Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Tuesday, 17 January 2012

St Antony of Egypt


On the principle of "waste not, want not", or, being modern, re-cycling, or better still, that if something is worth saying once it is worth saying twice, here is the link to my post from this day last year about St Antony of Egypt the father of monasticism.

Looking again at the text from his Life it is interesting to see how St Athanasius describes Antony placing his sister in a convent. Is this a translator's choice or does it indicate enclosed religious life for women by circa 270? Again what I find so interesting is the account's description of parish life in Egypt at that time - something that was already established and was to continue for so many centuries there and across Christendom.

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