Font of Life, by Garry Wills

A story is told of Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu in Cape Town, South Africa. He ascended the cathedral pulpit one Sunday to preach, yet again, against the evils of apartheid. As he did so, government-dispatched soldiers with machine guns encircled the nave. The tenseness of the moment indicated that if the bishop dared to speak against government policy, there would be a violent assault on him by the soldiers. When the bishop surveyed the scene from the pulpit, he paused, and then he laughed. Slowly members of the congregation laughed with him. And finally, the soldiers also began to laugh. All laughed together, I suppose, at the absurdity of the scene. When the laughter subsided, Tutu preached yet again against the evils of apartheid. And the soldiers, along with the congregation, listened respectfully.

Garry Wills presents Ambrose, the powerful bishop of Milan in the fourth century, as a recognizable forerunner of Tutu, for he too weighed in against government authority when he saw the government intruding upon the claims of the church over which he presided. Indeed, in his contest with the emperor,

believers were harassed as they went into or came out of Ambrose’s services in his various churches. Late in the year Ambrose preached with soldiers all around the church he was in, and he praised those present for their courage in coming under such intimidation.