October 26th Offers Essential Lessons for Dixie

October 26^th is a day of contrasts. On one hand, it is the day the Patriot Act went into effect in 2001, an event that greatly aided in the establishment of a total panopticon system in the 50 States:

Not only did the USA Patriot Act normalize the government’s mass surveillance powers, but it also dramatically expanded the government’s authority to spy on its own citizens without much of any oversight. Thus, a byproduct of this post 9/11-age in which we live, whether you’re walking through a store, driving your car, checking email, or talking to friends and family on the phone, you can be sure that some government agency is listening in and tracking your behavior. This doesn’t even begin to touch on the corporate trackers that monitor your purchases, web browsing, Facebook posts and other activities taking place in the cyber sphere. We have all become data collected in government files.

On the other hand, there are also remembered on that day two saints who were victorious against enemies who seemed unbeatable, St. Nestor (+305) and St. Alfred the Great (+899).  St. Nestor is mentioned in the life of the martyr St. Demetrios the Myrrh-Gusher, who is celebrated on the 26^th. The following is an account of the life of St. Nestor himself, who is celebrated more fully the following day:

The holy Martyr Nestor was very young in age, handsome in appearance, and he was known to the holy Great Martyr Demetrios (October 26), for he had instructed Nestor in the faith.

The Emperor was visiting Thessaloniki, and he built a high platform in the midst of the city so that a gigantic barbarian named Lyaios could wrestle there and be seen by everyone. Beneath the platform many spears and other sharp weapons were placed pointing upward. When Lyaios defeated his opponents, he threw them down onto the spears and they died. Many Christians were forced to fight Lyaios, and were killed. When Nestor saw how Emperor Maximian rejoiced over the victories of his champion, he disdained his pride. Seeing the miracles of Saint Demetrios, however, he took courage and went to the prison where the holy Martyr was confined, and fell at his feet.

“Pray for me, O Servant of God Demetrios,” he said, “that by your prayers, God may help me to beat Lyaios, and put an end to him who brings reproach upon the Christians.”

The Saint, after sealing Nestor with the Sign of the Cross, told him that he would prevail over Lyaios, and then suffer for Christ. Nestor mounted the platform without fear and exclaimed: “Help me, O God of Demetrios.” After he defeated Lyaios, he hurled him down onto the spears, where he gave up his wretched soul. Maximian became enraged and ordered that both Nestor and Demetrios should be put to death. Saint Demetrios was stabbed with spears, and Saint Nestor was beheaded. Thus, by his example Saint Nestor teaches us that in every human challenge we must say with confidence, “The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do to me.” (Psalm 117/118:6, Hebrews 13:6).

Fr. Andrew Phillips tells the story of St. Alfred’s remarkable victory over the Danes:

Now had come the third heathen invasion of Wessex and the lowest point of Alfred’s life. He and a small band of his most trusted and able men were forced to lead a nomadic life in sorrow and unrest among the woods and fen fastnesses of the marshes of Somerset. He and his men had nothing to live off and were obliged to forage from local peasants. Stories from this period, like that of the burnt cakes, passed into folklore. It seemed as though all were lost. Indeed, Alfred stood alone, the King of the last Christian Kingdom in England.

After Easter, in late March 878, Alfred and his company retreated through the alder forests and reedy marshes to the strategic island of Athelney, meaning the ‘island of the princes’. This may have been a hunting-lodge of the princes of Wessex, or it may have taken its name from that time, when Alfred made it into a family stronghold for the princes of the Royal House. For on this island, a low hill of some thirty acres, surrounded by marsh and thicket with a well-protected causeway, Alfred built a fortress. This was to be the ark of salvation for Christian England.

For seven weeks, from his flood-encircled isle, Alfred prepared and plotted a counter-attack and began to harry the heathen. He sent out messengers to plan a concerted campaign against the heathen. It is said that his spiritual father, the holy hermit Neot, who had died shortly before these events, appeared to him in a vision, assuring him of victory. St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, whom Alfred had always greatly honoured, also appeared to him as a pilgrim, asking for food. Alfred set aside half of all that he had, but when a servant took him the food, the mysterious guest had vanished. Moved by the King’s generosity, St Cuthbert then worked a miracle for him and appeared to him in a vision, giving him advice on how to defeat the heathen and promising him victory and future prosperity with the words: ‘All Albion is given to you and your sons’.

Some time before Easter a fleet of twenty-three Viking ships had attacked north Devon at Countisbury and facing organized resistance, they suffered a great defeat, losing over 800 men. With the threat of heathen attack from the west passed, now Alfred would be free to attack to the east. After the Feast of the Ascension in early May 878, at ‘Egbert’s Stone’, somewhere near Stourton on the Somerset-Wiltshire border, Alfred and his men went out and met up with other loyal forces from three shires. It is recorded that thousands gathered and, ‘when they saw the King, they received him like one risen from the dead, after so many sorrows, and they were filled with great joy’. This memorable scene, when spring was at its greenest, was the sign which gave hope and strength to the Christian cause.

The next morning at Edington in Wiltshire, then called ‘Ethandune’, and actually on the uplands above Edington, Alfred fought fiercely against the whole heathen ‘Great Army’. Here he won a victory ‘by God’s will’. It is reckoned that up to some eight thousand men fought one another. This battle in 878 was the turning point not only of English history, but also of early Western European history. This was the victory of right over wrong; here the White Christ overcame the Norse Odin, cynical, ruthless and deceitful. Alfred had saved the Kingdom of England and given new hope for the survival of all Christian civilization in Western Europe. Alfred had stood alone in Europe and unaided had vanquished those who elsewhere were considered unvanquishable. He had saved Wessex and in so doing he had saved England, and in saving England, he had saved Western Europe from becoming a heathen power. A little island had given birth to a great man.

Alfred pursued the heathen to their stronghold at Chippenham and seized all that they had, horses and cattle, and then laid siege. After two weeks the heathen, cold, hungry and fearful, made a peace-treaty. They swore that they would leave the Kingdom at once. In victory Alfred now showed his true greatness. He did not slaughter his former enemy like the murderous Charlemagne, but he fed them. Wisdom took the place of the sword; Alfred had defeated his enemies, but did not make enemies. He had overcome barbarism without becoming barbaric. Showing true Christian virtue and statesmanship, Alfred knew that the only real conquest is the conquest of the heart. As Churchill, emulating Alfred, said over a thousand years later: ‘In war, resolution; in defeat, defiance; in victory, magnanimity; in peace, good will’.

For the traditional Southerner who desires a separate Christian confederation of Dixie’s States, things look awfully grim. A powerful, hostile, inhuman federal government, one that winks at genocide, glowers at him; giant woke corporations menace him; perversion is glorified everywhere around him. Yet this is only what the physical eye sees. The spiritual eye sees farther, wider, deeper. It sees that events are not determined only by rational calculations of physical objects and forces alone.  Basil Gildersleeve, in his short work The Creed of the Old South, 1865-1915, writes,

“Counting the cost” is in things temporal the only wise course, as in the building of a tower; but there are times in the life of an individual, of a people, when the things that are eternal force themselves into the calculation, and the abacus is nowhere. “Neither count I my life dear unto myself” is a sentiment that does not enter into the domain of statistics (Baltimore, Johns Hopkins Press, 1915, pgs. 23-4).

There are invisible, spiritual forces at work, not simply physical ones: the intangible influence of a good leader, the blessing given by a saint, the example of a courageous martyr. And oftentimes, it is those spiritual forces that prove decisive, rather than the physical, at important moments in history, as we see quite clearly in the lives of Sts. Alfred and Nestor.

It is imperative for us here at the South to arm ourselves with those spiritual forces and weapons – by cultivating the virtues, befriending the saints, praying to God, helping our neighbor who is in need, etc. – if we would have any chance of besting our foes.

With God’s help, if it is His will, in the end we will see the trees of healing spring up in a free, Christian Southland, just as they have in other lands:

Saint Athanasius of Medikion Monastery (+ ca. 814) loved the monastic life and secretly left his parental home, but was forcibly returned by his father. After a certain time Athanasius entered the Medikion monastery in Bithynia with his father’s consent. He was a companion of Saint Nicetas (April 3) and he died about the year 814. A cypress tree grew up on his grave; from which occurred many healings, by the grace of God.

-By Walt Garlington