SPIRITED THINKING SINCE 1888
August 21, 2020
Pope Francis calls Mozambique bishop after Islamist militants seize port city
August 21, 2020
Pope Francis made an unexpected phone call this week to a bishop in northern Mozambique, where militants linked to the Islamic State have seized control of the port city of Mocimboa da Praia
Like Jesus, we the baptised are called and sent by the Father
August 21, 2020
Twenty-First Sunday of the Year Isaiah 22: 19-23; Romans 11: 33-36; Matthew 16: 13-20 “How rich are the depths of God, how deep his wisdom and knowledge, and how impossible to penetrate his motives or understand his methods. Who could ever know the mind of the Lord?” At first sight, these verses of St Paul
Singing ‘no riskier than speaking’ for virus transmission, study finds
August 21, 2020
In findings that could help choirs return to churches, a study says that singing does not produce substantially more airborne particles than speaking at a similar volume
Netflix apologises for ‘inappropriate’ Cuties film poster
August 21, 2020
Netflix has apologised after a poster advertising an upcoming film was accused of sexualising children
Nuncio meets Zimbabwe government minister after clash over Catholic bishops’ letter
August 21, 2020
The Vatican’s representative in Zimbabwe met with a senior government official on Wednesday amid tensions following a pastoral letter issued by the country’s bishops
Walsingham pilgrims appeal Historic Churches decision
August 21, 2020
A group of pilgrims are appealing the Diocese of East Anglia Historic Churches Committee’s determination against the development plans for the Catholic Shrine at Walsingham.
I’m not a Catholic, but I’d have liked to live in Catholic England
August 21, 2020
Festivals, pilgrimages, creativity, parish churches blazing with colour. Pre-Reformation England had it all.
Would Hollywood be fair to Phyllis Schlafly? No chance
August 21, 2020
Phyllis Schlafly was a Catholic mother of six children who campaigned against the American Equal Rights Amendment back in the 1970s. So it was a racing certainty that she would be portrayed, in a TV mini-series, as a smarmy hypocrite. And that’s how Cate Blanchett plays her, in Mrs America, currently showing on BBC Two
Tolkien learned early that the road through life is a rough one
August 21, 2020
The Worlds of JRR Tolkien By John Garth Frances Lincoln, 200pp £25/$29.95 Early in his new study of the places that inspired Middle-earth, John Garth draws our attention to the painting Tolkien made for the cover of The Hobbit, with its glacial colouring and snow-capped mountains dominated by one forbidding peak. Garth then directs us
Even after the missionaries left China, the image of Mary lingered
August 21, 2020
There has never been much that China has wanted from the outside world. Exotic produce from Southeast Asian rainforests used to be of interest; now it’s luxury goods from London and Paris, plus entire vineyards in Bordeaux. Foreign ideas, too, have rarely interested China. It took millennia to develop the blend of Confucianism and Taoism
‘Thou shalt commit adultery’: The accidental genius of typos
August 21, 2020
Typo was originally a short form of typographer – that is, a printer. Its first known use is 1816, but by the end of the century it had come to have its present-day meaning: a typographical error. Of course it leaves open the question of whether an error is inadvertent or deliberate. I choose this
‘Bede is one of my heroes’: On pilgrimage with Loyd Grossman
August 21, 2020
You’re planning a pilgrimage route. What’s on your itinerary? I would love to start at Durham Cathedral and to finish up on Lindisfarne. It’s the reverse pilgrimage of St Cuthbert, who started off on the Holy Island and is buried in Durham Cathedral. Durham is one of my favourite cathedrals: I like its very powerful
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