Depósuit poténtes de sede: * et exaltávit húmiles.

Boy Bishop Jason Kellinger of Salisbury (2014)

Stir-up Sunday

Four generations of the Royal Family together in 2019 for @PoppyLegion’s ‘Together at Christmas’ initiative🎄[Photo 📷 by @ChrisJack_Getty]

Excita, quǽsumus, Dómine, tuórum fidélium voluntátes: ut, divíni óperis fructum propénsius exsequéntes; pietátis tuæ remédia majóra percípiant. Per Dóminum nostrum Jesum Christum, Fílium tuum: qui tecum vivit et regnat in unitáte Spíritus Sancti Deus, per ómnia sǽcula sæculórum. Amen. 

STIR up, we beſeech thee, O Lord, the wills of thy faithful people; that they, plenteouſly bringing forth the fruit of good works, may of thee be plenteouſly rewarded, through Jeſus Chriſt our Lord. Amen.

Sir Edward Burne-Jones, window of St George's Chapel, Christ Church, Oxford

St Cecilia's Tomb, St Wilfrid's Chapel, London Oratory

Presentation

Titian, The Presentation of the Virgin at the Temple (1534–1538) [Detail]

For today's feast, the translation by the Benedictines of Stanbrook Abbey of Dom Prosper Guéranger's masterpiece The Liturgical Year has the following footnote:

From sources that do not come within the learned author's scope, it appears that in England the feast is of a much more ancient institution [than 1372], though the evidence gathered so far confines its observance to the monasteries. As Oblatio S. Mariae in templo Domini cum esset trium annorum, it occurs in several monastic calendars of Saxon times, and, still under the title of Oblatio, in some of later date. This is only one of many interesting facts illustrating the English movement of the tenth and early eleventh centuries in its devotional aspect : a side of the question which still awaits special study.

'Edmund, King of East Anglia, Killed by the Danes', from James E Doyle, A Chronicle of England, B.C. 55-A.D. 1485

Ave rex gentis Anglorum

miles Regis angelorum

O Edmunde flos martyrum

velut rosa vel lilium

funde preces ad Dominum

pro salute fidelium.

🐺

It is the day of Martilmasse,

Cuppes of ale should freelie passe;

What though Wynter has begunne

To push downe the Summer sunne,

To our fire we can betake,

And enjoye the crackling brake,

Never heedinge Wynter's face

On the day of Martilmasse.

Remembrance Sunday

Dicit Dóminus: Ego cógito cogitatiónes pacis, et non afflictiónis: invocábitis me, et ego exáudiam vos: et redúcam captivitátem vestram de cunctis locis.

Hallowmas

'non est paenitentiae locus, o vir carissime, nam hodie nihil potest me peturbare! gaude, nam Quidam tandem abiit! etiam Muggles similes tui debent celebrare hunc laetum, laetum diem!'

Shrine of St Frideswide, Christ Church, Oxford

Suddenly, everyone's going on pilgrimages.

Just as the Latin Mass Society was winding up its annual pilgrimage to Walsingham (see here and here - and trust me, compared to some walks it was pretty normal), The Daily Telegraph was puffing a (reconstructed, as it happens) walking pilgrimage route for St Cedd in Essex. (The author of the article himself has a new book out*, which looks interesting, though there's also a link to the website of the British Pilgrimage Trust.)

And not wishing to be, er, left behind, my own alma mater has got in on the act. Apparently there's now a St Frideswide pilgrimage "from Oxford to Reading". That in and of itself sounds weird of course, because she's buried in Oxford. But in fact the route connects up to the Camino Inglés, which of course ends up beyond the mountains and across the sea... in the Field of Stars.

*The Spectator reviewed it back in March. Apparently he mentions these nutters at Wayland's Smithy. (It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door...)

JMW Turner, 'Canterbury Gate, Christ Church' [H/T: Andrew Cusack]

'More things are wrought by prayer / Than this world dreams of'

Next morning he was up and washed and dressed, all but his jacket and waistcoat, just as the ten minutes' bell began to ring, and then in the face of the whole room knelt down to pray. Not five words could he say - the bell mocked him; he was listening for every whisper in the room - what were they all thinking of him? He was ashamed to go on kneeling, ashamed to rise from his knees. At last, as it were from his inmost heart, a still small voice seemed to breathe forth the words of the publican, 'God, be merciful to me a sinner!' He repeated them over and over, clinging to them as for his life, and rose from his knees comforted and humbled, and ready to face the whole world.

[Tom Brown's School Days (1857)]

"Gentlemen, " said Sir Henry presently, in his deep voice, "we are going on about as strange a journey as men can make in this world. It is very doubtful if we can succeed in it. But we are three men who will stand together for good or for evil to the last. And now before we start let us for a moment pray to the Power who shapes the destinies of men, and who ages since has marked out our paths, that it may please Him to direct our steps in accordance with His will."

Taking off his hat, for the space of a minute or so, he covered his face with his hands, and Good and I did likewise.

I do not say that I am first-rate praying man, few hunters are, and as for Sir Henry I never heard him speak like that before, and only once since, though deep down in his heart I believe that he is very religious. Good too is pious, though apt to swear. Anyhow I do not remember, excepting on one single occasion, ever putting in a better prayer in my life than I did during that minute, and somehow I felt happier for it. Our future was so completely unknown, and I think the unknown and the awful always bring a man nearer to his Maker.

[King Solomon's Mines (1885)]

'These are Daeron's Runes, such as were used of old in Moria,' said Gandalf. 'Here is written in the tongues of Men and Dwarves:

BALIN SON OF FUNDIN

LORD OF MORIA.'

'He is dead then,' said Frodo. 'I feared it was so.' Gimli cast his hood over his face. 

[The Lord of the Rings (1953)]

And the Pope has cast his arms abroad for agony and loss,

And called the kings of Christendom for swords about the Cross,

The cold queen of England is looking in the glass;

The shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass[.]

Prince Philip on his part in the Assisi Scandal

He who eats goose on Michaelmas day;
Shan’t money lack or debts pay.

'After all, a weed is just a plant in a place you don't want it to be.' 

[Miss Marple]

Ah, you should see Cynddylan on a tractor.

Gone the old look that yoked him to the soil;

He is a new man now, part of the machine,

His nerves of metal, and his blood oil.

The clutch curses, but the gears obey

His least bidding, and lo, he’s away

Out of the farmyard, scattering hens.

Riding to work now as a great man should,

He is the knight at arms breaking the fields’

Mirror of silence, emptying the wood

Of foxes and squirrels and bright jays.

The sun comes over the tall trees

Kindling all the hedges, but not for him

Who runs his engine on a different fuel.

And all the birds are singing, bills wide in vain,

As Cynddylan passes proudly up the lane.

Photo by Dr Joseph Shaw

If you came this way,

Taking any route, starting from anywhere,

At any time or at any season,

It would always be the same: you would have to put off

Sense and notion. You are not here to verify,

Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity

Or carry report. You are here to kneel

Where prayer has been valid. And prayer is more

Than an order of words, the conscious occupation

Of the praying mind, or the sound of the voice praying.

And what the dead had no speech for, when living,

They can tell you, being dead: the communication

Of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.

Here, the intersection of the timeless moment

Is England and nowhere. Never and always.

Free fruit!

(Feeling like a morning's work well done!)

'Yew that is old in churchyard-mould...'

— Oliver McCarthy (@OTGMcCarthy1979) July 22, 2024

Edward Burne-Jones, The Merciful Knight (1863)

She turns up in the most unexpected places!

Our Lady of the Wolves (aka Our Lady of the Thunder Candle, the Polish version of Candlemas) appears on the arms of the Metropolitan Borough of Westminster. pic.twitter.com/4OYtBF2btg

— Faith and Fatherland (@Faith_and_Land) July 4, 2024

Statue of St. Etheldreda and relic casket containing her incorrupt hand

St Etheldreda’s Church, Ely Place, London

Of all the trees that grow so fair,

   Old England to adorn,

Greater are none beneath the Sun,

   Than Oak, and Ash, and Thorn.

Sing Oak, and Ash, and Thorn, good sirs,

   (All of a Midsummer morn!)

Surely we sing no little thing,

   In Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Oak of the Clay lived many a day,

   Or ever AEneas began.

Ash of the Loam was a lady at home,

   When Brut was an outlaw man.

Thorn of the Down saw New Troy Town

   (From which was London born);

Witness hereby the ancientry

    Of Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Yew that is old in churchyard-mould,

   He breedeth a mighty bow.

Alder for shoes do wise men choose,

   And beech for cups also.

But when ye have killed, and your bowl is spilled,

   And your shoes are clean outworn,

Back ye must speed for all that ye need,

   To Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Ellum she hateth mankind, and waiteth

   Till every gust be laid,

To drop a limb on the head of him

   That anyway trusts her shade:

But whether a lad be sober or sad,

   Or mellow with ale from the horn,

He will take no wrong when he lieth along

   'Neath Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Oh, do not tell the Priest our plight,

   Or he would call it a sin;

But - we have been out in the woods all night,

   A-conjuring Summer in!

And we bring you news by word of mouth-

   Good news for cattle and corn-

Now is the Sun come up from the South,

   With Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

Sing Oak, and Ash, and Thorn, good sirs

   (All of a Midsummer morn!)

England shall bide till Judgment Tide,

   By Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!

ᚪ ᚫ ᚦ

 St Margaret of Scotland and her siblings, showing their descent from King Edmund Ironside of England
(BL Royal 14 B VI; H/T: Eleanor Parker)

Than with a glad chere our Lord loked into His syde and beheld, enjoyand; and with His swete lokyng He led forth the understondyng of His creture be the same wound into Hys syde withinne. And than He shewid a faire, delectabil place and large enow for al mankynd that shal be save to resten in pece and in love. 

[The Tenth Revelation]

From Cambridgeshire Live:

The unusual religious tradition is being enacted at St Ives parish church in 1979, and it’s called bible dicing. It’s nothing to do with slicing up the Good Book with a sharp knife, it’s all about gambling, not something generally encouraged in church. Every Whit Tuesday, children from local schools go to the church and roll a dice on a table to win a copy of the Bible. Remarkably, the custom dates back to 1765, when a parishioner, Dr Robert Wilde, left money in his will to fund copies of the holy writings.

Legend has it he had been lost in a fog, and was guided to safety by the church bells, so decided to bequeath money to the church to buy an orchard – which itself would provide an income the vicar could use to buy Bibles. The orchard, appropriately called Bible Orchard, is still there.

Empire Day

I. With voice and solemn music sing,

Loud let the pealing trumpets ring!

To-day our hands consolidate

The Empire of a thousand years,

Delusive hopes, distracting fears,

Have passed and left her great.

For Britain, Britain, we our voices raise,

Uplift your voices all, worthy is she of praise!

II. Our England at the call of Fate

Left her lone islets in the sea.

Donned her Imperial robe and state,

Took the sole sceptre of the Free!

'Mid clang of arms her Empire rose,

Embattled rolls her story down,

By shattered fleet, and flaming town,

Victorious over all her foes,

Soldier and sailor side by side,

Her strong sons bravely dared and died!

Close on their steps her dauntless toilers went,

O'er unknown sea and pathless continent,

And left, when years of strife were done

The proudest realm beneath the sun.

Praise them and Her, your grateful voices raise,

Mother of Freedom! worthy art thou of praise!

III. No more we seek our realm's increase

By savage war, but white-winged peace,

To-day we seek to bind in one,

Till all our England's work be done.

Through wider knowledge closer grown,

As each fair sister by the rest is known,

And mutual Commerce, mighty to efface

The envious bars of Time and Place,

Our great world Empire's ev'ry part,

And through a common speech expressed――

From North to South, from East to West,

Deep pulsing from a common heart,

An universal Britain strong

To 'stablish right and beat down wrong!

Let this thing be - who shall our realm divide?

We stand, to sink or triumph side by side!

IV. To-day we would make free

The millions of their glorious heritage.

Here, Labour crowds in hopeless misery;

There, is unbounded work and ready wage.

The salt breeze calling, stirs our Northern blood,

Lead we the toilers to their certain goal;

Guide we their feet to where

Is spread, for those who dare,

A happier Britain ’neath an ampler air.

V. First lady of our English race,

'Tis well that with thy Jubilee,

This glorious dream begins to be:

This thy lost consort would, this would thy son,

Who had seen all thine Empire face to face,

And fain would leave it one.

Oh, may the Hand which rules our Fate,

Keep this our Britain great!

We cannot tell, we can but pray

Heaven's blessing on our work today.

Rise palace fair, where all may see

This proud embodied unity,

For Britain and Queen one voice we raise,

Laud them, rejoice, peal forth,

worthy are they of praise!