Theologian's Almanac for Week of October 1, 2023
Welcome to SALT’s “Theologian’s Almanac,” a weekly selection of important birthdays, holidays, and other upcoming milestones worth marking — specially created for a) writing sermons and prayers, b) creating content for social media channels, and c) enriching your devotional life.
For the week of Sunday, October 1:
October 1 is the feast day of St. Therese of Lisieux, born in France in 1873. After becoming a Carmelite nun at the age of 15, she lived only to the age of 24 — but her autobiography, The Story of a Soul, and her direct, simple approach to spirituality were extremely influential. She was eventually named the patron saint of France, and has become one of the most popular saints in the history of the church. Pope Pius X called her “the greatest saint in modern times,” and Pope John Paul II declared her a Doctor (or Teacher) of the Church, only the third woman to be so honored (the other two are Catherine of Siena and Teresa of Avila). She was passionately devoted to missionary work, and inspired Mother Teresa of Calcutta. She is also the patron saint of florists and flower-growers, thanks to a remark she made promising to bless those who seek her intercession: “I will let fall a shower of roses.” From this she is also popularly known as “the Little Flower of Jesus,” or simply as “The Little Flower.”
October 1 is also the birthday of Nat Turner, born enslaved in Southampton County, Virginia, in 1800. He learned to read, studied the Bible, became a preacher who urged rebellion against slavery — and led a revolt in 1831, after a solar eclipse he took as a divine sign. At his trial, he confirmed he had led the rebellion but nevertheless pleaded not guilty. His Bible is on display at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C.
October 1 is also the birthday of Jimmy Carter, born in Plains, Georgia, in 1924. A successful peanut farmer, he got interested in politics after refusing to join a citizens’ group that opposed the racial integration of schools. After serving as governor of Georgia, he eventually became the 39th president of the United States. Most Sundays of his adult life, he has taught Sunday school at his American Baptist Church. Carter once said: “A strong nation, like a strong person, can afford to be gentle, firm, thoughtful, and restrained. It can afford to extend a helping hand to others. It is a weak nation, like a weak person, that must behave with bluster and boasting and rashness and other signs of insecurity.”
October 2 is the birthday of Mohandas Gandhi, a religious and civic leader born in India in 1869, best known for his role in India’s independence movement against British colonial rule, and particularly for his promotion of nonviolence as a means of resistance and liberation. He influenced Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s interests in nonviolence; King kept a portrait of Gandhi in his study. Gandhi wrote, “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is an attribute of the strong.”
October 4 is the Feast Day of St. Francis of Assisi, born in 1182, today considered the patron saint of animals and the natural world. He was a friar — a kind of monk who lived not in a monastery but rather among impoverished, vulnerable people out in the world. Here are three ways to honor St. Francis this month.
October 6 is the day in 1683 the first Mennonites arrived in what would become the United States. Francis Daniel Pastorius, a German lawyer and teacher, founded Germantown in Pennsylvania. After eating with a group of Native Americans, Pastorius wrote that they “have never in their lives heard the teaching of Jesus concerning temperance and contentment, yet they far excel the Christians in carrying it out.” In 1688, he wrote to a group of Quakers in Germantown who were enslaving African-Americans, urging the Quakers to abolish the practice — the first formal abolitionist protest by European immigrants in the American colonies.
October 7 is the birthday of Desmond Tutu, born in Klerksdorp, South Africa, in 1931. For his leadership in opposing apartheid in South Africa, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984; two years later, he elected to be the first black archbishop of Cape Town, the head of the country’s Anglican Church. In 1995, President Nelson Mandela appointed Tutu to lead the Truth and Reconciliation Committee, investigating apartheid-era human rights abuses.
Tutu said: “When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said, ‘Let us pray.’ We closed our eyes. When we opened them, we had the Bible and they had the land.”
And again: “How does peace come? Peace doesn’t come because allies agree. Allies are allies — they already agree! Peace comes when you talk to the person you most hate. And that’s where the courage of a leader comes.”