The exciting life of St Luke the Evangelist

An image of St Luke in the C6th Augustine Gospels,
held in the Parker Library at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge

An address given at Templederry Church on Saturday 18th October 2025, the Feast Day of Luke the Evangelist, and at St Mary's Nenagh the following Sunday 19th October 2025

Today we are celebrating the feast of St Luke the Evangelist.

‘Evangelist’ is the title the church gives to the four Gospel writers, of which Luke is one of course.

When I first sat down to write this sermon, I decided to explore who this man Luke was, and who he wasn’t. I looked up scholarly resources, and many less reliable resources, such as Google. And I began to write a sermon filled with references and quotes. I realised I was just showing off my own less than scholarly erudition. Those of you in this family service who are older would have found it dry as dust, and those who are younger, dull as ditch water.

So I started again, trying to paint a vivid picture of Luke as a vibrant and interesting person, who lived a truly exciting life in the service of his God, of Jesus who rose from the dead, and of the rapidly developing and growing fellowship of believers of which he was a part.

So here goes…

Luke grew up in a Greek-speaking family, probably in the city of Antioch in ancient Syria.

Antioch was a big and important city, the capital of the Roman province of Syria, which grew rich on the spice trade with the East. Before then it had been the capital of the Seleucid Empire, founded by Seleucus, one of Alexander the Great’s generals, for some 300 years.

Antioch must have been an exciting place to grow up in. As a Greek-speaking capital city, it was full of arenas and theatres, schools and libraries. And it was a multi-cultural melting pot, the streets filled with visiting traders in foreign clothes, speaking strange languages. A bit like London, or New York today, perhaps.

In Luke’s time, Antioch was a centre for Greek-speaking Jews of the Diaspora. We do not know for sure whether he was a Jew or a gentile, but we do know Luke was highly educated. No doubt he attended one of the many schools, where he learned to write excellent Greek, better than the other Gospel writers. His books show he was familiar with Greek literary texts. We also believe he studied to be a medical doctor, because St Paul calls him ‘Luke, the beloved physician’.

Luke wrote two books of our New Testament, his Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles.

We know this because the language used in both, and the underlying theology, are so similar that they must have come from the same hand. Both are addressed to the same person, perhaps his patron, Theophilus, meaning lover of God. And all the early church writers agree Luke wrote both.

These books are works of history, in the style of the time, and Luke was no mean historian. There is little reason to believe he was ever an eyewitness to Jesus’s life. But in his Gospel he carefully collected and set down the story of Jesus’s life, drawing on different sources, including the earlier Gospel of Mark, a lost collection of the sayings of Jesus shared with the Gospel of Matthew, and some other eyewitness accounts unique to himself.

The Acts of the Apostles traces the story of how the primitive church grew and developed after Jesus’s resurrection up to the time of Paul’s imprisonment in Rome. The first part deals with the life of the church in Jerusalem, and the second part with St Paul’s ministry journeys. It reads like an exciting, adventure story, as the new church rapidly spreads, starting from a small group of frightened disciples in an upper room in Jerusalem, right across the Roman empire, to Rome itself. Do take down your bible at home and read it from start to finish to experience that excitement.

In Acts, Luke draws on many sources of evidence for his story, but for some of it, Luke himself is clearly an eyewitness.

Luke travelled with St Paul on some of his missionary journeys.

We know this because some of the later parts of Acts are written in the 3^rd person plural as ‘We’. For instance, Luke writes, ‘After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia’, and ‘We put out to sea and sailed straight for Samothrace’.

So it is not surprising, that Paul refers to Luke by name in some of his epistles. In Philemon (1:24), Paul describes Luke as ‘a fellow worker’. In 2 Timothy (4:11), as we heard in today’s 1^st reading, Paul, awaiting death in prison in Rome, says, ‘Only Luke is with me’. In Colossians (4:14), Paul speaks of ‘Luke, the beloved physician’.

Here a word of caution is due - many modern scholars believe 2 Timothy and Colossians were not written by Paul himself, though Philemon is universally recognised as Paul’s.

Today’s 2^nd reading, from Luke’s Gospel, tells the story of 70 disciples Jesus sent ahead of him in pairs to prepare his way in places he planned to visit.

It is the pious belief of the Eastern Orthodox Church that Luke was one of these 70 disciples, all of whom they name. They celebrate Luke not just as an Evangelist, but also as an Apostle of the Seventy.

Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis in Cyprus in the late 4^th century, is the first recorded to say he was. I am doubtful. If Luke really was one of the 70, why does he not signal his presence, as he does in the Acts of the Apostles? But the fact is, we really don’t know one way or the other. We should be slow to criticise the pious beliefs of other brothers and sisters in Christ.

We know little else for sure about Luke’s life.

A much later 8^th century tradition maintains that Luke was the first person to paint icons. This is doubtful, but Luke is widely recognised as the patron saint of artists. He is said to have painted a picture of the Virgin Mary and child, known as the Madonna of Constantinople. Although it is now lost, many copies exist and are venerated by the Orthodox churches. The art critic A I Uspensky says that other icons attributed to Luke himself display a Byzantine style not seen before the 5-6^th centuries, so could not have been painted by him.

What did Luke do after his time in Rome with St Paul? We know nothing at all about it. 

However, a later tradition says that he died aged 84 in Boeotia in Greece, crucified by pagans on an olive tree. We may make of that what we will.

What an exciting life Luke had!

He played a prominent role in the rapidly growing Jesus movement, the primitive church spreading like wildfire across the Roman Empire. We do well to celebrate him on his feast day!

I finish in prayer with a Collect from the Episcopal Church.

Almighty God, who inspired your servant Luke the physician
to set forth in his Gospel the love and healing power of your Son:
Graciously continue in your Church this love and power to heal,
to the praise and glory of your Name;
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, 

in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and for ever. Amen.

 

The Last Supper was a Jewish Seder meal

The Last Supper, c. 1520, Andrea Solari (after Leonardo da Vinci)

Reflection at Morning Worship with the Community of Brendan the Navigator streamed on Tuesday 14th October 2025

The reading we have just heard is Mark’s short account of the Last Supper (Mark 14:12-25), at which Jesus instituted the Eucharist. It is clearly a Jewish Seder meal, presided over by Jesus in the company of his disciples. The Seder meal is an annual ceremony at which Jews, both then and now, remember the Passover, how God led them out of bondage in Egypt on a 40 year trek through the wilderness. The Seder is celebrated not in a Synagogue or Temple, but in the home, where the family is gathered. Through the ceremony, children are taught the story of how God saved the Children of Israel and led them to the Promised Land.

This reminds us that Jesus and his disciples were Jews. Antisemitism, hatred of Jews as a distinct people and religion, has been a stain on humanity for centuries. Jesus was a Jew, and anyone who hates Jews must hate Jesus too. As Christians we must be very clear that antisemitism is incompatible with our Christian faith. 

Antisemitism resulted in the Holocaust, the genocide of 6 million Jews during WW2. People of good will swore it would never happen again. But antisemitic views have been increasing again in recent years. This is largely due to the actions of the racist Zionist Israeli state, which expelled hundreds of thousands of Palestinians when it seized power in 1948, and has been denying rights to Palestinians ever since. This is the background to the foul attack on Israel by Hamas two years ago, followed by the equally foul genocide Israel has been perpetrating on Palestinians in Gaza. Zionist apologists attempt to equate any criticism of the Israeli state with antisemitism, but we must be careful to distinguish between antisemitism and anti-Zionism. It is not antisemitic to oppose the racist and genocidal actions of the Zionist Israeli state.

Jesus was a Jewish Rabbi, but he was unafraid to criticise the Jewish leaders of his day, and the encrusted traditions of their faith, when he saw that they were incompatible with the lovingkindness of the God he called his Father. So at his Last Supper, knowing full well what his fate would be at the hands of his enemies, he modifies the Seder liturgy.

In the Seder liturgy, the host breaks the unleavened bread in half and says, “This is the bread of affliction our fathers ate in the wilderness.” Instead, Jesus breaks it and says, “Take; this is my body.” Over the blessing of the third cup of wine, the host at the liturgy is supposed to say, “This is the cup of redemption from bondage in Egypt.” But Jesus makes another substitution and says, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many”.

By doing so, Jesus institutes our Christian Eucharist, which we still celebrate in his memory. He offers his whole being, his body and his blood, as a sacrifice for the sins of the world. He commands us to celebrate it in his memory. When we do so, we participate in an acted parable, that shows us how to confront evil, receive God’s forgiveness, and be united with him in the eternal life of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The Seder meal concludes with a beautiful blessing, said together by those who are present. It goes like this.

Blessed are You, Lord, our God, King of the universe,
who, in His goodness, feeds the whole world with grace,

with kindness and with mercy.

He gives food to all flesh, for His kindness is everlasting.

Through His great goodness to us continuously we do not lack food,

and may we never lack it, for the sake of His great Name.

For He is a God who feeds and sustains all, does good to all,

and prepares food for all His creatures whom He has created,

as it is said: You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

Blessed are You Lord, who provides food for all.

Foreigners and Exiles

Address given at St Mary's Nenagh and Killodiernan Church on Sunday 12th October 2025, the 17th after Trinity

‘Blow, blow, thou winter wind, thou art not so unkind as man’s ingratitude.’

These words from Shakespeare’s As You Like It came to mind when I read today’s NT reading (Luke 17:11-19).

Luke tells us that Jesus healed ten lepers, and only one came back to show his gratitude. ‘Were not ten made clean?’, says Jesus, ‘But the other nine, where are they?’

I fear I’m more like the nine ungrateful than the tenth grateful one – and I dare say you are too. How many of us do not owe an immense debt to someone else? Perhaps to a friend, a teacher, a doctor, who has done something for us that we could not possibly repay. Or to our parents - a week’s neglect on their part would have killed us when we were new born. Yet how often do we forget to express our gratitude, how often do we not even bother to say thank you?

And we are often ungrateful to God as well. He has blessed us with so much. He has given us a wonderful world so perfectly made to meet our needs for food, clothing, shelter and beauty. He has given us the capacity to form deep loving relationships as parents and children, as friends and lovers. And God has even given us his only Son to show us the way to his kingdom, the way of self-sacrifice which leads through the cross.

When times are bad we may pray to God with desparate intensity, but when times are good we are inclined to forget to be grateful. At Holy Communion we recite automatically the words ‘Almighty God, we thank you for feeding us’, but how many of us ever offer even a silent grace before meals, I wonder?

Jesus saw that the one who came back was a Samaritan. ‘Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?’, he says.

As an ethnic group the Samaritans were heretics - they did not behave, or believe, or worship as the Jews did – they were ritually unclean. They were disliked and despised by their Jewish neighbours – somewhat as some Irish people dislike and despise immigrants and travellers today. But Jesus teaches his disciples a lesson by drawing their attention to this particular outsider. He was the only one to turn back, to praise God for his healing, and to thank Jesus. Jesus publicly blessed him, saying, ‘Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well’.

Jesus is never dismissive of people who are different in race, culture or faith, and as Christians we should not be either. We are enriched by the diverse people who are our neighbours, and Jesus commands us to love them as ourselves.

Jeremiah (29:1, 4-7) gives the exiles in Babylon some good advice in today’s OT reading.

Get on with your lives - build houses and live in them, plant gardens and eat what they produce, marry and have children. But also, seek the welfare of the city where you find yourself, and pray for it, because in its welfare you will find your welfare.

Others at the time were stirring up the Jewish people to rebel against the Babylonians. But history shows that Jeremiah was wise. It seems the Jews did as he advised, they prospered in Babylon.They retained their identity, so that some 70 years later, after Babylon in turn had been overthrown by the Persians, their descendents were able to return to Jerusalem and restore the Temple.

It is good advice for migrants everywhere. It is good advice for the New Irish who have made our country their home. And it is good advice for the many Irish emigrants overseas. If we love them, let us pray that they may build good lives in their new communities and work for them to flourish, because if their new communities flourish, so will they.

But what of those of us who remain at home?

The news media are filled with stories of war and suffering. But I suggest it is the carefully phrased reports from scientists which should be of most concern to us. It is clear that human actions are seriously damaging the web of life on this beautiful planet God has placed us on.

The linked emergencies of climate change and biodiversity loss will force lifestyle changes on us all very soon. We do not yet see clearly what those changes will be, nor how we must adapt to new conditions. But change and adapt we must. One thing we can be sure of, the future cannot be one of ever-growing material prosperity as we have been conditioned to expect. We have grown up in a world where endless economic growth and increasingly wasteful consumption seems natural. As the limits to growth become more and more apparent, we will start to feel like exiles in our own country. We will have to find ways to live good and happy lives with less.

Jeremiah’s advice is good for us as well:

Get on with your lives, Jeremiah says. We must not look back at what we feel we are losing, but instead we must look forward.

Build houses and live in them, Jeremiah says. It is shameful that as a society we allow so many to be homeless, and it is shameful that policies of austerity ruin the lives of the poor, the sick and the vulnerable, even as the rich grow richer and the crisis intensifies. We need to build a better, more equal and resilient society. Together, as communities, we need to build our capacity to cherish all our neighbours, and we must love them as we love ourselves.

Plant gardens and eat what they produce, Jeremiah says. We are blessed with bountiful renewable resources: our land and seas to feed us, energy from wind, ocean and geothermal heat, skilled people and vibrant culture. Let us use them productively – they are the gardens that will feed us.

Marry and have children, Jeremiah says. Ordinary human life will continue, and our children are signs of our hope for the future. Let us use our capacity for deep loving relationships as parents, children, friends and lovers, to support and care for them and for one another.

But also, says Jeremiah, seek the welfare of the city where you find yourself, and pray for it, because in its welfare you will find your welfare. Let us strive to protect our God-given planet and build a just and sustainable society for the future, because only in such a society can we flourish, alongside all God’s creatures.

And lastly, let us behave like the grateful Samaritan and remember to turn back, praising God, and giving thanks for all he has given us.

I shall finish in prayer with a Collect of the Word:

O God,
you have made heaven and earth and all that is good:
help us to delight in simple things
and to rejoice always in the richness of your bounty;
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Amen

 

Forgiveness

Erica Kirk speaking at the memorial service of her husband Charlie Kirk

Article printed in the October 2025 issue of Grapevine, the news sheet of the Nenagh Union of Parishes

I suspect few if any of us had heard of Charlie Kirk before his foul murder in America on 10^th September. Aged 18, he set up Turning Point USA to advocate for conservative values on school and university campuses around the USA. He became deeply embedded in Donald Trump’s MAGA movement, cultivated friendship with many of its leaders, and is credited with encouraging many young people to vote for Trump in 2024. Since his assassination, MAGA is now trying to make him into a martyr for the MAGA cause, justifying persecution of their enemies.

Like most if not all of us, I detest Donald Trump. He claims to be a Christian, but his words and actions make a mockery of it. He is an avowed enemy of the liberal, democratic views I espouse. He is making our world a much more dangerous place, and blighting the lives of millions, not least in his own country. But Trump is an old man, two years older even than me. His confused and rambling speech, and erratic decision making, suggest he may be developing dementia. He will not last forever. What really concerns me is the MAGA movement he has created, which looks set on establishing an amoral autarchy to perpetuate a US government where might is right, and the purpose of the state is to punish opponents and enrich a coterie of billionaires.

I don’t seek to disparage Charlie Kirk’s evangelical Christian faith, but I am disgusted by his political views. He facilitated Trump, espousing Christian nationalism, young earth creationism, climate change denial, and islamophobia.

Charlie’s wife Erika, however, seems to be made of different stuff. In an emotional eulogy for her dead husband at a memorial service in Arizona before a crowd of more than 100,000, she bravely offered forgiveness to the shooter who killed Charlie, saying,

"My husband, Charlie, he wanted to save young men just like the one who took his life..."

"On the cross, our Saviour said: 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' That man - that young man - I forgive him. I forgive him because it's what Christ did. And it's what Charlie would do."

"The answer to hate is not hate. The answer - we know from the gospel - is love. Always love. Love for our enemies. Love for those who persecute us.”

It is well worth watching or reading her speech, which you can find by googling ‘erica kirk full speech’.

I am deeply moved by her words. It would have been so easy for her to express her grief through words of hate, riling up the crowd to seek revenge. But she did not, she spoke of love and forgiveness, truly Christian values. Unlike Trump himself, who spoke of hating his opponents. I think her words in that febrile atmosphere may have prevented an orgy of revenge attacks on people the MAGA crowd see as enemies. We shall see, but as the new leader of Turning Point USA, I pray that she will continue to speak words of love, not hatred, and help to bring a bitterly divided USA back to sanity, back to Christian values, back from the brink. May God bless her, may God bless America, and God bless every one of us.