Chalcedon feels like a guilty pleasure...

Over lunch I browsed the stacks in the Rutherford Library at the University of Alberta. It is one of the reasons I love working on campus. (For those of you who don't know, I am employed by Athabasca University, but work fully integrated into a Government of Alberta branch, helping to protect historic buildings and other cultural landscapes). I came across this new, three-volume, critical edition of The Acts of the Council of Chalcedon. It is beautifully done. I waded in briefly to the first few pages of the proceedings of this Council, and the translation reads elegantly, conjuring up what it must have felt like, eight days before the Ides of October, 451, when the bishops and imperial officials gathered together in the Church of the holy martyr Euphemia. I have to admit, it is almost like a soap opera, with the degree of drama the opening ceremonies of the Council experienced: accusations of murder, threats, and thwarted egos. And in the midst of it, the two Natures of the Incarnate One are revealed. I feel like a fly on the wall. I want to linger.