If no sane person of sufficient quality wants to be archbishop of Canterbury, then why not simply leave the see vacant? The Church seems to be getting on perfectly well, albeit with its customary quotient of moral failure and scandal, without a primate of All England. Why is one necessary? In the early modern period it was not uncommon (though not with respect to the see of Canterbury) for bishoprics to be left vacant, albeit so that the crown could harvest their temporalities. Another option might be to take suitable laypeople and ordain and consecrate them within a short period… Read more »
I’ve been rather enjoying life without unhelpful archiepiscopal interventions.
Geoff M.
20 days ago
Canon Fraser’s repeating of the ahistorical trope of a “gentler” Celtic church mitigates the seriousness with which I can take his piece.
It’s also curious to me that he (rightly) sees safeguarding snafus as disqualifying, yet still stumps for +Londin when the buck stops with her in the Alan Griffin affair.
Back in the day I led a module on spirituality – Benedictine, Franciscan, Celtic and so on; when twice the number turned out for the Celtic evening. As it was in Torbay, I suggested we should go down to the harbour and recite all 7 penitential psalms up to our necks in the sea. There were no takers.
Poor Fr Alan Griffin, a vulnerable man who committed suicide after fbeing abused by the Church of England’s officers. As the Coroner put it in her Report: “He killed himself because he could not cope with an investigation into his conduct, the detail of and the source for which he had never been told. The investigation had been ongoing for over a year and was being conducted by his former Church of England diocese and subsequently also by his current Roman Catholic diocese (to whom the Church of England had passed a short, written summary of allegations that contained inaccuracies… Read more »
Yes indeed,’Poor Fr Alan Griffin’. I often pray for his soul. The situation Fr Alan suffered was very similar to one that a friend of mine is currently experiencing. Since 2020, continuously, I have been supporting a friend, anonymously known as ‘Kenneth’, in an accusation of sexual touching – an accusation made by a chorister, which my friend denies. The Diocesan Safeguarding Adviser said it is in the Bishops Guidance that the child must be believed and any evidence to the contrary is inadmissible. When Fr Alan died and I learned of the circumstances surrounding it, I realised there were… Read more »
Very sad. I thought that in the wider world we no longer always insist that “the child must be believed”. My husband once reprimanded some boys who’d been clambering over boats that didn’t belong to them. As they scarpered one (about 12 years old) dropped his trousers, bared his backside and shouted “Paedophile!”. I believe the irony was lost on him.
I have not read the Unherd piece. But re: your comment, a good book to read is Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom by the late John O’Donohue. Anam Cara is Gaelic for soul friend. It is a particularly good read for folks who are into credentialism and want an
‘imprimatur’ from academics for their views. O’Donohue had a PH.D. in philosophical theology from Tubingen and was something an expert on both Hegel and Meister Eckhart.
Another nifty read is, Celtic Christianity: A Sacred Tradition, A Vision of Hope by Benedictine Timothy Joyce.
John O’Donohue has some unmatched poetry. I use excerpts from To Bless the Space Between Us in my forthcoming book, Le Grand Voyage. He has understood grief as well as anyone I have encountered. Tragic that, his early (and mysterious) death at 52 in Avignon. He is a blessing.
Insightful comment. Thanks! His book was given to me sometime ago as a gift. I keep coming back to it over and over again. It is one of the best things I have read on Celtic spirituality. A blessing indeed!
I wouldn’t call it celtic spirituality but to each his own. He knows something about death and its aftermath, and is a standard for complicated and traumatic loss. Gradually, you will learn acquaintance With the invisible form of your departed; And when the work of grief is done The wound of loss will heal And you will have learned To wean your eyes From that gap in the air And be able to enter the hearth In your soul where your loved one Has awaited your return All the time. I use this in the section titled, “The Love… Read more »
From the Jacket of the book: ” John O’Donohue invites you into the magical and unobtrusive world of your own divinity, to that place in the soul where there is no distance between you and the ternal. The ancient wisdom, poetry, and blessings of Celtic spirituality will awaken and embrace the beauty of your heart’s landscape.” And from the man himself in the prologue, ” The Celtic imagination articulates the inner friendship that embraces Nature, divinity, underworld, and human world as one. The dualism that separates the visible from the invisible, time from eternity, the human from the divine was… Read more »
I am struggling with half-formed thoughts here, but I wonder if there is a link between recent discussions on colonialism and these ideas about Celtic spirituality. In particular, having spent a few years looking at the effect of colonialism abroad, I am beginning to see my own country, Britain, as a colonised country (as well as a coloniser). It now seems well established that right across the world there were many pre-patriarchal indigenous cultures in which there was great gender equality, with men and women perhaps having different roles but with equal value. These cultures were often matrilineal. Women had… Read more »
Simon, I think there are affinities between aspects of First Nations culture and spirituality and Celtic Spirituality for sure. (I prefer the term Celtic spirituality to Celtic Church.) It would be reasonable to explore whether or not imperial colonialism has local domestic antecedents. Colonizing powers, both ancient and modern, certainly deploy the same tactics at home as they do abroad. The area of Nova Scotia I was raised in is an example. If you look at the history of industrial Cape Breton, British Empire Steel and Coal Company (Besco) , which owned/operated the steel mill and coal mines you will… Read more »
Thanks, That’s helpful. It’s just a vague feeling I had about this idea, but I wanted to check out it was an idea worth pursuing. And I think it is. What drives me is not only to focus on the colonialism (although that awful story must be told) but more importantly to uncover the stories of the people suppressed by colonialism and patriarchy, whether in Canada or Britain, or wherever in the world. I think there are two aspects. Firstly as you say the affinity between Celtic spirituality and First Nations spirituality. What’s going on there? But also there is… Read more »
“But Queen Bertha would have been an important and powerful woman in her own right.” Indeed, and not least because she was a daughter of Charibert, Merovingian king of Paris, although he died in 567, shortly after her birth in 565. Although the kingdom of Paris (which comprised almost all of western France and much of northern France, including Normandy) was divided 30 years’ prior to Augustine’s mission, the prestige of the matrimonial connection with the Merovingians would have been considerable, and would have helped underpin Æthelberht’s claim to the title of ‘bretwalda’ (that is, a form of weak political… Read more »
Probably several inter related things going on, a desire to connect with spirituality, especially in connection with the land and nature, from a pre-industrial age; the re-emergence and recovery of traditions in areas that were colonized and are now contending with what Heaney refers to as ‘coloniality’ in a post-colonial /neo-colonial setting; the ‘stepping out’, perhaps we could even say coming out (?), of cultural identities that were suppressed but never extinguished by colonial powers and so on. Hardly surprising that history has been told from a patriarchal perspective and that the seeking of a patriarchal hegemony is part of… Read more »
Simon, this perhaps indirectly related to one of the points you raise; but I think there are connections. The first link, is to a video that is only a couple of minutes long.
Indirectly related, but still interesting. Thank You.
For me it is more about whether such questions can speak to if there is a difference in the way that women or LGBT people relate to the divine, or to each other, compared to straight patriarchal men.
After Judith Butler such questions have often been regarded as essentialist and heretical, but the tide is turning.
If women dominant cultures in different parts of the world have the same spiritual patterns, then what does that say, and how should the church respond?
The question about difference as a basis for relating to the Divine is an intriguing question. Does it not go to what accounts for different types of spirituality? Are there analogies i.e. do artists relate to the Divine somewhat differently than systematic thinkers? I have often been surprised listening to interviews with accomplished musical artists. Their work has voice; but in oral interviews they seem sometimes lacking focus in responding to questions. What is your take on Judith Butler? What little I have read of Butler’s, I found heavy sledding. Part of it is Butler’s writing style, often writing style… Read more »
Ref your paragraph one, “Does it not go to what accounts for different types of spirituality? Yes, but with regard to gender and the divine, how do you prove it? How do you provide the evidence for such different spiritual needs? I think Cross-Cultural studies are one way forward. There is (and was) life going on outside Europe. Have you noticed that the very erudite and knowledgeable discussion about Celtic spirituality below on this thread (which have I appreciated and learnt from) is almost entirely about male religious. Where are the stories of the women, who made up 50% of… Read more »
With regard to your 2nd para, women and the discussion of Celtic spirituality, you make a take note point, not only about this issue but conversations here on TA in general. I commented earlier that Timothy Joyce’s book has an entry on Women Monastics. Here we get into the challenge of both sources and bias in what is preserved and read. Have you seen the the Jonathan Jones article in Today’s Guardian about the Bayeux Tapestry? ” One possible reason the Bayeux tapestry sees war so clearly is that it was made by women. Commissioned, it’s believed, by Odo, bishop… Read more »
I think patriarchy is like gender. You can chase definitions endlessly, but at the end of the day you have to define your own usage and get on with the work. But for me the issue is perhaps not patriarchy but what happened beforehand, what I’m calling “biarchy”, these gender egalitarian, matrilineal, cultures which accepted gender variant people as their spiritual leaders. Such biarchal cultures existed right across the world until patriarchy was imposed. It’s that biarchy-patriarchy transition that’s the interesting story, and the timing of it. A few thousand years BC in Mesopotamia, but not until the late 19th/early… Read more »
Just one quick comment. I am going through this thread to capture book recommendations and other helpful comments to follow-up. It has been a rich discussion.
But could you please say a bit more about
“the re-emergence and recovery of traditions in areas that were colonized and are now contending with what Heaney refers to as ‘coloniality’ in a post-colonial /neo-colonial setting;”
and possibly point me towards any useful Heaney/coloniality texts.
Simon, just seeing this now. Given that you are looking for book recommendations I think the most useful thing I can do is provide full details on Robert Heaney’s book, Post Colonial theology (links). Two concepts that he mentions, that I appreciated, but i think are best explained within the context of his book are ‘hybridization’ and ‘coloniality’.
Many thanks for alerting us to this poem, Ruairidh and Anglican Priest. In the spirit of Hegel, I would call John O’Donohue’s work as authentically Celtic rather than the ahistorical romanticism that often masquerades as ‘celtic’ today.
Here is another Poem by O’Donohue, in a Celtic vein. “When the canvas frays in the currach of thought.” The metaphorical allusion to a ‘currach’ calls to mind the legend of St. Brendan’s boat and St. Brendan’s stone, Kilnaruane, Ireland.
I’m always a little concerned by the lionising of (Christian) ‘Celtia‘. (The Breton Alan Stivell was using the ‘Celtia = noble, free, marginalised, non-patriarchal, anti-colonial…’ trope back in the early 70’s – eg his song ‘Délivrance’.) So do we project back our own prejudices and romantic yearnings on to the period, perhaps because it’s so easily romanticised – and its history widely ignored and misrepresented? I would argue that we do. Wilfrid – whom Bede thought most unpleasant – is surely one of the more questionable people ever to be canonised, but I feel a false opposition’s been set up… Read more »
Allan, is it possible to suggest a different approach – not “Rome bad” but “Rome incomplete”. Taking David Rowatt’s point above about excessive selectivity, is it possible to argue that much in Christian tradition is also excessively selective. Back 2020 the West Indian cricketer Michael Holding said “I heard Boris Johnson say you can’t edit history. Well history has already been edited. What we need is the real history, the entire history, what we have is the edited history, and it was edited to suit one race.” Can one say something similar about the Christian tradition? What we need is… Read more »
‘Celtic good, Rome bad’ was crude, although it summarises a certain take on spirituality that I come across now and then. I too watched Michael Holding on that day five years ago. History has to open to scrutiny: otherwise we not only eschew complexity, we prop-up the old narratives with our selective and self-serving version of the past. Philip Sheldrake’s reminder is timely, we need to hear the stories ‘from the underside of history’. But rather than taking the spiritually comforting route of setting ‘Celtic’ against ‘Roman’, we might hold the legacies of both in our heads and avoid the… Read more »
Allan, thanks for your generous response. You are right that both Roman and Celtic are important. It’s both-and not either-or. But why do certain people find Celtic more spiritually comforting than Roman? We shouldn’t dismiss that question. For me this speaks to a deeper question about gender and spirituality. But just one point of response. you said “was not ‘Celtic’ also largely male and monastic historically?”. Firstly, what about the other 90% of the culture who weren’t male and monastic. Aren’t we curious about them? But also, the monasteries were embedded within a culture, and the culture might have made… Read more »
Thanks for this detailed comment. When this issue has come up here previously I’ve put in a plug for Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza, In Memory of Her, etc. . So I shall do so again. Of course there are subsequent others. https://www.hds.harvard.edu/people/elisabeth-schussler-fiorenza Now, Feminist interpretation is rightly the subject of a critique on its own groundwork just in terms of what you mention, i.e. the ‘invisibility’ of sexual minorities. One of the things we have learned here is the validity of the kind of thing you mention with regards to First Nations peoples. When I was a student in high school… Read more »
“where we know, from external sources, that women and LGBT people (using modern terminology) played a prominent part.” Are you claiming that there is some unique reality, inside what you call ‘Celtic Christianity,’ that a) has been hidden, and b) is to be found in some very particular form in ‘Celtia’ but not elsewhere in the same era. I also cannot tell if you are referring to culture as it generally bubbles up — Pictish naturalism? — or something Christian. One supposes a general anthropology can show us all kinds of cultural stuff floating around, available in what you are… Read more »
A curious perspective. Culture as normative and your own as the norm? In your comments on O’Donohue, for example, you seem to be reluctant to the recognize O’Donohue as he was billed, received, self-understood, a representative of Celtic spirituality. However ( and good for you) you are an enthusiast of some of his poetry. I get the sense you are appropriating him into a kind of Christian cultural/historical meta-narrative that you are comfortable with? “Pictish naturalism”. At first I though you might be alluding to nude Scots. lol! Ah the articulation of a culture from the outside. Btw, See the… Read more »
St Augustine landed on the Isle of Thanet in 597AD. Had he landed in Dover instead then “a surveillance camera on a pole would reveal” a large Anglo-Saxon burial ground on the hill above his landing place. One of the graves, dated by the archaeologists to 600AD, almost exactly when Augustine arrived, was determined to be “definitely male” by skeleton characteristics. It was deeply buried and had extensive dental cavities due to sugar, both signs of high status. In the grave was a bone comb, a silver-gilt brooch, a silver pin, 84 beads, a silver pendant, a buckle, a knife… Read more »
Simon if I may add just one more thing about the notion of the editing of history; there has been/is the expurgation of minority groups from the historical narrative which raises the issue of how to correct this. We have in the liturgy at the Cathedral here, as part of the gathering of the community, a land acknowledgment. We have come some way from the past when indigenous people were ‘invisible’ and kept on ‘reservations’ where they were not seen –although there is much more to do. Land Acknowledgement Leader: As we gather today, we acknowledge, with gratitude, that we… Read more »
Thanks, I continue to be impressed by how well the Canadian church copes with its colonial legacy issues. I look at how we in the Church of England cope with issues around memorials to slaveowners, and the investment fund set up by the Commissioners, and the howls of protest from conservative forces.Both issues related to Michael Holding and his editing of history How would we have coped with the issues facing your church, where you have large numbers of the First Nation peoples as members of your congregations, peoples whose parents and grandparents were traumatised by the actions of the… Read more »
Let me add a story. I was raised on Cape Breton Island on the eastern edge of Nova Scotia. On the east side of the Island Scottish cultural expression largely disappeared into the big multi-national mix that industrialization always creates. However, on the west and rural side where my settler ancestors hailed from Highland Celtic culture persisted, and eventually enjoyed a major renaissance. The persistence of Celtic culture, music and dance for example, endured despite the efforts of austere authoritarian Presbyterian ministers and Jansenist like Catholic priests who tried to suppress it. Ironically, and as a missionary sheep stealing strategy… Read more »
The other book I referenced earlier, by Timothy Joyce OSB has a discussion on the historical trajectories. Chapter 1 is titled, Ancient Celts and Modern Christians. Chapter 3 is titled, Celtic Monasticism and has an entry on Celtic Monastic Women, Chapter 5 is titled, Decline, and the final chapter 8 is titled, Contemporary Vision with entries on Personal Spirituality for Today and Celtic Christianity a Choice. I tend to see it as a recovery and revitalization of a form of spirituality of which O’Donohue is a fine example. Something similar has been happening with Frist Nations spiritualty here, including with… Read more »
Just for clarification. In my comments I am only speaking about To Bless the Space Between Us. I am not commenting about Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom. I do not know it.
I wouldn’t call the poems in the former to be ones seeking to be ‘celtic’ in some way. Indeed, they are seeking to speak to myriad life transitions and occasions, and very effectively.
As for “ahistorical romanticism,” if I have your drift, I tend to agree. Corning’s book is good at identifying the causes for that in the last centuries.
Whatever insight he grasps about death and grief belongs to a truth without a country, save the eternal one. I find that to be true of poetry at its best. To Bless the Space Between Us is a collection of prayers for moments in life that he seeks to grasp and bless. “O’Donohue awakens readers to timeless truths and shows the power they have to answer contemporary dilemmas and ease us through periods of change.” I was given the book after the death of my wife and have found it resonate. I use it in one of the the final… Read more »
Thanks. I think art which has a cultural context can transcend that context and speak more universally. Hopefully your use of O’Donohue in your forthcoming book will introduce him to a wider audience still. I appreciate your comment on this.
Thanks. I am serializing Part One at the website of my French business. http://www.frenchaffaires.com My sense is that To Bless The Space Between Us has a different feel than the aforementioned Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom. It is more generic. Meant to help with transitions in life. House Blessing. For Love in a Time of Conflict. For courage. For loneliness. For a Nurse. On Waking. For Retirement. Grace After Meals. Etc etc. Probably 100 brief entries. He is known in evangelical and Catholic circles on the US church landscape. That’s where I encountered the Blessing book. Yes, he… Read more »
David Hawkins
20 days ago
“The Last Post was played and we sang the British and the Israeli national anthems, back to back, many in the congregation proudly wearing their medals.”
(Giles Fraser)
The National Synod was noisy in its condemnation of the suffering of white skinned Ukrainian babies but it will be silent about the deliberate starvation of Palestinian babies who ironically look exactly like baby Jesus would have done.
Fraser’s Zionist Christianity has most certainly done its part in the poisoning of the Church of England Chalice.
He has written of his journey from being an ally of Palestinians to an apologist for Israel, as well as from responding to trans people with pastoral affirmation to becoming a self-styled “TERF”. In both cases, I’m struck by how he describes those trajectories not in terms of evolving principles but simply as the result of being close to people on the wrong sides of the issues and feeling bad to see them criticized.
Now that one of the Church’s own, Sue Parfitt, has been arrested – to the incredulity of many rational observers – for holding a placard (an offence which, in her case, could carry a term of imprisonment of up to 14 years), perhaps General Synod can finally reflect on this issue and, in so doing, also take note of the use and abuse of the Terrorism Act 2000 (especially Section 12), and the implications of that abuse for civil rights and liberties within the UK. Of course the 2000 Act was pushed through parliament by Blair and Straw. Lest anyone… Read more »
It isn’t the first time Sue Parfitt has been arrested. She’s currently on conditional bail, awaiting trial next January. British Library, hammer, Magna Carta. Should the Magna Carta be destroyed because some people think it still reinforces the ‘wrong’ values?
Allan Hugh Ronald
20 days ago
Dr Fraser paints a bleak picture. We’ll know how bad it is when the CNC starts looking at any scholar who has produced an edition of a Greek play recently.
Indeed! Though I note that Blomfield, Monk and Maltby were actually pretty good bishops, and Blomfield – essentially the maker of the modern diocese of London – and Monk especially so. Although A. E. Housman noted “the successive strokes of fate which consigned Dobrée and Elmsley to the grave and Blomfield to the bishopric of Chester”, as disasters for British classical scholarship, I admit that we should perhaps also recall Sydney Smith’s savage castigation of the admittedly authoritarian and reformist Blomfield in the ‘First Letter to Archdeacon Singleton’ (1837), as “a man who has had no opportunities of seeing the… Read more »
Indeed, they could be pretty good bishops. And as G. M. Young wrote, “There is something to be said for Greek-play bishops. They could usually write English.” (Unlike the managerial boilerplate coming from the word processors of the bench these days.)
Adrian Clarke
19 days ago
No doubt Augustine thought that being an apostle to the Anglo Saxons was a poisoned chalice as he dragged his feet before arriving to Britain from the Church of Rome, The ‘British’ church was divided into the vibrant Celtic church in the north, the remnants of the Romano British churches in the west and his newly established and rapidly growing church of Rome in the south and east. The Church of Rome prevailed until the Reformation when the bible was translated into English for the first time. It seems that something similarly impactful is needed to restore the church in… Read more »
Now there’s a great ‘what-if’, Janet. We might not have had the ‘Roman’ establishments of Wilfrid and Benedict Biscop, and thus we might not have had Bede, and we might have remarkably little documentary account of the whole era. Maybe no-one would have wanted to establish a new Benedictine house on the cliffs in the Norman era, and it wouldn’t have been a conducive setting for gothic fantasy in the nineteenth century. An inlet for a few fishing boats, with a connection to an eighteenth century colonial enterprise that many would wish had been different, and possibly a trade in… Read more »
Wiflrid is not highly regarded in these parts, the old twister.
If the Synod of Whitby had decided differently, the Irish monks would not have left Lindisfarne, and excellence might have been preserved there a bit longer.
But my real regret is that, in the quest for unity, the Church of Rome and the Roman mindset was allowed to become monolithic and something important was lost. However, I have a great respect for Hild and Cuthbert, and they thought the decision was right.
Hi Janet, Did they? I thought they were on the opposing side but unlike now considered it their duty to follow the majority decision?
I completely agree about the murderous Bishop Wilfrid and it interests me that ‘the Society’ brackets the two of them together
That first great wave of Cistercian abbeys sweeping over all Europe. Earliest monasteries were in the East. In the West, St Honorat (4th century; visited by St Patrick in 5th). St John Cassian (cassianites) Early 5th. Benedict of Nursia (late 5th century) and the widespread Benedictine abbeys. Ninian was a local figure somewhat controverted in history. Referred to by Bede, Aelred. Studied in Rome? Associated with Martin of Tours? Colomba, 6th century. I was referring to “the great wave,” the spawning of abbeys, associated with Bernard, founder of the Cistercians. A non Clunaic return to the Rule of St Benedict.… Read more »
I was thinking particularly of the UK, where from the 4th century on thousands of monasteries, small monastic cells, and hermitages were established.
The Cistercian achievement is remarkable, but I don’t believe that bigger is necessarily better. I distrust monoliths; the small and local can adapt to local conditions and be very effective.
There were over 100 Cistercian Abbeys in Britain. I have visited the ones in Scotland. Henry VIII did a fairly thorough job on the 800 active in his day. Working from memory, Etienne Harding joined Robert Molesme to start what would become the movement associated with Bernard. Stephen Harding was from Cornwall I believe. The “Harding Bible” is an important artefact. Again, just to show the movement across la Manche, north and south, in the early Middle Ages and previously (so, Patrick in Provence, e.g.). There is no comparable movement associated with Ninian, Colomba or Aiden. That was all I… Read more »
I believe that Caitlin Corning’s monograph disputed the idea of a single “Celtic church in the north” and also what is meant by “vibrant.” She also pointed out that the churches of the era in question were loyal to the Papacy. One of the things she helpfully does is show how a view of the “vibrant Celtic church” so “distinctive” (fill in the blanks) vis-a-vis a “Roman” church arose latterly over the last centuries. Would the Venerable Bede, e.g., have held this view? She mentions the Reformation, Romanticism, and other factors. Caitlin Corning (inter alia), The Celtic and Roman Traditions: Conflict… Read more »
There is a lot of wishful thinking and re-writing of history when it comes to the Celtic Church. It developed distinctive practices due to geography, local culture etc but it was part of the universal church and respected the authority of the Pope. Just like countless churches in communion with Rome today which maintain their own liturgy, canon law etc.
I’d understood Celtic Christianity less as an institutional monolith and more as a set of tendencies – monastic (rather than episcopal) centered with leadership tied to secular ruling families, emphasis on penance and prescribed penitential activity, a certain amount of asceticism.
Serious question: as against what? Were the monks who followed St Honorat to the Islands of Lerins “less in tune with the natural world”? Where St Patrick was held to have received the tonsure? 4th century. The Carthusians with their manner of life? In time, the entire Cistercian movement. Visit Citeaux or Fontenay even today and immediately the close connection to the natural world is obvious. One might want to leave to the side the grotto of Mary Magdalen at Sainte Baume, though I would count myself in favor of its real connection to her, and then to St John… Read more »
The Franciscans, like the Dominicans, on the other hand, were explicitly preaching orders, largely settling in busy urban centres and building churches that were preaching halls with a small choir attached.
That is what is to come next in the culture as it unfolds. It is what called forth these newly minted orders. The withdrawing and the sending forth, complementary forms of the Christian life.
A very readable account is Walter Nigg’s Warriors of God: The Great Religious Orders and Their Founders.
PS. I once visited the famous 8th century Abbey at Charlieu, in time co-opted by the giant Cluny (Benedictine). Charlieu was on the once famous Paris-Lyon axis. The Abbey has famous stone carvings and is notable for them. The monastery is in the middle of town and there was tension between the inhabitants and the Benedictines.Mid-13th century the Friars Minor (Franciscans) arrived and the citizens welcomed them, hoping they’d side with them in the dispute. There had to be a papal intervention. The Franciscan Couvent des Cordelieres is the result. Driven out of town they set up shop not far… Read more »
Three British bishops attended the Synod of Arles as early as 314 so the Celtic Church must have been episcopal and although distinctive not separated from the universal church.
314 is before the end of Roman Britannia and the Saxon invasion, so doesn’t really reflect the monasticism that developed in later centuries in Dal Riada (and which is what we usually associate with “Celtic Christianity”). Nonetheless you’re correct there were bishops and they were in communion with Rome, but church life (and authority) centred primarily on monastic communities.
Anglican Priest
17 days ago
PS. On the connective tissue to nature. One can see this with the annual Notre-Dame de Chretiente Paris to Chartres pilgrimage, now overflowing with pelerins. Muddy boots, sleeping bags, long processions crossing la Beauce, Chevreuse, Rambouillet, until the twin towers of Chartres arise on the horizon. All generations. Lots of young people. Singing in Latin, French, English. I was at the beautifully renovated Chartres a fortnight ago, as well as Vezelay. Perhaps the Age of Pilgrimage will return! I’ve been to both Holy Isle and to Iona. Why not get a major movement going again in the British Isles? Why… Read more »
I went on retreat on a couple of occasions to Notre Dame de Fontgombault at the end of the 90s and agree with you. Seven days following the Benedictine routine in a monastery built in woodland and on the banks of a river were indeed good for the soul.
I did the Camino de Santiago in the Holy Year 2010 (it took up half of my sabbatical), and found it a remarkable experience, not least in that other people commented that I’d come back subtly different. Yesterday’s reading from RB being about the evil of personal possessions, I recalled how instructive it was to be limited to what one could carry on one’s back – one quickly discovered that which was surplus to requirements (I think it was the author of ‘One Man and his Bog’ who claimed that the best place to buy cheap Le Creuset pans was… Read more »
We do a 8 day circuit in Provence. St Honorat, la monastere de Segries near Moustiers, and Senanque. Silence and light excursions outside. I did a nice retreat at St Benoit sur Loire when we lived in France. I was encouraged to climb the chemin des rois to the massive Sainte-Baume, and it was unforgettable. Then a visit to St-Maximin Basilica. 500 miles is impressive. My instinct would be to stay in France and just take in a week or so. But I know people have had their life changed by the whole circuit down from Vezelay. Bravo. I may… Read more »
There’s a luminous reply by Paulinus of Nola to Gregory the Great’s teaching of restraint with regard to pilgrimage: “Make pilgrimage abroad to increase the grace of charity within you, whilst you still lodge in the body and are a pilgrim for Christ.”
I think there’s an Irish proverb on the lines of ‘Small profit it is to you to journey to seek Christ in Rome or Compostela if he is not with you when you begin the journey.’
Indeed. ” To go to Rome/Is much of trouble, little of profit;/ The King whom thou seekest there,/
Unless thou bring Him with thee, thou wilt not find.”
Esther de Waal in, The Celtic Way of Prayer, references this: n. 1. Kuno Meyer (tr.) Selections form Ancient Irish Poetry. (Constable, 1911, new ed., 1959), p. 100.
Incidentally, Carmina Gadelica: Hymns and Incantations, by Alexander Carmichael, English Edition, is available in e-book format at a very reasonable cost.
Anthony Archer
16 days ago
I fear the Canterbury CNC might struggle. There are papabile candidates but that’s not the same as saying any might be nominated (unlike in Rome). From my own direct experience, the two outstanding candidates (there are few others) are +Chelmsford and +Norwich. I served on the CNCs where each was nominated. The latter is not currently available. He could recuse himself later in the process despite the fact that the CNC has started meeting. I am on record (in a letter to The Times) in saying that the first woman Cantuar has much to commend. The CNC would have to… Read more »
Ruairidh
16 days ago
There are 2 different conversations here and there on the thread about Celtic Spirituality/Celtic church. Rather than insert this into one of those chats, I thought I would offer this separate. It is an interview with John O’Donohue. It is from the CBC radio series Tapestry with then host Mary Hynes. It is billed as their most requested interview. He recites some of his poetry, talks about being in and going out of priesthood, and the “divine region within you”. https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/audio/1.7060767 If the link does not open to the right episode of CBC Radio, put CBC Tapestry: Our Most Requested… Read more »
Thank you for bringing this to a wider audience. People will take different insights from it. Two resonated particularly for me. The first, his description of the Sunday Eucharist: “The yeast put into the quickening ground of the soul.” The second his take on beauty being in the eye of the beholder: “If you make your gaze beautiful then the beauty will come to meet it.”
I too appreciated those two observations of his. I was especially taken with his comments on the Eucharist at around 12 and a half minutes in, his description of the Eucharist as a veil opening between heaven and earth on the altar stone called to mind for me the Celtic notion of the ‘thin place’. I think you are right that folks will take different insights away. There is a richness to his comments applicable to a wide audience. Best regards!
As a priest in the Church of England, there was a sadness for me in his reflections on the Eucharist, given that my church is losing interest in the sacrament that makes us and makes the Church. The objectivity of the Eucharist stands against “the reduction of the mystical flame of religion to moralistic functionalism” of which O’Donohue speaks, and in which “the great fire and beauty of the divine is forgotten in favour of prescriptions, obligations and empty clichés.”
An interview rich enough to demand revisiting. Thank you!
If no sane person of sufficient quality wants to be archbishop of Canterbury, then why not simply leave the see vacant? The Church seems to be getting on perfectly well, albeit with its customary quotient of moral failure and scandal, without a primate of All England. Why is one necessary? In the early modern period it was not uncommon (though not with respect to the see of Canterbury) for bishoprics to be left vacant, albeit so that the crown could harvest their temporalities. Another option might be to take suitable laypeople and ordain and consecrate them within a short period… Read more »
Indeed. Hands up those missing having an Archbishop of Canterbury.
I’ve been rather enjoying life without unhelpful archiepiscopal interventions.
Canon Fraser’s repeating of the ahistorical trope of a “gentler” Celtic church mitigates the seriousness with which I can take his piece.
It’s also curious to me that he (rightly) sees safeguarding snafus as disqualifying, yet still stumps for +Londin when the buck stops with her in the Alan Griffin affair.
Back in the day I led a module on spirituality – Benedictine, Franciscan, Celtic and so on; when twice the number turned out for the Celtic evening. As it was in Torbay, I suggested we should go down to the harbour and recite all 7 penitential psalms up to our necks in the sea. There were no takers.
Yes. See Caitlin Corning (inter alia), The Celtic and Roman Traditions: Conflict and Consensus in the Early Medieval Church. Palgrave Macmillan, 2006.
Poor Fr Alan Griffin, a vulnerable man who committed suicide after fbeing abused by the Church of England’s officers. As the Coroner put it in her Report: “He killed himself because he could not cope with an investigation into his conduct, the detail of and the source for which he had never been told. The investigation had been ongoing for over a year and was being conducted by his former Church of England diocese and subsequently also by his current Roman Catholic diocese (to whom the Church of England had passed a short, written summary of allegations that contained inaccuracies… Read more »
Yes indeed,’Poor Fr Alan Griffin’. I often pray for his soul. The situation Fr Alan suffered was very similar to one that a friend of mine is currently experiencing. Since 2020, continuously, I have been supporting a friend, anonymously known as ‘Kenneth’, in an accusation of sexual touching – an accusation made by a chorister, which my friend denies. The Diocesan Safeguarding Adviser said it is in the Bishops Guidance that the child must be believed and any evidence to the contrary is inadmissible. When Fr Alan died and I learned of the circumstances surrounding it, I realised there were… Read more »
Very sad. I thought that in the wider world we no longer always insist that “the child must be believed”. My husband once reprimanded some boys who’d been clambering over boats that didn’t belong to them. As they scarpered one (about 12 years old) dropped his trousers, bared his backside and shouted “Paedophile!”. I believe the irony was lost on him.
I have not read the Unherd piece. But re: your comment, a good book to read is Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom by the late John O’Donohue. Anam Cara is Gaelic for soul friend. It is a particularly good read for folks who are into credentialism and want an
‘imprimatur’ from academics for their views. O’Donohue had a PH.D. in philosophical theology from Tubingen and was something an expert on both Hegel and Meister Eckhart.
Another nifty read is, Celtic Christianity: A Sacred Tradition, A Vision of Hope by Benedictine Timothy Joyce.
https://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/educational-magazines/joyce-timothy-j-1934
John O’Donohue has some unmatched poetry. I use excerpts from To Bless the Space Between Us in my forthcoming book, Le Grand Voyage. He has understood grief as well as anyone I have encountered. Tragic that, his early (and mysterious) death at 52 in Avignon. He is a blessing.
Insightful comment. Thanks! His book was given to me sometime ago as a gift. I keep coming back to it over and over again. It is one of the best things I have read on Celtic spirituality. A blessing indeed!
I wouldn’t call it celtic spirituality but to each his own. He knows something about death and its aftermath, and is a standard for complicated and traumatic loss. Gradually, you will learn acquaintance With the invisible form of your departed; And when the work of grief is done The wound of loss will heal And you will have learned To wean your eyes From that gap in the air And be able to enter the hearth In your soul where your loved one Has awaited your return All the time. I use this in the section titled, “The Love… Read more »
From the Jacket of the book: ” John O’Donohue invites you into the magical and unobtrusive world of your own divinity, to that place in the soul where there is no distance between you and the ternal. The ancient wisdom, poetry, and blessings of Celtic spirituality will awaken and embrace the beauty of your heart’s landscape.” And from the man himself in the prologue, ” The Celtic imagination articulates the inner friendship that embraces Nature, divinity, underworld, and human world as one. The dualism that separates the visible from the invisible, time from eternity, the human from the divine was… Read more »
I am struggling with half-formed thoughts here, but I wonder if there is a link between recent discussions on colonialism and these ideas about Celtic spirituality. In particular, having spent a few years looking at the effect of colonialism abroad, I am beginning to see my own country, Britain, as a colonised country (as well as a coloniser). It now seems well established that right across the world there were many pre-patriarchal indigenous cultures in which there was great gender equality, with men and women perhaps having different roles but with equal value. These cultures were often matrilineal. Women had… Read more »
Simon, I think there are affinities between aspects of First Nations culture and spirituality and Celtic Spirituality for sure. (I prefer the term Celtic spirituality to Celtic Church.) It would be reasonable to explore whether or not imperial colonialism has local domestic antecedents. Colonizing powers, both ancient and modern, certainly deploy the same tactics at home as they do abroad. The area of Nova Scotia I was raised in is an example. If you look at the history of industrial Cape Breton, British Empire Steel and Coal Company (Besco) , which owned/operated the steel mill and coal mines you will… Read more »
Thanks, That’s helpful. It’s just a vague feeling I had about this idea, but I wanted to check out it was an idea worth pursuing. And I think it is. What drives me is not only to focus on the colonialism (although that awful story must be told) but more importantly to uncover the stories of the people suppressed by colonialism and patriarchy, whether in Canada or Britain, or wherever in the world. I think there are two aspects. Firstly as you say the affinity between Celtic spirituality and First Nations spirituality. What’s going on there? But also there is… Read more »
“But Queen Bertha would have been an important and powerful woman in her own right.” Indeed, and not least because she was a daughter of Charibert, Merovingian king of Paris, although he died in 567, shortly after her birth in 565. Although the kingdom of Paris (which comprised almost all of western France and much of northern France, including Normandy) was divided 30 years’ prior to Augustine’s mission, the prestige of the matrimonial connection with the Merovingians would have been considerable, and would have helped underpin Æthelberht’s claim to the title of ‘bretwalda’ (that is, a form of weak political… Read more »
Probably several inter related things going on, a desire to connect with spirituality, especially in connection with the land and nature, from a pre-industrial age; the re-emergence and recovery of traditions in areas that were colonized and are now contending with what Heaney refers to as ‘coloniality’ in a post-colonial /neo-colonial setting; the ‘stepping out’, perhaps we could even say coming out (?), of cultural identities that were suppressed but never extinguished by colonial powers and so on. Hardly surprising that history has been told from a patriarchal perspective and that the seeking of a patriarchal hegemony is part of… Read more »
Simon, this perhaps indirectly related to one of the points you raise; but I think there are connections. The first link, is to a video that is only a couple of minutes long.
https://youtu.be/WdEbxlPaxuc
https://mcmichael.com/collection/first-nations/
https://www.mcgill.ca/vacollection/collection/first-nations-art
Indirectly related, but still interesting. Thank You.
For me it is more about whether such questions can speak to if there is a difference in the way that women or LGBT people relate to the divine, or to each other, compared to straight patriarchal men.
After Judith Butler such questions have often been regarded as essentialist and heretical, but the tide is turning.
If women dominant cultures in different parts of the world have the same spiritual patterns, then what does that say, and how should the church respond?
The question about difference as a basis for relating to the Divine is an intriguing question. Does it not go to what accounts for different types of spirituality? Are there analogies i.e. do artists relate to the Divine somewhat differently than systematic thinkers? I have often been surprised listening to interviews with accomplished musical artists. Their work has voice; but in oral interviews they seem sometimes lacking focus in responding to questions. What is your take on Judith Butler? What little I have read of Butler’s, I found heavy sledding. Part of it is Butler’s writing style, often writing style… Read more »
Ref your paragraph one, “Does it not go to what accounts for different types of spirituality? Yes, but with regard to gender and the divine, how do you prove it? How do you provide the evidence for such different spiritual needs? I think Cross-Cultural studies are one way forward. There is (and was) life going on outside Europe. Have you noticed that the very erudite and knowledgeable discussion about Celtic spirituality below on this thread (which have I appreciated and learnt from) is almost entirely about male religious. Where are the stories of the women, who made up 50% of… Read more »
With regard to your 2nd para, women and the discussion of Celtic spirituality, you make a take note point, not only about this issue but conversations here on TA in general. I commented earlier that Timothy Joyce’s book has an entry on Women Monastics. Here we get into the challenge of both sources and bias in what is preserved and read. Have you seen the the Jonathan Jones article in Today’s Guardian about the Bayeux Tapestry? ” One possible reason the Bayeux tapestry sees war so clearly is that it was made by women. Commissioned, it’s believed, by Odo, bishop… Read more »
I think patriarchy is like gender. You can chase definitions endlessly, but at the end of the day you have to define your own usage and get on with the work. But for me the issue is perhaps not patriarchy but what happened beforehand, what I’m calling “biarchy”, these gender egalitarian, matrilineal, cultures which accepted gender variant people as their spiritual leaders. Such biarchal cultures existed right across the world until patriarchy was imposed. It’s that biarchy-patriarchy transition that’s the interesting story, and the timing of it. A few thousand years BC in Mesopotamia, but not until the late 19th/early… Read more »
Ruairidh,
Just one quick comment. I am going through this thread to capture book recommendations and other helpful comments to follow-up. It has been a rich discussion.
But could you please say a bit more about
“the re-emergence and recovery of traditions in areas that were colonized and are now contending with what Heaney refers to as ‘coloniality’ in a post-colonial /neo-colonial setting;”
and possibly point me towards any useful Heaney/coloniality texts.
With many thanks.
Simon, just seeing this now. Given that you are looking for book recommendations I think the most useful thing I can do is provide full details on Robert Heaney’s book, Post Colonial theology (links). Two concepts that he mentions, that I appreciated, but i think are best explained within the context of his book are ‘hybridization’ and ‘coloniality’.
https://livingchurch.org/news/heaney-publishes-theology/
https://www.leslibraires.ca/en/books/from-historical-to-critical-post-colonial-robert-s-heaney-9781625647818.html?srsltid=AfmBOoq2Qy7mnameF9U7_5VswGOR3oW7R-lY6COecgo6bCceBM7OUtK3
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/51094368-post-colonial-theology
https://www.jstor.org/stable/27086794#:~:text=%2436.00.)-,Robert%20Heaney’s%20Post%2DColonial%20Theology%20is%20an%20important%20intro%2D%20ductory,starting%20point%20for%20post%2Dcolonialism.
Many thanks for alerting us to this poem, Ruairidh and Anglican Priest. In the spirit of Hegel, I would call John O’Donohue’s work as authentically Celtic rather than the ahistorical romanticism that often masquerades as ‘celtic’ today.
Here is another Poem by O’Donohue, in a Celtic vein. “When the canvas frays in the currach of thought.” The metaphorical allusion to a ‘currach’ calls to mind the legend of St. Brendan’s boat and St. Brendan’s stone, Kilnaruane, Ireland.
Beannacht / Blessing by John O’Donohue – Scottish Poetry Library
And thanks again!
I’m always a little concerned by the lionising of (Christian) ‘Celtia‘. (The Breton Alan Stivell was using the ‘Celtia = noble, free, marginalised, non-patriarchal, anti-colonial…’ trope back in the early 70’s – eg his song ‘Délivrance’.) So do we project back our own prejudices and romantic yearnings on to the period, perhaps because it’s so easily romanticised – and its history widely ignored and misrepresented? I would argue that we do. Wilfrid – whom Bede thought most unpleasant – is surely one of the more questionable people ever to be canonised, but I feel a false opposition’s been set up… Read more »
Thank you for this. A counter to the ‘Celtic good, Rome bad’ that often appears to inform discussion.
Allan, is it possible to suggest a different approach – not “Rome bad” but “Rome incomplete”. Taking David Rowatt’s point above about excessive selectivity, is it possible to argue that much in Christian tradition is also excessively selective. Back 2020 the West Indian cricketer Michael Holding said “I heard Boris Johnson say you can’t edit history. Well history has already been edited. What we need is the real history, the entire history, what we have is the edited history, and it was edited to suit one race.” Can one say something similar about the Christian tradition? What we need is… Read more »
‘Celtic good, Rome bad’ was crude, although it summarises a certain take on spirituality that I come across now and then. I too watched Michael Holding on that day five years ago. History has to open to scrutiny: otherwise we not only eschew complexity, we prop-up the old narratives with our selective and self-serving version of the past. Philip Sheldrake’s reminder is timely, we need to hear the stories ‘from the underside of history’. But rather than taking the spiritually comforting route of setting ‘Celtic’ against ‘Roman’, we might hold the legacies of both in our heads and avoid the… Read more »
Allan, thanks for your generous response. You are right that both Roman and Celtic are important. It’s both-and not either-or. But why do certain people find Celtic more spiritually comforting than Roman? We shouldn’t dismiss that question. For me this speaks to a deeper question about gender and spirituality. But just one point of response. you said “was not ‘Celtic’ also largely male and monastic historically?”. Firstly, what about the other 90% of the culture who weren’t male and monastic. Aren’t we curious about them? But also, the monasteries were embedded within a culture, and the culture might have made… Read more »
Thanks for this detailed comment. When this issue has come up here previously I’ve put in a plug for Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza, In Memory of Her, etc. . So I shall do so again. Of course there are subsequent others. https://www.hds.harvard.edu/people/elisabeth-schussler-fiorenza Now, Feminist interpretation is rightly the subject of a critique on its own groundwork just in terms of what you mention, i.e. the ‘invisibility’ of sexual minorities. One of the things we have learned here is the validity of the kind of thing you mention with regards to First Nations peoples. When I was a student in high school… Read more »
“where we know, from external sources, that women and LGBT people (using modern terminology) played a prominent part.” Are you claiming that there is some unique reality, inside what you call ‘Celtic Christianity,’ that a) has been hidden, and b) is to be found in some very particular form in ‘Celtia’ but not elsewhere in the same era. I also cannot tell if you are referring to culture as it generally bubbles up — Pictish naturalism? — or something Christian. One supposes a general anthropology can show us all kinds of cultural stuff floating around, available in what you are… Read more »
A curious perspective. Culture as normative and your own as the norm? In your comments on O’Donohue, for example, you seem to be reluctant to the recognize O’Donohue as he was billed, received, self-understood, a representative of Celtic spirituality. However ( and good for you) you are an enthusiast of some of his poetry. I get the sense you are appropriating him into a kind of Christian cultural/historical meta-narrative that you are comfortable with? “Pictish naturalism”. At first I though you might be alluding to nude Scots. lol! Ah the articulation of a culture from the outside. Btw, See the… Read more »
Thanks. Off from here for a spell. I’m not that interested beyond what I have said.
I have enjoyed the historical journey through early mediaeval France with fellow travelers.
Nice change of pace at TA.
Thank you. I did take a look at your web site. I plan to go back and read some of the serialization.
St Augustine landed on the Isle of Thanet in 597AD. Had he landed in Dover instead then “a surveillance camera on a pole would reveal” a large Anglo-Saxon burial ground on the hill above his landing place. One of the graves, dated by the archaeologists to 600AD, almost exactly when Augustine arrived, was determined to be “definitely male” by skeleton characteristics. It was deeply buried and had extensive dental cavities due to sugar, both signs of high status. In the grave was a bone comb, a silver-gilt brooch, a silver pin, 84 beads, a silver pendant, a buckle, a knife… Read more »
Simon if I may add just one more thing about the notion of the editing of history; there has been/is the expurgation of minority groups from the historical narrative which raises the issue of how to correct this. We have in the liturgy at the Cathedral here, as part of the gathering of the community, a land acknowledgment. We have come some way from the past when indigenous people were ‘invisible’ and kept on ‘reservations’ where they were not seen –although there is much more to do. Land Acknowledgement Leader: As we gather today, we acknowledge, with gratitude, that we… Read more »
Thanks, I continue to be impressed by how well the Canadian church copes with its colonial legacy issues. I look at how we in the Church of England cope with issues around memorials to slaveowners, and the investment fund set up by the Commissioners, and the howls of protest from conservative forces.Both issues related to Michael Holding and his editing of history How would we have coped with the issues facing your church, where you have large numbers of the First Nation peoples as members of your congregations, peoples whose parents and grandparents were traumatised by the actions of the… Read more »
Let me add a story. I was raised on Cape Breton Island on the eastern edge of Nova Scotia. On the east side of the Island Scottish cultural expression largely disappeared into the big multi-national mix that industrialization always creates. However, on the west and rural side where my settler ancestors hailed from Highland Celtic culture persisted, and eventually enjoyed a major renaissance. The persistence of Celtic culture, music and dance for example, endured despite the efforts of austere authoritarian Presbyterian ministers and Jansenist like Catholic priests who tried to suppress it. Ironically, and as a missionary sheep stealing strategy… Read more »
Thank you.
These isles were part of post-Classical European cultural superhighway.
The other book I referenced earlier, by Timothy Joyce OSB has a discussion on the historical trajectories. Chapter 1 is titled, Ancient Celts and Modern Christians. Chapter 3 is titled, Celtic Monasticism and has an entry on Celtic Monastic Women, Chapter 5 is titled, Decline, and the final chapter 8 is titled, Contemporary Vision with entries on Personal Spirituality for Today and Celtic Christianity a Choice. I tend to see it as a recovery and revitalization of a form of spirituality of which O’Donohue is a fine example. Something similar has been happening with Frist Nations spiritualty here, including with… Read more »
Just for clarification. In my comments I am only speaking about To Bless the Space Between Us. I am not commenting about Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom. I do not know it.
I wouldn’t call the poems in the former to be ones seeking to be ‘celtic’ in some way. Indeed, they are seeking to speak to myriad life transitions and occasions, and very effectively.
As for “ahistorical romanticism,” if I have your drift, I tend to agree. Corning’s book is good at identifying the causes for that in the last centuries.
Whatever insight he grasps about death and grief belongs to a truth without a country, save the eternal one. I find that to be true of poetry at its best. To Bless the Space Between Us is a collection of prayers for moments in life that he seeks to grasp and bless. “O’Donohue awakens readers to timeless truths and shows the power they have to answer contemporary dilemmas and ease us through periods of change.” I was given the book after the death of my wife and have found it resonate. I use it in one of the the final… Read more »
Thanks. I think art which has a cultural context can transcend that context and speak more universally. Hopefully your use of O’Donohue in your forthcoming book will introduce him to a wider audience still. I appreciate your comment on this.
Thanks. I am serializing Part One at the website of my French business. http://www.frenchaffaires.com My sense is that To Bless The Space Between Us has a different feel than the aforementioned Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom. It is more generic. Meant to help with transitions in life. House Blessing. For Love in a Time of Conflict. For courage. For loneliness. For a Nurse. On Waking. For Retirement. Grace After Meals. Etc etc. Probably 100 brief entries. He is known in evangelical and Catholic circles on the US church landscape. That’s where I encountered the Blessing book. Yes, he… Read more »
“The Last Post was played and we sang the British and the Israeli national anthems, back to back, many in the congregation proudly wearing their medals.”
(Giles Fraser)
The National Synod was noisy in its condemnation of the suffering of white skinned Ukrainian babies but it will be silent about the deliberate starvation of Palestinian babies who ironically look exactly like baby Jesus would have done.
Fraser’s Zionist Christianity has most certainly done its part in the poisoning of the Church of England Chalice.
He has written of his journey from being an ally of Palestinians to an apologist for Israel, as well as from responding to trans people with pastoral affirmation to becoming a self-styled “TERF”. In both cases, I’m struck by how he describes those trajectories not in terms of evolving principles but simply as the result of being close to people on the wrong sides of the issues and feeling bad to see them criticized.
Now that one of the Church’s own, Sue Parfitt, has been arrested – to the incredulity of many rational observers – for holding a placard (an offence which, in her case, could carry a term of imprisonment of up to 14 years), perhaps General Synod can finally reflect on this issue and, in so doing, also take note of the use and abuse of the Terrorism Act 2000 (especially Section 12), and the implications of that abuse for civil rights and liberties within the UK. Of course the 2000 Act was pushed through parliament by Blair and Straw. Lest anyone… Read more »
Thanks for the link for the article from Haaretz. Here is a link to a piece from Human Rights watch.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/05/15/gaza-latest-israeli-plan-inches-closer-extermination
It isn’t the first time Sue Parfitt has been arrested. She’s currently on conditional bail, awaiting trial next January. British Library, hammer, Magna Carta. Should the Magna Carta be destroyed because some people think it still reinforces the ‘wrong’ values?
Dr Fraser paints a bleak picture. We’ll know how bad it is when the CNC starts looking at any scholar who has produced an edition of a Greek play recently.
Indeed! Though I note that Blomfield, Monk and Maltby were actually pretty good bishops, and Blomfield – essentially the maker of the modern diocese of London – and Monk especially so. Although A. E. Housman noted “the successive strokes of fate which consigned Dobrée and Elmsley to the grave and Blomfield to the bishopric of Chester”, as disasters for British classical scholarship, I admit that we should perhaps also recall Sydney Smith’s savage castigation of the admittedly authoritarian and reformist Blomfield in the ‘First Letter to Archdeacon Singleton’ (1837), as “a man who has had no opportunities of seeing the… Read more »
Indeed, they could be pretty good bishops. And as G. M. Young wrote, “There is something to be said for Greek-play bishops. They could usually write English.” (Unlike the managerial boilerplate coming from the word processors of the bench these days.)
No doubt Augustine thought that being an apostle to the Anglo Saxons was a poisoned chalice as he dragged his feet before arriving to Britain from the Church of Rome, The ‘British’ church was divided into the vibrant Celtic church in the north, the remnants of the Romano British churches in the west and his newly established and rapidly growing church of Rome in the south and east. The Church of Rome prevailed until the Reformation when the bible was translated into English for the first time. It seems that something similarly impactful is needed to restore the church in… Read more »
Some of us still regret the decision taken at Whitby in the 7th century.
Now there’s a great ‘what-if’, Janet. We might not have had the ‘Roman’ establishments of Wilfrid and Benedict Biscop, and thus we might not have had Bede, and we might have remarkably little documentary account of the whole era. Maybe no-one would have wanted to establish a new Benedictine house on the cliffs in the Norman era, and it wouldn’t have been a conducive setting for gothic fantasy in the nineteenth century. An inlet for a few fishing boats, with a connection to an eighteenth century colonial enterprise that many would wish had been different, and possibly a trade in… Read more »
Wiflrid is not highly regarded in these parts, the old twister.
If the Synod of Whitby had decided differently, the Irish monks would not have left Lindisfarne, and excellence might have been preserved there a bit longer.
But my real regret is that, in the quest for unity, the Church of Rome and the Roman mindset was allowed to become monolithic and something important was lost. However, I have a great respect for Hild and Cuthbert, and they thought the decision was right.
Hi Janet, Did they? I thought they were on the opposing side but unlike now considered it their duty to follow the majority decision?
I completely agree about the murderous Bishop Wilfrid and it interests me that ‘the Society’ brackets the two of them together
I agree. Thank God the Catholic Church’s unity saw to Cistercian monasteries being planted in the British Isles as part of that first great wave.
The first great wave of monasteries? Didn’t that start with SS Ninian, Columba, Aidan, etc?
That first great wave of Cistercian abbeys sweeping over all Europe. Earliest monasteries were in the East. In the West, St Honorat (4th century; visited by St Patrick in 5th). St John Cassian (cassianites) Early 5th. Benedict of Nursia (late 5th century) and the widespread Benedictine abbeys. Ninian was a local figure somewhat controverted in history. Referred to by Bede, Aelred. Studied in Rome? Associated with Martin of Tours? Colomba, 6th century. I was referring to “the great wave,” the spawning of abbeys, associated with Bernard, founder of the Cistercians. A non Clunaic return to the Rule of St Benedict.… Read more »
I was thinking particularly of the UK, where from the 4th century on thousands of monasteries, small monastic cells, and hermitages were established.
The Cistercian achievement is remarkable, but I don’t believe that bigger is necessarily better. I distrust monoliths; the small and local can adapt to local conditions and be very effective.
There were over 100 Cistercian Abbeys in Britain. I have visited the ones in Scotland. Henry VIII did a fairly thorough job on the 800 active in his day. Working from memory, Etienne Harding joined Robert Molesme to start what would become the movement associated with Bernard. Stephen Harding was from Cornwall I believe. The “Harding Bible” is an important artefact. Again, just to show the movement across la Manche, north and south, in the early Middle Ages and previously (so, Patrick in Provence, e.g.). There is no comparable movement associated with Ninian, Colomba or Aiden. That was all I… Read more »
I believe that Caitlin Corning’s monograph disputed the idea of a single “Celtic church in the north” and also what is meant by “vibrant.” She also pointed out that the churches of the era in question were loyal to the Papacy. One of the things she helpfully does is show how a view of the “vibrant Celtic church” so “distinctive” (fill in the blanks) vis-a-vis a “Roman” church arose latterly over the last centuries. Would the Venerable Bede, e.g., have held this view? She mentions the Reformation, Romanticism, and other factors. Caitlin Corning (inter alia), The Celtic and Roman Traditions: Conflict… Read more »
There is a lot of wishful thinking and re-writing of history when it comes to the Celtic Church. It developed distinctive practices due to geography, local culture etc but it was part of the universal church and respected the authority of the Pope. Just like countless churches in communion with Rome today which maintain their own liturgy, canon law etc.
I’d understood Celtic Christianity less as an institutional monolith and more as a set of tendencies – monastic (rather than episcopal) centered with leadership tied to secular ruling families, emphasis on penance and prescribed penitential activity, a certain amount of asceticism.
And more in tune with the natural world.
Serious question: as against what? Were the monks who followed St Honorat to the Islands of Lerins “less in tune with the natural world”? Where St Patrick was held to have received the tonsure? 4th century. The Carthusians with their manner of life? In time, the entire Cistercian movement. Visit Citeaux or Fontenay even today and immediately the close connection to the natural world is obvious. One might want to leave to the side the grotto of Mary Magdalen at Sainte Baume, though I would count myself in favor of its real connection to her, and then to St John… Read more »
See also Rene Dubos’ argument that St Benedict may be a more appropriate patron saint of the environment than St Francis
Poor St Francis, he seems to have become the patron of ‘you’re nearer to God in a garden’ theology.
A visit to Fontenay in Burgundy would establish that quickly. Deep in the woods, in a valley.
The old canard was, Benedict on a hill, Colomba on an island, Bernard in the forest valley…and Simon on a stele.
All of these signaling a desire to withdraw, determined by one’s location.
The lay brothers at Cistercian abbeys in Burgundy farmed the environs. The “city” is in search of an identity more than rural life.
The Franciscans, like the Dominicans, on the other hand, were explicitly preaching orders, largely settling in busy urban centres and building churches that were preaching halls with a small choir attached.
That is what is to come next in the culture as it unfolds. It is what called forth these newly minted orders. The withdrawing and the sending forth, complementary forms of the Christian life.
A very readable account is Walter Nigg’s Warriors of God: The Great Religious Orders and Their Founders.
PS. I once visited the famous 8th century Abbey at Charlieu, in time co-opted by the giant Cluny (Benedictine). Charlieu was on the once famous Paris-Lyon axis. The Abbey has famous stone carvings and is notable for them. The monastery is in the middle of town and there was tension between the inhabitants and the Benedictines.Mid-13th century the Friars Minor (Franciscans) arrived and the citizens welcomed them, hoping they’d side with them in the dispute. There had to be a papal intervention. The Franciscan Couvent des Cordelieres is the result. Driven out of town they set up shop not far… Read more »
Three British bishops attended the Synod of Arles as early as 314 so the Celtic Church must have been episcopal and although distinctive not separated from the universal church.
314 is before the end of Roman Britannia and the Saxon invasion, so doesn’t really reflect the monasticism that developed in later centuries in Dal Riada (and which is what we usually associate with “Celtic Christianity”). Nonetheless you’re correct there were bishops and they were in communion with Rome, but church life (and authority) centred primarily on monastic communities.
PS. On the connective tissue to nature. One can see this with the annual Notre-Dame de Chretiente Paris to Chartres pilgrimage, now overflowing with pelerins. Muddy boots, sleeping bags, long processions crossing la Beauce, Chevreuse, Rambouillet, until the twin towers of Chartres arise on the horizon. All generations. Lots of young people. Singing in Latin, French, English. I was at the beautifully renovated Chartres a fortnight ago, as well as Vezelay. Perhaps the Age of Pilgrimage will return! I’ve been to both Holy Isle and to Iona. Why not get a major movement going again in the British Isles? Why… Read more »
I went on retreat on a couple of occasions to Notre Dame de Fontgombault at the end of the 90s and agree with you. Seven days following the Benedictine routine in a monastery built in woodland and on the banks of a river were indeed good for the soul.
I did the Camino de Santiago in the Holy Year 2010 (it took up half of my sabbatical), and found it a remarkable experience, not least in that other people commented that I’d come back subtly different. Yesterday’s reading from RB being about the evil of personal possessions, I recalled how instructive it was to be limited to what one could carry on one’s back – one quickly discovered that which was surplus to requirements (I think it was the author of ‘One Man and his Bog’ who claimed that the best place to buy cheap Le Creuset pans was… Read more »
We do a 8 day circuit in Provence. St Honorat, la monastere de Segries near Moustiers, and Senanque. Silence and light excursions outside. I did a nice retreat at St Benoit sur Loire when we lived in France. I was encouraged to climb the chemin des rois to the massive Sainte-Baume, and it was unforgettable. Then a visit to St-Maximin Basilica. 500 miles is impressive. My instinct would be to stay in France and just take in a week or so. But I know people have had their life changed by the whole circuit down from Vezelay. Bravo. I may… Read more »
There’s a luminous reply by Paulinus of Nola to Gregory the Great’s teaching of restraint with regard to pilgrimage: “Make pilgrimage abroad to increase the grace of charity within you, whilst you still lodge in the body and are a pilgrim for Christ.”
I think there’s an Irish proverb on the lines of ‘Small profit it is to you to journey to seek Christ in Rome or Compostela if he is not with you when you begin the journey.’
Indeed. ” To go to Rome/Is much of trouble, little of profit;/ The King whom thou seekest there,/
Unless thou bring Him with thee, thou wilt not find.”
Esther de Waal in, The Celtic Way of Prayer, references this: n. 1. Kuno Meyer (tr.) Selections form Ancient Irish Poetry. (Constable, 1911, new ed., 1959), p. 100.
Incidentally, Carmina Gadelica: Hymns and Incantations, by Alexander Carmichael, English Edition, is available in e-book format at a very reasonable cost.
I fear the Canterbury CNC might struggle. There are papabile candidates but that’s not the same as saying any might be nominated (unlike in Rome). From my own direct experience, the two outstanding candidates (there are few others) are +Chelmsford and +Norwich. I served on the CNCs where each was nominated. The latter is not currently available. He could recuse himself later in the process despite the fact that the CNC has started meeting. I am on record (in a letter to The Times) in saying that the first woman Cantuar has much to commend. The CNC would have to… Read more »
There are 2 different conversations here and there on the thread about Celtic Spirituality/Celtic church. Rather than insert this into one of those chats, I thought I would offer this separate. It is an interview with John O’Donohue. It is from the CBC radio series Tapestry with then host Mary Hynes. It is billed as their most requested interview. He recites some of his poetry, talks about being in and going out of priesthood, and the “divine region within you”. https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/audio/1.7060767 If the link does not open to the right episode of CBC Radio, put CBC Tapestry: Our Most Requested… Read more »
Thank you for bringing this to a wider audience. People will take different insights from it. Two resonated particularly for me. The first, his description of the Sunday Eucharist: “The yeast put into the quickening ground of the soul.” The second his take on beauty being in the eye of the beholder: “If you make your gaze beautiful then the beauty will come to meet it.”
I too appreciated those two observations of his. I was especially taken with his comments on the Eucharist at around 12 and a half minutes in, his description of the Eucharist as a veil opening between heaven and earth on the altar stone called to mind for me the Celtic notion of the ‘thin place’. I think you are right that folks will take different insights away. There is a richness to his comments applicable to a wide audience. Best regards!
As a priest in the Church of England, there was a sadness for me in his reflections on the Eucharist, given that my church is losing interest in the sacrament that makes us and makes the Church. The objectivity of the Eucharist stands against “the reduction of the mystical flame of religion to moralistic functionalism” of which O’Donohue speaks, and in which “the great fire and beauty of the divine is forgotten in favour of prescriptions, obligations and empty clichés.”
An interview rich enough to demand revisiting. Thank you!