Sadly, the classic Christmas carol, “Good King Wenceslaus” is going out of fashion. Once thanksgiving passes and Christmas dominates the radio, I lament bitterly each year that we no longer pay homage to saint Wenceslaus I, the great Duke of Bohemia who lived a brisk 28 years, reigning a mere fourteen before his tragic death at the hands of his brother, whom history has dubbed Boleslaus the Cruel.
So, in truth, I really lament three things. The first is that we no longer fill our hearts and culture with the rich fare of the lives of the saints who provide incredible accounts of God’s wonderful and mysterious ways to feed our imaginations. The second is that we forget why the duke of Bohemia is now regarded as the “Good King.” The third is that, despite his being murdered by his brother on the feast day of St. Cosmos and Damian at the doors of the church right before mass, we forget that Boleslaus ended up repenting and converting to Catholicism. He subsequently devoted his life to the faith, raised his son to be a member of the clergy and strengthened the Christian Bohemian state he inherited through his fratricide honoring his brother, so tragically lost, with a feast that is still celebrated to this day.
I will spend my time focusing on my first lament, making my case for the restoration of “Good King Wenceslaus” to Christmas dinners, parties, and carols everywhere. But I would be remiss if I didn’t briefly give insight into my other two laments.
Last things first. The feast is, admittedly, a little macabre for our sensibilities today as it involves carrying, with much pomp and circumstance, the skull of St. Wenceslaus in a procession from the Cathedral to the spot of his martyrdom. I am, frankly, greatly consoled that the people of Prague in the Czech Republic carry on this tradition to this day since I am a firm advocate of preserving and, when necessary, re-weirding Catholicism. It is due not only to Wenceslaus’ holiness, but also his brothers conversion and faithfulness that Bohemia, now modern-day Czech Republic, became Christian and a stable region of political solidarity. We must then not remember Boleslaus solely for his, admittedly, cool name.
The second is a point that might sound silly, but I think it matters. Wenceslaus was not a king by rank in his life. Bohemia at that time was not run with a monarch in that fashion, it was too small. But Wenceslaus because of his holiness was posthumously given that “regal dignity and title” by the Holy Roman Emperor Otto I somewhere within 50 years of Wenceslaus’ martyrdom.
So what is the story contained in the classic carol most people have heard about but seldom heard?
The origin of the classic carol is from the pen of John Mason Neale, an Anglican hymnwriter, in 1853. In his children’s book, Deeds of Faith, written around the same time he recounted a version of the tale inspiring the hymn.
“‘My liege,’ he said, ‘I cannot go on. The wind freezes my very blood. Pray you, let us return.’
‘Seems it so much?’ asked the King. ‘Was not His journey from Heaven a wearier and a colder way than this?’
Otto [his servant] answered not.
‘Follow me on still,’ said St. Wenceslaus. ‘Only tread in my footsteps, and you will proceed more easily.’
The servant knew that his master spoke not at random. He carefully looked for the footsteps of the King: he set his own feet in the print of his lord's feet.”
Since the Middle Ages Wenceslaus had captured the imagination of Christians as the rex iustus (righteous king) whose power originated in his faithfulness and devotion to Jesus and the subsequent zeal for the poor that flowed from it rather than worldly designs and deceits. In 1119 Cosmos of Prague wrote of him saying, “But his deeds I think you know better than I could tell you; for, as is read in his Passion, no one doubts that, rising every night from his noble bed, with bare feet and only one chamberlain, he went around to God’s churches and gave alms generously to widows, orphans, those in prison and afflicted by every difficulty, so much so that he was considered, not a prince, but the father of all the wretched.”
But the tale recorded in the hymn is captured most fully in the rendition as told from the creator of one of the most beloved Christmas hymns in Italy, St. Alphonsus Ligouri in 1745 (over a hundred years prior to the famous carol, I might add). (The hymn Alphonsus is beloved for, to those curiously minded, is called Tu scendi dalle stelle, “From Starry Skies Descending”).
The great Doctor of the Church writes in his Visits to the Blessed Sacrament and to the Blessed Virgin,
“[T]ender indeed was the devotion of St. Wenceslaus, duke of Bohemia, to the Most Holy Sacrament. This holy king was so enamored of Jesus there present, that he not only gathered the wheat and grapes, and made the hosts and wine with his own hands, and then gave them to be used in the Holy Sacrifice, but he used, even during the winter, to go at night to visit the church in which the Blessed Sacrament was kept. These visits enkindled in his beautiful soul such flames of Divine Love, that their ardor imparted itself even to his body, and took from the snow on which he walked its wonted cold; for it is related that the servant who accompanied him in these nightly excursions, having to walk through the snow, suffered much from the cold. The holy king, on perceiving this, was moved to compassion, and commanded him to follow him, and only to step in his footmarks; he did so, and never afterwards felt the cold.”
So what is the story saying? St. Wenceslaus was so filled with the burning love of God that his own body miraculously emanated that love in the preservation of his servant from suffering the cold by literally following in his master’s footsteps. This is one of those tales that perfectly captures the reality that discipleship, love, and service are all intertwined. It is the love that Wenceslaus had for Jesus in the Eucharist that gave him the ability to preserve his servant from the dangerous forces of nature. Likewise, it is the love we have for Jesus that will preserve us “against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians 6:12). As Wenceslaus’ death shows, this does not mean we won’t experience persecutions, even at the hands of those who should be closest to us, for our faith. It means that no matter what happens, God is faithful. His way, the Way of His feet, the way of the Cross, is “safe” because it is the way to salvation. It isn’t safe in any other sense. The only way to be a disciple means to follow a teacher or a leader.
Discipleship is captured well in a word we no longer use: master. As is often said, and perhaps comes straight to our minds when faced with the title of the present saint we are reflecting on: Jesus is the King of the universe, that is, of everything that ever happened, ever was, is, and ever will be. But he was a master of a different sort. As Jesus said after washing the disciples’ feet at the Last Supper, “Do you know what I have done for you? You call Me Teacher and Lord, and rightly so, because I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example so that you should do as I have done for you. Truly, truly, I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” (John 13:12-17).
Christians are known by their love. They live in this world differently. They ought to walk in their Master’s footsteps. They transform the world differently when they do this. The power of the Christian is in their faithful service to their King, Jesus Christ. Unlike earthly kings Jesus never coerced. He never did evil so that good might come of it. Instead, he endured all sorts of injustice to show us that to be truly human is to love, even unto the end. As Catholics, our faith shows us that this type of servant leadership can only flow from the true love Jesus came to reveal to us in full. We cannot pick and choose. He has revealed love by His actions, His words and through His Church He established. We cannot separate devotion to Him in the Eucharist, in the needy, or in the faithful following of his teaching and commands. It is all of a piece for the Christian. This unity of love, represented so well in St. Wenceslaus, is why we can rightly call him “good king.”
So what is the carol “Good King Wenceslaus” for? Through its song and joy it subtly imbues our hearts through our imagination with the healing and transforming love of the Gospel. It gives us a holy and delightful song to sing with our children, our parents, our grandparents. It reminds us that the “giving spirit” of Christmas is not to be consigned to one day of the year, but ought to be lived each day. For this is the spirit of Christianity, the Holy Spirit. So, let us imitate Wenceslaus by imbuing the responsibilities we have been given with the charity of the Gospel, which doesn’t stop at good deeds (what today we might call social justice or service) but goes from tabernacle to tabernacle with a burning love just as it goes from each person in need encountered each day.
St. Wenceslaus, pray for us.
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