Newman on Candlemas

I like this poem by Newman which we sing at the Oxford Oratory as a hymn for Candlemas because of the way it links the images of candles at Christmas through those burning at Candlemas through to the Pascal Candle. In so doing Bl. John Henry draws the sacral year together so as to express its liturgical and theological coherence.

I also like the poem because the same idea struck me many years ago when I was parish clerk at Pontefract, and it is always satisfying when someone agrees with one, especially a beatified Cardinal...

Candlemas

The Angel-lights of Christmas morn,
Which shot across the sky,
Away they pass at Candlemas,
They sparkle and they die.

Comfort of earth is brief at best,
Although it be divine;
Like funeral lights for Christmas gone
Old Simeon’s tapers shine.

And then for eight long weeks and more,
We wait in twilight grey,
Till the high candle sheds a beam
On Holy Saturday.

We wait along the penance-tide
Of solemn fast and prayer;
While song is hush’d, and lights grow dim
In the sin-laden air.

And while the sword in Mary’s soul
Is driven home, we hide
In our own hearts, and count the wounds
Of passion and of pride.

And still, though Candlemas be spent
And Alleluias o’er,
Mary is music in our need,
And Jesus light in store.

Bl.John Henry Newman, The Oratory. 1849


With acknowledgements to Why I am a Catholic blog

Candlemas

Today is Candlemas, the Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple, and of the Purification of Our Lady.

It is a feast of which I am particularly fond, originally for its symbolism and ceremonial, and then because it is both the feast of my college, Oriel - The House of Blessed Virgin Mary in Oxford commonly called Oriel College to give it the proper nomenclature - and also the anniversary of the establishment of the English Oratory in 1848 by that former Fellow of Oriel, Bl.John Henry Newman.

Image: Hagia Sophis on Flickr

I found this image on the internet, but so far have not discovered the artist or location of this tryptich which links to the Epiphany and the Coronation of Our Lady with its side panels. I assume it is early to mid-fifteenth century German or Netherlandish. I think it may well be by Stefan Lochner or apupil of his as it shows great similarities to the painting by him I posted last year in my post Candlemas. In any case it has delightful details and great charm.

Last year I posted the reading from the Divine Office for today from St Sophronius (560-638) which eloquently explores the symbolism of the feast, and indicates the use of candles and the procession at that time. It can be read at St Sophronius on Candlemas.

Showing US Seminarians around Newman's Oxford

As I did this time last year I spent this morning giving a tour to a party of seminarians from St Paul's Seminary School of Divinity in St Paul Minnesota. They are visiting England to study in particular the life and thought of Bl. John Henry Newman, and I was again asked to provide a guided tour of places associated with Newman in central Oxford.

We started after the mid-morning Mass at the Oxford Oratory and after an introduction as to life in Oxford in Newman's time I was also able to show them St John's College, with its links to St Edmund Campion, the backhanded compliment to the Oxford Movement that is the Martyrs Memorial of 1841 and the site of the Catherine Wheel inn where the Oxford Martyrs of 1589 were arrested on our way to Trinity.

Trinity College Chapel

Image: panoramio.com

Here I was able to show them the chapel, little changed since Newman made his first communion there as an Anglican in 1817, the hall and, having pointed out the windows of one of the rooms he is known to have occupied, finally we looked at Newman's memorial bust in the grounds.

From Trinity we went past the Sheldonian Theatre, scene of the moves to condemn the Tracts, the Bodleian and the site of Newman's lodgings in 1822 and where he heard of his election to the Oriel Fellowship. At St Mary's, currently starting a major set of repairs and renovations, I was able to talk about the place of that church in the life of Newman and the Oxford Movement, with its mixture of acadmic preaching and pastoral care as well as pointing out the south porch and its controversial design incorporating a statue of the Virgin and Child from the time of Archbishop Laud.

As last year the group was photographed in the shadow of Newman's pulpit, and I then took them across the High Street into Oriel, showing them the chapel, with the various Newman links, and concluding with a visit to what is now known as the Newman Oratory above the entrance, and now with its modern commemorative stained glass window by Vivienne Haig.

The Window in the Newman Oratory

Image: Oriel college website

This afternoon the seminarians are going to visit the College at Littlemore, and, after more lectures in Oxford, will then go to visit Maryvale, Ocsott and the Birmingham Oratory at the beginning of next week.

As with their precedessors last year they were a lively and interested group to show around, with plenty of questions about Oxford and Oxford life for me to answer. It was a great pleasure to meet a class of young men of obviously wide ranging gifts who are preparing to enter the priesthood in the near future. It was also very good to meet up again with Fr Tom who was leading the pilgrimage. Once again they were evidence of a confident and approachable Catholicism in the American mid-west.

King Charles X

Today is the 175th anniversary of the death in exile in 1836 of that oft-maligned monarch King Charles X of France.

King Charles X

Image:Wikipedia

There is an online life of the King here and an account of the revolution which led to his exile here. This was, in many ways, yet another Parisian 'Day of the Barricades'. His actions in July-August 1830 are reminiscent of those of King James II in 1688.

The homage of the Dauphin at the coronation of King Charles X
Rheims Cathedral May 29th 1825

François Gérard 1827
Musee des Beaux Artes, Chartres

Image:Lib-art.com

He is often remembered for his Coronation as King at Rheims in 1825, fifty years, a revolution and a world war away from the previous one in 1775 of his brother King Louis XVI. It can also be seen as a pendant to that of King George IV in 1821 at Westminster. This was the decade of lavish coronations, alas never repeated in France, and regrettably curtailed in Britain by King William IV, and gradually re-enhanced in the twentieth century, but still shorn of the Westminster Hall ceremonies and banquet.

King Charles X in his Coronation robes.
The similarity to clerical vestments in the robes is clear.
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres 1829-30

Image:terminartors.com

As King he is often seen as typifying the verdict that the Bourbons had "Learned nothing and forgotten nothing", which may be more memorable for being a witty remark that sums up a perception rather than anything else. He is also compared with King James II and VII as having undermined the consensus achieved by their brothers and predecessors.

It is true that some of the political moves under his rule did indicate a willingness to move France in a direction that looked back to the Throne and Altar view of the Ancien Regime, and with hindsight, the historian's way of knowing better than the people at the time did, one might have advised a different approach. However the central issue facing any French government then, and subsequently, was how to manage and reconcile the legacies of the years 1789-1815 in the light pf the country's past and present.

That achieving that proved beyond the King may be true - but then it has proved beyond that of all subsequent systems in France - July Monarchy, Second Republic, Second Empire, Provisional Government, Third Republic, Etat Francais, Fourth Republic, Fifth Republic ... all have failed to engage the whole consent of the nation. King Charles X and his ministers might be criticised for moving as they did, but would others have fared better, even if they had pursued very different policies?

There are interesting parallels between France and Britain in the 1820s that go beyond two spectacular coronations. Both were attempting to find means of reconciling tradition and change in a new era. Political elites and groups sought to maintain traditional rule or to effect change. Issues such as censorship, policing and crowd control were central to the period.

Ecclesiastical matters, symbolised in France by the law on Sacrilege were in Britain to be centred on Catholic Emancipation and later on position of the established Church. In France it was on July 18th 1830 that Saint Catherine Labouré had, at 140 Rue du Bac, the first of her visions which led to the establishment of the Miraculous Medal . In this first vision she was shown the downfall of the King, and told that "God wishes to charge you with a mission. You will be contradicted, but do not fear; you will have the grace to do what is necessary. Tell your spiritual director all that passes within you. Times are evil in France and in the world."

France failed to avoid an upheaval, whereas Britain made the moves to widen the pale of the Constitution that avoided violnce. The outcome was different, but the issues similar. In either case probably only a few individuals made the difference, but for France the rabble rousers could appeal to the spirit of revolution, with disastrous results.

The 1830 revolution made a considerable impact on the founders of the Oxford Movement - the events in France shocked them and led them to fear what might happen here under a government pledged to change aspects of the constitution, and not least the risk to the Church of England - the burning of the palace of the Bishop of Bristol in a riot over Parliamentary reform in 1831 indicated the risks. That concern fuelled their ideas leading to the events of 1833. As a fear or dislike it stayed with them - in later years John Henry Newman travelling through Paris drew down the blinds in his carriage to avoid seeing the revolutionary tricolour flying over buildings.

As far as I am concerned the very regrettable events of 1830 mark the end of all legitimate rule in France, and not just that of Legitimist rule. King Charles X may have been blinkered in his views by the experiences of the years after 1789 and the fate of his family and country. It would have been hard not to be. That does not deny legitimate validity to what he sought to do for France.

King Charles X
Georges Rouget

Image:www.Wikimedia.com

Walking with Newman to Littlemore

As has been my wont since I was received into the "one true fold ofthe Redeemer" I took part in the annual night walk to Littlemore last Saturday evening to commemorate the reception of Bl. John Henry Newman into the Church there in 1845.

I knew in advance that once more I was to be vested in a flourescent yellow jacket as a front or back marker for the procession, but I was surprised, and flattered, to be met at the door of the oratory church with a request from Br. Oliver, the new member of the community who was leading the procession, that I should be the voice of Newman in the readings at the various stations we mark on the walk. As a convert and an Orielensis this was perhapsd appropriate, but it was an honour I appreciated.

Tracing not only Bl. Dominic Barberi's route from Oxford to Littlemore on the evening of October 8th 1845 but also Newman's life from Trinity to Oriel, the churches of St Mary the Virgin and St Clement, his ideas about Catholic education within the University, and the houses he and his mother and sisters occupied at Rose Hill we arrived at Littlemore for reflections on his decision in October 1845.

In the church of Bl.Dominic Barberi at Littlemore, which might be described as an interesting example of the period which built it (the 1960s) , and might indeed be described in less charitable terms, we had a Holy Hour with Exposition and Benediction. For this I exchanged, thankfully, my yellow jacket for a cassock and cotta so as to act as thurifer before we proceeded to the College, and after the final prayers and blessing we were able to venerate the relic of Bl. John Henry in the restored chapel where he and his companions were received.

This walking pilgrimage is always an enjoyable and spiritual event, and if you are ever in Oxford on the night of October 8th I would encourage you to follow in Newman's footsteps to Littlemore, and who knows where else the kindly light may lead.

Image: Oriel College website by kind permission of the Warden and Fellows of Keble College

Commemorating Bl.John Henry Newman in Oxford

To celebrate the approaching Feast of Bl John Henry Newman the following events will be held in Oxford this coming week:

On Thursday and Friday following the 6pm Mass at the Oxford Oratory, and at 6 pm on Saturday before Mass, there will be a Triduum of prayers and Benediction to prepare for the Feast.

Saturday October 8th

Pilgrimage to Littlemore

The annual pilgrimage is centred on the church of Bl.Dominic Barberi with confessions available 11.15-11.45, Mass at 12 noon, the principal celebrant and preacher being the Rt.Rev.Mgr Andrew Burnham.

This will be followed by refreshments in the adjacent parish hall - bring a packed lunch.

After lunch there will be a lecture by Fr Ian Ker on Newman and the Vocation of the Christian in the World.
During the afternoon there will be tours of the College and of the Anglican parish church of St Mary and St Nicholas which was built by Newman in the 1830s.

The Night Walk to Littlemore

7.45 pm, starting at The Oxford Oratory, the annual Night Walk to Littlemore, stopping at places associated with Newman and following Bl. Dominic Barberi's route to Littlemore on October 8th 1845.
9.30 pm Candlelit procession from 89 Rose Hill to Littlemore Church.
10 pm Holy Hour and Benediction in the church of Bl. Dominic Barberi.
10.45 pm Procession to the College for thanksgiving prayers.
This is always an enjoyable and interesting, as well as prayerful and reflective, occasion.

Sunday October 9th

11 Solemn Mass for the feast at the Oxford Oratory.

Bl.Dominic Barberi greeting Newman. Bl.Dominic Barberi has just come in from the wet and cold. It is late at night on October 8th 1845 and he is trying to dry himself in front of the fire at the College in Littlemore. Newman is on one knee requesting of Dominic Barberi that he be received into the Church. A relief by Faith Tolkien in the Church of Bl.Dominic Barberi at Littlemore Image: Communigate

New setting of "The Dream of Geronius"

This coming Saturday, September 17th, in Christ Church Cathedral in Oxford at 8pm, there will be the premiere of the Winchester based composer Julien Chilcott-Monk's setting of Bl. John Henry Newman's The Dream of Gerontius.

The performers are the distinguished actor Robert Hardy as The Soul and Neil Nisbett as The Angel. The chorus of Angels and Demons are the choir Vox Humana.

Tickets are £15, £12 or £5, and are available at the Oxford Playhouse or on the door.

Newman Pilgrims from Brighton

Yesterday I spent a most agreeable day showing a group of pilgrims from St Mary Magdalen's Brighton around Newman's Oxford. They were led by my very good friend Andrew Wagstaff. They being a group of five meant that we could make our way in a leisurely and discursive way around the city, looking not only at places associated with Newman but at other places of Catholic interest.

So we took in the home of the first Anglican nun, Marion Hughes - who made her profession to Dr Pusey in 1841 with the support of Newman - before crossing the proposed site for Newman's Oratory in Oxford of the 1860s, which eventually became Wellington Square, on our way to visit the Oratory and showing them the restoration work that has been accomplished.

At Blackfriars, unexpectedly, we saw something of the Solemn Professions of Br Graham Hunt, a long-standing friend of mine and Br Gregory Pearson before looking at that wonderfully ironic tribute to the Oxford Movement, the Rev Charles Golightly' s Martyr's Memoral of 1841 and the site of the arrest of the Oxford Catholic Martyrs of 1589 on our way to Trinity College. After looking around Newman's undergraduate college we visited St Mary's where he was Vicar before looking at Oriel with it numerous reminders of his time as a Fellow there from 1822 to 1845.

making our way accross the city centre - never easy with the crowds on a Saturday - we had a very enjoyable lunch at an Italian restaurant, where the conversation flowed freely over theology, including the hypothetical state of the hypothetical souls of hypothetical aliens in outer space and its relationship to the Incarnation and how one ought to understand the Genesis Creation narratives in relation to faith, reason and scientific understanding, to our own conversion narratives, making humerous plans for the next career move of one of the party, and generally enjoying good fellowship.

This we continued with a visit to the Eagle and Child (The Bird and Baby) , famous as the Oxford pub frequented by C.S.Lewis, J.R.R.Tolkien and the Inklings, and where Andrew and I and other friends used to meet up regularly in our days at Pusey House.

We had hoped to show the visitors the Ordinariate in action at Holy Rood but time did not allow as they had a three hour journey back to Brighton. Nonetheless it was a thoroughly enjoyable visit, and with a real sense of making new friends.

Pilgrims walking with Newman

This morning I had the enjoyable task of showing a group of pilgrims around Oxford. They are a group based in the diocese of Arundel and Brighton. Information on their history and on this year's walk is on their website.

The group started in 1975 when a couple of priests in Arundel & Brighton decided that it would be a good way to mark the tenth anniversary of the formation of the diocese by organising a walk to "beat the bounds" of its territorial area. The participants enjoyed the experience and an annual walk was born. They became Ecumenical in the early 1980's and have gone on from there.

This year their walk is one linking Westminster to Birmingham via Oxford and concentrating in particular on the life of Bl.John Henry Newman. I met them after the 10 am Mass at the Oxford Oratory and provided a tour of Trinity and Oriel colleges and some of the sites associated with Newman, the other members of the Oxford Movement and their friends and opponents.

They were a varied group of nationalities and ages, and were very interested in the various places I was able to show them. I wish them well for the next stage of the pilgrimage.

Death of Cardinal Newman 1890

Today is the 121st anniversary of the death at the Birmingham Oratory of Bl.John Henry Newman. I thought I would repost the pictures I published last year of his lying-in- state prior to his funeral on August 19th.

Cardinal Newman lying-in-State in the Oratory Church, Edgbaston, prior to his Funeral Mass on Tuesday 19 August 1890.

From Times Online October 1, 2008

A painting of the Cardinal lying-in-state

in the Oratory Church at Edgbaston

From Valle Adurni

The reception of Newman in Germany

Last Wednesday evening I was at the lecture I advertised the other week by Professor Claus Arnold of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main on " Newman’s reception in Germany: From Dollinger to Ratzinger" which was the 2011 Newman Lecture in Oriel.

John Henry Newman
by Sir John Everett Millais

The lecture was a masterly exposition of its subject, and indicated how from the time of his reception into the Church Newman was and has continued to be of interest to, and influenrtial of, German Catholic opinion.

Prof. Arnold identified four phases or groups who appropriated parts at least of Newman's thought and how it transmuted according to the circumstances of the time. These correspond to the circumstances facing Catholics, and other Christians, in Germany rather than the English context of Newman's life and legacy.

1840-1870: The Ultramontane Model Convert.

For this group, represented by the writer Joseph Gorres ( 1776-1848) and Ignatz von Dollinger (1799-1890) the Munich church historian Newman was of interest because they saw the Oxford Movement as the most significant movement of its time in its resistence to state control of the Church, exemplified for them by the imprisonment by the Prussian government of the Archbishop of Cologne in 1835 for his opposition to mixed marraiges.

They also appreciated The Idea of a University - dreaming of such a Catholic foundation in Germany - and the Apologia, translated in 1864, the year of its first publication and seen as a defining work. After Vatican I Newman and Dollinger were, of course, to take divergent paths over the definition of Papal Infallibility.

1870-1918: The Model for a Culturally Acceptable 'Reform Catholicism'

In the age of the Kulturkampf for some Newman was neither neo-scholastic enough nor ultramontane enough. However Franz Xavier Kraus (1840-1901), the Freiburg church historian, saw in Newman, Dante and Rosmini the sources for a religious rather than a political Catholicism. He had links to Lady Blennerhassett (born Countess von Leyden) (1843-1917) who in 1904 published the most important German biography of Newman. Reviewers at the time were more impressed by Newman's ethical work than his historical aspect, and they regretted his inability to speak German which would have opened up to him research from German academics. Others began to contast Manning's brand of 'Ultramontane Catholicism' with Newman's 'Reform Catholicism.' Protestants such as Ferdinand Kattenbusch (1851-1935) the Halle theologian were ambivalent in their attitude.

For those who in Wilhelmine Germany sought to define a place for Reform Catholicism the English anti-Protestant Newman was a model to study, especially when Pope Pius X had endorsed Newman's orthodoxy.These ideas were articulated by Carl Muth (1867-1944) , editor of the influential journal "Hochland" and by Matthias Laros (1882-1965) the priest and writer who studied Newman's Anglican sermons and produced between 1922-40 a 10 volume translation of Newman's works.

1918-1945: Newman for and against the "Zeitgeist"

The First World War saw no decline in interest in the work of the English Cardinal and it was Romolo Guardini who drew attention to the idea of Church as Community in Newman's work. Laros stressed the idea of organic growth and the anti-Liberal in Newman. He and
Erich Przywara SJ (1889-1972) philosopher and theologian, whilst offering differing emphases in their interpretation maintained interest in Newman, the "Pius X of the Oxford Movement", and stressed that the issue was not Aquinas or Newman, but Aquinas and Newman. Theodor Haecker (1879-1945) was a writer and translator with an interest in Newman, translating The Grammar of Assent and like Edith Stein a convert influenced by Husserl's phenomenolgy. Haecker was an influence on and contact with Sophie Scholl (1921-1943) and members of the White Rose resistance group, whose indebtedness to Newman's teaching on conscience has been demonstrated by research in recent years.

1945-1962: The Model for a Re-Christianisation of Germany in an Ecumenical and European spirit.

Interest in Newman was apparent from the end of the Second World War. Thus in October 1945 there was a Newman Conference in Cologne, and awareness of him came through the influence of Birmingham Oratorian and students, including one who taught prisoners of war who were planning to enter the priesthood on their return to Germany. In 1946 there was the publication of an article by Paul Simon on Newman and German Catholicism in The Dublin Review , and from 1956 the Luxemburg Conferences on Newman.

Amongst those influenced by these developments were Heinrich Fries (1911-1998) the Tubingen and Munich theologian, who taught the young Joseph Ratzinger,Gunter Biemer (b.1929) the Freiburg theologian, who studied at Oscott and Joseph Ratzinger himself (b.1927) who in the late 1940s became aware of Newman. For him the Augustinian tradition, the relation of Church and country an not subjecting one to the other, and the understanding of the development of doctrine were to be of great importance.

In conclusion Prof. Arnold said that it should be no surprise that the Pope has shown such appreciation of the work and thought of Newman given the range of German interest in Bl.John Henry over more than a century and a half.

Prayer to St Philip

This is the text from the prayer card we were given at the blessing with the relic of St Philip Neri at the end of Solemn First Vespers for his feast at the Oxford Oratory this evening:

Philip, my glorious Patron, gain for me a portion of that gift which thou hadst so abundantly.
Alas! Thy heart was burning with love; mine is all frozen towards God, and alive only for creatures. I love the world, which can never make me happy; my highest desire is to well off here below; my highest desire is to be well off here below.
O my God. when I learn to love nothing else but Thee?
Gain for me,O Philip, a pure love, a strong love, and an efficacious love, that, loving God here upon earth, I may enjoy the sight of Him together with thee and all the saints, hereafter in Heaven.

Bl. John Henry Newman (Novena to St Philip, May 18th Meditations and Devotions)