"The End is Near!" proclaims the ubiquitous sign of the doomsday prophet. In the case of Lent Madness 2013, our sign-wielding friend would be correct. Welcome to the Faithful Four. After weeks of learning and voting and debating, the saintly field has been whittled down from 32 to four spiritual heavyweights: Frances Perkins, Hilda of Whitby, Luke the Evangelist, and Oscar Romero.
As we like to tell our five-year-olds when they join their first soccer team (that’s football for our friends across the pond), “there are no losers, everybody’s a winner.” Of course we’re lying. Thus, while we can sing the praises of these saints, only one Golden Halo will be awarded.
Today Frances Perkins takes on Hilda of Whitby; tomorrow Luke the Evangelist battles Oscar Romero; and on Spy Wednesday the championship round will take place. For the Faithful Four, we let our remaining Celebrity Bloggers loose as they answer the question “Why should Saint XX win the Golden Halo?” In other words, they’ve been charged with letting us know why their particular saint is so awesome. In this match-up, Heidi Shott is advocating for Frances Perkins and Laurie Brock for Hilda of Whitby. Tomorrow Laura Toepfer is writing for Luke the Evangelist and Megan Castellan for Oscar Romero.
To make it to the Faithful Four, bracket Cinderella Frances Perkins made it past Damien of Molokai, Martin Luther King, Jr, and Jonathan Daniels. Hilda of Whitby bested Samuel Seabury, Ignatius of Antioch, and Harriet Tubman. Here's your chance to send one of these inspiring women off to vie for the Golden Halo.
Don't forget to watch Maple Anglican's video previewing today's match-up.
Frances Perkins
In his 2010 essay in The Anglican Examiner, “Frances Perkins: Architect of the Gracious Society,” Donn Mitchell begins by recounting how Perkins once answered a provocative question.
‘Don't you think it's wrong for people to get things they don't pay for?’
‘Why no,’ Frances Perkins responded. ‘I find I get so much more than I pay for. Don't you?’
The woman who had conceived, birthed, nursed, and nurtured the New Deal's crowning achievement — the Social Security Act -- the Social Security Act — was revealing the theological perspective that informed her long career advocating, shaping, and ultimately implementing social policy. She knew she had not paid for the earth she walked on or the parents who had raised her. She had not ‘earned’ the breath in her lungs. All life was an unearned gift from God, as she saw it.
Perkins with President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
What we ‘got,’ in her view, was a function of grace, not merit or its inverse correlate, sin. A godly society, therefore, would be a gracious society. Just as God had endowed humankind with the basics and then allowed them freedom to develop their capacities to create and contribute, so the community should graciously guarantee basic provision for its individual members while allowing maximum freedom to make their way in the world.
Plaque at St. Andrew's, Newcastle, Maine
We talk a great deal about the theology of abundance and the theology of scarcity in the Episcopal Church. Often it’s used to transform our old notions of stewardship or to get members thinking about capital campaign gifts. The transformation is local -- our own hearts or perhaps, on a truly miraculous scale, the collective heart of a congregation.
But Frances Perkins took her belief in the theology of abundance to an astonishing level. Through incredible hard work and determination and in the midst of a political and social climate that is unimaginable for a late-boomer woman like me, Perkins extended her theology to the whole nation for the benefit of all its citizens.
Perkins with President John F. Kennedy (Bettman/Corbis)
The prologue of Kirstin Downey’s biography, The Woman Behind the New Deal: The Life of Frances Perkins, FDR’S Secretary of Labor and His Moral Conscience, begins with the ultimatum that Perkins gave to Roosevelt before she would accept the appointment to become his Secretary of Labor.
“On a chilly February night in 1933, a middle-aged woman waited expectantly to meet with her employer at his residence on East 65th Street in New York City. She clutched a scrap of paper with hastily written notes. Finally ushered into his study the woman brushed aside her nervousness and spoke confidently....
He wanted her to take an assignment but she had decided she wouldn’t accept it unless he allowed her to do it her own way. She held up the piece of paper in her hand, and he motioned for her to continue. She ticked off the items: a forty-hour workweek, a minimum wage, worker’s compensation, unemployment compensation, a federal law banning child labor, direct federal aid for unemployment relief, Social Security, a revitalized public employment service, and health insurance.”
Sloane, the girlfriend in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, might have been just as astutely describing Perkins as Ferris when she said, “You knew what you were doing when you woke up this morning.”
Frances Perkins knew what she was doing.
I wasn’t thinking about Perkins, years ago, when I wrote an essay called “Cleaning the Fridge,” but now it seems obvious. “The people we revere most are simply human beings choosing from among the options laid out before them and then doing the work they’ve been given to do. Most of them would avoid the hard and unpleasant stuff given the chance. Most, like Melville’s Bartleby, ‘would prefer not to.’ But the difference between our saints and the rest of us is they do the hard things anyway.”
Frances Perkins -- lay woman, public servant, doer of hard things because they needed to be done. She knew God imbued her with the strength, talent, and experience to do them, and, like another saint in the bracket, she knew she could do no other.
-- Heidi Shott
Hilda of Whitby
Hilda (or, more correctly Hild of Streaneschalch) is not known for one spectacular moment. Some saints are. That one moment where they make such a devoted decision out of love we are left in awe. She is not known for a profound body of literature, as are other saints. In fact, nothing of her own writing exists. Most of what we know about her was written by Bede. She is not known for anything other than perhaps hosting a synod.
Or at least that’s what I thought when I began my Lenten relationship with Hilda. Almost forty days and several rounds later, I am in awe of this woman who is not known for anything spectacular other than her profound ability to encourage others.
She might not have left her own writings, but when a young monk named Caedmon who
Abbess Hilda receiving Caedmon
cared for animals at Whitby had a dream about composing song, Hilda encouraged him to write. In doing so, she helped birth what would become English poetry. She might not have been a great queen or powerful politician, but her compassionate wisdom grounded in the Gospel encouraged kings and rulers who sought her advice. She might not have been a pope or priest or bishop, but she created a community where equality of property, study, and communal prayer encouraged education and parity in a double monastery. Five of her monks became bishops; two are revered as saints.
She might not have even carried the day at Whiby, that synod she hosted. Yes, the Roman date of Easter and monastic hairstyle won, but Hilda continued to encourage. She encouraged Christianity to remain unified, despite differences. She encouraged obedience to the vote that carried the day, even though she personally disagreed with the outcome. She stood with unified dignity in a way our modern church leaders could emulate as we struggle with decisions that can be divisive.
However we view saints, they are (hopefully) very human people who lived their lives in very remarkable ways. And while I will always be impressed with Hilda’s turning snakes to stone, I am in awe of her extraordinary ability to encourage others and to create a community where that encouragement could thrive. I am humbled by her example of desiring a unified, faithful community over her own position.
Hilda’s life is a holy example that speaks to us today as we wrestle with a changing church, with new understandings of theology that can be challenging and divisive, and with the temptation to nurture our own egos rather than encouraging lives lived in the radical love of Christ. She reminds us that this place is nothing new for the church. Her life speaks with calm love to us all. And her ministry of encouragement -- all of those spectacular moments she wove together in her days -- is still urging us on to live our lives in love, service, and community.
Thanks be to God.
-- Laurie Brock
Vote!
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153 comments on “Frances Perkins vs. Hilda of Whitby”
The Archbishops have released the following video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WALPssC5_u8
Sister Winifred ... thank you! I have learned yet something else from Lent Madness and this wonderful community of lively pilgrims!
Both amazing women used their political skills to bring about change that is still felt today. However, Frances reminds us that the compassionate society we claim is in danger of further deterioration. We need her voice.
After reading 2 of J Phillip Newell's books, "Listening to the Heartbeat of God" and "Christ of the Celts" I began to wonder what Christianity would be like if Hilda and her way of worship had carried the day in the Council of Whitby. It seems that a huge opportunity was lost there, to be the church that understands God to be immanent in nature, as well as transcendent, to be a church of people, not just a church of structures and walls. Frances Perkins is a good person, but I think it takes more than that to be a saint. Hilda tried to shape the whole church. I wish she had been able to do so. We would all be a lot better off now, if she had.
Vote for the original Sistah Souljah, HILDA!!
I sing a song of the saints of God, patient and brave and true. For all of them were saints of God and I mean to be one too. This Anglican hymn says it all: Frances is as much a saint as is Hilda. From my standpoint, I'll take the woman who made such a difference in millions of American's lives: Frances.
I was on the fence u til I read Vivienne P.'s post - https://www.lentmadness.org/2013/03/frances-perkins-vs-hilda-of-whitby/#comment-16073 - and as a non-traditional aged university undergraduate, that tipped me over to Saint Frances of the Cabinet.
. . . fence until I read . . .
I live in the Diocese of San Joaquin, so I vote for Hilda: we need a witness of reconciliation so badly. I admire Perkins, but Hilda gets my vote today. (And when in doubt, which I usually am, I vote for the elders who laid foundations for us...)
I agree. Exactly.
Hilda. The original Sistah Souljah!!
I worry a bit that with this contest we're showing what's going on in our broader church that concerns me. While I'm a huge fan of the new deal, was an organizer for a union, and was a progressive political staffer for years, but why is it that we prize only progressive social change over our spiritual foundation? Why is it that when a 20-something year old pushes a little girl out of the way to take a shotgun blast for her, he's faulted for "not having accomplished (as much as Perkins)" As one person said? Why is it that when we have people who dedicated their whole life to the church and achieved positions of power within the church they're faulted for not being humble or lowly enough? I can't act like it doesn't worry me that we've just decided that nice people who advocate for progressive and liberal social policies are our new saints, rather than those whose whole life stands as witness to the sacrificial love of Christ.
Why is it*, not but why.
As should be as, #DYAC
Sarah R, you are a shameless politicker! ...er, I mean, "passionate advocate for your Holy Woman!" ; )
I think you are right, but there are also the facts of the Dept. of Labor votes for Frances Perkins and how indebted people feel toward her for social security. . . not saying that's right or wrong, but only that those things are influencing the vote as much if not more than any idea or thought of spirituality or holiness.
There's something about the ministry of encouraging that touched me deeply. Hilda it is.
Great write ups, Heidi and Laurie! But managing to get Ferris Bueller in there really takes the crown! Oh yeah, and Francis, too!
Thank you, Lent Madness for a Holy Lent!
I haven't heard the term "Spy Wednesday" since my elementary school days - I was beginning to think I made it up and I join Ellen's chant - Hil-DA HIL-DA !!! I am so glad that I learned more about her and the other saints during this Lent Madness. I too thank you for a Holy Lent!
Vivienne P. - thank you for speaking out for those who attend(ed) Mt. Holyoak, for the Frances Perkins Scholars (which I'm delighted to learn about today) and for all women who struggle to achieve goals for themselves and their world.
I know that both Hilda and Frances did this in their own way in their own time. Some of us are encouragers and some are activists. We have two great examples of each way before us. Either would be worthy of the Golden Halo.
In the final analysis, however, as much as I love Hilda and the Celtic tradition. I had to support Frances all the way. We cannot conceive, in our comfortable view from the 21st century, what it was like before the implementation of the basic human rights we now take for granted: 40 hour work weeks, no child labor, disability, workmens' comp, medical benefits, unemployment benefits, social security. The achievement of these benefits was a hurculean feat against almost insurmountable odds. Frances is one of the most heroic women I know to have fought the battle and prevailed. And she did not receive the recognition for this until more recent years. FDR did. Now these supports are being threatened. We must continue to insure they are available for generations to come. Frances winning the Golden Halo may help us, as the church corporate, continue to be a strong voice of advocacy for human rights. She can be the banner around which we rally and continue to move forward not slip backward. Yes, there are problems in the system but let's figure out how to fix them. That's what Frances (and Hilda, too, for that matter) would do.
Frances Perkins all the way to the Golden Halo!!
Frances you are my hero. You seem to be responsible for the only income I have to live on...My S.S. Security disability. I'm sure thousands of others would thank you also if they knew your story.
MLK's halo shines brightly and he receives many well deserved accolades all the time. Not surprised.he stepped aside to allow another her time in the limelight! Sometimes we need to sing the unsung heroine!
I'm for Frances Perkins. When asked, “Don't you think it's wrong for people to get things they don't pay for?” She replied,
“Why no, I find I get so much more than I pay for. Don't you?” So very true, as any saint would know. Don't you?
After voting for Frances, I read today marks the 102 anniversary of the tragic Triangle Shirtwaist fire in NYC, which becaming a rallying point in US the labor movement. Coincidence? I think not.
After she wins the Golden Halo, we'll need to vote onwho will play Frances Perkins in the movie. Ideas? Discuss . . . and: The people of the US Department of Labor (who have been working for America's workers for 100 years) are proud of our Patron Saint.
Meryl Streep, obviously!
I'm still not over the vote going against MLK, but that's not why I'm voting for Hilda.
Well, I'm a member of a proud union household and not unrelatedly at all, a lifelong Episcopalian, Anglo-Catholic flavor; spent my childhood in a church that had and actually used a monstrance on occasion. Learned to sing Anglican chant at the age of six when I joined the choir, all decked out in my teensy little cassock and cotta and pigtails. So there. 🙂
I do think the discussion of what is sainthood is important (though perhaps unresolvable in our church that draws from both Protestant and Catholic strands), and have appreciated the several blog posts out there about it. All Saints' is my favorite holiday after the Great Vigil and the whole Triduum of course, and Christmas and Pentecost, i.e., the biggies; I had both my kids baptized on All Saints', not by happenstance. The great cloud of witnesses is real to me, almost palpably, certainly mystically, so. All of them--ancient, medieval, modern. I've voted for some of each in this LM. There is no "anti" vote in LM on my part. MLK is a personal hero, and my family has a personal connection to Jon Daniels.
But we really do need 'em all! What is it Saint Paul said about the different parts of the body not being able to say, I have no need of you? One of the best parts for me of saying the Daily Office is the chance to learn about and meditate on these folks in all of their particularity--a different one almost every day, each pointing to a different kind of witness, but each walking the way of the cross. This is probably also why I play LM, even though it hurts at times to vote.
I have many friends through my labor circles who love Frances, and a good number of them are not Christian--they are Jews, Hindus, Buddhist, "nones," atheists. I share their love for her, but my vote here is not their vote. I vote for her here because of her Christian witness. She was an adult confirmand in the Episcopal Church, a faithful communicant, and one who sought retreat and spiritual direction with an Anglican order of sisters. I believe the only way she was able to do what she did, over many years and over much hostility and/or indifference, was through her faith. Her vocation as a lay person carried her out into the weekday world to be the Church in our messy, broken world. She fought through the principalities and powers of this world to address systemic causes of poverty and inequality.
We can't take any of this for granted. I really believe that if child labor laws or workers' comp, let alone Social Security, were to come up for a vote today in Congress, they would fail. What she did to move FDR and Congress both was amazing. That's not even counting her work in New York State, New York City, Chicago, and Philadelphia. Decades of faithful struggle.
As for her being a "politician" or "bureaucrat" -- in their contexts, Gregory, Hilda, the Iggys, and of course MLK were also politicians. Church and state were deeply intertwined in ancient and medieval times. More than that though, being of and in this crazy world outside the church walls, including in political spheres and institutions and businesses, as well as streets and homes, is one of the primary vocations of the laity, no? Why put that down? It's not an easy calling to live out one's Christian faith well within these contexts. Well done, Frances, good and faithful servant.
Postscript, a couple of links:
1. On the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, whose 102nd anniversary is today (March 25, 1911). Frances happened to witness the fire as she lived nearby. On that day, 146 young workers, mostly immigrant girls between the ages of 13-22, lost their lives within 18 minutes. Frances never forgot the sight and sound of the girls jumping together, 2-3 at a time and holding hands, to the pavement and death to escape the flames and the locked doors. That day, she vowed to make a difference. More info here:
http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/trianglefire/
2. The scourge of child labor--which still goes on throughout the world but has largely been stopped in the USA thanks in no small measure to Frances. Check out these photos by Lewis Hines, a contemporary of Frances. It took her another 30 years to win this fight though.
http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/childlabor/
I vote for Hilda of Whitby , because my Mother Cynthia told me to do so.
A mother we should listen!!!!!!
This just in: I channeled Frances and she told me she is voting for St. Hilda as well. Wow, what a class act. Go Hilda!
Sarah Lawton, beautifully said.
It is interesting to note Dorothy Day's assessment of Perkins' great bureaucratic opera fidei:
"We believe that social security legislation, now balled as a great victory for the poor and for the worker, is a great defeat for Christianity. It is an acceptance of the Idea of force and compulsion. It is an acceptance of Cain’s statement, on the part of the employer. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
Of course, Day did not spare Frances' boss either:
"Roosevelt will be elected on the platform of Cake and Circuses. During the depression years the relief checks flowed in, and now during the war years the government checks come regularly on the first of every month. The millions who are thus bought and paid for do not want any change."
But in an Episcopal Church given over pretty thoroughly to the proposition that partisan political wheel-and-deal coupled with reasonably competent administration of a bureaucracy somehow constitutes saintliness, I should not be surprised that Frances Perkins, by all accounts a generally good person, would be beating Hilda of Whitby, a real Saint.
Hilda Hilda Hilda! You're our saint!!
Yes, Ephrem, Dorothy Day very much had an outside-in view and strategy, which the Catholic Worker movement continues to this day. It's an important and prophetic perspective. I think we need the Dorothys witnessing from the outside and the Franceses working the inside ... both with a laser focus on the poor. Like I said, we need 'em all.
Curious if you voted for Dorothy a few days ago over Luke?
. . . and we also NEED the Hildas and Lukes of the world, and in spite of the fact that they have gotten little reward in this season of Lent Madness, we also need those who care enough of die for someone else.
Indeed, which is why I've voted for both Luke and Hilda previously, and that wonderful church builder, Absalom Jones. I got my whole extended family to vote for Jonathan Daniels. I'll be fiercely promoting San Oscar Romero de las Americas tomorrow.
It's not a zero-sum game (despite the LM set up, sigh). We really do need them all. Let's rejoice at every vote cast for any of these holy persons.
Amen, sister (except for the sigh - LM is what it is! no apologies for the set-up in the absurd game of picking 'the best' saint!)
Today's choice was hard. Tomorrow's is simpler - Romero.
As a gay Episcopalian-to-be (I'm getting baptized at the Easter vigil!), inspired this way by my close friends and the former Bishop Robinson, I have to vote for Hilda and hope that more and more in the communion can follow her example.
Voted for Hilda. Simple reason- I was raised by nuns and can't vote against one. Sr Isobel would weep and Sr Presentina would stab herself with her ruler, the way she did when she taught us Julius Caesar.
That is hysterical!
I find it kind of interesting, actually, that in the end, the Final Four make up a rather "traditional" - and BTW pretty well-balanced - lineup: an Evangelist, a medieval abbess, a bishop-Martyr - and then the Cinderella laywoman Frances Perkins.
Not bad, all in all, I'd say. Voted for Hilda today; I'll be interested to see what happens tomorrow....