On his way to World Youth Day, Tom Colsy enjoys the prodigious hospitality of a Herald reader in Lisbon.
I was walking down the boulevards of Cordoba, Andalusia, on the way to visit its most prominent building, the Christianised former mosque, when an email arrived. One of the Catholic Herald’s regular readers had asked if we were sending anyone to World Youth Day (WYD) in Lisbon – and insisted on offering us hospitality if we were. He was keen to give us “an insight into Portuguese Catholic life” and emphasised that he was also hosting “a Brazilian retired bishop and a French priest from the Communauté Saint Martin”.
It was an intriguing prospect, and my co-traveller, Jonas, and I were the ones fortunate enough to be able to take up this kind offer; days later, we were in the Portuguese capital. We never met the bishop, but we did meet the sturdy, good-humoured French priest and enjoyed some excellent company. Our host, the author of the email, was Tiago Picão de Abreu, 30, from the rural Alentejo region, who is now a successful corporate lawyer. He is smart and dignified. Six years married, he is a father to three children and a fourth is on the way.
We arrive at his duplex apartment in the central Príncipe Real district of Lisbon on the evening of Wednesday 2 August – when the World Youth Day proceedings officially began – and are met with smiles, handshakes and introductions. We are welcomed into a home adorned with tasteful furniture and beautiful Catholic iconography and led up to a balcony on the top floor, where we meet another guest: Nuno, 27, who works in diplomacy with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Portugal.
The previous day, Jonas and I had heard a talk by a local Jesuit on the importance of feasting and hospitality in the Bible, Catholicism, and Portuguese culture. This is our first experience of the last, and Tiago pulls out all the stops. On his balcony, as we drink in the magnificent view over the red roofs of Lisbon out towards the Tagus and the Cristo Rei statue on the opposite banks, we enjoy a good wine with sides of manteiga and Portuguese jamón. It soon becomes clear that our company for the evening are avid Anglophiles.
After proper introductions and plentiful discussion, we are led into Tiago’s dining room, where we enjoy a starter of cold gazpacho. It turns out that Nuno, too, is a regular Herald reader and subscriber. Both are fluent Anglophones, but Nuno has a distinct, perfect King’s English. It turns out that he is descended from an Englishman who settled in Lisbon and became Charles of Portugal’s English tutor.
There are plenty of topics to discuss, with a lot of passion, humour and insight – ranging from liturgy to marriage and hunting – but it is over history, as plates of bacalhau are being plated up, that most of the deep bonding is initially made. After exchanging some of the old Catholic anecdotes and slivers of insight into our own countries, we learn of St Nuno, knight of the Reconquista, politician and friar – relatively recently canonised by Benedict XVI – and the various succession crises in the Portuguese monarchy.
The contemporary green and red flag of Portugal is an issue of contention, they tell us; a recent introduction by secular republican radicals. Portugal’s ancient colours are blue and white. We hear of the varying levels of piety among the kings and queens (such as St Elizabeth) and, in a strange parallel, of a mysterious Arthurian figure named King Sebastião who disappeared on crusade in Morocco and who, according to Portuguese folklore, shall one day return to restore the faith and glory to nostalgic Lusitania.
This theme is Tolkienesque: a return of the king. It is appropriate for a number of reasons, not least that Tiago is a big Tolkien fan. There are innumerable strange parallels between England and Portugal, and, it soon becomes clear, plenty of reasons that the Anglo-Portuguese alliance is the oldest in the world. Both are peripheral, Atlantic nations to Europe: outward-looking, seafaring, formerly imperial.
The English were incredibly important in Portuguese history. They instrumentally supported the initial conquest of Lisbon by generously providing a substantial number of crusading troops. The local chroniclers complimented their behaviour as exemplary and pious, in stark contrast to that of the Flemish and Germans. In fact, the English impressed to such a degree that the first Bishop of Lisbon after the reconquest was Gilbert of Hastings, a monk who had fought in the second crusade on the side of his Portuguese allies. Furthermore, England (and later Britain) was constantly Portugal’s largest trading partner and played a big role in the development of port wine.
One of Portugal’s greatest heroes, Henry the Navigator, was half-English. The chaste, hair-shirt-wearing prince was the grand master of the Order of Christ, the successor organisation to the Knights Templar. He is credited with initiating the Age of Discovery by beginning the mission to find an alternative trade route (via Africa) to India: to enrich Europe, enter into alliance with the rumoured Christian community in the Far East, and to rout Islam.
There is a mystical tie between the spiritual and social history of our countries. Both were born amid reconquest campaigns for territory occupied by non-Christians: the Vikings for the Saxons for England, and the Moors for the Portuguese. There are even curious details, like the great fires that devastated both London and Lisbon in the 17th and 18th centuries successively.
There also exists a strong sense that both nations were once places of vibrant faith which was, in various ways, critically wounded in the modern era. As England had Henry VIII, Portugal had Pombal, the expulsion of all religious orders, an anti-clerical and anti-monarchical revolution, and an insertion of socialist principles into its constitution. Connected to Fátima as to Walsingham, there is also a hope, based on prophecy, that this may yet be overturned.
The next time the table becomes alive with enthusiasm is when the conversation turns to literature. Jonas had noticed Eamon Duffy on the house’s bookshelves, which becomes a source of conversation about English Catholicism. Tiago highly recommends that I read Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited (he has read all of his works), but not as strongly as he insists I read a book about the Curé d’Ars by Fr François Trochu. He credits it as one of the most important works he has ever read. “You will not be indifferent to this book,” he later texts me. His demeanour as he gave the recommendation carried such a slow, thoughtful sincerity that I cannot but believe him. I intend to read it.
Upon request, Jonas gladly reveals more about himself and his own faith journey, which both of our company find fascinating. An Anglo-Catholic with a former Catholic priest as a father who converted to Anglicanism (and became a vicar) after meeting his mother, Jonas now believes in things like eucharistic miracles, the primacy of the pope and the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin. Approving, amused and intrigued, Nuno cheerily winks at him. “You do realise you’re materially Catholic?” he quips.
These words clearly moved my friend, as Jonas would admit shortly after our meal that he is already drawing closer to conversion.
As the night draws to a close, Tiago’s French priest joins us for ice cream and port. We hear anecdotes about Archbishop Viganò and his apparently strained relationship with the papacy. We discuss the sedevacantists and other factions in the Church.
Our new guest is a traditionalist-friendly, conservative secular priest. This is loosely the same persuasion as Nuno, who is in favour of the Benedictine settlement of the liturgy wars. Tiago, meanwhile, is a bit more traditionally persuaded. None is radical or purist, though, and all are integrated into the mainstream Church.
Besides a few points of contention, they are all generally pleased with the manner in which the WYD events have been organised. They are delighted, for example, that pilgrims have been given the option of visiting relics of Ss Joan of Arc, Thomas Aquinas and Thérèse of Lisieux, and that there are so many confessions being heard and that there is such an emphasis on Eucharistic adoration.
We finish the evening, late, with hearty handshakes and adeus. It has been full of laughter and we are no longer strangers to one another but friends. Catholicism has an unparalleled ability to help surmount national and even linguistic barriers with ease, and we have been welcomed like family. It has become clear that there might be plenty of reasons that the Anglo-Portuguese alliance lives yet, and the Herald’s readership includes varied and deeply faithful people all over the world.
Long may that continue.
Tom Colsy is editorial and digital assistant at the Catholic Herald.
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