As our dear readers have by now guessed, St. Ambrose is my chosen patron. Today is his Feast Day, which is what got me thinking about him and about the Bishops of today. These thoughts are by no means novel, but it is worth returning to them again and again.

St. Ambrose was Bishop of Milan in the 4th century, during the height of the Arian heresy; he famously was chosen bishop by an angry crowd of orthodox Catholic and Arians who could not decide who would be their next bishop: he spoke so well to calm them, that they spontaneously elected him, even though he was not yet baptized at the time! Anyway, here was St. Ambrose’s postion: he was Bishop of a large and influential city (say, like Boston today in the US); the secular powers were heretics (the Empress of Constantinople was an Arian); and the faithful of his Diocese were sharply divided. Can you begin to see the parallels? The big difference between this “honey-tongued Doctor” and today’s major Archbishops is that he was tough, tough like I think we don’t even know how to describe these days. He was holed up in his Cathedral with several hundred faithful one night by imperial troops who were striving to make him bow to their power; he responded by refusing to bend, and spent the night teaching the faithful chant and hymns! Why can’t our Bishops take him as their example, even a little?

Consider: what is keeping our Bishops from infuriating the world, hewing close to the Faith, and renewing the Church as Ambrose did? Nothing! They have all the same resources at their disposal as he did, and though we cannot of course expect every Bishop to be a Doctor of the Church, we can expect them to learn from their betters. Why aren’t we holding our Bishops to a much, much higher standard? Why isn’t the Vatican?

This is what I propose: that each Bishop first become fully Catholic, and learn to love his Faith more than he loves kind words from the local newspaper. This being accomplished, he needs to chop down his bureaucracy and actually take personal charge of much, much more. Yes, I know that this is virtually impossible. Get over it: that’s his job. Every single soul in his diocese is his personal responsibilty. Recent history has proven that Bishops can’t trust so-called experts, and so he needs to actually stop doing this. Be unpopular, really! We want you to be unpopular, your Excellencies! We want you to be hated and mocked by the world: if you are, then we will defend you with our lives, and support you with our wallets and our backs. I want my Bishop to ask me to do something I have no desire to do, and for me to have to do it because I love and respect him. Can you imagine? There is no reason why this can’t be reality. Let’s pray for it! And stop defending these dudes when they’re indefensible: it is not charity to gloss over grave errors; neither is it kind to support the wicked. We as laymen can never do their job for them. The Bishops must radically take responsibility, and we must radically expect it of them, and be willing to sacrifice for them. I want my Bishop to fight the US government so hard on abortion that the National Guard has to lock me up in the Cathedral with him; for him to stand at the door of his cathedral and prevent publicly wicked “Catholic” politicians from entering, as St. Ambrose did with the Emperor Theodosius, who had slaughtered innocents (see painting above): don’t you? I want him to be such a symbol of love and true charity that the New York Times will despise him. I want him to take the restoration of liturgy so seriously that he would himself spearhead the return to truly sacred music, even to the point of teaching it to us himself: Ambrose did so, and so can he. And only then, when the powers of the world quail at the power of Christ — humble but unyielding; firm and fast — will some in power, at least, come and kneel before our Lord in the person of the Bishop who has rebuked them, as St. Ambrose’s unyielding stance eventually brought the very Emperor to his knees, repenting of his sins.

That’s enough for now
Read more about St. Ambrose’s life and work here and here
Finally, a sage observation from the good Doctor:

To avoid dissensions we should be ever on our guard, more especially with those who drive us to argue with them, with those who vex and irritate us, and who say things likely to excite us to anger. When we find ourselves in company with quarrelsome, eccentric individuals, people who openly and unblushingly say the most shocking things, difficult to put up with, we should take refuge in silence, and the wisest plan is not to reply to people whose behavior is so preposterous.
Those who insult us and treat us contumeliously are anxious for a spiteful and sarcastic reply: the silence we then affect disheartens them, and they cannot avoid showing their vexation; they do all they can to provoke us and to elicit a reply, but the best way to baffle them is to say nothing, refuse to argue with them, and to leave them to chew the cud of their hasty anger. This method of bringing down their pride disarms them, and shows them plainly that we slight and despise them.

And a photo of St. Ambrose’s body, dressed in Episcopal splendor, buried between the Martyrs Sts. Gervase and Protase, in the Basilica built in his honor in the city of Milan.

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