Fr. Z's Blog

Waking Giacarlo in the sala of the Archconfraternity with the recitation of the Office of the Dead.

If you enlarge, you will see a sign on one of the candles written in ancient Greek.

It is

ΘΑΝΏΝ
ΑΣΤΈΡΑΣ
ΟΙΚΟΝ
ΕΧΕΙ

Just to help, that’s something like, “now dead he has a dwelling in the stars”

I am not sure where this is from, but I have a suspicion it’s an ancient epigram.

Removing the pall, you can see also a larger version of the other epitaph on the other candle.  In Latin.

Which is…

IOHANNI CAROLO CRASSO
ARCHISODALITATIS
SANCTISSIMAE TRINITATIS IN URBE
CAMERARIO
LATINARUM GRAECARUMQ LITTERARUM PERITO
SACRARUMQUE CAERIMONIARUM MAGISTRO
IN EOD AUGUSTAE TRIADIS TEMPLO PEREGRINATOR
DIUTINA AEGRITUDINE FIRMITER SUSTENTA
QUI TAM RECTE VIXIT QUAM PIE EXIIT
ANNOS XLIII MENSES VIII DIES X
LACRIMARUM TRIBUTA MAESTARUM
REQUIEM IN PACE
BEATAE GLORIAM AETERNITATIS 
LUCTUOSI OPTANT SODALES

It’s a lovely inscription.   Giancarlo, who taught Latin, would probably have enjoyed you giving your own accurate yet smooth version, as Foster would have said.

I missed his funeral by a few days.

Please remember me when shopping online and use my affiliate links.  US HERE – UK HERE  WHY?  This helps to pay for health insurance (massively hiked for this new year of surprises), utilities, groceries, etc..  At no extra cost, you provide help for which I am grateful.

In churchy news… Francis is in Luxembourg. I guess that’s the perifery.

In chessy news… HERE

Thanks go out to an unknown reader who sent some items from my wishlist.  No slips were included in the box and or the envelope, so I don’t have a clue as to who you are or how to send a thank you note.  So… if you recently sent something and didn’t hear from me, thank you.  The angels know who you are and you are included in my prayers.

Please remember me when shopping online and use my affiliate links.  US HERE – UK HERE  WHY?  This helps to pay for health insurance (massively hiked for this new year of surprises), utilities, groceries, etc..  At no extra cost, you provide help for which I am grateful.

Hey Fathers!  How about a clerical Guayabera shirt?

In churchy news… Ed Pentin has a piece at the National Catholic Register about newly appointed consultors for the Dicastery (Congregation) for the Doctrine of the Faith.  HERE   In the list of appointments, I didn’t see either a native English speaker or an African.  Most are Italian.  A couple of them would never have entered into my strangest imaginations to appoint.

In chessy news…  HERE

Nice people! Great service!

Welcome registrant:

MargaretAnn

Please remember me when shopping online and use my affiliate links.  US HERE – UK HERE  WHY?  This helps to pay for health insurance (massively hiked for this new year of surprises), utilities, groceries, etc..  At no extra cost, you provide help for which I am grateful.

In churchy news…

This is worth a read.  At the UK’s Catholic Herald, an article about how Francis wrote to the Cardinals telling them to tighten the belt and work for zero deficit.  They are going to have to resort to “seek external resources to cover operating costs” and then those who do well should “contribute to cover the general deficit”.   Also, he has urged “mutual collaboration and synergies”.   There’s a really interesting point at the end of the article about a “Council for Inclusive Capitalism with the Vatican”.  Check it out.

Card. Pell was not available for comment.

Something popped across my screen that I did  four years ago, namely, my reading of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 44, from my daily Twitter series of all of the Bard’s Sonnets. Yup, I did them all, 154.  I threw in some other poets too, for variety, like GK Chesterton, and  That was a fun project. I was challenged my one of you readers to do it because Patrick Stewart was doing it during COVID Theater.

#ASonnetADay – 44. “If the dull substance of my flesh were thought…” pic.twitter.com/M3r3Hb0pDv

— Fr. John Zuhlsdorf (@fatherz) September 25, 2020

In chessy news…

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I wrote of the passing of a friend and confrere of the Archconfraternity of the Most Holy Trinity in Rome, Giancarlo, after his long suffering. His body will be watch over during the night before interment at the great Verano cemetery near St. Lawrence outside-the-walls. During the night members of the Archconfraternity will stand vigil in turns.

Here are the arrangements for the arrival of Giancarlo’s coffin in the sala of the Archconfraternity.

In your goodness, please say a prayer for him.

The 22nd of September has come and gone, the Autumnal Equinox, and the birthday of Bilbo and Frodo. And, in Gondor, it was a festival in honor of Frodo on 30 Yavannie (= 22 September). Tolkien’s books were an important link in a chain of events that, eventually led to conversion and priesthood, rather like “the falling of small stones that starts an avalanche in the mountains”. Meanwhile, for a couple of years now there has been a series called Rings of Power. It has been relentlessly drifting between tedious, irritating and cringeworthy. I have watched it nonetheless. The most recent episode had some moments of redemption, now that they are really getting into the point of the series.

Since it is 23 Sept, and the Feast of St. “Padre Pio” of Pietrelcina, I share my relic of St. Pio, which is a piece of a blood stained bandage.

The reliquary was a from a reader and kind benefactor who often sends practical things, like household items or tools, from my wishlist, CG.

In chessy news… HERE

Please remember me when shopping online and use my affiliate links.  US HERE – UK HERE  WHY?  This helps to pay for health insurance (massively hiked for this new year of surprises), utilities, groceries, etc..  At no extra cost, you provide help for which I am grateful.

I remind you about a new book published by Emmaus Press, a branch of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology.

On The Demonic by Archbp. Fulton J. Sheen.

US HERE – UK HERE (not yet)

The forward explains that, toward the end of his life, Sheen was ever more convinced that we are living in a demonic age and that we may be seeing the “first cells of the Anti-Christ”.  More on this amazing book HERE.