Our Colin Helps Celebrate College’s 650th Anniversary
2 February 2012
Last weekend was a special one for Colin Mason our student for the priesthood who’s studying in Rome. His college the Venerable English College marked six centuries and a half since it was founded.
Friday 27 January was the 650th anniversary of the foundation deed which established an English and Welsh hospice on the site occupied by the college. Its foundation in 1362 makes it the oldest English institution outside of England. From 1362 to 1579, there was a hospice on the site. In 1579, the house became a seminary for training Catholic priests, even though the hospice tradition continued as it has to the present time.
Colin told cliftondiocese.com: “When I first arrived in Rome I was very interested to learn that the English College was the oldest English institution outside England. This was something which I never knew before. It really does feel a privilege to have the opportunity to be here, in a college and a hospice that goes back 650 years.
“I have in front of me a book listing the English pilgrims who stayed here at the pilgrim hospice in 1479 and 1480; it includes people from Salisbury, Bristol, Gloucester, Tewkesbury, and Somerset. So these pilgrims from what is now our Clifton Diocese were staying in the building where I now live over 530 years ago. This gives a real sense of continuity to what I am doing here in Rome as a Clifton seminarian.”
The college community continued the celebrations on Saturday (29 January) with more than 250 guests for lunch after Mass celebrated by Most Reverend Vincent Nichols the Archbishop of Westminster.
The site of the college on the via di Monserrato, was a hospice for English and Welsh pilgrims. It attracted large numbers of pilgrims, including, in its early years, the mystic Margery Kempe, the priest-hunter Thomas Cromwell, the future martyr St Henry Walpole, and later the poet John Milton. From 1412, the wall out onto the street was emblazoned with the English Royal Coat of Arms - the shield enduring to this day - for this was a house under the patronage of the Crown. The 15th century saw some of the most famous English humanists among the hospice’s members: Thomas Linacre, William Lily, William Warham, John Giglis, Christopher Bainbridge and John Colet. In Henry VII’s reign, it was known as the ‘King’s Hospice’; Henry VIII described it as ‘Our Hospice’.
Colin added: “The 650th Anniversary events were an opportunity for the students of the English College to welcome people from around the world to share in the celebrations. I was able to show a Methodist professor from Australia around the college, and he was delighted to share in this history. I also spent time talking to four visitors from England who said that it was a wonderful day and an experience that they would never forget. This was good to hear, as it continues our tradition of welcoming pilgrims and visitors to Rome.”
With the split between Rome and Elizabeth I, it was no longer possible to train priests at home; and so the hospice’s use was altered to prepare young men for the ‘mission’ to England and Wales, that was to return to their home countries to support the faith of persecuted Catholics. The college achieved fame fast for, in the first century of its existence (between 1581 and 1678), 44 of its recent alumni were martyred. Of these some 10 have been recognised as saints and the majority as blessed. In the four centuries that it has been a seminary, the college has continued to welcome pilgrims to worship and to visit, offering bed and board to bishops, priest and lay people come to Rome on Church business. The Villa Palazzola overlooking Lake Albano, purchased by Rector Hinsley in 1920 and now a retreat house belonging to the college, has enabled the seminary to continue the 650-year-long tradition of accommodating countless groups from England and Wales come as pilgrims to visit the sacred sites of Rome.
Whenever students in the first century of the seminary’s existence heard that one of their number had been martyred, they would come before the church’s altarpiece, depicting the Most Holy Trinity and St Thomas, to sing a song of praise, the Te Deum Laudemus. At the end of Mass last Friday (27 January) former rector Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor intoned the great prayer of praise once more on that same site - in thanksgiving for all the graces received these last 650 years in this place which will surely be “forever England”.
Last weekend was a special one for Colin Mason our student for the priesthood who’s studying in Rome. His college the Venerable English College marked six centuries and a half since it was founded.
Friday 27 January was the 650th anniversary of the foundation deed which established an English and Welsh hospice on the site occupied by the college. Its foundation in 1362 makes it the oldest English institution outside of England. From 1362 to 1579, there was a hospice on the site. In 1579, the house became a seminary for training Catholic priests, even though the hospice tradition continued as it has to the present time.
Colin told cliftondiocese.com: “When I first arrived in Rome I was very interested to learn that the English College was the oldest English institution outside England. This was something which I never knew before. It really does feel a privilege to have the opportunity to be here, in a college and a hospice that goes back 650 years.
“I have in front of me a book listing the English pilgrims who stayed here at the pilgrim hospice in 1479 and 1480; it includes people from Salisbury, Bristol, Gloucester, Tewkesbury, and Somerset. So these pilgrims from what is now our Clifton Diocese were staying in the building where I now live over 530 years ago. This gives a real sense of continuity to what I am doing here in Rome as a Clifton seminarian.”
The college community continued the celebrations on Saturday (29 January) with more than 250 guests for lunch after Mass celebrated by Most Reverend Vincent Nichols the Archbishop of Westminster.
The site of the college on the via di Monserrato, was a hospice for English and Welsh pilgrims. It attracted large numbers of pilgrims, including, in its early years, the mystic Margery Kempe, the priest-hunter Thomas Cromwell, the future martyr St Henry Walpole, and later the poet John Milton. From 1412, the wall out onto the street was emblazoned with the English Royal Coat of Arms - the shield enduring to this day - for this was a house under the patronage of the Crown. The 15th century saw some of the most famous English humanists among the hospice’s members: Thomas Linacre, William Lily, William Warham, John Giglis, Christopher Bainbridge and John Colet. In Henry VII’s reign, it was known as the ‘King’s Hospice’; Henry VIII described it as ‘Our Hospice’.
Colin added: “The 650th Anniversary events were an opportunity for the students of the English College to welcome people from around the world to share in the celebrations. I was able to show a Methodist professor from Australia around the college, and he was delighted to share in this history. I also spent time talking to four visitors from England who said that it was a wonderful day and an experience that they would never forget. This was good to hear, as it continues our tradition of welcoming pilgrims and visitors to Rome.”
With the split between Rome and Elizabeth I, it was no longer possible to train priests at home; and so the hospice’s use was altered to prepare young men for the ‘mission’ to England and Wales, that was to return to their home countries to support the faith of persecuted Catholics. The college achieved fame fast for, in the first century of its existence (between 1581 and 1678), 44 of its recent alumni were martyred. Of these some 10 have been recognised as saints and the majority as blessed. In the four centuries that it has been a seminary, the college has continued to welcome pilgrims to worship and to visit, offering bed and board to bishops, priest and lay people come to Rome on Church business. The Villa Palazzola overlooking Lake Albano, purchased by Rector Hinsley in 1920 and now a retreat house belonging to the college, has enabled the seminary to continue the 650-year-long tradition of accommodating countless groups from England and Wales come as pilgrims to visit the sacred sites of Rome.
Whenever students in the first century of the seminary’s existence heard that one of their number had been martyred, they would come before the church’s altarpiece, depicting the Most Holy Trinity and St Thomas, to sing a song of praise, the Te Deum Laudemus. At the end of Mass last Friday (27 January) former rector Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor intoned the great prayer of praise once more on that same site - in thanksgiving for all the graces received these last 650 years in this place which will surely be “forever England”.
Your comments
© Clifton Diocese 2010 | Disclaimer
