SPIRITED THINKING SINCE 1888
Column
October Diary: Reflecting on the plight of refugees
October 13, 2021
Anna Somers Cocks
Anna Somers Cocks on the plight of those left behind in Afghanistan, the apps offering a window on that country, and the challenges of her Italian garden
Diary: Art without God
October 13, 2021
Adam Dant
Adam Dant on the EU's art collection
The remarkable restoration of St Birinus, Dorchester-upon-Thames
October 13, 2021
Michael Hodges
St Birinus, probably a monk of St Andrew’s Benedictine Monastery on the Caelian Hill in Rome, was ordered by Pope Honorius I to England in 634 AD to convert the West Saxons. A year later he landed at Southampton. He succeeded in converting Cynegils, the West Saxon king. The latter gave St Birinus Dorchester-upon-Thames, as
How Dante shows up wokeness
October 12, 2021
Diego Murillo
When faced with modern quandaries, the Church offers guidance
On Pilgrimage with Rosemary Hill
October 12, 2021
The Catholic Herald
Where would you go? I would go to Canterbury which is not very original, but I have my reasons. Where I live in south London is very close to the Pilgrims Way and my office is in some almshouses in Peckham called the Pilgrims’ Cloisters. I feel that Canterbury is so essential to the church
Reading the Runes
October 11, 2021
Serenhedd James
Weathering the storm with the subtle theology in the poetry of George Mackay Brown
Tessa’s Feasts: herring and monkfish for St Andrew
October 11, 2021
Tessa Balfour
Herring and monkfish prepared in honour 
of St Andrew, the patron of saint of fishing
Mist and moments of delight
October 11, 2021
Charlie Hart
However bleak and overshadowed life might seem, lurking among the ruins are moments of true beauty –proof that ‘nothing pleaseth but rare accidents’
Following St Francis
October 02, 2021
Niall Gooch
On 4 October 2003, the Feast Day of Saint Francis, I arrived in Santiago de Compostela, having completed the Camino Frances, the pilgrimage route which crosses northern Spain from the Pyrenees. After queuing for our certificates of completion, my walking companions and I hurried to the midday pilgrims’ Mass at the magnificent Gothic cathedral. It
Diary: I am a poor wayfaring brother
September 01, 2021
Bevis Hillier
Since 2000, when I turned 60, I have lived at the Hospital of St Cross, a medieval almshouse in Winchester. It was founded about 1132 by William the Conqueror’s grandson, Henry de Blois, Bishop of Winchester – as “sheltered accommodation” for old men in straitened circumstances. (It’s not a medical hospital – here the word
On Pilgrimage with Peter Frankopan
September 01, 2021
The Catholic Herald
Where would you go? Assisi. We have been several times before and it has always been a very special place for us. As my wife and I turned 50, we wanted to do a special visit and walk there. But then Covid stopped that. Once the world gets back to normal, we will be on
The English cathedrals and churches of Edward Welby Pugin (1834-75)
September 01, 2021
Michael Hodges
The reputation of EW Pugin has inevi tably, to a degree, been overshadowed by that of his father, Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (1812-52). Both lived very short lives – father and son respectively died at 40 and 41 – and yet both achieved a prolific amount. EW Pugin was responsible for two English Catholic cathedrals
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