Huguenot Sunday

April 20, 2008

Acts 7:55-60

I Peter 2:2-10

John 14:1-14

 

Several years ago, the Vestry of Saint Esprit met to discuss the mission of the church and to devise a Mission Statement; the statement you can read every Sunday printed in your bulletins.  As our discussions progressed, we were very aware of the unique history of Saint Esprit and the role that this little church has played in New York City since the first communion service in French on Easter Day, 1628.  One of the members of the Vestry helped us to reflect on the fact that our identity springs from two wonderful traditions; the Reformed Church of France, and the Anglican or Episcopal Church of England.  When we think of the Church of England, we probably do not immediately think of a persecuted and martyred group of people hunted down by the authorities. But when we think of churches belonging to the Huguenot Tradition, our thoughts immediately go to those who were slaughtered or who fled from France during the terrible wars of religion. The archives of Saint Esprit and the boards on our walls bear the family names of many of those early martyrs in Huguenot history.   It is right that they should continue to play an important part in the formulation of our mission today.

 

In our reading from the book of Acts, we heard the story of the very first Christian martyr.  Stephen was a deacon in the church in Jerusalem, and was stoned to death in the first wave of persecutions directed against the Church.  From Stephen onwards, Christian theologians have declared that “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.”  (Tertullian).  The first Huguenot martyrs played a similar role not only in the Protestant church in France, but in the churches they founded in exile.  

    

One of the most well known of those martyrs was Claude Brousson; a minister from the south of France.  In the first wave of persecutions directed against the Huguenots, hundreds of ministers fled France and went to Switzerland.  A small number of them regretted their hasty flight, and returned to France in order to encourage those Protestants who had remained in hiding.  Claude Brousson was one of those ministers. As he was leaving Lausanne, he said to his weeping wife, "I must go and strengthen my brethren, groaning under their oppressions. If God lets His children die, they will preach louder from their graves than during their lives." When he returned to the Cevennes he discovered that the soldiers of Louis XIV (the Dragonades) had placed a price on his head, and he spent much of his time hiding in hollow trees and caves. In spite of this, he managed to complete seventeen sermons, which he addressed to Louis XIV.  After four years in France, Brousson returned to Lausanne a physical wreck. He was appointed pastor to a wealthy church at The Hague, but he could not settle to the new job.  Disguised as a wool-comber he again crossed the frontier into France. The persecution was very bitter, and Brousson had to take refuge in a well. He was eventually captured and condemned to be broken on the wheel. His last act was a benediction on the multitude that came to see him die.

 

Protestant devotion to martyrology became an important component in the desire to return to the spirit of the primitive church. These new martyrs evoked the first Christian martyrs as witnesses to Christ.   The Huguenot Pastors were remarkable in their knowledge of the Greek language, and read widely in the early history of the church.  They sometimes even wrote baptism certificates in Greek, so that the Catholic authorities could not read them.  They also read the Latin works of Tertullian; perhaps the most famous writer on the concept of martyrdom.  There they found inspiration in passages such as:  “Despise the sword, the fire, the cross, the wild beasts, the torture; these surely are but trifling sufferings to obtain a celestial glory and a divine reward. If the false pearl is so precious, what must the true pearl be worth? Are we not called on, then, most joyfully to lay out as much for the true as others do for the false?”

 

What is it that these martyrs of the past and of the present have to teach us?  Is there anything that we believe in so strongly that we would be willing to lay down our lives for it?  I think that such stories inspire us to do several things; firstly, to pray for those who are imprisoned or persecuted for their beliefs.  Secondly, to do what we can to support those who are, or who have been in this position.  Thirdly, to remember their stories and keep them alive.  And finally and most importantly, to find it in our hearts to be grateful for what they have bequeathed to us.  Whether we are aware of it or not, we enjoy the fruits of other people’s willingness to fight and suffer in order to obtain freedom and justice.  As for the Huguenot martyrs; their endurance, their faith, and their heroic courage are today the heritage not only of their descendents but of all humankind.

 

The Revd. Nigel Massey