr.
   George
   Johann Sebastian Bach
   Alfred the Great
   Richard Hooker
   Samuel Seabury
   Stephen
   Æthelthryth (Etheldreda)
   John the Evangelist

7. I nominate Julian of Norwich, Claire of Assisi, and Jonathan Daniels.

8. I nominate Faustina Kowalska

9. I nominate Abraham Lincoln. To quote from J.H. Holland in Henry Ketcham's "The Life of Abraham Lincoln": "He had a tenderly, brotherly regard for every human being; and the thought of oppression was torment to him... A statesman without a statesman's craftiness, a politician without a politician's meanness, a great man without a great man's vices, a philanthropist without a philanthropist's impracticable dreams, a Christian without pretensions, a ruler without pride of place and power, an ambitious man without selfishness, and a successful man without vanity."

10. Clare of Assisi, the other Francis.
    Since you won't allow my guy.

11. Wow...I hope either the rate of these comments slows down for you guys. or that you have an army of minions to sort through the nominations. (I am seeing dozens of cassock-and-cotta-clad persons hunched over computers, hitting control+f and filling out spreadsheets...or some such.) It's going to be a long haul til February!

12. Great list, already.
    Happy to see Jonathan Daniels and Madeleine L'Engle on the list of potentials. Frances Perkins' story should be better known and now it is.

13. Samuel Isaac Joseph Scherechewsky, Cuthbert, Mary of Egypt

14. I nominate Saint Cainnech of Aghaboe (515/16–600), also known as Saint Canice in Ireland, Saint Kenneth in Scotland, Saint Kenny and in Latin Saint Canicus.
    I wish to second the nomination of Jonathan Daniels.

15. I nominate Dympna, patron saint of epileptics and the insane.

16. I nominate Alfred the Great, King of the West Saxons. It’s easy to think that he lived in a simpler world, to romanticize the ninth century and see it as a time of short lives, hard labor, and communal values. The people of Wessex were mostly farmers, except for the thegns who lived with the king, and except for the monks, although many of these weren’t adverse to tilling their own lands. These monks had much to worry about, as had everyone else. Terrible news came repeatedly from the east of England. The Vikings were invading in great hordes, toppling the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and burning the monasteries. The poor monks must have heard about the deaths of their friends and brothers with great regularity, and their mourning must have been increased when they were told that the monasteries in the east had been burned to the ground, that the holy relics and worship objects had been lost or defiled, and, most terrible of all, that the books had been burned or torn to pieces. These books were of vital importance, since the monks kept the only repositories of knowledge in England. Often they were the only ones who could read. They had access to the golden legacy of all the human thoughts and hopes that had come before, and because of this, they had a sense of the diversity of the world beyond their own small kingdoms. The deprivations of the Vikings brought a very real narrowing to the Anglo-Saxon’s sense of what it meant to be a human being.

    There had been large Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, but Wessex was not one of them. It had been a client kingdom of Mercia, to the north. But Mercia soon fell to the Vikings, just like everywhere else. Wessex stood alone. Some historians say that leadership isn’t important in history, that the story of humankind is determined by vast material and economic forces, even geologic forces from time to time. Wessex stands as a counter argument. It was small and unimportant, but it had the advantage of a wise king, Aethelwulf, who may have been a monk before he got married. Aethelwulf had five sons, and when he died these sons, adopting the wisdom of their father, decided that the inheritance would pass between them, since they didn’t want to endanger Wessex by allowing one of their young children to inherit the crown. In ten years, three of the brothers became king and then died while battling the vikings. In this way, the crown finally came to Alfred in the year 871. He was twenty-one years old. The year before he had distinguished himself in battle by defeating the Vikings at Ashdown. He understood that his kingship had one great task before it. He had to defeat his powerful enemy and somehow preserve his tiny kingdom. Wessex had every military disadvantage. It had no navy, and the Vikings terrorized the coast with their long ships. The fighting men of Wessex were also farmers, and as they marched and trained they worried about their crops, and about getting in the harvest so that their wives and children wouldn’t starve during the long winter. If the Vikings happened to attack at harvest time, Alfred’s army had a tendency to drift away, as the men laid down their spears and picked up their scythes to work in the fields.

    The first seven years of Alfred’s reign didn’t go particularly well. The Vikings raided repeatedly and then, in 878, they launched an all-out attack, led by the ferocious King Guthrum. They penetrated into the kingdom and seized one of Alfred’s palaces at Chippenham. The West Saxons fled before them. Alfred himself fled into the Sedgemoor Marshes, to an island fastness with the charming name of Burrow Mump. He was accompanied by a rag-tag group of thegns and refugee monks, and as he wandered through his remaining kingdom, organizing a guerrilla resistance, he was often alone. He was so threadbare and bedraggled that a woman living in the swamp mistook him for an ordinary traveller, and set him the task of watching some cakes she had cooking on the hearth while she went outside to cut more firewood. The king, preoccupied with the task of saving his kingdom, stared into space and didn’t notice the cakes burning. When the housewife came in she roundly berated him. This story got about, and the West Saxon’s grew in affection for their king. Here was a man who was humble enough that the lowliest of his subjects could yell and scream at him, while he sat quietly and admitted his wrong. But here was a man who was also strong enough that he could gather together an army at Burrow Mump, and lead them out to fight the Vikings. He met the Viking horde on the northern edge of Salisbury plain, drove his troops between them, divided their forces, and defeated them. The Vikings went fleeing back to Chippenham. Alfred followed and lay siege, and the Vikings soon surrendered. Alfred made peace, and became his enemy Guthrum’s godfather when the Viking king was baptized soon afterwards.

    England was split in two, with the Vikings controlling the east and north, and Alfred controlling the west and south. Now that he had peace and stability, his first concern was how to maintain it. He called upon European allies to supply him with the expertise to build a navy. And he created a system of forts, called burhs, which could defend the land. These burhs didn’t have permanent garrisons, but were defended by the people who lived around them. They were places that the people could flee to in times of danger. They were also the places where the people held their markets, and these burhs became some of the most important cities in England. Alfred reorganized his army by creating a rotating system of service. When the army was called up, half of it stayed at home for part of the year, working the land, and then rotated into the ranks so that the other half could go home to plow or harvest. These changes gave the West Saxons a tenacious strength and a stable environment in which to work and raise their children.

    It also gave them the chance to reinvigorate learning. Alfred was a devout Christian who enjoyed spending time with the monks, and it was through their influence that he came to learn Latin and prioritize scholarship in general. Once he had turned his mind to learning, he was surprised to find how many of his people were illiterate, and how few books there were in his kingdom. The church services were in Latin, and few people understood what was going on. Alfred set about the task of translating many of the great philosophical and theological classics into the Anglo-Saxon tongue. He himself undertook some of these translations. He also created an enduring record of the social and economic status of his kingdom. He had monks keep careful records in their separate monasteries, and these records collectively became the Anglo-Saxon chronicle.

    He did all of this while living the everyday life of a human being, and the occasionally vexatious life of a leader. His times were no simpler than our own. They were in many ways harder, involving a life and death struggle against the Vikings, not to mention against disease and agricultural disaster. And through it all, people were still people. They still squabbled and fought over unimportant things. They still hurt each other intentionally or unintentionally. They still clung to their petty privileges and cared more about status than they cared about goodness. But Alfred could see past all of that with compassion. He bothered to understand them and their needs, and he remained humble before them, dedicated to serving them and keeping them safe. As he himself said, “It has ever been my desire to live honourably while I was alive, and after my death to leave to them that should come after me my memory in good works.”

17. I nominate Saint Cainnech of Aghaboe (515/16–600), also known as Saint Canice in Ireland, Saint Kenneth in Scotland, Saint Kenny and in Latin Saint Canicus.
    I also wish to second (or is third?) the nomination of Jonathan Daniels.

18. My suggestions are: Theresa of Avila (again), Martin Luther, Billy Graham, and this last one is more of a group and my first choice - The Council of Trent. Putting the Bible together, to me, is to say the least, a saintly thing.

19. Definitely Mother Teresa of Cacutta! Such an amazing example of living the Word.

20. I second Jonathan Myrick Daniels!

21. Perhaps during your benevolent discernment, the SEC would consider a person or two unique to the ELCA's calendar? (Maybe as part of a first four?) After all, we are in full communion, so maybe we could all deign to live like it. For an important modern, ecumenical influence, how about Br. Roger of Taize'? He isn't on any calendar as far as I know (at least not yet), but I knew him to be a very saintly man and quite an inspiration. Third, I am also happy to see Fred Rogers and Jonathan Daniels nominated. Last but not least, for a few women, I most humbly request the SEC to consider: Hildegard von Bingen, Bridget of Sweden, Katie Luther (how could I not?), Esther John, Mother Teresa, and/or Sophie Scholl (some on calendars and some not, but important witnesses). Humbly submitted with thanskgiving for the great 2012 bracket. Looking forward to 2013!

22. PS thanks to all the peeps who nominated Martin Luther. It should go without saying that I totally agree! (But just in case anyone doubts...)

23. Being a Helen, myself, I would like to nominate ST. HELEN, the finder of the True Cross. She has a beautiful, huge statue in St. Peter's holding a giant cross, on the right as you walk to the high altar.
    Being a school teacher, I nominate ST. DYMPHNA, patron for mental anguish. I have prayed to her every morning for years and years, to get me through the day.
    Being a singer, I nominate ST. CECELLIA, patron of singers. When you sing you are praying twice.
    I also nominate ST. ELIZABETH, who did so much for her people, eventhough she was a royal. My middle name is Elizabeth.
    FATHER DAMIEN was a wonderful saint, caring for those with Hansen's Disease (leprosy) who were sent to the Hawaiian island of Moloka'i, when no one else would have anything to do with them. He contracted the disease himself while caring for them, very similar to the stories of the lepers in the Bible. BUT do we really want to get the people of Hawai'i involved again???? h+++

24. How about John Huss, Florence Nightengale, George Herbert, and John Donne?

25. I nominate:
    John and/or Charles Wesley
    St. Joseph (not least of all because his day is my birthday)
    Oscar Romero
    Martin Luther King Jr.
    John Muir
    Sojourner Truth

26. Tim and Scott,
    I think the idea of a play-in is great, and I would suggest you use it for two saints that aren't yet in Holy Women and Holy Men (sort of a warm-up for the show, as it were). I would nominate Rogers Israel, first bishop of Northwestern Pennsylvania and an chaplain during WWI who helped found the American Cathedral in Paris (you have gone worldwide, right?). Our diocese has done a commemoration for him at our recent 100th anniversary, which was traditionally the first step in getting someone on the Episcopal calendar.

    I also like the idea of a Martin Luther-Martin Luther King, Jr. matchup.
    Thanks, guys!!

27. In the Fictitious Saints Department, I nominate St. Leibowitz. "Bless me, Father. I ate a lizard" (Brother Francis on one of his 7 vocational vigils).

    1. And to match against St Leibowitz in this category, I nominate St. Vidicon of Cathode!

28. I nominate Pelagius: brilliant, misunderstood, abused and envied by Augustine. Augustine had Pelagius tried for heresy twice, once before the Pope and both times Pelagius was acquitted. Finally, Augustine used his influence with the Emperor to have Pelagius found guilty of heresy.

29. I nominate Francis Perkins, Secretary of Labor in the Roosevelt administration.

30. I nominate Blessed Frances Joseph-Gaudet (1861- December 1934), prison reform worker and educator. She was born in a log cabin in Holmesville, Mississippi of African American and Native American descent. She was raised by her grandparents. Later she went to live with a brother in New Orleans where she attended school and Straight College. Widowed early, she dedicated her life to prison reform. Beginning in 1894 she held prayer meetings, wrote letters, delivered messages, and secured clothing for black prisoners, and later for white prisoners as well. Her dedication to prisoners and prison reform won her the respect of prison officials, city authorities, the governor, and the Prison Reform Association.

    A delegate to the Women’s Christian Temperance Union international convention in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1900, she worked for the reform of young blacks arrested for misdemeanor or vagrancy. Joseph-Gaudet was the first woman to support juvenile offenders in Louisiana, and her efforts helped found the juvenile court.

    She eventually purchased a farm and founded the Gaudet Normal and Industrial School. The school, which eventually expanded to 105 acres and numerous buildings, also served as a boarding school for children with working mothers.

    Joseph-Gaudet served as principal of the school until 1921 when she donated the school to the Episcopal Church of Lousiana. The school closed in 1950 and the land was later expropriated for highway construction. Those funds were placed in an endowment that supports the education of African American children and children in low income communities in the Diocese of Louisiana through grants and scholarships, continuing the work begun by Blessed Frances Joseph-Gaudet.

    Her feast day is December 30.