Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Sunday 16 September 2012

Remembering Dr Pusey


Today is the 130th anniversary of the death of  Edward Bouverie Pusey at the house of nuns he founded, the Society of the Most Holy Trinity, at Ascot Priory. He is buried in Christ Church cathedral in Oxford, and Pusey House was founded as a memorial to preserve both his library and his life work for future generations. 

E.B. Pusey

Dr Pusey by Vanity Fair

Image: Nova Scotia Scott

As someone who owes a great deal to the Oxford Movement of which Pusey was a founder, and to Pusey House where I worshipped regularly from 1996 until 2004, and made many valued and enduring friendships there as well as using the library I feel I owe a great deal to Dr Pusey, and am happy to commemorate him and to pray for the repose of his soul.

Unlike Newman, who shared in the Victorian love of the camera Pusey refused to be photographed or to sit for his portrait. This I think stemmed from his self-abnegatory regime which he adopted following the death of his beloved wife Maria. Apart from his death-mask all the portraits we have are sketches made during sermons or done as pictures from memory. The one I reproduce below suggests something of the charm and cheerfulness in his faith which clearly marked  him as a spiritual director and sustained him in his long and often lonely years of leadership of the Puseyites after Newman's reception as a Catholic in 1845.

E.+B.+Pusey - 56020 Rev Pusey Lg
Dr Pusey

Image:explow.com

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