Church Vikings
A Homily for Nidaros Lutheran Church’s “150th +2” Anniversary
Propers: The Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost, AD 2024 B
Homily:
Lord, we pray for the preacher, for you know his sins are great.
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
The Year of Our Lord 793. Here terrible portents came about over the land of Northumbria, and miserably frightened the people: these were immense flashes of lightning, and fiery dragons were seen flying across the firmament of the sky. A great famine immediately followed these signs; and a little after that in the same year, on 8 June—the sixth day before the ides—the raiding of heathen men miserably devastated God’s church in the isle of Lindisfarne by looting and slaughter.
Thus does the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle herald the dawn of the Viking Age.
Britain had known waves of Christianization, a stubborn island at the end of the ancient world, requiring rechristening every so many centuries. The Romans had settled Londinium, and brought with them their Roman ways. This included, in due time, Christianity, to which some of the natives took, and some did not. Those Celts who came to Christ were known as Britons, later the Welsh; while those who stayed beyond Rome’s reach remained the painted Picts.
As the Empire waned, the Legions were recalled, leaving the Britons to fend for themselves. Not wishing to abandon the benefits of civilization, they called upon Germanic mercenaries—Angles and Saxons and Jutes—to fight the pagan Picts. Alas, the King of the Britons, Vortigern by name, welched on his debts. So the Angles and the Saxons carved their fee out of his fief, and settled in the land that would be England. The image of Vortigern burning in his tower is popular amongst Welshmen to this day.
Christianity returned by roundabout route, arcing up through Ireland, which had never been part of Rome, converting the Picts of Scotland, then spreading the Gospel throughout the Angle-Land from a monastery on the holy isle of Lindisfarne. English Christianity was born there. The Angles and the Saxons settled down: still warriors, of course, but tempered by the Celtic monks of Christ. Yet while the English built their castles, their Scandinavian cousins were building boats; longships; raiders.
The wild pagan Vikings of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden burst out of the North Sea to sack and burn at Lindisfarne, targeting the undefended, richly-furnished monasteries, lashing out at the descendants of Charlemagne, in Paris, Normandy, Ireland, Britain. English prayer-books printed the plea, A furore Normannorum libera nos, Domine: Deliver us, O Lord, from the fury of the Northmen. They were seen as a punishment from God. They were seen as the devil’s own.
So naturally the Church would seek to send them Jesus Christ.
Enter St Ansgar, Apostle to the North. Denmark was firstborn of the Scandinavian kingdoms, unified by the reign of Gorm the Old. Gorm’s son Harald Bluetooth requested Christian missionaries, in part I’m sure as the Church could be for him a useful ally. Ansgar, a visionary Frank of noble descent who had been raised within a monastery, having proved himself by winning souls for Christ in Saxony and Sweden, found himself now elevated to Archbishop of Hamburg-Brennen, with a mission to Christianize the North.
And by the grace of God did he succeed. Denmark under Bluetooth became a Christian kingdom. But—they didn’t like the idea of being under a German Archbishop. So they got their own Archbishopric of Lund, in what is today Sweden, but back then was part of Denmark. Next came the Norwegians. They were a stickier wicket, a wilder people disunified since the death of Harald Fairhair. A series of Christian kings eventually brought them back together, and the Norse embraced the Church. But—they didn’t want to be under a Danish archbishop.
So they got their own Archbishopric of Nidaros. Nidaros became the center of Christianity for all the Northern Sea, embracing five bishoprics in Norway, two in Iceland, and one each in Greenland, Orkney, Faroe, and the Isle of Man. Shetland was part of Orkney at the time. And I have to tell you, a couple centuries of Christianity really calmed them down. All that going a-Viking they seem to have gotten out of their system, much to Europe’s relief. But while the raiding abated, the exploration never did.
The Scandinavians Lutheranized in the Protestant Reformation, and I can attest that they are proud of that heritage to this day, crediting to Luther their tradition of social democracy. They may not go to church that much, but they know how to care for the poor. And of course they came out here. Minnesota, North Dakota, proved fertile ground for the Frozen Chosen. They brought their pioneering spirit, their dreams of a better life, the strength of all their ancestors, and the faith that they’d been given through the saints.
Out here, among small towns and farms, the people of Clitherall and Vining chose to name this congregation for the ancient cathedral of Northern Christianity, a purposeful, conscious link not simply to the past but to eternity, to the timeless liberation that is the Gospel. For 152 years, the people of Nidaros have stewarded this land, gathered together for prayer, baptized our children, instructed our youth, offered the Lord’s Supper for all who may believe, and buried our dead in the sure hope of Jesus’ Resurrection.
That is one heck of a legacy, a story that we can all be proud to share within the greater tale of Christ’s Church alive in every land and generation. We are part of a family that encompasses all of humankind, all of Adam and of Eve, made one, made new, in the Body of Jesus Christ. And to be clear: we were His enemies before He made us all His sisters and His brothers. This is a pattern repeated throughout all of Christian history. The foes of Christ in any given generation become the Church of the next. The punishment He deals is forgiveness and conversion.
We saw this in St Paul, the great opponent who became an Apostle. We saw this in the Celts, converted by slaves they took who gave them Christ. We saw this in the English, who heard the Gospel preached at Lindisfarne, and in the Vikings who burned Lindisfarne to the ground. Jesus wins His battles by the Cross and not the sword. He converts us by humility, not by hubris.
We are called to wage war, yes, but not against outsiders, not against aliens. We are called to wage a war within ourselves, to drown our sinful natures in the waters of this Font, and to find the Spirit’s strength to love our neighbors as ourselves. Jesus was crucified by Rome; and Rome became the center of the Church. We poured out into Him every violence, every humiliation, every cruelty at our disposal, and what was His response? “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
That is how Jesus conquers all the cosmos. He confronts His every foe and makes us all into His friends; nay, more than this, He makes us all into Himself. Such is the love that outlives death, the life that snuffs out hell. How else could one conquer a Viking? Not by sword and flame and axe and spear, but by a love from above that holds every sinner dear.
Such has been the mission of Nidaros Lutheran Church for 152 years: to be Christ for one another, to be Christ for all the world, by laying down our lives, taking up the Cross, and welcoming all children in His Name. Greatness comes by service, not by subjugation. We are descended from warriors of old, who laid down every weapon for our King. Love conquers all, forgives all, heals all, raises all. The love of God in Christ cannot be stopped.
In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Pertinent Links
RDG Stout
Blog: https://rdgstout.blogspot.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RDGStout/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsqiJiPAwfNS-nVhYeXkfOA
X: https://twitter.com/RDGStout
St Peter’s Lutheran
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064841583987
Website: https://www.stpetersnymills.org/
Donation: https://secure.myvanco.com/L-Z9EG/home
Nidaros Lutheran
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100074108479275
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@nidaroschurch6026
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