Celtic Church Migration Prior to Charlemagne
Prior to Charlemagne coming to power and establishing his Holy Roman Empire, the Celtic Church had grown to become the most dominant church in the world in terms of size. It had churches and monasteries that spread from Iceland all through the Brittanic Isles across Europe from Spain to the Slovak Empire in Eastern Europe and down to Northern Italy in the Lombard Kingdom. The church had no central seat of authority like the churches in Rome, Constantinople and North Africa and so it did not function in one voice. There were differences in how the churches worshipped. For example, a peculiarity of the Celtic Liturgy is that the chalice and paten are doubly veiled. The Brittish, Gallican (European) and Mozabarec (Spanish) Churches all removed the first veil just prior to the Gospel Reading. But the Bobbio Church (Northern Italy) removed the veil just after the reading of the Gospel.
How did the church grow to be so large? It grew because it had a different philosophy than the other churches. While the churches in Rome and Constantinople tied themselves to the political fortunes of the governments of their Empires the monks of the Celtic monasteries were perigeni's. A perigeni is a wanderer. There are many stories about monks getting in boats and drifting in the ocean for days and choosing to evangelize the first place the boat landed. This concept took Celtic missionaries in strange and far away places. St. Brendan the Navigator is perhaps the best known of all the Celtic perigeni's. It is said that he visited 5,000 different places building monasteries and churches where ever he went, from Iceland throughout the Brittanic Isles. St. Columbanus traveled across Europe building churches in Northern Italy to the Slavic Empire in Eastern Europe. He was not the first to build a Celtic Church in Rome's backdoor. That honor goes to Philip the Apostle and Lazarus who founded a Celtic church in Italy long before the Roman Catholic Church was established.
The Celtic monks were also known for something else. As Europe was plunged into the dark ages and barbarians raided and burned church libraries destroying ancient manuscripts monks in Celtic monasteries in Ireland and Scotland were busy copying ancient biblical texts. It was painstaking work and each page was copied from the text of the original page and then that page would be adorned with hand painted illustrations. Many of these texts survive to this day and many are dated centuries after the Synod of Whitby, when Rome contends the Celtic Church went away. The very existence of these books copied laboriously in Celtic monasteries is proof our church had not gone away.
Some of the better known books or missals as the Celts called them are The Book of Armagh from the 9th century, The Book of Deer from the early 9th century, The Book of Dimma from the 7th century,The Durham Gospels, The Lindisfarne Gospels and The Book of Durrow all from the 7th century. But of all these The Book of Kells from the mid 6th century is perhaps the best known of all the Celtic Missals. It survives and resides at Trinity College in Dublin.
How did the church grow to be so large? It grew because it had a different philosophy than the other churches. While the churches in Rome and Constantinople tied themselves to the political fortunes of the governments of their Empires the monks of the Celtic monasteries were perigeni's. A perigeni is a wanderer. There are many stories about monks getting in boats and drifting in the ocean for days and choosing to evangelize the first place the boat landed. This concept took Celtic missionaries in strange and far away places. St. Brendan the Navigator is perhaps the best known of all the Celtic perigeni's. It is said that he visited 5,000 different places building monasteries and churches where ever he went, from Iceland throughout the Brittanic Isles. St. Columbanus traveled across Europe building churches in Northern Italy to the Slavic Empire in Eastern Europe. He was not the first to build a Celtic Church in Rome's backdoor. That honor goes to Philip the Apostle and Lazarus who founded a Celtic church in Italy long before the Roman Catholic Church was established.
The Celtic monks were also known for something else. As Europe was plunged into the dark ages and barbarians raided and burned church libraries destroying ancient manuscripts monks in Celtic monasteries in Ireland and Scotland were busy copying ancient biblical texts. It was painstaking work and each page was copied from the text of the original page and then that page would be adorned with hand painted illustrations. Many of these texts survive to this day and many are dated centuries after the Synod of Whitby, when Rome contends the Celtic Church went away. The very existence of these books copied laboriously in Celtic monasteries is proof our church had not gone away.
Some of the better known books or missals as the Celts called them are The Book of Armagh from the 9th century, The Book of Deer from the early 9th century, The Book of Dimma from the 7th century,The Durham Gospels, The Lindisfarne Gospels and The Book of Durrow all from the 7th century. But of all these The Book of Kells from the mid 6th century is perhaps the best known of all the Celtic Missals. It survives and resides at Trinity College in Dublin.
