Margaret Hebblethwaiteinvestigates the Mystery of the Winchester Bible
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George Weigel The next pope must challenge the moral confusion and decadence of the age THE INTERNATIONAL 11 JULY 2020 £3.80 CATHOLIC WEEKLY www.thetablet.co.uk Est. 1840 28 770039 883257 9 A king’s sorrow Margaret Hebblethwaite investigates the mystery of the Winchester Bible Zena Hitz defends the bookworm • Elena Curti reports on Walsingham’s redevelopment Christopher Howse won’t let go of the Sixties • Lucy Lethbridge explores the contradictions of Mrs. America 01_Tablet11Jul20 Cover.indd 1 07/07/2020 18:59 02_Tablet11Jul20 Leaders.qxp_Tablet features spread 07/07/2020 19:10 Page 2 THE INTERNATIONAL CATHOLIC WEEKLY THE TABLET FOUNDED IN 1840 GLOBAL he main pitch of the campaign for Brexit was Hong Kong. Britain’s offer of entry visas and a TRADE the promise that Britain would regain control pathway to citizenship is a very generous and T of its own borders, with regard to honourable response, which reflects well on a British GREEN immigration and with regard to trade. government not normally given much credit for its Outside the European Union, it was said, immigration moral integrity. If the offer is taken up, it will lead to a LIGHT could be limited and free trade expanded, and “Global large influx of immigrants to Britain just when the Britain” would prosper. Both those goals are now in government had hoped to reduce the flow, post-Brexit. FOR THE jeopardy, and the reason is found in one word: China. The behaviour of the Chinese government puts the China was rapidly becoming the hub of the whole edifice of international trade, and the progress globalised economy, which has handed the Chinese of globalisation over the last three decades, in doubt. FUTURE government leverage over the affairs of other The United States, a key participant in that process, countries, a leverage it is increasingly tempted to use. was already moving to anti-free trade protectionism Meanwhile, its behaviour towards Hong Kong exposes and a trade war with China. Globalisation depends on China as a global partner that cannot be trusted. The minimal compliance with a set of rules, especially the Chinese ambassador to Britain, Liu Xiaoming, has observance of treaty obligations, and if neither China unwisely warned Britain not to jeopardise its trading nor the US are willing to respect those rules then a relationship with China by reversing the decision to decade of international protectionism beckons. allow the Chinese technology giant Huawei a role in Globalisation has lifted millions of China’s citizens the 5G network that will eventually cover the whole of out of dire poverty. China has virtually cornered the Britain. Eliminating Huawei would be a setback for market in the production of electronic consumer Chinese global economic ambitions, and any Chinese goods such as smartphones. But globalisation has also measures in retaliation would only make things worse. been a major factor in the loss of hundreds of Mr Xiaoming has also denounced what he calls thousands of jobs in British steelworks and Britain’s “interference” in Hong Kong, specifically the shipbuilding, and has swung the economy into heavy announcement that up to three million Hong Kong dependence on financial services. This has increased citizens could be allowed to emigrate to the United the economic imbalance, and consequent inequality, Kingdom and eventually graduate to full citizenship. between the north of England and London and the The Beijing government has introduced draconian south-east. So if globalisation is stuttering to a halt – new security laws to try to stamp out the street even if it is only temporary – a new era of domestic protests against its increasing control of Hong Kong’s industrialisation will be necessary to sustain the internal affairs. The new measures are plainly in British economy for the next half century. And “green” contravention of the “one country, two systems” industrialisation, which the government has placed at arrangement enshrined in international law by the the core of its policy for long-term economic growth, 1997 treaty under which Britain ended colonial rule in becomes its essential component. It is an ill wind … CORONAVIRUS ntil the end of last month, the practising is absent. Catholic parishioners may not communicate LESSONS Catholic population of the United Kingdom verbally with each other very much, but being in each U was approximately zero – if by “practising other’s presence does have a transformative effect. COVID Catholic” is meant someone who attends Even more significant, watching remotely is not just Mass on Sundays and Holy Days. Even now, with a poor substitute for “being there”, but a different kind REVEALS church doors half open, normal Catholic life remains of reality. To be in the real presence of the body and disrupted. So one truth the coronavirus has unearthed blood of Christ is to be where Heaven and Earth are HIDDEN is that Christian discipleship cannot simply be defined mystically joined. The God who created the universe by participation in the liturgy. The obligation under becomes present in this small space, among His TRUTHS canon law to hear Mass every Sunday cannot be people. This is, as Vatican II’s decree Lumen Gentium reimposed as if nothing has happened. declares, the “source and summit of the Christian life”. The distinction between the “practising” and the Medieval churches had tall spires rising above the “lapsed” – meaning, essentially, non-practising – tree tops so people could see from afar the place where Catholic has been, in effect, dissolved. Not all those this miracle happened. Stand close to the base of the who were once practising, in this sense, will return to spire and look upwards, and it becomes an infinite weekly Massgoing. That does not mean that they no column reaching beyond and above the sky. It is a longer live by the Gospel. Indeed, if the virus remains symbol, as the Encyclopaedia Britannica endemic in the population long-term, large gatherings condescendingly puts it, “of the heavenly aspirations of the faithful such as in a typical parish on a typical of pious medieval men”. They obviously knew Sunday may become a thing of the past. something they were later forced to forget. Masses have continued to be celebrated, of course, All these glimpses of truth and many others have with invisible congregations watching at home via been uncovered by the coronavirus earthquake, and computer screens. Much praise is due to those who remain to be collected and used. It would be a shrewd have kept things moving, and, anecdotally at least, move by the bishops’ conferences of these islands if this unusual procedure has concentrated hearts and they were to commission research into this episode minds on neglected distinctions between good liturgy and the effect it has had on the faith of the People of and bad. But it has also placed a focus on the God, knowing that Providence leaves nothing wasted, community present at Mass, and how we feel when it even disasters and their consequences. 2 | THE TABLET | 11 JULY 2020 03_Tablet11Jul20 Contents.qxp_Tablet features spread 07/07/2020 19:09 Page 3 PHOTO: PA/EMPICS, DAVID JENSEN Shaftesbury Avenue - 14 London’s theatreland – deserted during lockdown z COLUMN BOOKS / PAGE 18 CONTENTS Piers Plowright 11 JULY 2020 // VOL 274 NO. 9360 Stories We Tell Ourselves FEATURES RICHARD HOLLOWAY 4 / A royal search for illumination Could an illuminated Bible have been commissioned by Henry II, trying to find Roger Hardy Christopher biblical precedents for the disasters of his own life? / BY MARGARET HEBBLETHWAITE The Call: Inside the Global Saudi Howse’s 8 / Notebook The next pope Religious Project Catholicism in Western Europe is moribund and only a pope offering doctrinal KRITHIKA VARAGUR ‘Somehow we clarity will make the faith compelling / BY GEORGE WEIGEL have preserved Euan Cameron the culture 10 / In defence of bookworms A Hundred Million of the Sixties In a transactional, technological world riven by crisis, have literature and Years and a Day in amber’ / 6 philosophy become redundant? / BY ZENA HITZ JEAN-BAPTISTE ANDREA, 12 / Choppy waters for pilgrims’ progress TRANSLATED An ambitious proposal to redevelop the riverside Marian shrine lying south of BY SAM TAYLOR Walsingham village is meeting stiff opposition / BY ELENA CURTI 14 / Faith in the arts The coronavirus pandemic has had a devastating impact on our spiritual and imaginative life, argues an Anglican bishop and writer / BY MARTIN WARNER ARTS / PAGE 21 Television Mrs. America LUCY LETHBRIDGE Radio Times Radio NEWS D.J. TAYLOR REGULARS 24 / The Church in the World / News briefing Word from Theatre the Cloisters 15 25 / US judges rule for public funds for Catholic schools The Protest: Black Lives Matter Puzzles 15 27 / View from Rome MARK LAWSON Letters 16 The Living Spirit 28 / News from Britain and Ireland / News briefing 17 Music The Ethical 29 / Pope picks his new ambassador to Great Britian Bob Dylan: Rough Kitchen 31 and Rowdy Ways Glimpses of Eden 31 COVER: SCENE FROM THE LIFE OF DAVID, WINCHESTER BIBLE, FROM THE MORGAN LIBRARY & MUSEUM, NEW YORK. BRIDGEMAN IMAGES BRIAN MORTON 11 JULY 2020 | THE TABLET | 3 04-06_Tablet11Jul20 Hebblethwaite Howse UPDATED dh.qxp_Tablet features spread 07/07/2020 17:42 Page 10 FEATURES / King Henry’s Bible? ILLUSTRATION USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE CHAPTER, WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL A detail showing Henry of Blois, Bishop of Winchester, right. Did he commission the Bible? A wealthy bishop is said to have ordered the magnificently illuminated Bible displayed in Winchester Cathedral. But could it have been commissioned by a worried Henry II, trying to find biblical precedents for the disasters of his own life, including the death of Thomas Becket? BY MARGARET HEBBLETHWAITE February this year, de Hamel, author of the A royal search widely acclaimed Meetings with Remarkable Manuscripts, colourfully elaborated the tra- ditional account of Henry of Blois commissioning the Winchester Bible.