Ceremonial City

What a great day to be in central London, as it was Her Majesty the Queen's official birthday and (even more importantly) the Feast of the Immaculate Heart. I celebrated the latter by attending a twin Ordination at Westminster Cathedral. There must have been 100 priests there to welcome into our ranks Fr Richard Nesbitt and Fr John Elliott - ad multos annos!

As I made my way to the Cathedral, I stopped off on The Mall, that great ceremonial road leading to Buckingham Palace. The Queen's Birthday Parade (Trooping the Colour) was finishing at Horse Guards and the crowds were expectantly waiting to see the stately procession return to the Palace.
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The procession came in stages - first a small detachment of Foot Guards (above) and then The King's Troop, Royal Horse Artillery. Then it was the turn of two barouche carriages containing members of the Royal Family. Here is a picture of the Duchess of Cornwall and (partly obscured by her large hat) Prince William, wearing his Blues and Royal uniform.
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Eventually the Household Cavalry appeared, with their magnificent mounted band. Centre of everybody's attention were the two Drum Horses, such as this one:

Then it was the turn of the Foot Guards, with their equally magnificent Massed Band - led by the splendid Drum Majors.

Her Majesty The Queen whizzed into view, accompanied by Prince Philip, dressed as Colonel of the Grenadier Guards. Since the crowd - including (mea culpa) myself - was so pre-occupied with taking photos on their cameras and mobiles, there was very little applause. I hope the Queen didn't think we were rampantly republican. It is perhaps unfortunate that we live in such a technological age.

The Princess Royal (Colonel of the Blues and Royals), the Duke of Kent (Colonel of the Scots Guards), and the Prince of Wales (Colonel of the Welsh Guards) were mounted on horses behind Her Majesty. You can the latter two in this picture (on black horses):


Behind came the Foot Guards, headed by their colour:

Various important-looking dignitaries closed the procession, looking forward, no doubt, to a festive luncheon:


Her Majesty's last duty was taking the salute for the last time at Buckingham Palace and then watching a fly past. Here you can just see the Royal Family assembling on the Palace balcony.

There's nothing like a bit of pomp and circumstance on a Saturday in June. Happy Birthday, Ma'am!

Stonyhurst's Royal Relics

I've already posted about the relics of the English martyrs kept at the beautiful Jesuit college at Stonyhurst, Lancashire:

There are also some fine royal treasures. Firstly, this stunning chasuble commissioned by Henry VII for use in Westminster Abbey. They were used for state occasions and taken over to France for the Field of the Cloth of Gold (1520), when Henry VIII met Francis I outside Calais. The original set of 29 vestments was mostly destroyed at the Reformation, but a cope and chasuble survive at Stonyhurst.

This Book of Hours was printed at Lyons in 1558 for Mary Tudor - note the Tudor badges of the rose and pomegranite on the cover. It then passed to another Mary - the Queen of Scots - and she took this book with her to the scaffold in 1586, where she recited the Little Office of Our Lady:

This frame contains assorted Jacobite relics - including the flesh of James II, part of the waistcoat he was wearing when he died and the blood of the Jacobite 'martyr,' Lord Derwentwater:


There is a Stuart Room at the College, with some charming Jacobite portraits, including this one of Maria Clementina, the mother of Bonnie Prince Charlie:

Finally, a fine binding showing the arms of the Cardinal Duke of York (the bicentenary of whose death we'll be marking in July):

Thanks to Jan Graffius, Stonyhurst's dynamic curator, for letting me use the photos I took during my tour.

Britain's Last Crusader King

On Thursday evening I'm giving a talk to the students of SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London) on 'Should the Church Apologise for the Crusades and the Inquisition?', organised by their redoubtable chaplain, Fr Joe Evans of Opus Dei. I spent part of today (my dies non) going through my notes and, as is always necessary, making some changes based on recent reading.

Here's a bit of crusading trivia which isn't widely known (or, at least, I didn't know it until a few days ago): who, would you say, was the last British Crusading King?

We all know about Richard I (the Lionheart), who took such a prominent part in the 'Third' Crusade, and Edward I, who joined St Louis IX on the campaign of 1269-72. But what about the crusading credentials of this eighteenth century monarch?:

George I (r.1714-27) was the first Hanoverian King of Great Britain and Ireland, gaining the throne on the death of Queen Anne by virtue of the Act of Succession (1701). He was the closest living Protestant relative of the dead Queen, although many Catholics with a superior claim were passed over. Despite being a Lutheran, he had an important role in the Holy Roman Empire as one of the Prince Electors (who elected the Emperor) and Archtreasurer (from 1710).

George I was unsurprisingly involved in imperial politics and, as a young man, was present at the Siege of Vienna in 1683 , during which absence his first son, Georg August (the future George II), was born. He went on to command the Hanoverian troops in the consequent campains against the Turks in 1684 and 1685. These wars are often seen as the last gasp of the crusading spirit and demonstrated the real threat that the Ottoman Empire still posed to Christendom. And so, the Protestant George I, the great patron of Handel, could be said to be our last crusading King!

The Deathbed Conversion of King Charles II

Today is the anniversary of the death of Charles II in 1685. As is well-known, the 'Merry Monarch' personally had friendly sentiments towards Catholics although his reign saw no end to the penal laws and bloody martyrdoms of priests and their supporters. Finally, on his deathbed, he was received into the Church. Better late than never.

On the evening of 5 February 1685 a Benedictine monk, Fr John Huddleston, was smuggled into the King's apartment. They had first met many years previously in 1651 after the disastrous Battle of Worcester. The King, disguised as a peasant, encountered the priest at Moseley, near Wolverhampton, which was the home of the Catholic Whitgreave family (where Fr Huddleston was chaplain). As he hid with the priest, the King read Huddleston's manuscript of A short and Plain Way to the Faith and Church (eventually published in 1688) and had his bleeding feet bathed by the priest. The two of them even shared a hiding hole when Cromwell's troops came to search the house.

In the meantime Charles was restored to the throne (1660) and Huddleston joined the Benedictines and became a chaplain at Somerset House, under the Queen Dowager, Henrietta Maria, and Catherine of Braganza (Charles II's wife).

Then, as the King lay dying of apoplexy, Huddleston was summoned by the Catholic Duke of York (soon to become James II). According to the historian, the Anglican Bishop Gilbert Burnet

When Huddleston was told what was to be done, he was in great confusion, for he had not brought the host. He went, however, to another priest, who lived in the court, who gave him the pix, with an host in it. Everything being prepared, the Duke whispered the King in the ear; upon that the King ordered that all who were in the bedchamber should withdraw, except the Earls of Bath and Feversham; and the door was double-locked. The company was kept out half an hour; only Lord Feversham opened the door once, and called for a glass of water. Cardinal Howard told Bishop Burnet that, in the absence of the company, Huddleston, according to the account he sent to Rome, made the King go through some acts of contrition, and, after obtaining such a confession as he was then able to give, he gave him absolution. The consecrated wafer stuck in the King's throat, and that was the reason of calling for a glass of water. Charles told Huddleston that he had saved his life twice, first his body, then his soul.

When the company were admitted, they found the King had undergone a marvellous alteration. Bishop Ken [the Anglican Bishop of Bath and Wells] then vigorously applied himself to the awaking of the King's conscience, and pronounced many short ejaculations and prayers, of which, however, the King seemed to take no notice, and returned no answer. He pressed the King six or seven times to receive the sacrament; but the King always declined, saying he was very weak. But Ken pronounced over him absolution of his sins. The King suffered much inwardly, and said he was burnt up within. He said once that he hoped he should climb up to heaven's gates, which was the only word savouring of religion that he used.

The King died peacefully at noon the following day, having apologised to those around him for taking an unconscionable time dying. Incidentally, today is also the anniversary of the death of George VI and thus of Her Majesty's accession 55 years ago!

Royal Claimants

'Were your ancestors Anglo-Saxon or Danish nobles before 1066? Perhaps you can trace your heritage back to Harold, Edward the Confessor or Edgar the Aetheling?' Well, I can't, but if you, dear reader, can and you could therefore theoretically be a claimant to the throne, then English Heritage would like hear from you. This is to mark the opening of a new multi-million pound visitors centre at Battle Abbey (near the battlefield of Hastings, 1066) - but are they, I wonder, thinking about staging a rebellion in time-honoured fashion?

Queen's English?

Interesting report in the Telegraph explaining How Queen's English Has Grown More Like Ours. Professor Jonathan Harrington has undertaken a scientific study of Her Majesty's voice, as recorded in the Christmas Broadcasts over the years.

In 1952 she would have been heard referring to "thet men in the bleck het". Now it would be "that man in the black hat". Similarly, she would have spoken of the citay and dutay, rather than citee and dutee, and hame rather than home. In the 1950s she would have been lorst, but by the 1970s lost. And indeed, the Queen's first Christmas broadcast was pure Dartington Crystal. She began: "As he (King George VI) used to do, I em speaking to you from my own hame, where I em spending Christmas with my femly."

According to royal biographer, Kenneth Rose

She has become definitely less upper class — dropping an octave and coming nearer to her own "Queen's English", by which I mean nearer to standard English. There have always been variations in royal speech. The Queen Mother was the embodiment of the upper class lady in the first class compartment, while George V was more like a hoarse country gentleman. Edward VIII adopted a kind of upper class cockney, talking of "moi house", but after his marriage began to sound more American.

About two or three years ago I was sitting next to the Queen at tea and she remarked that some of her grandchildren talked Estuary. I think she was talking about the Phillips children — but then Princess Anne always sounded a little suburban. And then there's Prince Edward, who sounds a bit Estuary — whereas the Dukes of Kent and Gloucester are proper country gents.

But readers will be relieved to hear that the Queen may be 'drifting slowly downstream towards Estuary, but she has a very, very long way to go before she gets anywhere near the open sea.' Gaud bless 'er!

God Save the Queen!

Above (drumroll please) is the debut You Tube video from Roman Miscellany, taken on my digital camera (apologies for the quality).

On my way to work at the diocesan archives this morning I made a detour at Green Park and walked to The Mall, the ceremonial street linking Buckingham Palace to Whitehall and Trafalgar Square.

Why? Today Her Majesty the Queen solemnly opened Parliament and so I thought I might catch a glimpse of her in the Australian State Coach. Amazingly there were more soldiers around than spectators and I overheard a number of confused tourists asking police officers what on earth was going on! It's rather impressive that such pagentry continues regardless of whether or not there are actually crowds of spectators. The State Opening is not a gimmick but a time-honoured ritual expressing the fact that the Monarch is our Head of State and it is her Government and her Parliament that sits in Westminster. This comes across in the Queen's Speech, even though it is written for her by her Government.

The first part of the procession, whizzing past around 10.40am, were the coaches containing the Imperial Crown (which you can just make out through the window of the carriage in the first photo below) and the other royal insignia. Such is the symbolic importance of these items that the Guards lining the street present their arms.

Very little happened during the next twenty minutes, except a car passing containing lots of excited looking page boys in their red uniforms. Then the royal procession slowly emerged from the Palace at 11am, as the bells of Westminster Abbey wafted over St James' Park. The unfortunate consequence of using digital technology on such occasions is that you're too busy concentrating on the camera to observe all the finer details of the spettacolo. However, I certainly noticed Princess Anne in one carriage.

Despite the 'reforms' of Tony 'Bugnini' Blair in our State Ceremonial, it's good to see such pageantry alive and well in the twenty-first century!

Marie-Antoinette

It was busy day at the diocesan archive yesterday, catching up with a week's worth of correspondence and receiving five visitors - including an Australian Bishop, the Most Rev. Geoffrey Jarrett, DD (Bishop of Lismore). Having been present at the Abbatial Blessing at Farnborough, he was spending a few days in London and had expressed a desire to see our collection. It's nice to meet a bishop with such keen interest in the English Martyrs and ecclesiastical architecture.

Anyway, I relaxed in the evening by accompanying Fr Richard Whinder to see Marie-Antoinette at the cinema just round the corner from the Archives. The film has had a mixed reception - the French critics at Cannes are said to have booed - but I loved it! I wasn't expecting a film with a clear beginning-middle-end nor was I looking for strict historical accuracy. But as an impressionistic portrait of a lost age, it was second to none.

Unlike any other film I've seen, you really felt as if you were there - at Versailles (and it helped, of course, that the film was shot 'on location' at the great palace). The film deserves at least Oscar nominations for costume design and photography. There were some impressive shots of the royal carriages trundling along and of the gardens of Versailles, full of courtiers as far as the eye could see. I must say Miss Dunst also cut a fine Marie-Antoinette, despite (or perhaps because of) the relative lack of dialogue. The film, I must add, was comparatively 'priest-friendly' and, with its 12A certificate, did not go down the path (which many other directors would have chosen) of including lots of sex scenes.

There were some minor irritations. Louis XV had a particularly strong, cowboy-like American accent (apologies to readers across the pond). Joseph II didn't resemble the obsessively enlightened despot that he was. The modern rock music (juxtaposed with the odd Baroque aria) didn't always work as a soundtrack. And - as always with big films - there were numerous liturgical errors in the ceremonial scenes, such as cardinals wearing chasubles under their copes (unless it was an ancient Gallican privilege?!). This is particularly tragic because the Versailles area is not short of a few traditionalist clergy who could have advised on such matters.

Worst of all, in my mind, is the fact the film stops at the Revolution, which was the Queen's finest hour. As Elena Maria Vidal (Catholic author of such novels as Trianon) has pointed out:

The Coppola film ends when the Revolution begins, at the moment when Marie-Antoinette came into her own as the daughter of a great empress and as a queen who would not forsake her husband or her duty, even when to do so cost her her life. The new generation of movie goers will be deprived of such an inspiration that would be so powerful on screen. Antoinette's Christian fortitude is ignored and her personal tragedy is trivialized amid a movie of froth. Without the spiritual depths, the depiction is shallow and incomplete.

However, at least Marie-Antoinette is very much the heroine and, in its quiet way, the film is a piece of historical revision and goes against the traditional 'let them eat cake' image of the French Queen (although the 'myth' of her affair with Count Axel von Fersen is repeated). For a historical critique of the film, see Elena Maria Vidal's website (raised biretta to Dappled Things). But, on the whole, the film gets a thumbs up from the Roman Miscellanist.

(All pictures copyright Columbia Pictures)

The Queen

Last night I met a priest friend and went to see The Queen (starring the wonderful Helen Mirren) at a cinema which, appropriately enough, is a short walk away from Kensington Palace.

Based on the events following Diana's death, I wasn't quite sure that I would enjoy the movie but the acting certainly kept my attention and there were some interesting details of palace life. Her Majesty came across fairly well, even if her stiff resolve to 'do nothing' after Diana's death proves to be the wrong decision - but I don't think any of the audience in Kensington would have left with radical republican sentiments. In fact, the only opponent of the Monarchy in the film is Mrs Blair. All in all, it's an interesting study of power and the British Establishment.

According to the today's Telegraph, the film is proving quite a hit in New York and everyone wants to imitate Her Majesty's dress sense. As a regular wearer of a black barbour jacket (it goes nicely with a Roman collar), I was pleased to read that the latest must-have item across the pond is the Beauford - 'a zip-up "classic country" waxed number with a corduroy collar and optional hood.' Another great English export!

James II and Ian Paisley

Today is the 373rd birthday of King James II, our last Catholic King - and, for the benefit of American readers, the guy who gave 'New York' its name because he was Governor of that colonial settlement as Duke of York.

This time last year I led a service and gave an address for the Royal Stuart Society, in which I was asked to focus on James' policy of toleration. It was quite an amazing experience since it took place on Trafalgar Square, just outside the National Gallery where there is statue of the King by Grinling Gibbons. At the end of the De Profundis roses were laid beside the image.

The 'congregation' was pretty small but slightly to my embarrasment a reporter from the Catholic Herald was present and a large article appeared the following week, with a colour photo of me. The amusing thing is that this was discovered by Ian Paisley's website, The European Institute of Protestant Studies. I won't provide a link but this is what appears on the website. It's taken from the Herald report but I love the headline Ian Paisley provides - it takes you back 100 years to the controversies of Edwardian Britain!:

Rome’s Attempt to Whitewash the Perjurer James II

Article taken from:- The Catholic Herald – 21 October 2005

THE LAST CATHOLIC king ever to rule over the British people has seldom been treated kindly by the historians who chronicled his fate. King James II is generally depicted as an autocratic bigot, a religious zealot with contempt for freedom and a man whose arrogance and recklessness led to his own downfall in the so called “Glorious Revolution” of 1688.

But historians attached to the Royal Stuart Society, an organisation set up to promote interest in the Royal House of Stuart, believe nothing could be further from the truth.

Last week, the Society commemorated the birthday of the Stuart king in a ceremony held in Trafalgar Square, London. The event formed part of a wider campaign by the Society for the “rehab” of James as an “enlightened ruler” who championed religious toleration not only for Catholics but also for Jews, Quakers and Nonconformists.

Fr Nicholas Schofield, the archivist of the Archdiocese of Westminster; addressed the group as it gathered around Grinling Gibbons’s 17th century statue of James as a Roman Caesar. “This noble square has been the focus of many celebrations this year, ranging from the bicentenary celebrations of the Battle of Trafalgar to the announcement of the winning Olympic bid,” said Fr Schofield, a priest at Our Lady of Willesden Church, north London.

"Today we add to this list of commemorations as we recall an event that took place at St James’s Palace 372 years ago. On that day, a third son was born to King Charles I and Henrietta Maria: Prince James, Duke of York and Albany."

Fr Schofield said that James, during his lifetime, would go through such incarnations as "the rosycheeked infant surrounded by siblings and spaniels in the paintings of Van Dyck; the successful admiral; the unlucky king; the devout, saintly exile."

But he said: "We think of him as an heroic figure. We come here not only to remember the king and pray for the repose of his soul, but also to resurrect his reputation." He added: "We particularly think of King James today not as a bigot but as a champion of liberty."

Fr Schofield also described the friendship between James and the younger William Penn. He told how James, a Catholic convert, resigned as Lord High Admiral in 1673 as a result of the anti-Catholic Test Act, and how Penn had been expelled from Oxford and imprisoned because of his Quaker beliefs. James granted Penn territories in the American colonies where Quakers would be free from persecution. The two men also later formed a political alliance to introduce toleration and to abolish the Test Acts, he said. In 1686, James released 1,200 Quaker prisoners and the following year Penn helped to draft the first Declaration of Indulgence suspending the Test Acts and other penal laws. The result was that toleration was extended to Protestant Dissenters, Catholics, Quakers and non Christians.

"Even more surprising to the generations brought up under the old Whig history is King James’s treatment of the Jewish community," said Fr Schofield. "James had an early positive encounter with them in the persons of David da Costa and Augustine Coronel-Chacon, Jews who had given financial aid to the Royal Family during their exile. In his colony of New York, James, as Duke of York, granted toleration to the Jews and, as recent research has shown, gave them their first synagogue. Jews had previously been barred from settling in English colonies and, indeed, all English lands since the Expulsion of 1290." He said that such a policy was especially progressive given that Jewish emancipation was not finally granted in Britain until 1830.

"So let us remember the king as a champion of toleration," Fr Schofield concluded. "His ambitious and far-reaching policy was thwarted by prejudice and given the most sinister of interpretations, especially since it threatened the Anglican establishment and was seen to leave the door wide open ‘Popish’ domination."

"James was devout in his Catholic faith and hoped for the conversion of his kingdoms, but throughout his life he showed an impressive openness to those who held different religious beliefs. Even in exile, as hopes of restoration declined, he continued to employ Dissenters in his household. On James’s 468th birthday, let us give thanks rather than apologise for this beleaguered King."

David Sox paid tribute to James on behalf of the Quakers, saying the King and Penn had laid the cornerstone of religious freedom and tolerance, "so important in our own day." Mr Sox, an executive member of the Friends’ Historical Society, told the group that by honouring James they were celebrating one of the cornerstones of what it meant "to be British."

After a series of short prayers, a bouquet of flowers was laid at the foot of the statue by Roger Dave, the secretary of the Society. Afterwards, Society chairman Dr Eveline Cruikshanks, a distinguished historian of the Jacobite period, told The Catholic Herald that inquiries were being made with the Vatican to find out why James’s cause for sainthood, opened in 1702, a year after his death, was suspended in 1740. "Not everyone in the Society would support taking the time to push the cause of beatification for James II but others would," she said.

James II became the last British monarch to be overthrown by foreign invasion when he was driven out of England by a large Dutch army under William of Orange. The invasion force was brought to England by a fleet even larger than the Spanish Armada 100 years earlier and comprised twice as many soldiers as the Royal army.

William occupied London and insisted that Parliament accepted him as the new king on the grounds that he would reassert the Protestant ascendancy in Britain. It is widely accepted today, however, that William’s truer motive was to bring England into his war with Louis XIV of France. After 1689, the new regime passed the Toleration Act which merely exempted Trinitarian Dissenters from penalties of the law without confer¬ring equal rights. For Jews, Catholics, Quakers and Unitarian Dissenters there was no toleration but renewed persecution.

I took comfort from its inclusion on the site because you must be doing something right if Ian Paisley attacks you!

On the home page, by the way, they give five reasons 'why Catholic is not Christian,' spelling 'tiara':
Trinity
Inter-mediation
Authority
Remission
Assurance.

Hmmmm.