Gregorian ChantIn 1903, the first year of his pontificate, Pope Pius X wrote a letter on sacred music. The text is notable in what it says about Gregorian chant. The pope wrote that Gregorian Chant ‘is sweet, soft, easy to learn Read More
Bourne – AgainI’m in cordial agreement with A.E. Stallings’s review of Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey. Without going into tedious detail, he addresses much-propounded criticisms of Nolan’s plot developments, especially at the end, by citing venerable ancient variants, remarking: ‘Liberties and departures are nothing new.’ Read More
St Bernard‘Bernard was a nobleman through and through, naturally proud. But we must not forget the sheer drudgery of Bernard’s life as he laboured under constant overwork and the world’s messianic expectations, which can easily be dashed and turn sour. Bernard Read More
Dark Gospel‘True poetry, which is rare, says something new. There is newness here, and beauty. Christine Perrin offers us poems that, if attended to, teach us how to live aware; she offers them, one by one, as if they were ripe Read More
21 Sunday AIsaiah 22:19-23: I place the key of the house of David on his shoulder. Rm 11:33-36: Who could ever know the mind of the Lord? Mt 16:13-20: Who do people say the Son of Man is? Isaiah’s oracle against Shebna, the palace-master, is spoken on a building-site Shebna is running. All his relatives have been drummed together there to admire the work in progress. Before their amazed eyes a mausoleum for Shebna is rising, a monument to his greatness unto the ages. Oh Shebna! Greatest of civil servants! What a contrast between this public display of vanity, probably funded by public money, and the prophet’s disdainful reproach. He tells Shebna that he is in fact doing a lousy job and will be out of it: ‘The Lord’, he says, ‘will whirl you round and round, and throw you like a ball into a wide land.’ The Hebrew word translated as ‘ball’ can mean ‘a dumpling’, which is rather a good image, I think. Shebna thinks himself fittingly commemorated in marble. In reality he is but a lump of gooey dough to be flicked out of the kitchen window into the savannah. How different our perception of self can be from our true significance and station! We don’t know whether Shebna was just a vain fool or whether he actively undermined the country: We’re at the time, remember, of Assyrian expansion. Highly-placed folk in Jerusalem were helping the super-power out. In retrospect, it doesn’t matter too much. For Isaiah’s oracle is not just an order of dismissal. It is a brief of investiture. Shebna’s dismissal makes room for someone to replace him. His marks of high office — robe, sash, and palace key — are taken from him to be given to another, Eliakim son of Hilkiah, whose faithful service will be glorious. So far, so good. We have before us a chapter of ancient history that chimes in with our sense of just retribution: out with the selfish show-off; in with the substitute who will be a father to the people of Judah. This passage, however, came to haunt people’s imagination on account of a singular image. Isaiah’s majestic promise, ‘He shall open, and no one shall shut; he shall shut, and no one shall open’, seemed too immense to be locked in an 8th-century dynastic struggle. So Eliakim, with time, came to be seen as a type of the ultimate champion of justice, the Messiah, who at the end of time will show God’s paternal care for his people, welcoming the faithful remnant into the eternal mansion, then locking the door securely behind them. In the Apocalypse, Isaiah’s description of Eliakim’s task is applied word for word to Jesus Christ, ‘the Holy One and True’. From the Bible it made its way into the Church’s liturgy. We repeat it each year before Christmas, when we call on ‘the Key of David’ to ‘set the captive free’. Yet today the Church presents us with a different association. The Old Testament passage about Eliakim’s key sagely introduces the Gospel in which the power of the keys is passed to Peter. We’ve heard that story hundreds of times. There is no need to speak of its importance for Catholic ecclesiology. All of that we can surely take for granted. The two simple points I’d like to make arise, rather, out of what Eliakim’s key might tell us about Peter’s. The first thing to notice is this: in neither text is the key identified with its bearer. Eliakim is a high official, but an official all the same. The key is entrusted to him by the master of the House of David: the legitimate king of Judah, heir to the Davidic line. Peter, too, is identified as a King’s servant, only in his case the realm at stake is infinitely vaster. We are dealing with the kingdom of heaven on which we have meditated for several Sundays running, the kingdom that’s like a sown field, a dragnet, a pearl of great price. Peter wields the key to this kingdom, but as trusted servant, not as lord. The ownership of the key belongs eternally to the kingdom’s rightful heir, the Son of David who is also the Son of God. This important distinction shows us both the dignity and limit of Peter’s authority. We should never confuse the power of the keys with him who is the Key, Jesus Christ. Another point to ponder arises out of the account of Eliakim’s ministry. His predecessor Shebna, as we’ve seen, put on airs. He used his position of privilege to magnify himself. Eliakim, by contrast, will show himself a father to Jerusalem. In the logic of the Davidic kingdom, and even more so in the logic of the kingdom of heaven, this is how authority is wielded: through paternal solicitude that fosters life and flourishing for others. The successors of Peter have for centuries shown their awareness of this by adopting the formal title ‘servant of the servants of God’. When Peter in a moment of distraction presumes that his position lets him dictate Christ’s course of action, he is rebuked in the strongest possible terms. In this we may find rules of conduct valid for all of us. We all share responsibility for the administration of the Father’s house. Together we attend to the needs of those who seek refuge in it. Whatever might be the particular key lent to us, let us use it humbly and charitably. Shebna’s example reminds us that self-importance is noxious. The point of prominence is more effective service. If we perform ours well, we shall have the joy of sitting at table with him who is our model, who came not to be served but to serve. In the sacred banquet we are about to share, he gives us a pledge of his fidelity and a foretaste of gifts to come. A late fourteenth-century illumination showing Christ giving the keys to Peter
Gregorian ChantIn 1903, the first year of his pontificate, Pope Pius X wrote a letter on sacred music. The text is notable in what it says about Gregorian chant. The pope wrote that Gregorian Chant ‘is sweet, soft, easy to learn and of a beauty so fresh and full of surprises that wherever it has been introduced it has never failed to excite real enthusiasm in youthful singers.’ That statement corresponds to my experience. I remember how thrilled I was when I first consciously heard it sung, aged seventeen or so. I’d never heard such simply soul-piercing music! The pope remarked: ‘Now, when delight enters into the fulfilment of duty, everything is done with greater alacrity and with more lasting fruit’, envisaging a bright future for the study of Gregorian chant. It is, he noted, as the Fathers of Vatican II would do as well (SC, 116), ‘the Chant proper to the Roman Church, the only chant she has inherited from the ancient fathers, jealously guarded for centuries in her liturgical codices, which she proposes to the faithful as her own, which she prescribes exclusively for some parts of the liturgy, and which the most recent studies have so happily restored to their integrity and purity.’ ‘Composers of sacred music’, the Holy Father noted this week, are called to know and preserve the musical heritage of the Church.’ How blessed we are in it.
Bourne – AgainI’m in cordial agreement with A.E. Stallings’s review of Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey. Without going into tedious detail, he addresses much-propounded criticisms of Nolan’s plot developments, especially at the end, by citing venerable ancient variants, remarking: ‘Liberties and departures are nothing new.’ The impact the film is having as catalyst of a Homer revival is estimable. At the annual summer party in the block of flats where I live, I overheard several neighbours saying they are (re-)reading The Odyssey. They weren’t reading Greek epics last August. Nolan, writes Stallings, ‘gives us an imaginary world with an internal consistency, a verisimilitude of realism’. He really does. Thereby he shows why the story matters. One thing intrigues me: I don’t think I’ve seen a single review remark on the parallel between one of the film’s key elements – Odysseus’s gradually recovering memory and thereby, for better or worse, a sense of his own legacy – and the drama of the Bourne films in which a younger Matt Damon revealed his mettle as a subtle actor. There’s a touch of Bourne to Nolan’s Odysseus. A couple of scenes looked to me like quotations. I thought that clever.
St Bernard‘Bernard was a nobleman through and through, naturally proud. But we must not forget the sheer drudgery of Bernard’s life as he laboured under constant overwork and the world’s messianic expectations, which can easily be dashed and turn sour. Bernard had his share of detractors. His high profile was also a school of humiliation. Humiliation is, to a monastic mindset, potentially a way to charity in truth if we welcome it without murmuring, using confrontations with our own limitations and the world’s, run-ins with the real, to cry out to God and establish ourselves afresh within his help, which may not be where we think it is. Bernard taught this process. He also lived through it inwardly. The outward events of his life are spectacular; in the chronicle of history they matter. For those of us who wish to know the man, however, they are the least important part of his biography. More momentous was the maturing that went on in the depth of his soul.’ From Alight with Hidden Glory, reviewed here.
Dark Gospel‘True poetry, which is rare, says something new. There is newness here, and beauty. Christine Perrin offers us poems that, if attended to, teach us how to live aware; she offers them, one by one, as if they were ripe black raspberries picked from different bushes. Her bold claim holds: ‘Each bush has a singular taste’. Sober inebriation results. Even in the face of harsh realities, ever honestly named, the poet enables, somehow, joy. What gratitude I’ve felt on reading this collection!’ These were the best words I could find with which to introduce a wonderful collection of poetry that has accompanied me these past months. When the author first presented the manuscript to me she said it was a book ‘about the challenge, wonder, terror of founding a child‘. I have learnt much from it, been challenged and inspired. If you get yourself one new volume of poems this year, let it be this one. https://coramfratribus.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/Christine-Perrin-Before-Surgery.mp3
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Today is the Memorial of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary 🙏 MEMORARE - - REMEMBER, O most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help, or sought thy intercession Read More 2 Comments
Today is the feast day of St. Pius X Real name Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto, he adopted the name Pius X when he was named Pope in 1903. As a Pope he was known for his humble nature, and spoke frequently of Read More 1 Likes
Today we celebrate St Bernard St Bernard, 1090 - 1153, became a Cisterican monk at Citeaux in 1113 and was chosen Abbot of Clairvaux in 1115. His writings reveal a solid grasp of biblical studies, spiritual theology and philosophy. Patron Read More 4 Likes
BEHOLD I AM DOING A NEW THING Says the Lord (Isaiah 42:19) My friends, This is the theme that has inspired our prayer and dialogue across the diocese over this past while. It reflects our desire to be attentive to the Read More 18 Likes
