Welcome to Adobe GoLive 5

A Celtic Look at the Four Gospels

While each of the four Gospels brought its own particular message to the culture of Ireland (and to us today), all four books are required to fully understand the life, ministry, and message of Jesus, the resurrected Christ, and the Kingdom of God. Each of the Evangelists brought his own perspective to the Gospel and told it in a way that delivered a specific message to the Irish people. As this message was accepted and re-expressed through the Celtic cultural lens, it not only transformed the culture, but it took on a form of spiritual thought and expression that is unique to Christian history…a kinder, gentler, more earthy expression, than its Roman counterpart. .

SESSION 1

The Gospels in the Celtic Context: Transforming and Transformed
An overview of how Christianity came to Ireland, and how the message of the Gospels was received into that context. It transformed the culture, but was also transformed by Ireland’s highly colorful and imaginative culture. In the hundred years or so after Patrick, as the rest of Europe was plunged into the dark ages, Ireland was an oasis of peace and enlightenment. In this oasis, a unique form of Christian thought and spirituality developed, which eventually could not be contained.

SESSION 2

MATTHEW, The Man: The Love of God Incarnate
Matthew tells us the story of Jesus of Nazareth: the very human story of the life, ministry, and message of the person of Jesus. Jesus’ humanity is God’s way of identifying with our own humanity. Jesus grew, learned, loved, liked to eat, laugh, had friends, a family, a skill. Jesus also suffered disappointments, setbacks, storms, hunger, insults, indignities and a very human death. This was a person the Irish could identify with! The gods could appear in any shape and form, but this one…this One came to us as human. "Begorra! He’s one of us!"

SESSION 3

MARK, The Lion: The Kingdom of God
To the pagan, warring, and tribal peoples of Ireland, the story of a king who sacrificed himself to his people (and not the other way around) was worth paying attention to. The high kings of Ireland never brought the message of love and peace that this High King of Heaven proclaimed! Who would NOT want to serve Him?

SESSION 4

Luke, The Ox, the Beast of Burden: The Ministry of Healing
Luke was a physician, a healer. Through his lens, we see the ministry of compassion Jesus brought to bear on those who were marginalized, those who were oppressed, those who suffered from disease and sorrow. It was through this message of healing and ministering to those in need that a very unique method of evangelism emerged. This warring, tribal nation was converted to Christianity without bloodshed. Christians today need to revisit this unique way of spreading the gospel in a world that has once again forgotten the message of peace and love.

SESSION 5

John, The Eagle, The Visionary
Relationship, Resurrection, Re-Creation
John was Jesus’ closest disciple. He is often pictured with his head on Jesus’ chest, listening to the heartbeat of God. John understood things in a way none of the other Evangelists did. Had Jesus lived in Ireland, this is the way the Irish would have written about him: in word pictures and metaphors. To the Irish, John the Evangelist, becomes John, the consummate Bard of Heaven.

The Book of Kells

It was Patrick and other early Christians that brought literacy to Ireland, so the Gospels, especially were treasured, not only for their liberating message, but for the text itself. In acts of devotion and meditation, the Gospels were loving, artistically, and reverently reproduced into masterful works of art. The influence of Celtic art can be seen, particularly during the Middle Ages, in the form of beautiful decorated (illuminated) alphabets and manuscripts. Recovered miraculously in 800 AD, the Book of Kells remains today one of the treasures, not only of Celtic Christianity, but of the art world in general. Throughout the class, we will be looking at this unique form of Christian art, and of the symbolism contained in it. Like the great stained glass windows of the Gothic cathedrals, the Illuminated Gospels depict the Good News in more than just words.