A Different Take

My last blog seemed so disappointing, that even I seldom visited it.   The construction was faulty, the vision unclear and the title utterly prosaic.  Tradition and Treasure... Blargh!!!!!!!!!!!! I cannot help of think of that horrible cliche of time, talent, and treasure one always hears at diocesan appeals..  I needed both a clarification of what I was trying to focus on with this blog and a title that would really sing.  For those who are familiar with my reading preferences, the title will need no explanation.   For the rest, I shall explain.  The line is taken from Ha'nacker Mill, a poem by Hilaire Belloc. The piece describes the loss of rural England, as the Industrial Revolution took its toll. The mill from, which the poem derives its name, had fallen into disrepair and stood as a symbol of the decay and death of a culture, a way of life.  Like the Ha'nacker Mill, many glorious Catholic churches from the late Nineteenth Century have fallen on hard times. They have been disfigured, disused, disdained, and even demolished ... the travails arising from a toxic mix of population shifts, economic decay, misrepresentations of the Second Vatican Council, and a general vulgarization  of modern culture.   Fortunately not all these gems have been lost or mauled, and there are if you will some spirits who still love them and who still hear their call.  This blog is a remembrance of these monuments and the culture which produced them.  I shall try initially to post photos of  a particular church every day or so.   When many churches have been addressed (and when my knowledge of architecture has been somewhat fortified) I shall endeavor to make comparisons of pattens, and to address how these churches were a manifestation to the glory of the Faith in every little detail.  Some of the churches pictured may not last much longer, so it is almost with a sense of urgency that I endeavor to document them and to make them known, known to those spirits who might still love them and the vibrant orthodoxy which they embody.