According to kathnews, a German news outlet, the huge St. Peter bell in the tower of the Cathedral of Cologne fell silent today when its clapper broke.
Cologne Cathedral is where what tradition holds to be the remains of the Three Kings are venerated.
Surely this was a protest against the transferal of Epiphany in so many places around the world!
o{];¬)
Big bell…
Coat of Arms by D Burkart
Loading ...
A Daily Prayer for Priests
Nota bene: I do not answer these numbers or this Skype address. You won't get me "live". I check for messages regularly.
WDTPRS
020 8133 4535
651-447-6265
on Daily Rome Shot 528, etc.: “Cameron: Good work! Yes, that Qa3+ is important to force the enemy King to g8, thus removing a guard from…”
on Daily Rome Shot 528, etc.: “Not good at chess notation but I think I got it. Qa3 Check Black can block with Queen and/or Knight,…”
on ASK FATHER: Should displaced Catholics attend the Novus Ordo? Wherein Fr. Z rants.: “I was thinking of the chiton, but perhaps the limpet, with the tensile strength of their teeth of up to…” on ASK FATHER: Should displaced Catholics attend the Novus Ordo? Wherein Fr. Z rants.: “What are those tidal creatures called that are like little discs of plated armor sort of loosely hanging on to…”
on ASK FATHER: I failed to do my confession penance. Now what?: “Good that the writer feels compunction for doing the given penance. I get it. Flaky priests, although maybe well-meaning and…” on ASK FATHER: Should displaced Catholics attend the Novus Ordo? Wherein Fr. Z rants.: “TFW, I’m happy your experience has been otherwise. My family has seen nothing but carnage. Brutal. It’s what drove us…”
on Meanwhile, the Novus Ordo is the only expression of the Roman Rite… not.: “What I found most startling is that many of the visual clues I look for to determine where on the…” on ASK FATHER: Should displaced Catholics attend the Novus Ordo? Wherein Fr. Z rants.: “The introduction of the new Mass was not successful. It led to many young Catholics of the 60s and 70s…”
on Wherein Fr. Z rants and recommends a must read entry at NLM: “Firstly, let me say that I’ve not had the privilege of attending a Vetus Ordo Mass, I have observed and…”
on Meanwhile, the Novus Ordo is the only expression of the Roman Rite… not.: “What’s the apocryphal story about a Bishop at Mass with a Pastor, who watches a dancer like this working her…”
on ASK FATHER: The faithful put blood, sweat, and tears into the building, revival of churches, parishes. Given how bishops them them, is there recourse in Canon Law?: “In the Archdiocese of Boston the New Archbishop at the time was sent to close and sell churches to pay…” on Wherein Fr. Z rants and recommends a must read entry at NLM: “Interesting how they use the word Organic, as if that everything that is organic is good. Most poisons come from…”
on Wherein Fr. Z rants and recommends a must read entry at NLM: “Lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi.”
on Meanwhile, the Novus Ordo is the only expression of the Roman Rite… not.: “I wonder what those priests were thinking…”
on If a law isn’t accepted, it is essentially no law at all. Traditionis? Time will tell. Novus Ordo? Time has told.: “Senor Quixana, I think you’re missing the points. “They had a choice of products” – no, they didn’t, at least…”
PLEASE subscribe via PayPal if it is useful.
That way I have steady income I can plan on, and you wind up regularly on my list of benefactors for whom I pray and for whom I periodically say Holy Mass.
In view of the rapidly changing challenges I now face, I would like to add more $10/month subscribers. Will you please help?
For a one time donation...
My "challenge coin" for my 25th anniversary of ordination in 2016.
Want one? I do exchanges with military and LEOs, etc.
Loading ...If you travel internationally, this is a super useful gizmo for your mobile internet data. I use one. If you get one through my link, I get data rewards.
Loading ...
They find you a pro-life agent in your area who commits to giving a portion of the fee to a pro-life group!
Help Monks in Wyoming (coffee – UPDATED LINK) and Norcia (beer) and the wonderful "Soap Sisters" of Summit, NJ!
Please follow me on Twitter!
Visits tracked by Statcounter
since Sat., 25 Nov. 2006:
We have a special, low Mass for the Epiphany tonight-EF. I am so grateful.
Three Kings, bless the Church.
Looks like fortunately there was no injury to the bell itself (it has cracked several times in the past) and none to anyone below when the clapper broke loose, since the bell room is closed when the bell is ringing.
They say it is the largest free-swinging bell in the world. Like most big tower bells, it has a nickname – “Decke Pitter” in the local dialect: “Fat Pete”. And like most big tower bells, it has inscriptions:
St. Peter bin ich genannt
Schütze das deutsche Land
Geboren aus deutschem Leid
Ruf ich zur Einigkeit.
St. Peter I am named
Protect the German land
Born out of German sorrow
I call for unity.
König der Herrlichkeit
Komm Christus mit Frieden
King of Glory,
Come Christ with peace
St. Gereon bitt für uns
St. Gereon (of Cologne) pray for us
St. Ursula bitt für uns
St. Ursula pray for us
It was cast at the request of Konrad Adenauer (then mayor) in 1922.
You can read all about it here: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Petersglocke
Video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btUwShVSDfw
Perhaps?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpVjW30I-YU&feature=related
Meanwhile, while they’re waiting for the St. Peter bell to be fixed, it’s a good thing Cologne Cathedral has 10 other bells!
That is a BIIIIIG bell. Mind you, that’s a BIIIIIG Cathedral. Nevertheless, I hope the clapper didn’t go straight through the floor! I actually have an LP of recordings of the Koln Cathedral bells, loaded with pictures of their installation. Mightily impressive they are!
By the way, here’s an interesting video on Youtube about the bells of Cologne Cathedral: each bell individually, with vital statistics, and then all the bells at once.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vbe3CwBeOfA
That’s one big bell.
KÖLN, Dom: St. Petersglocke (Glocke 1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWCjcioe5dI&NR=1&feature=fvwp
See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pWBJiW0Xpo&feature=player_detailpage to find out what happend to the clapper.
I was lucky enough to be in Cologne for Epiphany back in 2005, and the city takes this feast very seriously. And that’s with good cause – the cathedral was built as a giant sepulchre for the relics of the Three Kings! (The Holy Roman Emperor, Frederic Barbarossa, had given them to the city in AD 1164.)
There’s little else that can match standing in the square before the cathedral and feeling the biggest bell (Dicke Pitter in Kölsch) ring out by itself before being joined by the full peal. The Cardinal Archbishop of Cologne also leads a procession after the Mass to venerate the relics, with a forest of candles lit around them in devotion. The cathedral also breaks out some of its finest vestments, plate, and other pieces from the treasury for this Mass.
The place is packed to standing room.
You GOTTA put this right up there with the Lutheran church building that got hit by a tornado and lost part of its steeple when they voted to allow gay unions or ministers or whatever it was a couple years ago — the more I live, the more I am convinced there are no coincidences.
And yes, that’s a big bell. Everything about that Church is amazing. I got to take wife and kids there a few years ago. I think our church would fit free and clear inside one of the transept wings. The basement has vestments on display that weigh close to a hundred pounds (when priests HAD to be manly, or they’d be crushed!), and what are supposed to have been St. Peter’s shackles. There is something about the familiarity of them to modern eyes that makes them a little more poignant than you might imagine.
JMody, maybe they could put your church in the south transept, as a way of blocking the view of that awful new pixel window.
In my opinion, it’s the most breathtaking Cathedral in Europe.
It oozes pain, joy, devastation, triumph and holiness from every pore.
It’s enormous, solid and so incredibly masterfully detailed – thre is nothing like a gothic Cathedral, anyway.
Once it comes into view when you get to Cologne by whatever means (boat/car/train), it captivates you like ‘magic’.
It’s probably also a sign that maintenance of the bells hasn’t been done as often as it should be, or that the recent cold snaps have been too much for whatever they use to hold the clapper.
Now that is one huge bell! Couldn’t watch the videos, though.
I have a little curio box at home with an old photo of Cologne Cathedral on it. My late mother brought it from Germany when she and her family left there in 1923.
I hope that the clapper can be fixed.
‘Clap on! Clap off!’-now that’s funny, Father Z! : D
Father Z, help. Curiosity is killing me. (Okay, not killing me but, driving me nutz)
[Nope… that’s my signature icon.]
I can make everything except the nose. Where do I find that character?
Here’s a closer look at an exact copy of the bell:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/de/4/4d/Apolda_Autohaus_Matt_Petersglocke_Nachbildung_2.JPG
The small inscriptions around the shoulder of the bell explain who cast it, who the bishop and dean of the cathedral were at the time, etc. Note the beautiful lions on the crown.
The Petersglocke was cast in Apolda in 1923, in the Heinrich Ulrich foundry (which no longer exists). There is a pretty neat-looking bell museum there now.
http://www.apolda.de/tourismus/erleben/glockenmuseum.htm
The Anglican churches (and their counterparts in the U.S.) have a thing about bells. A downtown Episcopal church has the only ring of ten bells in Georgia (there are several other churches in GA with a ring of 8, all Episcopalian.)
If I hit the lottery, I’m donating a ring of 10 to our parish (the lottery’s 34 million this week, and 10 bells should just about take care of that, after taxes). At least there’s already a tower!
Irishgirl,
The news reports say that the clapper failed due to metal fatigue, and a new one will have to be cast.
That will take some time, because the old clapper weighed almost 1800 pounds, and it was smaller than the original. It was substituted after the repairs in the 1950s to take some of the strain off the soundbow – the bell was also tilted slightly so that the clapper did not strike the repaired crack.
Any bell this big is approaching operational limits, although it does seem that the old English bells are more durable.
Father Z, I realize this is your sig. How could I possibly use it since I am not a priest? And no, I really don’t want to become one. ;-D
I spent many years in graphic arts and typesetting. I am just curious about the character you use for the nose. No offense meant, I hope you know.