Friday, 5 October 2007

moving right along

It's now been over a month since the start of term, and the first assignments are looming on the distant horizon. I'm currently starting an essay on Pope Gregory the Great, as well as reading up on Aquinas, the pre-Socratics, and juggling a healthy dose of latin declensions. And of course there are plenty of other things recreational and spiritual to be taking part in: football, badminton, jaunts to the Birmingham Catholic chaplaincy (Fr. Julian runs a weekly youth prayer group there), chanting practice, preparation for the in-house concert, etc. This last week was riddled with liturgical celebrations, and on Oct 1st we continued the Oscott tradition of crowning a beautiful statue of Mary which resides in the cloisters. Some of us also went to the Birmingham Oratory last night where there was a beautiful Mass of the Sacred Heart to end 40 Hours Devotion there. The college feast day is this coming Tuesday, and that should be quite an occassion. The good news is that there are no lectures that day - but it means I have to cant morning prayer!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

It sounds like you have had a fruitful, if busy, time! I am just back from Pluscarden, where I too have been reading Aquinas--though I escaped my Latin declensions after the first day, realising I will need a teacher!

On the side of the angels said...

Hussey is really good on the pre-socratics [i.e. no need to regurgitate coppleston or the ridiculously boring 'kirk and raven'] ; but if you wish to submerge yourself into the whole milieu there's nobody better than Gompertz [if you can manage to beg, borrow or steal a copy of vol 1 of his greek thinkers..]

as for latin , reading duolinear roman histories is a great learning device - and if you can afford it - asterix books and manga are being printed in latin - plus there are some fantastic websites !!! [I'm learning korean on veoh??]

If you want to understand a basic overview of aquinas -
http://www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/aquinas.html

if Gilson is just a little bit too technical to start off with ; try and get hold of 'God and intelligence in Modern philosophy' by Fulton Sheen - a good introduction....
but the simplest way towards aquinas is to read the great man himself first hand - the genius leaps from the page - but Gilson is ultimately essential reading...