Hildegard von Bingen (Part Seven)

Text and illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia,
unless otherwise stated.

His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI, extended the liturgical cult of Saint Hildegard to the universal Church in 2012.

Hildegard's name was, nonetheless, taken up in the Roman Martyrology at the end of the 16th-Century. Her Feast Day is 17 September. Numerous Popes have referred to Hildegard as a Saint, including Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI.

On 10 May 2012, Pope Benedict XVI extended the liturgical cult of St. Hildegard to the universal Church in a process known as "equivalent canonisation". Hildegard’s parish and pilgrimage Church in Eibingen, near Rüdesheim, houses her relics.

Hildegard of Bingen also appears in the calendar of saints of various Anglican churches, such as that of the Church of England, in which she is commemorated on 17 September.

Hildegard has also become a figure of reverence within the contemporary New Age movement, mostly due to her holistic and natural view of healing, as well as her status as a mystic. She was the inspiration for Dr. Gottfried Hertzka's "Hildegard-Medicine", and is the namesake for June Boyce-Tillman's Hildegard Network, a healing centre that focuses on a holistic approach to wellness and brings together people interested in exploring the links between spirituality, the arts, and healing.

German Emperor, Friedrich Barbarossa, mit seinen Söhnen König Heinrich und Herzog Friedrich. Miniatur aus der Welfenchronik (Kloster Weingarten, 1179-1191). Heute Landesbibliothek Fulda.

Frederic I Barbarossa and his sons King Henry VI and Duke Frederick VI. Medieval illustration from the Chronicle of the Guelphs (Weingarten Abbey, 1179-1191).

In recent years, Hildegard has become of particular interest to feminist scholars. Her reference to herself as a member of the "weaker sex" and her rather constant belittling of women, though at first seemingly problematic, must be considered within the context of the patriarchal Church hierarchy. Hildegard frequently referred to herself as an unlearned woman, completely incapable of Biblical exegesis. 

Such a statement on her part, however, worked to her advantage, because it made her statements that all of her writings and music came from visions of the Divine more believable, therefore giving Hildegard the authority to speak in a time and place where few women were permitted a voice. Hildegard used her voice to condemn Church practices she disagreed with, in particular simony.

In space, she is commemorated by the asteroid 898 Hildegard.

THIS CONCLUDES THE ARTICLE ON HILDEGARD VON BINGEN.

Pope Saint Zephyrinus

Text and illustrations taken from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia,
unless otherwise stated.

Pope Saint Zephyrinus

199 A. D. - 217 A. D.

Feast Day 26 August

(Usus Antiquior)

Pope Saint Zephyrinus, born in Rome, was bishop of Rome from 199 to 217. His predecessor was bishop Victor I. Upon his death on 20 December 217, he was succeeded by his advisor, bishop Callixtus I.

During the 17-year pontificate of Zephyrinus, the young Church endured severe persecution under the Emperor Severus, until his death in the year 211. To quote Butler (Ref. A. Butler: Lives of the Saints Vol VIII, 1866), St Zephyrinus was the support of his flock. He also endured the trials associated with new heresies and apostases. The chief among these were Marcion, Praxeas, Valentine and the Montanists.

St. Optatus testifies that all of these were subdued by Zephyrinus, Bishop of Rome. (Ref. Optat. 1,1 De Schismate, n.9 et Albaspinæus, not.ib.) Eusebius insists that Zephyrinus fought vigorously against the blasphemies of the two Theodotuses, who, in response, treated him with contempt, but later called him the greatest defender of the divinity of Christ. 

Although he was not physically martyred for the Faith, his suffering – both mental and spiritual – during his pontificate have earned him the title of martyr. (Ref. Berti in Sæc 3. Diss. 1.t. 2 p 158). During the reign of Emperor Severus (193 A.D. – 211 A.D.), relations with the young Christian Church deteriorated, and in 202 A.D. or 203 A.D. the edict of persecution appeared which forbade conversion to Christianity under the severest penalties. (Ref Opus cit Butler)

A certain Proclus (or Proculus), who had confessed the Faith before the prosecutors and underwent torments in defence of it, subsequently was seduced into heresy by Asclepiodotus and Theodotus the banker. These were disciples of Theodotus the Tanner, whom Victor, Zephyrinus's predecessor in the Chair of Peter, had excommunicated for reviving the heresy of Ebion, that affirmed that Christ was only a mere man, though a prophet. 

These two heretics persuaded Natalis to allow them to ordain him a bishop in their sect, promising in return that they would provide him with a monthly stipend of 150 silver denarii (approximately 3 Pounds sterling). But God, having compassion on his Confessor, warned him by several visions to abandon these heretics. 

At last, he was whipped a whole night by an angel. The next day he donned sackcloth and ashes, and,  weeping bitterly, threw himself at the feet of Zephyrinus. (Ref Butler;Op. cit.).

The feast of St Zephyrinus, Pope and Martyr, formerly held on 26 August, has been celebrated since 1970 on 20 December, the date of his death. Some Traditionalist Catholics continue to observe pre-1970 calendars.

Worcester Cathedral (Part One)

Text and illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia,
unless otherwise stated.

Worcester Cathedral.
Author: Newton2.
Photo: 2004.
From: Wikimedia Commons.


Worcester Cathedral is an Anglican Cathedral in Worcester, England; situated on a bank overlooking the River Severn. It is the seat of the Anglican Bishop of Worcester. Its official name is The Cathedral Church of Christ and Blessed Mary the Virgin of Worcester.

Built between 1084 and 1504, Worcester Cathedral represents every style of English architecture from Norman to Perpendicular Gothic. It is famous for its Norman crypt and unique chapter house, its unusual Transitional Gothic bays, its fine woodwork and its "exquisite" central tower, which is of particularly fine proportion.

The Cathedral's West facade appeared, with a portrait of Sir Edward Elgar, on the reverse of the £20 note issued by the Bank of England between 1999 and 2007.

The Cattley Window, Worcester Cathedral. At the West End of the North Aisle. Dedicated by Richard Cattley, Honorary Canon of the Cathedral Church, in memory of his wife, Harriet Emma, who died 1854, and his son, Richard Thomas D'Arcy, who died 1894.
Author: Bob Embleton.
Photo: July 2007.
From: Wikimedia Commons.


The Cathedral was founded in 680 A.D., with Bishop Bosel as its head. The first Cathedral was built in this period, but nothing now remains of it. The existing crypt of the Cathedral dates from the 10th-Century and the time of St. Oswald, Bishop of Worcester. The current Cathedral dates from the 12th-Century and the 13th-Century.

Monks and nuns had been present at the Cathedral since the 7th-Century (see Bede). The Monastery became Benedictine in the second half of the 10th-Century. There is an important connection to Fleury, as Oswald, Bishop of Worcester 961 A.D. - 992 A.D., being prior at the same time, was professed at Fleury and introduced the Monastic Rule of Fleury to Worcester. The Benedictine monks were driven out in 1540 and replaced by Secular Canons.

The former monastic library of Worcester contained a considerable number of manuscripts which are, with other libraries, now scattered over Cambridge, London (British Library), Oxford Bodleian, and the Cathedral library at Worcester.

Worcester Cathedral's Gothic Vaulting.
Photo: January 2008.
Author: Mattana.
From: Wikimedia Commons.

Following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the building was re-established as a Cathedral of Secular Clergy. The Cathedral was subject to major restoration work by Sir George Gilbert Scott and A. E. Perkins in the 1860s.

The Cathedral contains the tomb of King John in its chancel. Before his death in Newark in 1216, John had requested to be buried at Worcester. He is buried between the shrines of St Wulstan and St Oswald (now destroyed).

The Cathedral has a memorial, Prince Arthur's Chantry, to the young prince, Arthur Tudor, who is buried here. Arthur's younger brother and next in line for the throne was Henry VIII. Worcester Cathedral was doubtless spared destruction by Henry VIII, during the English Reformation, because of his brother's chantry in the Cathedral.

PART TWO FOLLOWS

Hildegard von Bingen (Part Six)

Text and illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia,
unless otherwise stated.

Hildegardis-Codex, sogenannter Scivias-Codex, Szene:
Der mystische Leib
(The Mystical Body).
circa 1165 A.D.
From: Wikimedia Commons.

Due to Church limitation on public, discursive rhetoric, the mediaeval rhetorical arts included: preaching, letter writing, poetry, and the encyclopedic tradition. Hildegard’s participation in these arts speaks to her significance as a female rhetorician, transcending bans on women’s social participation and interpretation of Scripture.

The acceptance of public preaching by a woman, even a well-connected Abbess and acknowledged Prophet. does not fit the usual stereotype of this time. Her preaching was not limited to the Monasteries; she even preached publicly in 1160 in Germany. She conducted four preaching tours throughout Germany, speaking to both clergy and laity in Chapter Houses and in public, mainly denouncing clerical corruption and calling for reform.

Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, who advanced the work of Hildegard von Bingen at the Synod of Trier in 1147 and 1148.

Bernard of Clairvaux, O.Cist (1090 – August 20, 1153) was a French Abbot and the primary builder of the reforming Cistercian order.

After the death of his mother, Bernard sought admission into the Cistercian order. Three years later, he was sent to found a new Abbey at an isolated clearing in a glen known as the Val d'Absinthe, about 15 km southeast of Bar-sur-Aube. 

According to tradition, Bernard founded the Monastery on 25 June 1115, naming it Claire Vallée, which evolved into Clairvaux. There, Bernard would preach an immediate faith, in which the intercessor was the Virgin Mary.

 In the year 1128, Bernard assisted at the Council of Troyes, at which he traced the outlines of the Rule of the Knights Templar, who soon became the ideal of Christian nobility.

Many Abbots and Abbesses asked Hildegard for prayers and opinions on various matters. She travelled widely during her four preaching tours. She had several rather fanatic followers, including Guibert of Gembloux, who wrote frequently to her and eventually became her secretary, after Volmar died in 1173. In addition, Hildegard influenced several monastic women of her time and the centuries that followed; in particular, she engaged in correspondence with another nearby visionary, Elisabeth of Schönau.

Hildegard von Bingen corresponded with another visionary, 

Elisabeth of Schönau. This photo is of the Altar of St. Elizabeth of Schönau (with the reliquary in which Elizabeth's skull is kept) in the Monastery Church of St. Florin, Kloster Schönau-im-Taunus.

Hildegard communicated with Popes, such as Eugene III and Anastasius IV, statesmen, such as Abbot Suger, German Emperors, such as Frederick I Barbarossa, and other notable figures, such as Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, who advanced her work, at the behest of her Abbot, Kuno, at the Synod of Trier in 1147 and 1148.

Hildegard of Bingen’s correspondence with many people is an important element of her literary work because this is where we can see her speaking most directly to us.


Beatification and Canonisation

Hildegard was one of the first persons for whom the Roman canonisation process was officially applied, but the process took so long that four attempts at canonisation were not completed, and she remained at the level of her beatification.

PART SEVEN FOLLOWS

Hildegard von Bingen (Part Five)

Text and Illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia,
unless otherwise accredited.

Benediktinerinnenkloster Eibingen

(Eibingen Abbey)

Author: Moguntiner

Photo: October 2006.

Web-Site: http://www.abtei-st-hildegard.de

Eibingen Abbey (in German, Abtei St. Hildegard, full name, Benedictine Abbey of St. Hildegard) is a community of Benedictine nuns in Eibingen, near Rüdesheim, in Hesse, Germany.

The original community was founded in 1165 by Hildegard von Bingen. It was dissolved at the beginning of the 19th-Century during the secularisation of this part of Germany.

The present community was established by Charles, 6th Prince of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rosenberg in 1904 and re-settled from St. Gabriel's Abbey, Bertholdstein. The nunnery belongs to the Beuronese Congregation within the Benedictine Confederation.

In 1941, the nuns were expelled by the Nazis; they were not able to return until 1945.

Abtei St. Hildegard in Eibingen,

Ortsteil von Rüdesheim am Rhein.

Innenansicht der Abteikirche.

Interior of the Abbey Church of Eibingen.

Author: Haffitt.

Photo: May 2012.

From: Wikimedia Commons.

In 1988, the sisters founded Marienrode Priory at Hildesheim, which became independent of Eibingen Abbey in 1998.

The nuns work in the vineyard and in the craft workshops, besides undertaking the traditional duties of hospitality. They can be heard (but not seen) singing their regular services.

The abbey is a Rhine Gorge World Heritage Site. The church has been used for concerts of the Rheingau Musik Festival, such as a "BachTrompetenGala" with Edgar Krapp, organ.

Eibingen Abbey: A Benedictine Abbey, full of the contemplative life.

It is claimed by some that it is likely Hildegard learned simple Latin, and the tenets of the Christian faith, but was not instructed in the Seven Liberal Arts, which formed the basis of all education for the learned classes in the Middle Ages: the Trivium of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric, plus the Quadrivium of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music.

The correspondence she kept with the outside world, both spiritual and social, transgressed the Cloister as a space of female confinement, and served to document Hildegard’s grand style and strict formatting of mediaeval letter writing.

Contributing to Christian European rhetorical traditions, Hildegard “authorised herself as a theologian” through alternative rhetorical arts. Hildegard was creative in her interpretation of theology. She believed that her monastery should not allow novices who were from a different class than nobility because it put them in an inferior position. She also stated that ‘woman may be made from man, but no man can be made without a woman.'

PART SIX FOLLOWS

Peterborough Cathedral (Part Four)

Text and illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia
unless otherwise annotated.

Cloisters, Peterborough Cathedral. 

A view across what remains of the cloisters, largely destroyed during the Civil War, with the South side of the Cathedral behind.

Author: Derek Harper
Photo: December 2007.
Taken from Wikimedia Commons.


The Cathedral was vandalised during the English Civil War, in 1643, by Parliamentarian troops. As was common at the time, almost all the stained glass and the Medieval Choir Stalls were destroyed, and the High Altar and reredos were demolished, as were the cloisters and Lady Chapel. All the monuments and memorials of the Cathedral were also damaged or destroyed.

King Henry VIII's wife, Katharine of Aragon, was buried here in 1536, as was Mary, Queen of Scots, in 1587.
Mary was later removed to Westminster Abbey.
Author: Dave Hitchborne
Photo: April 2004.
From Wikimedia Commons.

The Choir of The Cathedral Church of St Peter, St Paul and St Andrew, Peterborough.
Author: Dave Hitchborne
Photo: April 2004.
From Wikimedia Commons.

Some of the damage was repaired during the 17th- and 18th-Centuries. In 1883, extensive restoration work began, with the interior pillars, the Choir and the West Front being completely rebuilt under the supervision of John Loughborough Pearson, and new hand-carved Choir Stalls, Cathedra (Bishop's Throne), Choir Pulpit and the marble pavement and High Altar being added. A stepped level of battlements was removed from the Central Tower, reducing its height, slightly.

In the early evening of 22 November 2001, the Cathedral was hit by a fire, thought to have been started deliberately amongst plastic chairs stored in the North Choir Aisle. Fortunately, the fire was spotted by one of the vergers, allowing a swift response by emergency services.

Peterborough Cathedral: Looking from the Nave to the High Altar.
Author: Dave Hitchborne
Photo: April 2004.
From Wikimedia Commons.

The High Altar.
Author: Dave Hitchborne
Photo: April 2004.
From Wikimedia Commons.

The timing was particularly unfortunate, as a complete restoration of the painted wooden ceiling was nearing completion. The oily smoke given off by the plastic chairs was particularly damaging, coating much of the building with a sticky black layer. 

Fan vaulting in the ambulatory at Peterborough Cathedral.
Author: NotFromUtrecht
Photo: March 2010.
From Wikimedia Commons.

The seat of the fire was close to the organ and the combination of direct damage from the fire, and the water used to extinguish it, necessitated a full-scale rebuild of the instrument, putting it out of action for several years.

An extensive programme of repairs to the West Front began in July 2006 and has cost in excess of half a million pounds. This work is concentrated around the statues located in niches, which have been so badly affected by years of pollution and weathering that, in some cases, they have only stayed intact thanks to iron bars inserted through them from the head to the body. This enabled people to "sponsor" a stone.

THIS CONCLUDES THE ARTICLE ON PETERBOROUGH CATHEDRAL

Hildegard von Bingen (Part Four)

Text and Illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia, 

unless otherwise accredited.

Die wahre Dreiheit in der wahren Einheit
(The true Trinity in the true Unity)
(circa 1165)

In addition to the Ordo Virtutum, Hildegard composed many liturgical songs that were collected into a cycle called the Symphonia armoniae celestium revelationum. The songs from the Symphonia are set to Hildegard’s own text and range from antiphons, hymns, and sequences, to responsories.

Her music is described as monophonic; that is, consisting of exactly one melodic line.Hildegard's compositional style is characterised by soaring melodies, often well outside of the normal range of chant at the time.

Additionally, scholars such as Margot Fassler and Marianna Richert Pfau describe Hildegard's music as highly melismatic, often with recurrent melodic units, and also note her close attention to the relationship between music and text, which was a rare occurrence in monastic chant of the 12th-Century.

Hildegard of Bingen’s songs are left open for rhythmic interpretation because of the use of neumes without a staff. The reverence for the Virgin Mary, reflected in music, shows how deeply influenced and inspired Hildegard of Bingen and her community were by the Virgin Mary and the saints.

German 10 DM commemorative coin
issued by the Federal Republic of Germany (1998)
designed by Carl Vezerfi-Clemm
on the 900th anniversary of Hildegard of Bingen's birth


The definition of viriditas or ‘greenness’ is an earthly expression of "the heavenly" in an integrity that overcomes dualisms. This ‘greenness’ or power of life appears frequently in Hildegard’s works.

Recent scholars have asserted that Hildegard made a close association between music and the female body in her musical compositions. The poetry and music of Hildegard’s Symphonia is concerned with the anatomy of female desire, thus described as Sapphonic, or pertaining to Sappho, connecting her to a history of female rhetoricians.

Mysticism

In addition to her music, Hildegard also wrote three books of visions, the first of which, her Scivias ("Know the Way"), was completed in 1151. Liber vitae meritorum ("Book of Life's Merits" or "Book of the Rewards of Life") and Liber divinorum operum ("Book of Divine Works", also known as De operatione Dei, "On God's Activity") followed. In these volumes, the last of which was completed when she was about 75, Hildegard first describes each vision, then interprets them through Biblical exegesis.

The narrative of her visions was richly decorated, under her direction, with transcription assistance provided by the monk, Volmar, and nun, Richardis. The book was celebrated in the Middle Ages, in part because of the approval given to it by Pope Eugenius III, and was later printed in Paris in 1513.

Hildegard von Bingen's alphabet "Litterae ignotae"

Herbal medicine

Hildegard also wrote Physica, a text on the natural sciences, as well as Causae et Curae. Hildegard of Bingen was well known for her healing powers, involving practical application of tinctures, herbs, and precious stones. In both texts, Hildegard describes the natural world around her, including the cosmos, animals, plants, stones, and minerals.

She combined these elements with a theological notion ultimately derived from Genesis: all things put on Earth are for the use of humans. She is particularly interested in the healing properties of plants, animals, and stones, though she also questions God's effect on man's health. One example of her healing powers was curing the blind with the use of Rhine water.

Alphabet

Hildegard also invented an alternative alphabet. The text of her writing and compositions reveals Hildegard's use of this form of modified mediaeval Latin, encompassing many invented, conflated and abridged words.  Due to her inventions of words for her lyrics and a constructed script, many conlangers look upon her as a mediaeval precursor. Scholars believe that Hildegard used her Lingua Ignota to increase solidarity among her nuns.

PART FIVE FOLLOWS

Hildegard von Bingen "Caritas abundat in omnia" by Elfenthal

The Fourteen Auxiliary Saints.

Text is taken from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal.
Illustrations are taken from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia.

Saint Christopher, 

one of the Fourteen Auxiliary Saints, 

(Feast Day 25 July)

Saint Christopher Carrying the Christ Child, 

by Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1485)

The name of "Auxiliary Saints" is given to a group of fourteen Saints particularly noted for the efficacy of their intercession. They were often represented together.

Saint George

Feast Day 23 April

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by the dragon he strikes down. He is invoked against herpetic diseases. He is, with Saint Sebastian and Saint Maurice, the Patron Saint of soldiers.

Saint Blaise

Feast Day 3 February

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his two candles, crossed. He is invoked against diseases of the throat.

Saint Erasmus

Feast Day 2 June

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by entrails wound around a windlass. He is invoked against diseases of the stomach. He is the Patron Saint of mariners and seamen.

Saint Pantaleon

Feast Day 27 July

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his nailed hands. Invoked against consumption. He is, with Saint Luke and Saints Cosmas and Damian, the Patron Saint of medical men.

Detail of Saint Giles and the Hind,

by the Master of Saint Giles, circa 1500 A.D.

Saint Vitus (or Guy)

Feast Day 15 June

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his cross. Invoked against chorea (Saint Vitus's Dance), lethargy and the bite of venomous or mad beasts.

Saint Christopher

Feast Day 25 July

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by the Infant Jesus he bears. He is invoked in storms, tempests, plagues,, and for the avoidance of accidents in travelling. Also, in the Blessing of motor cars.

Saint Denis

Feast Day 9 October

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his head, which he holds in his hands. Invoked for people possessed of devils.

Saint Cyriacus

Feast Day 8 August

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his Deacon's Vestments. Invoked against diseases of the eye and diabolical possession.

Saint Acathius

Feast Day 8 May

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his crown of thorns. Invoked against headaches.

Saint Eustace

Feast Day 20 September

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his stag and hunting equipment. Invoked for preservation from fire (eternal or temporal).

Saint Barbara shrines in German mines.

Schacht Konrad mine (left) 

and Schacht Asse II mine (right).

Saint Giles

Feast Day 1 September

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by his Benedictine cowl and his hind. Invoked against panic, epilepsy, madness, nocturnal terrors.

Saint Margaret

Feast Day 20 July

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by the dragon she keeps in chains. Invoked against pains in the loins and by women about to become mothers.

Saint Barbara

Feast Day 4 December

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by her tower and the ciborium surmounted by a Sacred Host. Invoked against lightnings and sudden death. Patron Saint of miners and artillery soldiers.

Saint Catharine

Feast Day 25 November

Is to be recognised in statuary and pictures by her broken wheel. "The wise Counsellor" is invoked by students, Christian philosophers, orators and barristers.

Peterborough Cathedral (Part Three)

Text and illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia
unless otherwise annotated.

Henry VIII, after Hans Holbein the Younger, 

Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool.

King Henry VIII ordered the Dissolution of the Monasteries,

which ended the life of Peterborough Abbey 

and instigated the life of Peterborough Cathedral.

Monastic life

From the Mid-12th-Century monk, Hugh Candidus, we have a detailed record of the contents of the Abbey's reliquaries , which included two pieces of swaddling clothes which wrapped the baby Jesus, pieces of Jesus' manger, a part of the five loaves which fed the 5,000, a piece of the raiment of St Mary, a piece of Aaron's rod, and relics of St Peter, St Paul and St Andrew - to whom the church is dedicated.

Most famous, however, was the supposed arm of St Oswald, which disappeared from its chapel, probably during the Reformation, despite a watch-tower having been built for monks to guard its reliquary, and various contact relics of Thomas Becket, brought from Canterbury in a special reliquary by its Prior, Benedict (who had witnessed Becket's assassination), when he was 'promoted' to Abbot of Peterborough.

All of these created an aura of great importance around what is today Peterborough Cathedral, making it at the zenith of its wealth, just before the Reformation, the sixth largest monastery in England in terms of income, with 120 monks and departments including an Almoner, an Infirmarian, a Sacristan and a Cellarer.

Signature of King Henry VIII.

Harbinger of doom for many Abbeys and Monasteries.

Tudor

In 1541, following Henry VIII's Dissolution of the Monasteries, the relics were lost, but the Church survived by not being sold off and, instead, being selected as the Cathedral of the new Diocese of Peterborough. This may have been related to the fact that Henry's former queen, Katherine of Aragon, had been buried there in 1536.

Her grave can still be seen and is nowadays honoured by visitors and often decorated with flowers and pomegranates (her symbol). It carries the legend "Katharine, Queen of England", a title she was denied at the time of her death.

In 1587, the body of Mary, Queen of Scots, was also buried here after her execution at nearby Fotheringhay Castle, but it was later removed to Westminster Abbey on the orders of her son, King James I of England.

Coat of Arms of King Henry VIII

Author: Sodacan

August 2010

From Wikimedia Commons

PART FOUR FOLLOWS

Peterborough Cathedral (Part Two)

Text and illustrations from Wikipedia -the free encyclopedia,
unless otherwise attributed.

The Nave.

Photo taken by Kev747, 

March 2007.

This newer Church had as its major focal point a substantial Western tower with a "Rhenish Helm" and was largely constructed of ashlar. Only a small section of the foundations of the Saxon Church remain beneath the South Transept, but there are several significant artefacts, including Saxon carvings such as the 'Hedda Stone', from the earlier building.

In 2008, Anglo-Saxon grave markers were reported to have been found by workmen repairing a wall in the cathedral precincts. The grave markers are said to date to the 11th-Century, and probably belonged to "townsfolk".

Norman and Mediaeval architectural evolution

Although damaged during the struggle between the Norman invaders and local folk-hero, Hereward the Wake, the Cathedral was repaired and continued to thrive until destroyed by an accidental fire in 1116. This event necessitated the building of a new Church in the Norman style, begun by Abbot John de Sais in 1118 (Old Style). By 1193, the building was completed to the Western end of the Nave, including the Central Tower and the decorated wooden ceiling of the Nave. The ceiling, completed between 1230 and 1250, still survives. It is unique in Britain and one of only four such ceilings in the whole of Europe. It has been over-painted twice, once in 1745, then in 1834, but still retains the character and style of the original. (The painted nave ceiling of Ely Cathedral, by contrast, is entirely a Victorian creation.)

Robert Grosseteste (Bishop of Lincoln) 

consecrated Peterborough Cathedral in 1238.

The Cathedral is largely built of Barnack limestone, from quarries on its own land, and it was paid annually for access to these quarries by the builders of Ely Cathedral and Ramsey Abbey in thousands of eels (e.g., 4,000 eels each year for Ramsey). Cathedral historians believe that part of the placing of the Church is due to the easy ability to transfer quarried stones by river, and then to the existing site, allowing it to grow without being relocated.

Then, after completing the Western Transept and adding the Great West Front Portico in 1237, the Mediaeval masons switched over to the new Gothic style. Apart from changes to the windows, the insertion of a porch to support the free-standing pillars of the portico and the addition of a ‘new’ building at the East end, around the beginning of the 16th-Century, the structure of the building remains essentially as it was on completion almost 800 years ago. The completed building was consecrated in 1238 by Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, within whose diocese it then fell.

The trio of arches forming the Great West Front, the defining image of Peterborough Cathedral, is unrivalled in Mediaeval architecture. The line of spires behind it, topping an unprecedented four towers, evolved for more practical reasons. Chief amongst them was the wish to retain the earlier Norman towers, which became obsolete when the Gothic front was added. Instead of being demolished and replaced with new stretches of wall, these old towers were retained and embellished with cornices and other Gothic decor, while two new towers were added to create a continuous frontage.

Peterborough Cathedral, from the South-East.

The Norman tower was rebuilt in the Decorated Gothic style in about 1350-1380 (its main beams and roof bosses survive) with two tiers of Romanesque windows combined into a single set of Gothic windows, with the turreted cap and pinnacles removed and replaced by battlements.

Between 1496 and 1508, the Presbytery roof was replaced and the 'New Building', a rectangular building built around the end of the Norman Eastern apse, with Perpendicular fan vaulting (probably designed by John Wastell, the architect of King's College Chapel, Cambridge and the Bell Harry Tower at Canterbury Cathedral), was added.

PART THREE FOLLOWS

Hildegard von Bingen- O vis aeternitatis

Hildegard von Bingen (Part Three)

Text and Illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia, unless otherwise accredited.

"Universal Man" illumination 

from Hildegard's Liber Divinorum Operum, 1165

Hildegard's Vita was begun by Godfrey of Disibodenberg, under Hildegard's supervision. It was between November 1147 and February 1148, at the Synod in Trier, that Pope Eugenus heard about Hildegard’s writings. It was from this that she received Papal approval to document her visions as revelations from the Holy Spirit, giving her instant credibility.

Before Hildegard’s death, a problem arose with the clergy of Mainz. A man buried in Rupertsburg had died after excommunication from the Church. Therefore, the clergy wanted to remove his body from the sacred ground. Hildegard did not accept this idea, replying that it was a sin and that the man had been reconciled to the Church at the time of his death.

On 17 September 1179, when Hildegard died, her Sisters claimed they saw two streams of light appear in the skies and cross over the room where she was dying.

Hildegard's musical, literary, and scientific writings are housed primarily in two manuscripts: the Dendermonde manuscript and the Riesencodex. The Dendermonde manuscript was copied under Hildegard's supervision at Rupertsberg, while the Riesencodex was copied in the century after Hildegard's death.

A Facsimile of the"Riesencodex"

(Hs.2 of the Hessische Landesbibliothek, Wiesbaden, fol. 466-481v)

(see http://www.omifacsimiles.com/brochures/hild_w.html)

Attention in recent decades to women of the Mediaeval Church has led to a great deal of popular interest in Hildegard, particularly her music. In addition to the Ordo Virtutum, sixty-nine musical compositions, each with its own original poetic text, survive, and at least four other texts are known, though their musical notation has been lost.

This is one of the largest repertoires among Mediaeval composers. Hildegard also wrote nearly 400 letters to correspondents ranging from Popes to Emperors to abbots and abbesses; two volumes of material on natural medicine and cures; an invented language called the Lingua ignota; various minor works, including a Gospel commentary and two works of hagiography; and three great volumes of visionary theology: Scivias, Liber vitae meritorum ("Book of Life's Merits" or "Book of the Rewards of Life"), and Liber divinorum operum ("Book of Divine Works").

One of her better known works, Ordo Virtutum (Play of the Virtues), is a morality play. It is unsure when some of Hildegard’s compositions were composed, though the Ordo Virtutum is thought to have been composed as early as 1151. 

The morality play consists of monophonic melodies for the Anima (human Soul) and 16 Virtues. There is also one speaking part for the Devil. Scholars assert that the role of the Devil would have been played by Volmar, while Hildegard's nuns would have played the parts of Anima and the Virtues.

PART FOUR FOLLOWS

Peterborough Cathedral (Part One)

Text and illustrations from Wikipedia -the free encyclopedia,
unless otherwise attributed.

The West Front of Peterborough Cathedral

(Cathedral Church of St Peter, St Paul and St Andrew)

Photo taken March 2010 by NotFromUtrecht

Peterborough Cathedral, properly the Cathedral Church of St Peter, St Paul and St Andrew – also known as Saint Peter's Cathedral in the United Kingdom – is the seat of the Bishop of Peterborough, dedicated to Saint Peter, Saint Paul and Saint Andrew, whose statues look down from the three high gables of the famousWest Front.

Founded in the Anglo-Saxon period, the architecture is mainly Norman, following a re-building in the 

12th-Century. With Durham Cathedral and Ely Cathedral, it is one of the most important 12th-Century buildings in England to have remained largely intact, despite extensions and restoration.

Peterborough Cathedral is known for its imposing Early English Gothic West Front (façade) which, with its three enormous arches, is without architectural precedent and with no direct successor. The appearance is slightly asymmetrical, as one of the two towers that rise from behind the façade was never completed, but this is only visible from a distance, while the effect of the West Front upon entering the Cathedral Close is overwhelming.

Peterborough Cathedral - fan vaulting in the "new building".

Author: Steve Cadman from London, U.K. 

Taken July 2008.

(Wikimedia Commons) 

Anglo-Saxon origins

The original Church, known simply as "Medeshamstede", was founded in the reign of the Anglo-Saxon King Peada of the Middle Angles, in about 655 A.D., as one of the first centres of Christianity in Central England. The monastic settlement, with which the Church was associated, lasted at least until 870 A.D., when it was supposedly destroyed by Vikings.

In the mid-10th-Century monastic revival (in which, Churches at Ely and Ramsey were also re-founded), a Benedictine Abbey was created and endowed in 966 A.D., principally by Athelwold, Bishop of Winchester, from what remained of the earlier Church, with "a Basilica [Church] there furbished with suitable structures of halls, and enriched with surrounding lands" and more extensive buildings which saw the Aisle built out to the West, with a second Tower added.

The original Central Tower was, however, retained. It was dedicated to St Peter, and came to be called a burgh, hence the town, surrounding the Abbey, was eventually named Peter-burgh. The community was further revived in 972 A.D. by Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury.

PART TWO FOLLOWS

Hildegard von Bingen (Part Two)

Text and Illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia, unless otherwise accredited.

Mutterschaft aus dem Geiste und dem Wasser

(Motherhood from the Spirit and the Water), 1165

In any case, Hildegard and Jutta were enclosed at Disibodenberg in the Palatinate Forest in what is now Germany. Jutta was also a visionary and thus attracted many followers who came to visit her at the enclosure. Hildegard also tells us that Jutta taught her to read and write, but that she was unlearned and therefore incapable of teaching Hildegard Biblical interpretation.

Hildegard and Jutta most likely prayed, meditated, read scriptures, such as the psalter, and did some sort of handiwork during the hours of the Divine Office. This also might have been a time when Hildegard learned how to play the ten-stringed psaltery. Volmar, a frequent visitor, may have taught Hildegard simple psalm notation. The time she studied music could also have been the beginning of the compositions she would later create.

Upon Jutta's death in 1136, Hildegard was unanimously elected as "magistra" of the community by her fellow nuns. Abbot Kuno of Disibodenberg also asked Hildegard to be Prioress, which would be under his authority. Hildegard, however, wanted more independence for herself and her nuns and asked Abbot Kuno to allow them to move to Rupertsberg. This was to be a move towards poverty, from a stone complex that was well established to a temporary dwelling place. 

When the abbot declined Hildegard's proposition, Hildegard went over his head and received the approval of Archbishop Henry I of Mainz. Abbot Kuno did not relent, however, until Hildegard was stricken by an illness that kept her paralyzed and unable to move from her bed, an event that she attributed to God's unhappiness at her not following his orders to move her nuns to Rupertsberg. 

Hildegard von Bingen's alphabet "Litterae ignotae"

It was only when the Abbot himself could not move Hildegard that he decided to grant the nuns their own monastery. Hildegard and about twenty nuns moved to the Saint Rupertsberg monastery in 1150, where Volmar served as provost, as well as Hildegard's confessor and scribe. In 1165, Hildegard founded a second monastery for her nuns at Eibingen.

Visions

Hildegard says that she first saw "The Shade of the Living Light" at the age of three, and by the age of five she began to understand that she was experiencing visions. She used the term 'visio' to this feature of her experience, and recognized that it was a gift that she could not explain to others. Hildegard explained that she saw all things in the light of God through the five senses: sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch.

She was hesitant to share her visions, confiding only to Jutta, who, in turn, told Volmar, Hildegard's tutor and, later, secretary. Throughout her life, she continued to have many visions, and in 1141, at the age of 42, Hildegard received a vision she believed to be an instruction from God, to "write down that which you see and hear." Still hesitant to record her visions, Hildegard became physically ill. The illustrations recorded in the book of Scivias were visions that Hildegard experienced, causing her great suffering and tribulations. In her first theological text, Scivias ("Know the Ways"), Hildegard describes her struggle within:

But I, though I saw and heard these things, refused to write for a long time through doubt and bad opinion and the diversity of human words, not with stubbornness but in the exercise of humility, until, laid low by the scourge of God, I fell upon a bed of sickness; then, compelled at last by many illnesses, and by the witness of a certain noble maiden of good conduct [the nun Richardis von Stade] and of that man whom I had secretly sought and found, as mentioned above, I set my hand to the writing.

While I was doing it, I sensed, as I mentioned before, the deep profundity of scriptural exposition; and, raising myself from illness by the strength I received, I brought this work to a close – though just barely – in ten years. [...] And I spoke and wrote these things not by the invention of my heart or that of any other person, but as by the secret mysteries of God I heard and received them in the heavenly places. And again I heard a voice from Heaven saying to me, 'Cry out therefore, and write thus!'

PART THREE FOLLOWS

Commemoration of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel

Illustration taken from the Web-Site of the Transalpine Redemptorists

The following text is taken from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal for 16 July, The Commemoration of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel

Greater-Double

White Vestments

According to a pious tradition authorised by the Liturgy, on the day of Pentecost a number of men who walked in the footsteps of the holy prophets, Elias and Eliseus, and whom John the Baptist had prepared for the advent of Jesus, embraced the Christian faith, and erected the first Church to the Blessed Virgin on Mount Carmel, at the very spot where Elias had seen a cloud rise, a figure of the fecundity of the Mother of God (Lesson of Second Nocturn at Matins).

They were called: Brethren of Blessed Mary of Mount Carmel (Collect). These Religious came to Europe in the 13th-Century and, in 1245, Pope Innocent IV gave his approbation to their rule under the generalship of Simon Stock, an English Saint.

On 16 July 1251, Mary appeared to this fervent servant [Simon Stock] and placed in his hands the habit which was to be their distinctive sign. Pope Innocent IV blessed this habit and attached to it many privileges, not only for the members of the Order, but also for those who entered the Confraternity of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. By wearing the scapular, which is in smaller form than that of the Carmelite Fathers, they participate in all their merits and may hope to obtain through the Virgin a prompt delivery from Purgatory, if they have faithfully observed abstinence, chastity (according to their state), and said the Prayers prescribed by Pope John XXII, in the Sabbatine Bull, published on 3 March 1322.

The Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, at first celebrated only in the Churches of the Order, was extended to all Christendom by Pope Benedict XIII in 1726.

From Hungary to Rome... on a motorbike to mark a religious anniversary

Beszélsz MAGYAR?

The following was gleaned from ROME REPORTS.

From Hungary to Rome... on a motorbike to mark a religious anniversary

Solemn High Masses for the Feast of Our Lady Of Mount Carmel

This information has been provided by the Society of St. Hugh of Cluny.
Their Blog can be found at http://sthughofcluny.org/

For our American readers, please be aware that the following Churches in Newark, New Jersey, and Stamford, Connecticut, and New York, have scheduled Traditional Masses, to observe the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, on Sunday, 15 July 2012, Monday, 16 July 2012, and also Saturday, 21 July 2012.

Monday, 16 July 2012, at 7:30 p.m.

SOLEMN HIGH MASS FOR THE FEAST OF OUR LADY OF MOUNT CARMEL

Gregorian Chant with music by Victoria and Morales.

Light refreshments to follow in Parish Meeting Room

Church of Saint Gabriel, 914 Newfield Avenue, Stamford, Connecticut.



Sunday, 15 July 2012, and Monday, 16 July 2012, both at 12 noon

Solemn High Masses with Procession through the streets of the neighborhood with Italian Marching band.

Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church, 259 Oliver Street, Newark, NJ 07105.



Saturday, 21 July 2012, at 11 a.m.

Solemn High Mass at the Altar of the Pontifically Crowned Madonna.

Shrine Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, 449 East 115th Street, New York, New York.