A mighty Lady, most deserving of the great Who shall find a strong woman lection given her by the Latin Church. May she intercede for the Land of Britanny, of which she is Patron, a country faithful to the Church when so much of France went a-whoring after strange deities. Let us not forget that the demonic hatreds which brought a crown of martyrdom to the Carmelites of Compiegne, are still alive. I recall pointing out to a granddaughter called Anna the majestic wording round the ceiling of the Church at Pontrieux, which began ANNA POTENS ... and went on to ask the potentissima to pray for the Fatherland. Pedit evidomp.
The cult of S Anne spread in the West particularly in the later Middle Ages. Medievals did not share PF's disdain for grandmothers ... could it be that the roots of his psychological problems, poor poppet, lie in his having been soundly whacked by an all-too-prescient grandmother?
And, today, remember Reverend Mother and the Carmelite Sisters at Lanherne in Cornwall, whose lovely little church has S Anne as a Patron: so fitting in the church of Carmelites who fled to England in 1794, hounded by the bloodthirsty armies of the murderous Enlightenment.
And we shall not forget, shall we, St Anne's College Oxford, blessed spot, where I found the best of wives and which I rewarded by sending it a daughter and a son. Yes; it became a mixed college. When it was still one of Oxford's five Women's Colleges, and each of the five had a strongly individual character, this joke circulated:
A woman undergraduate burst into a hen-party with the breathless news that she had just met a man (perhaps not difficult in the days when there were seven men to every woman undergraduate at Oxford).
The Somerville girl (they were preoccupied with academic matters) asked "What's he reading?"
The Lady Margaret Hall girl (they had social antennae): "Who's his father?"
The St Hugh's girl (crazy about sport): "What does he play?"
The St Hilda's girl (waste no time): "Where can I find him?"
The St Anne's girl (elegant, accomplished, and beautiful): "I've already had him to Tea".
I had Tea quite often ... a very toothsome Tea it was too ... finest quality home-made sandwiches ... in an enchanted room overlooking Banbury Road and the Parks Entrance ...
Gaude Mater Anna ... as the Monastic Breviary wisely invites us to sing ...
1 comment:
So, congratulations, sort of, on your patronage, sort of.
Does the Pope has a disdain for grandmothers? I know he often speaks as if hatred of the mother-in-law is the natural state of affairs... but I don't recall him speak ill of grandmothers.
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