The collect for today, the Feast of The Venerable Bede (673-735), Monk, Historian, Doctor of the Church (source):
Almighty God, maker of all things,
whose Son Jesus Christ gave to thy servant Bede
grace to drink in with joy
the word which leadeth us to know thee and to love thee:
in thy goodness
grant that we also may come at [...]

On Easter Day, Anglican Curmudgeon A.S. Haley posted a lengthy item about the Shroud of Turin, arguing that best current evidence strongly suggests that the shroud is the actual burial cloth of Jesus Christ. I did not see that post until yesterday, via a link at Lent & Beyond.
I have known about the Shroud [...]

The Christian church flourished in the Middle East and Asia for over a thousand years. In the 14th century, however, Syriac Christianity came under attack in a series of adverse events—most importantly, Islamic rulers began a wide-ranging and sustained persecution of Christians.
The church was forced to retreat to remote mountainous regions and borderlands, where small [...]

Saint Gabriel Syriac-Orthodox Monastery, located in Tur Abdin, south-east Turkey, is the oldest functioning Christian monastery in the world. It was founded in 397, but its survival is now imperilled by a series of lawsuits launched by Muslim neighbours who are seeking to have the monastery closed or deprived of its land.
[T]he future of [...]

The collect for today, the Feast Day of St Antony the Great of Egypt (251-356), anchorite, abbot (source):
Most gracious God,
who didst call thy servant Antony to sell all that he had
and to serve thee in the solitude of the desert:
grant that we, following his example,
may learn to deny ourselves
and to love thee before all things;
through [...]

The collect for today, the commemoration of the Right Rev John Horden (1828-1893), first Bishop of Moosonee, Missionary to the First Nations of Canada:
O God,
the Desire of all the nations,
you chose your servant John Horden
to open the treasury of your Word
among the native peoples of Canada.
Grant us, after his example,
to be constant in our purpose [...]

In one of the great tragedies of church history, one of the most ancient Christian communities is being destroyed before our very eyes. The Assyrian, Chaldean, and Orthodox churches of Mesopotamia appear headed for a bloody end. As recently as 1970, Christians made up 5-6 percent of Iraq’s population; today, they are less [...]

I came across this disconcerting passage in How To Read A Church by Richard Taylor.
Images of Jesus with a beard may also have developed through a wish to symbolize ugliness. There was some debate in the early Church as to whether Jesus was in appearance the most handsome, or the most repulsive of men. [...]

Some contemporary biblical scholars and historians believe that the early church was awash with gospels, epistles, and apocalypses that are not found in today’s New Testament.  These other texts, according to this view, were allowed to circulate within the early church more or less freely and were judged heretical and tossed out only after Emperor [...]

For well over a thousand years, the world of Christianity looked something like this map, a flower with three petals—Africa, Asia, Europe—centred around Jerusalem. Not until around 1500 did Christianity and Europe become synonymous: Christianity became essentially European and Europe essentially Christian. Before then, the Christian church survived and flourished in Egypt and [...]

Conrad Rudolph, Professor of Art History, University of California at Riverside, has digitally re-constructed a lost 12th-century mural. Hugh of Saint-Victor (1096-1141) originally created “The Mystic Ark”, probably as a wall painting, but it was subsequently lost.  The mural is considered the most complex work of art from the medieval period.

That digital reconstruction of “The [...]

Three years ago this week, an ancient Armenian cemetery in the Azerbaijani enclave of Nakhichevan was destroyed in a stunning act of cultural vandalism. The Djulfa (Jugha in Armenian) cemetery was at one time filled with thousands of beautifully and intricately carved “khachkars” (literally, “cross-stones”), some dating back to the 8th century.
In 1998 and [...]

The collect for today, the Feast Day of Saint Edmund (841-869), King of the East Angles, Martyr (source);
O eternal God,
whose servant Edmund kept faith to the end,
both with thee and with his people,
and glorified thee by his death:
grant us the same steadfast faith,
that, together with the noble army of martyrs,
we may come to the perfect [...]

The collect for today, the Feast Day of St Martin (c 316-397), Monk, Bishop of Tours (source):
Almighty God,
who didst call Martin from the armies of this world
to be a faithful soldier of Christ:
give us grace to follow him
in his love and compassion for those in need,
and empower thy Church to claim for all people
their inheritance [...]

In recent years, Christians have been martyred in Turkey, Gaza, and elsewhere for professing the gospel of Christ. Powerful Muslim groups are seeking to criminalise any criticism of Islam or Mohammed. How should Christians respond?
In medieval Cordoba, the capital of Muslim Spain (711-1492), Christians faced similar questions. Followers of Christ were tolerated [...]