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 28 September 2021

More on Ember Days


Last week I posted September Ember Days to share an FSSP piece about the Embrr Days. Although this month’s set are now past another series awaits late in Advent and in the meantime Shawn Tribe has put together a catena of quotations from scholars about the origins and place of the four ( originally three ) Ember seasons of fasting and prayer. What is striking, and shocking, is that these were of great antiquity and discarded by the modernisers of the 1960s for no apparent reason or gain. Indeed with the introduction of Saturday evening Masses in the 1950s there could have been an excellent case for the option of having a celebration of the Saturday Ember liturgy as an evening Vigil, if that is indeed its origin.



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