St Birinus Festival at Dorchester Abbey

Rotate Cæli has an article by Peter Kwasniewski about the forthcoming St Birinus Festival at Dorchester Abbey in Oxfordshire for the celebration of All Saints and All Souls over October 30th to November 2nd. This is an initiative from the Catholic Church in Dorchester and seeks to draw attention to the wonderful heritage of Classical settings for the liturgical music of the Traditional Rite, and to raise funds to make such celebrations possible.

The article, together with the relevant links, can be seen at The Latin Mass Returns to Dorchester Abbey: The St Birinus Festival, 30 Oct - 2 Nov 2024

Dorchester Abbey is a remarkable and fascinating survival, an instance of a complete church from a moderately sized Augustinian house. It has not a few noteworthy architectural features, such as the carved stone Jesse tracery of the east window, and some fine medieval effigies. No monastic buildings survive save some carved capitals in a modern gallery on the site of south walk of the cloister. The abbey stands on the site of the Anglo-Saxon cathedral, founded by St Birinus, a site from which the later dioceses of Winchester and Lincoln can claim their origin. The move of the seat of the bishopric of the great East Midlands diocese to its largest city, that of Lincoln, in 1072 resulted not only in the creation of Lincoln Cathedral, but the eventual foundation of the Augustinian house at Dorchester to preserve the memory of St Birinus at Dorchester.

The mid-nineteenth century Catholic Church, which lies to the south of the medieval monastic church, was built by William Wardell who had been a leading pupil of Pugin. His most famous works are in his adopted home of Australia. For the church at Dorchester, and for one of his smaller, early Australian commissions he clearly followed Pugin’s now tragically destroyed Jesus Chapel at Ackworth in Yorkshire.

In recent years St Birinus has had a splendid renovation which has decked it out in an exquisite Puginesque decorative scheme which is a delight to behold. It has also become a centre of excellence for Traditional liturgy and music.