Weosendes in Pulgaraland

For the first time in centuries, thanks to the efforts of the Bulgarian government (particularly the Coalition for Bulgaria, which spearheaded the project) and conservationists, and some coöperative nature reserves in Niedersachsen and Nordrhein-Westfalen, wild European bison are returning to the Rhodope Mountains of Bulgaria! What’s more, one of the females in the new herd has given birth to a baby calf - the first of its species born south of the Danube since the Middle Ages.

This is big environmental news. The European bison, which once roamed everywhere in continental Europe from France to the Russian steppes, was all but extinct everywhere except for a few forested areas of eastern Poland and Transcarpathia by 1500. Even these animals were very nearly hunted to extinction by the Deutsches Heer in the Eastern theatre of World War I. It was only thanks to the efforts of a handful of far-sighted German conservationists that the last dozen or so animals were placed in zoos for their protection. Reintroduction efforts were made into the wild lands of several Eastern European and Asian countries from these small captive stocks, beginning in 1951. The reintroduction of bison into these areas has already helped to stabilise and diversify local œcosystems. From the article:

For the first time in centuries, European bison are now roaming free in the Rhodope Mountains of Bulgaria. The herd of seven animals (two males and five females) was released from their enclosure this summer and is now living free in the Studen Kladenets Hunting Reserve (part of the Rhodope Mountains rewilding area), where the Rewilding Rhodopes team is monitoring their behaviour and movement on a daily basis.

“This is a momentous occasion,” says Hristo Hristov, a rewilding officer attached to the Rewilding Rhodopes team. “The animals are now reoccupying their former ecological niche, finding water and food, learning to protect themselves against wolves and jackals, and exploring the challenging terrain.”

The good news doesn’t end at the bison release. One of the free-roaming female bison has already given birth – this is the first bison calf born in the wild south of the River Danube since the Middle Ages. The female calf and mother are both doing well.

“We are thrilled by the new addition,” says Hristov. “The calf was born in one of the wildest parts of the reserve and has been following the herd ever since. This young bison is a symbol of hope for a wilder and more biodiverse Rhodope Mountains. This is why we have named her Nadezhda (meaning ‘hope’ in Bulgarian).”

As they roam free in the Rhodope Mountains, the bison will live alongside deer, wolves, vultures and many other rare and endangered species. As in the Southern Carpathians of Romania, where Rewilding Europe and partners have been reintroducing bison since 2014, the animals will have a positive impact on local wild nature, helping to create biodiversity-rich mosaic landscape through their grazing and browsing, as well as enhancing local food chains.

“The European bison will bring a range of benefits to wild nature and people,” says Hristov. “The existing herd has already become quite a visitor attraction and will help us to develop nature-based tourism here.”

Many long and healthy years to Nadezhda, and congratulations to the wildlife conservationists of Bulgaria and the village of Studen Kladenets! Gód hælo, weosendes!

Holy Hierarch Acca, Bishop of Hexham

Saint Acca of Hexham

Today in the Holy Orthodox Church we commemorate Saint Acca, the Bishop of Hexham under whom Venerable Bede did most of his work and to whom most of those works were dedicated. Bede had voluble praise for his bishop, the ‘dearest and best loved of all bishops on this earth’, and in particular he commended the breadth and profundity of Acca’s learning, as witnessed by his broad-ranging library of spiritual works.

When Acca was young, he served in the household of Saint Bosa, the Bishop of York. While there, he made the acquaintance of Saint Wilfrið, whose magnetic personality seems to have swiftly won over Acca’s devotion. (It may have helped that Acca was already deeply in sympathy with the Roman Liturgical preferences of Saint James the Deacon.) Saint Acca spent the next thirteen years accompanying Saint Wilfrið on his journeys, faring with him to Rome and to France, and also remaining at his side during his Sussex and Mercian exiles. When Saint Wilfrið was reinstated as Bishop of Hexham in 692, he named Acca – then a priest – as abbot of Saint Andrew’s. Abbot Acca was present at Saint Wilfrið’s repose in 709, and was appointed bishop in Hexham after him in the following year.

Saint Acca proved to be a wise choice of bishop. Possessed of great zeal and energy, he looked first to completing his beloved predecessor’s church-building work. He oversaw the completion of three smaller churches in the diocæse of Hexham whose construction had been begun by Wilfrið, and also procured for the abbey kirk at Hexham numerous beautiful vestments and Liturgical vessels, as well as a rare and ornate altar-cloth of purple silk. In addition, he invited a Liturgical musician from Canterbury named Maban to serve at Hexham Abbey, who there taught Acca and the people how to chant in harmony. Saint Acca himself proved an adept pupil, for his own skills in Liturgical chant were highly praised.

Saint Acca and Saint Bede were closely known to one another and on good terms, and Acca was of considerable assistance to the monastic historian in gaining him access to both sæcular and ecclesiastical historical texts. These were used in Bede’s History of the English Church and People. As mentioned above, Acca was far from lax in keeping his abbey’s library stocked with a great variety of spiritually-edifying works from the Church Fathers and from other Christian authors.

Bishop Saint Acca was not on such close or affectionate terms with the sæcular authorities. In 730, Ceolwulf King of Northumbria was deposed from his throne and forcibly tonsured as a monk by his political foes – of whom, Acca may have been one or at least under heavy suspicion. When Ceolwulf regained his throne, one of his first acts upon being restored was to strip Acca of his bishopric and send him into exile in Scotland. (Acca subsequently became Bishop of Whithorn.) After his repose on the twentieth of October, 740, Saint Acca’s remains were translated to a burial site near the eastern wall of Hexham Abbey.

Around 1030, the sacristan Fr Ælfred Westowe was called from Durham to have Acca’s remains translated from the grounds into a reliquary inside the abbey. The saint’s Liturgical vestments, with which he was buried, were found to be in immaculate condition, free from all decay. These were placed on display within the Abbey. A portable altar was placed above him, bearing the inscription Almæ Trinitati, agiæ Sophiæ, sanctæ Mariæ. Those who attempted to steal these relics were driven off in a terrible and ominous manner, but many wonders were wrought through the relics and shrine of Saint Acca for those poor folk who came to God in singleness of mind. Holy Acca, pilgrim, scholar and kindly bishop, pray unto Christ our God that our souls may be saved!

Venerable Friðuswíþ of Binsey, Abbess of Oxford

Church of Saint Margaret, Binsey, Oxford

Two days ago we commemorated the feast-day of Saint Nóðhelm, the studious and scholarly Mercian Archbishop of Canterbury and friend of Saint Bede and Saint Boniface whose advancement in the Church he owed in the main to one Æþelbald King of Mercia. Today, we also commemorate another holy Mercian – a princess turned abbess named Saint Friðuswíþ [also Frideswide, Frevisse or Fris].

Friðuswíþ was born in Oxford, in the year 650, to one Didan of Eynsham, a sub-king of Mercia whose sway held in the Chilterns, and his wife Sæfrið. The two of them brought her a tutor: a nun named Saint Ælfgýð (also commemorated today) who taught her the precepts of holiness in Christ. Friðuswíþ did not, however, become a nun right away. Her mother Sæfrið took ill and died, and she returned to her father to help and comfort him. However, she did manage to convince Didan to build a church for her in the Oxford gates; there she and twelve of her friends took the veil and dedicated their lives to Christ in perpetual virginity. Didan was remarkably indulgent of his daughter’s wishes, not only gladly allowing her to become a nun, but also expanding the cloister with buildings and a generous stipend.

All was well for some time. However Ælfgár, the Mercian sub-king who ruled the lands around Leicester, knew full well of Friðuswíþ’s fairness. Of course, she being Didan’s only daughter, Ælfgár also understood her to be quite wealthy. Thus, inflamed with lust and greed, he set about pursuing her. When she heard the proposition from his heralds, she declined him at once, swearing that she had already given herself to Christ. Put bluntly, Ælfgár did not take her ‘no’ particularly well. He made plans to abduct her by force. Friðuswíþ fled from Ælfgár in a boat that lay moored on the Thames, and stole away in it to a secluded spot: Binsey. There, thanks to a holy well that sprang up in response to her prayers, she was able to live for three years and elude Ælfgár’s notice that whole time. After that time she returned to Oxford, thinking it safe.

However, Ælfgár didn’t give up even that easily. Enraged by her success in her attempts to elude him, he raised a here and lay siege to Oxford in an attempt to flush Friðuswíþ out, threatening the townsfolk with burning the town to the ground unless she were given up. In his wrath Ælfgár swore that not only he would have her, but all of his men would as well. Thus backed into a corner, in her extremity Friðuswíþ called out to God and His holy saints to save her, particularly Saint Catherine and Saint Cæcilia who also suffered for their vows of virginity. As soon as Ælfgár entered the gates of Oxford, he was stricken full blind. His men, beholding this fell omen, took fright and fled, but Ælfgár himself, blind and helpless, stumbled to where Friðuswíþ was, begging her to forgive him and asking her to restore his sight. Saint Friðuswíþ took pity on him, and asked if he would undergo penance for his sins. He having agreed to this, Friðuswíþ restored Ælfgár’s sight, and he left her in peace. (The shorter hagiographical source has it that his horse stumbled, throwing him and causing him to break his neck.)

Saint Friðuswíþ worked several wonders among the nuns at Oxford, and at least another of these seems to have involved a holy spring. When her sister-nuns, who accompanied Friðuswíþ into hiding from Ælfgár, began to gripe about having to haul water from the Thames, Abbess Friðuswíþ prayed to God and a holy well of pure water sprang up. (This well is still extant, at the Church of Saint Margaret of Antioch in Binsey.) Another miracle she worked involved a leper who lived in the Oxford gates. Seeing her, the leper demanded that the saint kiss him. Friðuswíþ overcame her revulsion at his deformed flesh and her own fear of infection, and did as he asked. Once she did so, the scales fell from his skin and the leper’s flesh became whole and healthy, like that of a newborn.

Saint Friðuswíþ established a monastic school at her former abode. The University of Oxford represents this school as the basis for its mediæval foundation, and she remains the patron of the University to this day. She reposed in the Lord on the nineteenth of October, 727, at her hermitage in Binsey, to which she had retired permanently in her old age. She was buried in the church at Oxford – today Christ Church Cathedral. Holy Mother Friðuswíþ, noble ascetic and gentle teacher of nuns, pray to Christ our God that our souls may be saved!

Come, let us solemnly rejoice today, and let us laud the virtues and struggles
Of the most splendid luminary of the Western lands:
Friðuswíþ, great among ascetics,
The most praiseworthy instructor of nuns,
Who watcheth over us from her dwelling-place on high;
For the Lord hath truly made her wondrous among His saints.
By her supplications may He save our souls.

Holy well of Saint Friðuswíþ, Binsey

A few ‘takes’ from recent headlines

1. Here’s a simple rule. If you didn’t support Kaep when he protested police brutality at home, then don’t blame LeBron when he doesn’t protest normal policing abroad. Actually, on second thought, don’t blame LeBron at all. He actually puts his money where his mouth is.


2. Speaking of China: it’s not just the cars, stupid. It’s the infrastructure.


3. Few things move me further into the Tulsi camp than watching her give massive rhetorical body-checks to people who clearly deserve them. Case in point: Hillary Clinton, who should have known better than to comment on the Democratic nomination after having basically tossed the last election – and certainly should have known better than to call one of the trailing candidates a ‘Russian asset’. Congresswoman Gabbard also has repeatedly called the sitting president a ‘bitch’ for supporting Saudi Arabia in Yemen. Again, completely deserved. She’s a jock, but she sure knows how to pick her fights – it’s a pity she doesn’t support Medicare for All as strongly as she might. As it is, I’m still on-the-fence between her and Bernie.


4. EDIT (20 Oct 2019): Beto O’Rourke, Andrew Yang and Marianne Williamson, by defending Tulsi Gabbard against the ‘Russian asset’ smear, have proven that they are at least decent human beings, even if I disagree with much of their platforms. If treatment of ‘outsiders’ is a measure of character, then they have proven that they have it. Cory Booker, Kamala Harris and Julián Castro have revealed that they do not.


5. A horrific, genocidal Turkish invasion of Syria is probably not the best time to say ‘I told you so’ about the FSA, which is busy carrying out the dirty work of said horrific genocide. But yes: the supporters of Baššâr al-’Asad (even as the least-worst option) have been right about the ‘moderate rebels’, if not from day one then pret-near close to it. The American betrayal went far deeper than Trump’s quasi-pullout, and few people know that now better than the Kurds themselves.


6. What the hell kind of country decides it’s a good idea to shoot more whales when vanishingly few people at all, and certainly nobody in their right mind, wants to eat whale meat? Whales are sentient. It’s long past time for the ‘civilised’ world to stop butchering them.

Holy Virgin-Martyr Gwen of Talgarth

Church of St Wenn, Cornwall

On the eighteenth of October we venerate Saint Gwen [also Wenn or Wenna], another of the prolific and holy brood of Brychan Brycheiniog. Born in South Wales, she moved to Cornwall and became an anchoress. She is commonly confused with the Breton Saint Gwen ‘the Three-Breasted’, and with Gwen ferch Cynyr Ceinfarfog the mother of Saint Cybi Felyn. This is somewhat understandable, as all three Gwens are saints connected with Cornwall – but it is still an error to be avoided.

We know very little of Saint Gwen’s short life. She was born in 463 in Talgarth, in the British kingdom of Powys. She did move to Cornwall with, or shortly after, her brother Saint Nectan did, and established several churches both there and in Devon, including St Wenn in Bodmin, St Kew and Cheristow. She and Nectan were apparently very close as siblings, and she chose to live close by Nectan’s hermitage.

Gwen was compelled to visit again her home of Talgarth in 492, which was under attack by the West Saxons, who were yet heathen and unenlightened by the true faith. She was discovered by the Saxons and put to the sword on the eighteenth of October that year, thus earning a martyr’s crown at the age of twenty-nine. Holy martyr Gwen, pray to Christ our God for us sinners!

O Brychan’s jewel and holy daughter, most pious Gwen,
Thou didst defy the heathen Saxons, thereby winning a martyr’s crown.
Being, therefore, numbered among the saints,
Intercede for us before the Throne of Grace,
That we may be granted great mercy.

Holy Hierarch Nóðhelm, Archbishop of Canterbury

Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London

Today in the Orthodox Church we commemorate another saintly Archbishop of Canterbury: a contemporary, friend and correspondent of both Bede and Boniface; Nóðhelm of Canterbury.

Very little appears to be known about Nóðhelm’s early life. He was a Middle Angle, and was a sæcular advisor to Æþelbald King of Mercia before becoming a priest. We do know, however, that prior to his consecration as Archbishop of Canterbury, he had served as the archpriest and rector of Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London. He was chosen to succeed Saint Tatwine, a Benedictine monk and author who was well known for his composition of riddles. Saint Nóðhelm, too, was an accomplished scholar, and the letters he wrote to and received from Saints Bede and Boniface attest to this, as well as the profound acknowledgement Nóðhelm receives from Bede in his History of the English Church and People. Nóðhelm had, by Bede’s account, done some significant research in the Roman archives on the history and gæography of Kent, which was of considerable use to Bede in his historiography of that kingdom. The capacity of Nóðhelm’s prodigious memory is attested in that one of Bede’s primary sources were the testimonies of Abbot Albinus of Saint Augustine’s (pupil of Saints Theodore and Hadrian), which he in turn had received from his letters and discussions with ‘our venerable brother Nóðhelm the priest’. Bede and Nóðhelm corresponded several more times: Bede addressed a commentary on the Biblical books of Kings to Nóðhelm. The disputed work De octo quæstionibus is also addressed to the Archbishop.

Nóðhelm appears also in the correspondence of Saint Boniface. Boniface, in his missionary work among the Frisians, was particularly appalled (as was, for example, Saint Frideric) by the penchant of Frankish nobles to engage in incestuous unions with their aunts, both out of perverted lust and out of a desire to hoard wealth within the family. These noblemen pointed to the Libellus responsionum, the series of pastoral admonitions issued from Saint Gregory Dialogos to Saint Augustine of Canterbury, to justify their liaisons. As Boniface (rightly) doubted that a sainted pope would ever condone sexual unions between aunts and nephews, he was led to question the authenticity of the document, and he asked Saint Nóðhelm to send him Canterbury’s copy of the Libellus as well as his own opinion on its true authorship.

Saint Nóðhelm’s tenure as Archbishop of Canterbury was primarily concerned with church administration. He successfully reorganised Mercia into two diocæses, Lichfield and Leicester. He also presided over a local synod in 737 which adjudicated an ownership dispute over the Abbey of Withington in Gloucester: a synod which was noteworthy in that it was not attended by any king and yet was still accepted as authoritative.

Nóðhelm reposed in the Lord on the 17^th of November, 739. Holy Hierarch Nóðhelm, worthy scholar and shepherd of the Kentish Church, pray unto Christ our God to save our souls!

Begletsy: searching for gold and God

Pavel (Petr Fedorov) and Ustya (Elizaveta Boyarskaya) in Begletsy

The year is 1907. Revolutionary fervour sweeps Russia, and the most common punishment for political subversives and revolutionaries is exile to Siberia. Those who try to escape their exile and return are hunted down by Cossacks. Their ears are cut off and traded for bounties. The first feature film by the recent genre-film director Rustam Mosafir, the 2014 joint Kazakhstani-Russian production Begletsy (or Fugitives), follows the story of one of these revolutionaries as he tries to escape from Cossack bounty hunters.

Begletsy is, essentially, an Ostern. We may even call it, with perhaps a bit of irony given the revisionist nature of the Ostern genre itself, a ‘revisionist Ostern’. For the most part, it’s played straight – but the ‘revisionist’ marks on it are made clear throughout. Mosafir calls us (with varying degrees of success) to a reflective self-criticality. There are elements in it of a tale of sin, suffering, redemption. There are also questions the film raises for us about the nature of wealth, our desire for this-worldly freedom and security, and the agonistic relationship of both to our religious strivings. It is also, much like Kelin or Shal, a survival film. But it is obvious that the vision of the film is a Russian one, albeit a Russian one that ‘faces east’.

Pavel (Pyotr Fedorov) is part of a group of escaped prisoners that are being hunted by a band of Cossacks led by the cruel and cynical Kudim (Sergei Tsepov). Kudim and his men manage to kill all of them except Pavel, who escapes by jumping into a raging river and swimming to the other side. However, Pavel is the one they’re really after since, as a political prisoner, his bounty is largest. The escapee takes shelter with a prospector, Vasilii (Valerii Grishko) and his mute, illiterate wife Ustya (Elizaveta Boyarskaya). Vasilii’s father, whom Pavel comes across as he is dying, informs Pavel of a cache of gold hidden in a pit he dug outside, and asks him to help Vasilii retrieve it. They recover the cache, but Vasilii is killed by the Cossacks after they discover he is sheltering Pavel. After that, a three-way game of cat-and-mouse ensues in the wooded taiga between Pavel and Ustya, the Cossacks, and an enraged bear which is trying to find her lost cub. Pavel winds up shot and falls into a bear trap; after that he has to be taken into an Evenki shirangju to be healed.

The Evenki hunter (Seidulla Moldahanov) who heals Pavel is actually also the one who introduces the story. He reflects on the strange ways of the white man – who hunts for gold and then tries to speak to God, thinking that God will hear him and heal him. In so doing, he sets in play the central dilemma of both Vasilii and the Cossacks – as well as Pavel, to some extent. To what extent is chasing wealth, or ease, or security, worth giving up parts of your own soul? The film demonstrates to us, intriguingly enough, that even hateful blackguards like Kudim and his henchman Skandyba, after all, have souls and desire union with God. They have just mired themselves in such a mad scramble for gold such that they cannot hear or rightly speak to God. Pavel, too, doesn’t seem to be going about ‘healing his soul’ in the right way. We get glimpses – both in his own flashbacks and during the Spirit Dance of the Evenki hunter – that he feels a certain degree of remorse for his assassination attempt that clearly went awry. But by the end of the film he doesn’t seem to have dealt with that, and the Evenk says as much. What is truly intriguing to me, though, is that, despite the Cossacks crossing themselves and praying to Christ and despite Ustya chasing after her lost baptismal cross, Mosafir puts the religious, Orthodox perspective on these questions into the mouth of a shamanistic Evenki hunter! There is no question but that this was a deliberate choice on his part – hence my application of the term ‘revisionist’.

As a meditation on the conflict between wealth and religion and the tension between a desire for a secure life and a desire for God, the film doesn’t quite work. The moments where it comes closest are the moments of tension among the Cossacks when they start to betray each other over the bounty. But for the two main characters, it doesn’t quite work. Ustya is too simple in the positive Russian sense, and Pavel, despite his chequered past – too altruistic. It is probably best to think about Begletsy more as a survival film from their perspective.

The acting in this film is remarkably decent. Petr Fedorov’s acting gives us certain shades of a young Michael Biehn; he has a similar resilience combined with physical and emotional vulnerability. He’s a ‘fish out of water’ when it comes to the taiga, but also clearly not wholly helpless. Elizaveta Boyarskaya really carries the day here, though. By turns wild and demure, domestic and tough, despite her character having literally zero dialogue, she manages to convey a particularly redoubtable emotional subtlety and range, in addition to being easy on the eyes even when covered in blood and grime. Little wonder indeed that the relationship between Pavel and Ustya takes the turn that it does. On the other side, the Cossacks are a delightfully well-done motley crew, from the unprincipled Skandyba (Aleksandr Samoilov) to the reluctantly-conscientious Ignat (Juris Lauciņš) and the naïve and cowardly Mihei (Kirill Anisimov). They are also shown to be expert bounty hunters and survivalists, which keeps the stakes high and allows Mostafir to build up some excellent dramatic tension.

The film is, by the way, incredibly well-paced, and holds the viewer’s interest throughout. The one thing about Begletsy I wasn’t too appreciative of was the soundtrack. Maybe it’s just because I’m coming off watching some minimalist art films with fairly sparse soundtracks that I’m saying this, and so my opinion here ought to be taken with a grain of salt. Even so, I found the soundtrack too bombastic and ostentatious for a film like this. I’m not saying we necessarily have to have another Shostakovich doing the score, but the big dramatic swells or the tense musical passages that accompany various beats of the plot do seem a bit much. It seems to me that less, and more judicious, here could have meant more.

The cinematography dwells lovingly on the rural taiga. (In the humble opinion of yours truly, it’s prohibitively hard to make an ugly movie in Kazakhstan. Cameras are attracted to the Kazakhstani landscape like magnets.) We have some nice atmospheric shots of mountainscapes and forests, some animal photography of eagles and especially bears. And it was clear they used live brown bears for most of the takes rather than animatronics or puppetry, but that also meant some awkward takes and edits for the action scenes where the bears were involved.

Overall, Begletsy is a fun, enjoyable movie with some typical Ostern flourishes. Even though (as he seems to intimate from his interviews) this wasn’t quite the movie that Mosafir wanted to make for his debut, it’s still a strong start to a career.