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The Man Who Left No Footprints A young monk was rewarded for taking his duties as guest-master seriously.
AD 658
Music: John Garth

© Richard Croft, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0. Source

About this picture …

The mediaeval kitchen at Gainsborough Old Hall in Lincolnshire, roughly midway between Doncaster and Lincoln.

The Man Who Left No Footprints
In about 658, Abbot Eata sent Cuthbert from Melrose Abbey away south to Ripon, to be the guest-master in a new monastery there. It was while he was at Ripon that Cuthbert had a remarkable experience which left him trembling with excitement and fear.

EARLY one snowy morning, Cuthbert found a footsore and travel-stained visitor resting in the monastery guesthouse. The monk treated his raw hands and feet, and invited him to breakfast. The wanderer said his home was a long way off, and he must go; but waving aside his protestations Cuthbert dashed to the kitchens and soon returned with freshly-baked bread, only to find the guesthouse empty.

That puzzled him mightily. Snow had fallen overnight and the only footprints were his own. He shrugged the mystery off, however, and was just leaving the little guesthouse when he noticed a delicious aroma, with a hint of honey. It proved to be rising from three loaves of hot, white bread, set by the door.

His first thought was that if he could make bread like that, he would call himself a baker. His second, with a thrill, was that only the guest who made no footprints could have left them — and that he had been entertaining an angel unawares.*

Miracles of St Cuthbert Next: ‘Why Am I Still Lying Here?’

See Hebrews 13:3 - ‘Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.’

Précis

Sometime around 658, Cuthbert was guest-master at a monastery in Ripon when a traveller called. Cuthbert pressed breakfast on him, but while he out of the room his guest vanished without trace, despite fresh snow on the ground. Cuthbert later discovered three loaves of incomparably fine, tasty bread in the refectory, and concluded that his visitor had been an angel. (59 / 60 words)

Source

Based on The Life of St Cuthbert by St Bede of Jarrow (672-735).

Suggested Music

Cello Concerto in D major, Op. 1 No. 1

Allegro

John Garth (1721-1810)

Performed by Richard Tunnicliffe, with the Avison Ensemble conducted by Pavlo Beznosiuk.

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