...to London. I really dislike hot weather, and today has been horrid.
Westminster Cathedral was however beautifully cool. Seated in the confession-queue, I felt peaceful and calm. But it was too peaceful. Nothing was moving. No priest hearing confessions. I whispered to the chap next to me that perhaps we should ring the bell and summon a priest from the sacristy? No, he whispered back. Confessions don't start till 11.30 - and it was still just 11 am. Hmmmm. Half an hour to wait. I whispered back that I was going to go and have some coffee...and left my sandwiches on the chair to mark my place. He whispered back that he'd guard them. Coffee and a pastry in the cool downstairs café. Back to the confession queue. My place still marked, packet of sandwiches still there . "It did occur to me" whispered the chap "that I could have taken them, and then gone straight to confession about it..."
Later, shriven, I dropped in to the bookshop next door. My book on Bl John Paul is still selling - should I produce a new version as he is due to be canonised soon?
Met Fr Mark Vickers in the bookshop, and we chatted about the success of the Day of Faith. Tomorrow I am due at a FAITH Family day in Shaftesbury, and then the next big event of the FAITH Movement is of course the Summer Session: I hope to drop in at some stage...
And so on to Chelsea, and a meeting of the Association of Catholic Women. Lots to plan for next year, which is our 25th anniversary. We have many projects in hand, and there is a lot happening...but a big celebration would be fun! And we talked about our recent visit to the Vocations Centre at Whitstable, a very happy day...
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4 comments:
Sadly 'the bookshop next door' sells a book that repeats the blood libel against the Jews (the accusation that they kidnap and ritually murder Christian children). Still in circulation among some extreme right wing groups and in parts of the Muslim world, the blood libel has been condemned by several popes. The book in question is The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary by Anne Catherine Emmerich and the offending passage is in Clement Brentano's footnotes to the chapter called Our Lady's Ancestors (on page 66 in the Tan edition and page 70 in the Baronius Press Classics edition). Interestingly, the beatification process for Anne Catherine Emmerich left aside consideration of her popular writings as so much of the content could not be reliably attributed to her. I wonder if you could use your good offices to persuade them not to stock this book which arguably promotes antisemitism - something your hero (and one of mine) JPII deplored.
There's always a queue at Westminister. It's something about London being such a big, complicated city, with all sorts of odd things happening. Obviously the sheer number of people passing through has an effect, but I think it's more than that. The pace of life generates a demand for confession.
Tim: Censoring or refusing to stock an old book is very problematic. It's part of the historical record. It represents what someone said and wrote at that particular time. A living author can retract his words, but not a dead one. A dead author can only be falsified or suppressed, and both are attempts to rewrite history.
Malcolm: I take your point about anachronism but these editions of the book are relatively recent (post-war I think) and the authorship of the content is in any case contested. If an edition without Brentano's lurid and ahistorical speculations about the Jews can't be sourced it should at least carry a disclaimer making clear that the book is at odds with Christian (particularly Catholic) teaching on the subject. We're talking about a Christian bookshop next to a Catholic cathedral after all - not Amazon. A nearby Catholic bookshop has withdrawn it (as well as another title from Tan describing 'the Jew' as 'a rank element' in medieval secret societies) I think because they appreciate the responsibility that goes with their name and location - not because they are attempting to rewrite history. Joanna: apologies - I didn't mean to hijack this thread.
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