Month: November 2012

I was shocked to hear the news that women will not be allowed to become bishops in the Church of England.  I had no idea that they were banned in the first place.  I had thought that when they were allowed to join the clergy in the first place, that opened up the whole hierarchy.  Oh well, it is only the C of E.  It is not as if it is anything that important.  In fact, I should have realised that if there was a crazy option to take on the subject of gender, the established church was likely to take it.

I only have to look at some of the curious arrangements in the churches in the little bit of the patchwork of the English countryside where I happen to live.   The local Catholic priest lives with his wife.  He can only do that on the basis of a special dispensation from the Pope.  He used to be an Anglican vicar who went over to the Catholics over the issue of women priests.  The Catholics were flexible enough to allow married ex-Anglican clergy to sign up even if they were married.  Not too far away a former Catholic priest has turned Anglican.  He was obliged to make the switch when he fell in love and got married.  Not all local clergy have such problems I should point out.  The previous vicar in the Church nearest to me was a confirmed bachelor, who was happy to make do with the companionship of a good friend who lived in with him.  So that was alright.

The opening lines of Henry V, the ‘Oh for a muse of fire’ ones, are justly famous for their beauty and literary flare.  But at the end of the day, they are basically an excuse for poor staging.  We are being told that the actors are doing their best but you’ll have to use your imagination to fill in the dots.

Since the time of the first emperor. Augustus, there had been a rough equilibrium between the empire and the German tribes.  The empire had been too big for the Germans to defeat, but too overextended to threaten their independence.  But with the Huns now about to wipe out the Germans the position had changed.  The equilibrium was wrecked.  The Goths understood the change in the situation sooner than anyone else.

The origin of the Huns is obscure.  Gibbon traces it back to early first century when they were known as the Tanjou and lived on the borders of China just north of the Great Wall. This was not a coincidence. The Tanjou were a force to be reckoned with.  They had put together a vast coalition of steppe peoples via diplomacy, war and straight forward intimidation.  They had become powerful enough that they threatened to overthrow the ruling dynasty in China itself.  The first wall built by the Chinese was a specific response to this threat.