Devotion to Saint Thomas of Canterbury

I've grown in my spiritual devotion to the Catholic Martyrs of England and Wales of the Reformation era, and I'm also growing in devotion to Saint Thomas of Canterbury, thanks to this book of prayers asking his intercession and meditating on his life and martyrdom.

Saint Thomas has often been seen as an important figure in the conflicts between Church and State: defending the rights of the Church in England against Henry II's attempt to take away the bishops's authority over priests and clergy. But Father John S. Hogan, in this book from Gracewing, Devotions to St Thomas Becket, reminds us that devotion to the martyred saint began as people went on pilgrimage to pray for his intercession, seeking miraculous healings through his prayers.

Therefore, Father Hogan includes prayers to Saint Thomas of Canterbury for the sick, a Litany for the Sick, a Prayer for Miracles, etc.

Father Hogan also reminds us that Saint Thomas of Canterbury grew in his Christian faith, that we find a process of conversion in his life, not just from his secular life at Court with Henry II, but through his exile and other sufferings. Father Hogan declares, "As he slowly woke to the way of true Christian discipleship, his experiences, his mistakes, his trials and sufferings, progressively turned him completely to Christ". (p. x) So there are prayers for conversion, including a Novena for the Grace of Conversion. 

Because Saint Thomas of Canterbury was a priest and bishop Father Hogan includes prayers for priests, for bishops, and a "Eucharistic Prayer", emphasizing Becket's growth in devotion to the Eucharist and to celebrating Mass with great reverence.

Thomas  Becket was born on the 21st of December (in 1119/20) and died on the 29th of December (in 1170), so there's a novena to celebrate the martyr between those dates. Since Canterbury is still a site for pilgrimage, there's a "Seven Stations" series of prayers with landmarks like St. Dunstan's Church, where Henry II started his penitential pilgrimage to the Cathedral in reparation for the martyr's murder, the Cloister of the Cathedral through which both the saint and his killers walked to enter the north transept, the Crypt where his first tomb was located, and the parish church of Saint Thomas of Canterbury, the Catholic shrine to this great saint.

There's also a Litany to St Thomas Becket and other prayers for courage, in time of persecution, etc. Gracewing has also published Father Hogan's biography of the saint.

Saint Thomas of Canterbury, pray for us.

How Medieval! Venerating St. Cuthbert

News from The Catholic Herald about a Catholic shrine in an Anglican Cathedral:

Relics of one of Britain’s earliest saints, St Cuthbert, have gone on display in Durham Cathedral.

The centrepiece of the permanent exhibition at the cathedral – which was built in his honour – is an oak coffin, made in Lindisfarne in AD 698, 11 years after Cuthbert’s death. Other exhibits include the saint’s pectoral cross – Cuthbert was called back from his hermit’s cell to become a bishop – and his ivory comb.

Cuthbert’s body and relics were carried by Lindisfarne’s monks when they fled inland to escape Viking raids. They eventually settled in Durham, which became a place of pilgrimage. Although his shrine was destroyed in the Reformation, his relics survived, and his remains were finally reburied in the cathedral in 1899.

The BBC notes that St. Cuthbert's shrine could help save the Cathedral:

Many cathedrals across the UK are suffering financial pressures with some facing closure.

Durham Cathedral's Very Reverend Andrew Tremlett said the £7.50 admission fee for the Treasures of St Cuthbert exhibition would "keep the cathedral open for everybody".

He said: "These things are different in different parts of the country. It depends on your visitor mix.

"We want to keep the cathedral there for the whole community, but also be able to balance the books."

More about the shrine at the Durham Cathedral website, including this detail about Cromwell's commissioners preparing to destroy the shrine:

He found Cuthbert “lying whole with his face bare and his beard as if it had a fortnight’s growth.”

The goldsmith shouted out “Alas, I have broken one of his legs”

Dr Henley called out “throw down the bones”

But the goldsmith replied that he could not do so because the bones were kept together by skin and tissue.

Dr Ley went to the feretory to see for himself, and then told Dr Henley in Latin:

“He was lying whole”

Dr Henley did not believe this and repeated “Cast down the bones,”

“If you do not believe me, come up and see for yourself,” Dr Ley said.

At which point Dr Henley came up and handled him and saw that he was indeed un-decayed.

The commissioners then ordered the monks to move the body to the vestry until the King decided what should be done.

Which just goes to show that some grave robbers have a conscience! Nevertheless, the commissioners knew what to do with the jewels and gold of the shrine.

Pilgrimages Yesterday and Today

Interesting project:

'Pilgrimage and England's cathedrals' employs a ground-breaking combination of interdisciplinary perspectives and methodologies to identify and analyse the core dynamics of pilgrimage and sacred sites in England from the 11th to 21st centuries, assess the growing significance of English cathedrals as sacred/heritage sites today, and inform management of/public engagement with these iconic buildings. Set against the background of the worldwide growth of pilgrimage and increasing importance of sacred sites, the project's innovative approaches and timely research agenda also contributes substantially to defining and establishing the emerging field of Pilgrimage Studies.

At the heart of this project is a new, wide-ranging analysis of the meaning and breadth of 'pilgrimage' and the role of sacred places past and present. Why did pilgrimage matter in the past and why does it still matter today? In exploring these issues, the project focuses attention on the role of cathedrals: places where, uniquely, national and local history and identity, material culture and traditional and emerging religious practice can be encountered together. Pilgrimage was central to the development and status of English cathedrals in the Middle Ages and although most shrines were destroyed at the Reformation, many of the great churches and monasteries which housed them remain as cathedrals today, literally shaped by their pilgrim past and retaining a strong pilgrimage legacy. Anglican cathedrals are increasingly refocusing on and reinstating shrines, reflecting an international multi-faith phenomenon in which an estimated 200 million people across the world engage in pilgrimage and religious tourism annually.

Historically the pilgrims going to a certain cathedral were intent on visiting a saint's shrine, praying for his or her intercession, acting in penitence for some great personal sin or in reparation for the sake some great blessing on themselves or another. Pilgrimage on earth was aimed at eventual arrival in heaven. It was expensive, dangerous--although pilgrims were supposed to be protected--arduous, and time-consuming. Walking along the pilgrimage route, the pilgrims were focused on their goal.

Although they were stripped of their shrines and saintly significance after the English Reformation, English cathedrals have remained a goal of pilgrimage. The project organizers comment that many coming to the cathedrals in the study, York, Durham, Canterbury, and Westminster, are not even Christian or may practice no faith at all:

Moreover, over 40% of those visitors came from faith traditions other than Christianity or had no religious affiliation. This suggests that cathedrals are seen as shaped by, but transcending, Christianity, offering unique access to the 'spiritual' within the context of history, heritage and culture, and providing meaningful spaces for people of all faiths and none. These developments demand fuller, rigorous, multi-disciplinary investigation so that implications for cathedrals, visitors and communities can be explored in detail.

File that under the heading "The Unintended Reformation"! The Protestant reformers of the sixteenth century in England would be shocked. Since Christianity means Jesus Christ, transcending Christianity would be the furthest thing in their minds; yet, their reformation started the process of destroying the worldview that held saints in heaven and sinners on earth (and in purgatory) in a community of pilgrimage and love.

Renovation or Wreckovation at Chartres?

We last visited the Cathedrale de Notre Dame in Chartres in 2010 and noted the reconstruction going on, which seemed to me to be cleaning the walls of the ages of incense and candle smoke. Turns out that more drastic changes were being made and there is some controversy about it: from The New York Times Book Review blog, Martin Filler reports:

In 2009, amid a rising wave of other refurbishments of medieval buildings, the French Ministry of Culture’s Monuments Historiques division embarked on a drastic, $18.5 million overhaul of the eight-hundred-year-old cathedral. Though little is specifically known about the church’s original appearance—despite small traces of pigment at many points throughout the interior stonework—the project’s leaders, apparently with the full support of the French state, have set out to do no less than repaint the entire interior in bright whites and garish colors that are intended to return the sanctuary to its medieval state. This sweeping program to “reclaim” Chartres from its allegedly anachronistic gloom is supposed to be completed in 2017.

He describes his first views of Chartres and his latest:

Over a lifetime of looking at buildings, a few have stood out as soul-stirring experiences. High among them is Chartres Cathedral, which I first saw some thirty years ago. Though I had long been acquainted with this renowned Gothic landmark through photographs, I was quite unprepared for the visceral impact of its dark, soaring interior, especially the famous stained glass windows that glowed like precious gems set into the intricately carved stone walls. I began to understand how this overwhelming creation could be perceived as heaven on earth.

During a recent trip to Paris I decided it was time for a return visit, and on an autumn Sunday morning my wife, our friends, and I traveled sixty miles southwest of the French capital to take in this architectural wonder. It was crisp and sunny, perfect weather for viewing the celebrated vitraux, widely considered the finest in the world. As we entered the great church, which was largely constructed between 1194 and 1230, High Mass was in full swing—the scene heightened by the combination of majestic organ music, chanted liturgy, clouds of incense, and banks of votive candles.

Carried away by the splendors of the moment, I did not initially realize that something was very wrong. I had noticed the floor-to-ceiling scrim-covered scaffolding near the crossing of the nave and transepts, but had assumed it was routine maintenance. But my more attentive wife, the architectural historian Rosemarie Haag Bletter—who as a Columbia doctoral candidate took courses on Romanesque sculpture with the legendary Meyer Schapiro and Gothic architecture with the great medievalist Robert Branner—immediately noticed that large areas of the sanctuary’s deep gray limestone surface had been painted.

The first portion she pointed out was a pale ochre wall patterned with thin, perpendicular white lines mimicking mortar between masonry blocks. Looking upward we then saw panels of blue faux marbre, high above them gilded column capitals and bosses (the ornamental knobs where vault ribs intersect), and, nearby, floor-to-ceiling piers covered in glossy yellow trompe l’oeil marbling, like some funeral parlor in Little Italy.

You can see more recent pictures of the changes on NYTBR blog. The pictures above and below were taken by my husband in 2010 and are copyright (c) 2010 by Mark U. Mann (not to be used without permission).

Another pilgrim to Chartres noticed the changes, especially to the statue of Our Lady of the Pillar. And here is yet another view. The organizer of the restoration expected some negative response, according to this article from 2009 in The Independent:

Mr Fresson expects some visitors to Chartres to be taken aback – maybe even angered – by the transformation. "There is no doubt that we will lose something, even if we gain a great deal," he said. "The sense of mystery, the sense of the passing ages, which you receive when you enter the dark interior of today will be replaced by something fresher and much more dynamic."

Concerns have been expressed, in particular, about the effect of the restoration on Chartre's exquisite stained-glass windows: the most complete, and to many people the most beautiful anywhere in the world. The glass is also being gradually restored, largely with money raised by charitable appeals.

"You could argue that the power of the windows has been increased by the cathedral's dark interior and that their beauty will therefore suffer," said Mr Fresson. "Our first impression, from the work so far, is that the effect will be different, but no less beautiful."

Finally, this architect notes that the restoration involves two different time periods:

the choir area has been restored to to how it looked in the 18th century while the remainder of the cathedral interior is being restored to how it looked in the 13th century, when it was first built.

Since the sanctuary of the Altar in the choir was already anachronistic, the renovation may be accentuated the differences! If we stay on track for a Paris visit every two years, perhaps we will go back to Chartres in 2016 and see nearly the finished product.

Catholic Metaphors in Shakespeare

The Catholic English Teacher reports on a lecture by Dr. Gillian Woods, who cites one of my favorite passages from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet to demonstrate how the Bard used Catholic metaphors in his plays that would have recalled times before the English Reformation to those old enough to remember:

Romeo:

If I profane with my unworthiest hand
This holy shrine, the gentle sin is this:
My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.

Juliet:
Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.

Romeo:
Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?

Juliet:
Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.

Romeo:
O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do;
They pray — grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.

Juliet:
Saints do not move, though grant for prayers' sake.

Romeo:
Then move not, while my prayer's effect I take.

So while Shakespeare uses all these Catholic religious terms in the cause of romantic wooing between Romeo and Juliet, the ground of the metaphor is pilgrimage and sainthood and he knew his audience knew enough of those terms to make sense of the metaphor. Pilgrimage and devotion to the saints were definitely Catholic themes: pilgrimage sites in England had been destroyed during the course of the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI and devotion to saints through prayer and even visiting their shrines (which brings up the notion of relics) had been removed from English practice.

Dr. Woods has her own metaphor for these Catholic traces in Shakespeare's plays reports the blogger:

What do we make then of what she called this "residue" or "memory of the faith that had been banned and rejected"? It seems clear that there were a range of options available to people in post-Reformation England, ranging from nostalgia to fear, from hatred to acceptance. Many of these responses appear in Shakespeare's plays. In fact, many of them appear within individual plays, creating a complex picture that needs to be read in a historically informed way.

Dr Woods used a helpful metaphor in her lecture, suggesting that the ways in which Catholicism is present in Shakespeare's plays are akin to the ways in which pre-Reformation wall paintings survived in the post-Reformation Church. Many were simply removed. Some were literally defaced (in order to make it clear that the Reformed Church in England was not just a new church but a rejection of the Old Church, that it was - in some sense - still in dialogue with it). And others were whitewashed, perhaps in the hope that they might one day be uncovered, though the images still seeped through. (The definitive work on all of this is Eamon Duffy's The Stripping of the Altars.)

I like this last metaphor in particular: we can see Catholicism seeping through the language and drama of Shakespeare's plays without having to get drawn into largely fruitless discussions about his own religious inclinations.

Dr. Gillian Woods is the author of this book, Shakespeare's Unreformed Fictions, which answers the question:

Why does Catholicism have such an imaginative hold on Shakespearean drama, even though the on-going Reformation outlawed its practice? Shakespeare's Unreformed Fictions contends that the answers to this question are theatrical rather than strictly theological. Avoiding biographical speculation, this book concentrates on dramatic impact, and thoroughly integrates new literary analysis with fresh historical research.

In exploring the dramaturgical variety of the "Catholic" content of Shakespeare's plays, Gillian Woods argues that habits, idioms, images, and ideas lose their denominational clarity when translated into dramatic fiction: they are awkwardly "unreformed" rather than doctrinally Catholic. Providing nuanced readings of generically diverse plays, this book emphasises the creative function of such unreformed material, which Shakespeare uses to pose questions about the relationship between self and other. A wealth of contextual evidence is studied, including catechisms, homilies, religious polemics, news quartos, and non-Shakespearean drama, to highlight how early modern Catholicism variously provoked nostalgia, faith, conversion, humour, fear, and hatred. This book argues that Shakespeare exploits these contradictory attitudes to frame ethical problems, creating fictional plays that consciously engage audiences in the difficult leaps of faith required by both theatre and theology. By recognizing the playfulness of Shakespeare's unreformed fictions, this book offers a different perspective on the interactions between post-Reformation religion and the theatre, and an alternative angle on Shakespeare's interrogation of the scope of dramatic fiction.

The Carmelite Martyrs of Compiegne on the Son Rise Morning Show

Today I'll be on the Son Rise Morning Show at 6:45 a.m. Central/7:45 a.m. Eastern because this is the memorial (in France) of the Carmelite martyrs of Compiegne, victims of the Committee for Public Safety and French Revolution, executed in Paris in 1794. Brian Patrick and I will discuss the sacrificial martyrdom of these Carmelites, who swore to offer their deaths for the peace of France. The Catholic martyrs of the French Revolution are probably as little known as the martyrs of the English Reformation have been, although I hope I've made a dent in that ignorance. Many priests and nuns suffered torture, execution--and exile during the Reign of Terror.

The Carmelites' story also has a great connection to the English Reformation and the Dissolution of the Monasteries. The exiled French priests and nuns who fled the Civil Constitution of the Clergy and the dangers of the Terror provoked feelings of sympathy in England. The fact that they were allowed to practice their faith while English Catholics were not contributed to the Catholic Relief movement in Parliament. Among those exiles were actually English Benedictine nuns from Cambrai--they were English nuns in exile on the Continent who then founded a new monastery at Stanbrook Abbey. The foundress of the Cambrai house was none other than Helen More, the great-great-granddaughter of St. Thomas More. Her name in religion became Dame Gertrude More. The Benedictines of Our Lady of Comfort in Cambrai wore the secular clothing of the Carmelites on their journey "home". Stanbrook Abbey was the inspiration for Rumer Godden's novel, In This House of Brede, one of my favorite books. According to her New York Time's obituary:

To do research on ''In This House of Brede,'' Ms. Godden lived for three years near Stanbrook Abbey. Her experience with the nuns there contributed to her decision to convert to Roman Catholicism in 1968. In many of her stories and novels, Ms. Godden would write about the rewards and perils of the contemplative life.

A couple of years ago, I went on a mini-pilgrimage in Paris to the site of the Blessed Carmelites' execution and then to the cemetery behind which their remains were dumped into mass graves: here are links to those posts: the site of execution and the chapel at Picpus, the cemetery grounds at Picpus, and the mass graves.

There were sixteen martyrs in all on July 17, 1794:

Choir Nuns
Mother Teresa of St. Augustine, prioress (Madeleine-Claudine Ledoine) b. 1752
Mother St. Louis, sub-prioress (Marie-Anne [or Antoinett] Brideau) b. 1752
Mother Henriette of Jesus, ex-prioress (Marie-Françoise Gabrielle de Croissy) b. 1745
Sister Mary of Jesus Crucified (Marie-Anne Piedcourt) b. 1715
Sister Charlotte of the Resurrection, ex-sub-prioress and sacristan (Anne-Marie-Madeleine Thouret) b. 1715
Sister Euphrasia of the Immaculate Conception (Marie-Claude Cyprienne) b. 1736
Sister Teresa of the Sacred Heart of Mary (Marie-Antoniette Hanisset) b. 1740
Sister Julie Louise of Jesus, widow (Rose-Chrétien de la Neuville) b. 1741
Sister Teresa of St. Ignatius (Marie-Gabrielle Trézel) b. 1743
Sister Mary-Henrietta of Providence (Anne Petras) b. 1760
Sister Constance, novice (Marie-Geneviève Meunier) b. 1765

Lay Sisters
Sister St. Martha (Marie Dufour) b. 1742
Sister Mary of the Holy Spirit (Angélique Roussel) b. 1742
Sister St. Francis Xavier (Julie Vérolot) b. 1764

Externs:
Catherine Soiron b. 1742
Thérèse Soiron b. 1748

[Image Source: wikipedia commons--from the Carmel in Quidenham, Norfolk!]

Preview of July/August "The Catholic Answer Magazine"

There's my story about the Blessed Carmelite Martyrs of Compiegne on the cover of the July/August issue--illustrated with a scene from Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites!

Watch this space for more information!

Just a little sample from the beginning of the article:

A visitor in Paris today might arrive at the Place de la Nation, a hub of transportation and commerce on the right bank of the Seine River and never know about the Revolutionary deeds of blood committed there.

Restaurants, taxis and buses ring around the Place de la Nation and its statue depicting Marianne, the symbol of the Republic, while locals walk their dogs in the park. But here, in the last hot summer of the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror, on July 17, 1794, fourteen nuns, three lay sisters and two servants of the Carmelite house of Compiègne died for their Catholic Faith.

What brought them to such a bloody end beneath the blade of the guillotine the day after the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel? The answer might be surprising if we presume the ideals of liberty, fraternity and equality truly summarize the spirit of the French Revolution. After the fall of the traditional, absolute monarchy and the rise of the National Assembly with a constitutional monarchy in 1789, the state attacked the Catholic Church, confiscating churches and closing convents. . . .

That introduction is based upon my pilgrimage to the site of the Carmelites' execution and to their place of burial at Cimitiere de Picpus (in November of 2010).

Podcasts Available

I talked with Ken Huck on his Radio Maria US "Meet the Author" show last week and the podcast is now available online:

Ken talks with his guest Stephanie Mann author of Supremacy and Survival – How Catholics Endured the English Reformation (published by Scepter). This book is a gripping history of famous events in England that had ramifications reaching across the ocean and impacted religious freedom in America. There are so many real-life twists and turns that the book reads like a novel.

Last year, on December 1, I spoke with Christine Niles on her radio show Forward Boldly about my book and the history of the English Reformation, and that interview is also available online here.

While I'm at it, here's a link to my interview last November with Ian Rutherford of the great Catholic bookstore, Aquinas and More (St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Thomas More)!

And, as a preview of an upcoming interview, I'll be on the Son Rise Morning Show, broadcast from Sacred Heart Radio in Cincinnati, Ohio on the EWTN Radio Network this Thursday, January 31 to discuss the Catholic Martyrs of England Tour and Pilgrimage I just announced. You may listen LIVE here at 7:45 a.m. Eastern/6:45 a.m. Central!

Tour St. Jacques in the Late Afternoon

Tour St. Jacques is located in the Fourth Arrondisement of Paris, a couple of blocks to the west of the Hotel de Ville. It is all that remains of the16th century Church of Saint-Jacques-de-la-Boucherie. Saint Jacques (St. James) was dedicated to St. James the Greater and was the major starting point for Parisian pilgrims on the way to Santiago de Compostela. You can see other drawings of the church here and here, before it was destroyed in 1793--the tower was a major landmark standing alongside the Gothic church. As the church's title indicates, it was the parish of the butchers of Paris, built from 1508 to 1522. Nicholas Flamel was buried in its crypt.

Until our visit in 2010, I had always seen the tower covered in scaffolding as research into its structural integrity and restoration works were carried out. I visited the park and the tower in November of 2010 and then brought my husband to the tower and Place St Jacques because I thought he'd enjoyed the photographic opportunities.

It was a fine time of day, late afternoon, when we arrived at the park, which was filled with Parisians relaxing. Here are a couple of views of the tower:

 

And here are a couple of views of the statue of Blaise Pascal in the base of the Tower:

 

 

His statue is there because he is supposed to have conducted some atmospheric pressure experiments at the church, although it might have been at St. Jacques-du-Haut-Pas in the Fifth Arrondisement, which had some connections to the Jansenist Port Royal convent. "St James on the High Pass" was also on the way to Compostela.

 

This picture is from my November 2010 visit to the tower, showing the plaque remarking on its purpose on the pilgrimage to Spain and its history.

 

 

And just to show the difference the light and the bright blue October sky made, here is one of my pictures of the Tower on a cold November morning in 2010:

 



Wales and the Catholic Church

With the commemoration of St. John Jones the Welsh Franciscan martyr yesterday, I thought I'd mention a couple of interesting links on the Church and Wales, occasioned by this article in the National Catholic Register:

For centuries, they came. Trudging along narrow footpaths, often precariously perched atop steep cliffs that plunged down to the Irish Sea, the pilgrims had one mission: to reach Bardsey Island.
Bardsey Island sits off the blustery northern coast of Wales, and evidence indicates it has been a site of worship since the Bronze Age (3600-1200 B.C.). In the sixth century, St. Cadfan began construction of a monastery there that eventually became home to many devout monks, causing Bardsey to become an important site for the Celtic Christian Church. Over time, the faithful began flocking to the island on pilgrimage. As their numbers swelled in the Middle Ages, the Pope declared that three pilgrimages to Bardsey Island equaled one pilgrimage to Rome.
 
Eventually, the island became known as the “Island of the Saints,” and it was said 20,000 holy people were interred there.

Of course, you've noticed that the two groups of martyrs canonized and beatified are the "Forty Martyrs of England and Wales" and the "Eighty-Five Martyrs of England and Wales": Here is a site dedicated to telling the stories of the Welsh martyrs.

And of course, one of the most evocative of all the monastic ruins, Tintern Abbey, is in Wales: Here is a site dedicated to the Welsh Abbeys and other holy sites in Wales. Tintern Abbey, of course, inspired William Wordsworth. (Image credit: wikipedia.)