Bawdy Metres and Inspectors at Staggers

Fr Hunwicke's blog is a not only a mine of useful information on classical matters (see, for example his post Of the Father's heart begotten with background information on the trochaic tetrameter catalectic metre and its bawdy origins); his blog also contains nuggets of rare humour. I enjoyed yesterday's post on Mass practices at Staggers and the confounding of the Inspectors who were looking for liturgical extremism. It would spoil it if I summarised it, so do have a read of More Mass Practices.

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1962 Missal pdf online

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SPUC Clergy information day

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SPUC today held a Clergy Information Day. Unfortunately, because of an urgent meeting I had to be late for this so I missed the first half of the morning lecture by Fr John Fleming. I could catch up with most of it from his notes and look forward to the published version when it is available from SPUC. Fr Fleming was speaking about the rights of the unborn under international law, the pro-life battle at the UN and the nature of the early human embryo. As a lecture, it was certainly not "dumbed down". He presented some of the latest research on the biochemistry of the human embryo in relationship with the mother and then tied this in to the philosophical question of the status of the embryo, dealing with such hoary chestnuts as twinning and the differentiation of cells in the embryo. It was a most helpful and informative presentation: intellectually challenging but well put together. I think that the sheer quality of these presentations has been the important factor in the gr
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Saint Gabriel

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