THIS DAY IN HISTORY: December 23 | Posted Dec. 23, 2007

Researched and written by Gloriscope staff

1922: Pope Pius XI published his encyclical Ubi arcano Dei consilio (”On the Peace of Christ in His Kingdom”).

1902: Death of Frederick Temple, an Archbishop of Canterbury with a big interest in science. – He was born in 1821, studied mathematics and logic at the University of Oxford and became ordained in the Anglican church in his twenties. He became the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1896. He had a great interest in education and in the relationship between science and faith. In a lecture at the Oxford University in 1884. he said that the “doctrine of evolution” was “in no sense whatsoever antagonistic to the teachings of Religion.”

1805: Death of Pehr Osbeck, a Christian explorer of Asia. – Pehr Osbeck, a Swede, was a student of the famous Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus (in Swedish: Carl von Linné), the father of the modern scientific nomenclature for plants and animals. Pehr Osbeck became one of the twenty “Linnaeus apostles” sent by Linnaeus all over the world to collect and study plants. Osbeck traveled to China and Java in 1750-1752 and contributed about 600 plant species to Linnaeus “System of Plants,” an important book published in 1753. Osbeck was ordained a priest in the Swedish Lutheran church and earned a doctorate in theology. His travel report was published in 1757. and he was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1758.

1776: Thomas Paine honored God during the American Revolution. – Thomas Paine (1737-1809), a writer who inspired Americans during the American Revolution against Great Britain, wrote an influential pamphlet entitled “Common Sense,” On December 23, 1776, during a bitter winter, the pamphlet was read by order of General George Washington to 2,898 heroic American troops freezing barefoot at Valley Forge. The pamphlet, which strengthened them in their sufferings for the American independence, honored God with these words:

But where says some is the King of America? I’ll tell you Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain. Yet that we may not appear to be defective even in earthly honors, let a day be solemnly set apart for proclaiming the charter; let it be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed thereon…

1771: Death of Marie-Marguerite d’Youville, founder of “the Grey Nuns.” – She was born in 1701 near Montréal, Canada. In 1738, she founded the Order of Sisters of Charity of Montreal (Soeurs de la Charité de Montréal) popularly known as “the Grey Nuns” (”Soeurs Grises”). She was beatified by Pope John XXIII, who called her “Mother of Universal Charity.” She was officially canonized as a saint of the Catholic Church in 1990 as a model of compassionate love.

1652: Death of John Cotton, an influential minister in colonial New England. – John Cotton (1585-1652) was an English-born Protestant churchman who influenced the spiritual foundations of the New Haven Colony in New England, an area on the northeastern coast of the present-day northeastern United States. He wrote a Bible-based legal code and an adult catechism. His most popular book is “Milk for Babes”, which is a short catechism for children, considered to be the first American children’s book. He preached numerous sermons, the best known of which is “God’s Promise to His Plantation”, (1630), a sermon that he preached to English Puritans led by John Winthrop before their emigration to North America. That sermon was a tremendous inspiration to English Christians who left Europe with a purpose of establishing a God-centered Christian community in the New World.

1491: Birth of Jacques Cartier, European discoverer of Canada. – Cartier led a French marine expedition to North America and they were the first Europeans to enter the estuary of St. Lawrence (1535). Cartier gave the name “Canada” to a part of Quebec that he explored. During the winter of his second voyage, he planted a cross at the mouth of River Lairet, a tributary of a river named Sainte-Croix (Holy Cross).

619: Boniface V became Pope - he promoted Christianization of England. – He was born in Naples, Italy, and as a Pope in 619-625 he promoted Christianization of pagan kingdoms of England. He had a reputation to be “the mildest of men” who loved his fellow workers in the Church. He was buried in St. Peter’s Church in 625 and his epitaph describes him as “custodian of justice, upright and patient, benign, cultivated in speech and pleasing in piety.”

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TO GOD BE ALL THE GLORY!

Published in the U.S.A. Copyright © 4T4C News Corp. 2007. All rights reserved.