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.


Thursday 2 October 2014

The Cathedrals of Berlin


Last week the New Liturgical Movement had a post about the latest plans to re-order the interior of the Catholic Cathedral of St Hedwig in Berlin. The post, Re-Wreckovating the Cathedral of Berlin, is not impressed with either what is there now nor with that which is proposed to replace it. On the basis of the post and its illustrations I agree with the writer in this matter. The interior looked infinitely better in the photograph from 1886.

Tellingly the post concludes by contrasting the design with the Wilhelmine splendours of the Evangelischekirke equivalent in Berlin, completed in 1905, and restored after wartime bombing, as can be seen in the photographs and link provided to an account of its history.


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

"liturgical gathering" ??? As I viewed the photographs I thought "ugly." but as I reflect more on them, I think "sterile." Ugly and sterile it is. John Nolan