G.K. Chesterton once said that “Tradition means giving a vote to most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead…Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our father.”
To honor that sentiment and to stave off an easy chronological snobbery, today’s post comes straight from the mouths (or pens) of men and women who have died in the faith.
A Prayer from Gregory of Nazianzus
I am spent, O my Christ, breath of my life.
Perpetual stress and surge, in league together, make long, O long, this life, this business of living.
Grappling with foes within and foes without, my soul has lost its beauty, blurred your image.
Did ever oak such buffeting from winds or ship receive from waves as I do now? Labor to labor, task succeeds to task…friendship has bowed and illness wasted me…Do not forsake me, my Strength, I beseech you.
When the storms beat hard I may have betrayed you, but let me return to you now.
–Gregory of Nazianzus.
Oratio Contemplativa 