In This House of Brede

by Rumer Godden

She had thought the cathedral dark, vast and ugly compared to the patina and beauty of Westminster Abbey;

‘Everything seemed –

not hollow, but – as if suddenly I could see beyond them, into an emptiness, and all the while there was this strange pull; no one can describe it to someone who hasn’t felt it, and doubly strange for me because until then, such a thing had never crossed my mind.’

‘That suit was Chanel,’ Dame Colette pronounced. They liked the way she walked;

is splendid. That is the blessing of the liturgy, it wipes out self.’

hope that here too our priests will soon be saying Mass facing the community.’

Privy Council.

Catherine, a misdemeanour or fault can go almost unnoticed; conscience is not as tender, as cleansed and polished with many rubbings as with us – examinations of conscience every day, every week a Chapter of Faults, and instant acknowledgements. Yes, thought Abbess Catherine, it is the difference between a rough and pitted surface and one so planed down and polished

and the nuns would have the, to them, extraordinary experience of Mass facing the community. ‘I don’t know if I dread it or look forward to it,’ said Dame Veronica.

mock wedding,’

‘Not just for ourselves; the interior life engages our whole being – its discoveries, the growing intimacy with our Lord which is one of its fruits – fascinates us and this is the very temptation, because it tends to shut us in on ourselves.’

‘In other words, you are now a professional,’ Abbess Catherine had told her. The nuns prayed in their cells, in the garden or park, in any favoured spot, but for most of them there was no place where they were as happy or as at home as in their stalls.

the smaller Thomas who was burned alive;

‘And Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all!’

claustral sisters.

choir nun has to have exceptional qualifications before she can