Subj : =?UTF-8?Q?Jan_26_=E2=80=93_Ss_Timothy_and_Titus?= To : All From : rich Date : Mon Jan 25 2021 09:09:19 From: rich Jan 26 =E2=80=93 Ss Timothy and Titus (1st century AD) Ss Timothy and Titus, Bishops. They were two of St Paul's most loya= l disciples. They seem to have attended the Council of Jerusalem with him and both died toward the end of the first century. Timothy represented Saint Paul to various communities and, according to tradition, was eventually placed him in charge of the Church at Ephesus. Titus was asked to organise the Church in Crete. They are honoured as leaders to whom St Paul sent pastoral letters in the New Testament. Since the revision of the Roman Calendar in 1970, they share a feast on the day following the feast of the Conversion of St Paul (25th Jan). Patrick Duffy traces what is known about them. ____________________________ TITUS At the Council of Jerusalem Although not mentioned by name in the Acts of the Apostles, Titus was recruited by Paul quite early on as a companion and was the occasion of controversy at the Council of Jerusalem. Since he was a Gentile, there was pressure from the hard-line Jewish party on Paul to have him circumcised. However, Paul firmly resisted this and eventually his view prevailed. According to tradition, Titus journeyed to Jerusalem and witnessed the preaching of Christ during the Lord's ministry on earth. Only later, however=E2=80=93 after the conversion of St. Paul and th= e beginning of his ministry =E2=80=93did Titus receive baptism from the apostle, who called the pagan convert his =E2=80=9Ctrue child in our common faith.=E2=80=9D Corinth Titus appears again in Paul's Second Letter to the Corinthians (2 C= or 2:13, 7:13 and 8:6): he was probably the bearer of an angry letter from Paul to the Corinthians, but he acted quite successfully as Paul's ambassador in Corinth in rather difficult circumstances, sorting out disputes in the Corinthian church and organising a collection for Jerusalem. Crete and Dalmatia Paul sent a letter to Titus whom he left in Crete (Tit 1:5; See Acts 24:7-12). The letter gives him instructions to ordain =E2=80=9Celders=E2=80= =9D and control the Cretans, of whom Paul did not have a very high opinion (Tit 1:12). In 2 Tim 4:10 Paul says Titus had gone on a mission to Dalmatia and he is especially venerated in Croatia. Influence Later tradition venerated Titus as the first bishop of the Cretan city of Gortyna. In 1966 the head of Titus was returned from Venice where it had been venerated at St Mark's since the 9th century to the chu= rch of St Titus at Heraklion in Crete. ___________________________ =C2 TIMOTHY Paul took Timothy on as an apostolic travelling companion probably on the occasion of his second visit to Timothy's home town of Lystra. = The Christian community spoke well of him. His mother was a Jewess, who had converted to Christianity, but his father was a Greek. Contrary to his stance in the case of Titus, Paul had Timothy circumcised =E2=80=9Con account of the Jews in the locality=E2=80=9D. Paul's companion to Macedonia and Greece Timothy travelled with Paul and Silas to Macedonia and through Greece to Corinth, working with Paul and Silas to set up the churches in Corinth, Thessalonica and Philippi. Writing to the Corinthians, Paul commends Timothy to them as a faithful co-worker (1 Cor 4:17; 16:10). At Ephesus Timothy later accompanied Paul to Ephesus in Asia Minor (Acts 19:2, 1 Cor 16:10-11). As the presence of his name in the first verses of various epistles indicates (2 Corinthians, Colossians, Philemon and Philippians), he was closely associated with Paul in all his work and probably with his imprisonment in Ephesus. In charge at Ephesus In the Pastoral Letters Timothy is the one in charge of the church at Ephesus. Paul calls him =E2=80=9Cmy true son in the faith=E2=80=9D (1 Tim 1= :2). Paul is concerned about his health and writes: =E2=80=9CYou should give up drink= ing only water and have a little wine for the sake of your digestion and the frequent bouts of illness that you have.=E2=80=9D Last letter In his last letter probably written just before his death, Paul reminisces about Timothy's grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice w= hom Paul would have met when he first took on Timothy as a companion at Lystra (2 Tim 1:5). Relics In the 4th century, Timothy's relics were transferred to the Church= of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople, which since 1461 has been replaced by the Fatih Mosque. Saint Quote: Stretch forth your hand towards God as an infant towards its father to be conducted by Him. --St. Francis de Sales Bible Quote: "But the Lord shall endure forever; He has prepared His throne for judgment. He shall judge the world in righteousness." [Psalm 9:7-8] <><><><> St. Paul told the Corinthians (1 Cor 12:26): "If one member [of Christ] suffers, all the members suffer. For we are naturally bound together, we form one body in Christ. An old Rabbis said it well, Simeon ben Eleazar: "Someone has committed a transgression. Woe to him! He has tipped the scale to the side of debt for himself and for the world. For any sin of someone harms all. There is no such a thing as a victimless crime. So the Holiness of God wants the scales rebalanced because He loves what is right in itself. He also wants it rebalanced because the imbalance is harmful to all the other members of Christ. But one member can make up for another. So St.. Paul said (Col 1:24): "I fill up the things that are lacking to the tribulations of Christ in my flesh for His body, which is the Church." Of course, Christ lacked no suffering. His suffering was beyond telling. But the whole Christ, that is, Christ with His members, can lack something. For we are not saved as individuals. We are saved in as much as we are members of Christ. And of course that means we must be like Him--like Him in the matter of making rebalance for sin. St. Paul knew that many members of Christ were not doing their part--but he, Paul, could make up for them. So he did. --- NewsGate v1.0 gamma 2 * Origin: News Gate @ Net396 -Huntsville, AL - USA (1:396/4) .