Arcadia Discussion Zone

It is less a question of being upset and more a matter of what is appropriate and correct.

I do not find it appropriate, for example, to be addressed by my Christian name when I do not know the person addressing me, or if the person is antipathetic and hostile even if we are vaguely acquainted. It is a familiarity exercised by Americans which, like so much else, has infected the custom here in England. That notwithstanding, those of my own generation tend to both prefer and adhere to the traditions of an older and altogether more polite period of history.

In you own case, you happened to address me as Reverend which would have been correct when I served as a priest, but once I had become elevated to the episcopate, as I did in 1991, this altered to Bishop.

It will not upset me in the slightest if people here address me incorrectly, but as the matter was raised I thought it only right and proper to set the matter straight for those who care.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/thunderer/article828301.ece

As are seventy million Anglicans in schism, most Eastern Orthodox and many more besides.

And you point is exactly what? You have clarified for everyone that it matters little to you.

To anyone for whom it does actually matter it will be noted that my clerical shirt is of a hue not worn by Roman Catholic bishops (who are always attired in black shirts).

While it is true the movement in which I was ordained deacon, priest and bishop is in schism with Rome, the latter nonetheless holds our Holy Orders and Sacraments to be valid, albeit irregular for the reason stated by yourself; unlike Anglicans and most others whose Orders and Sacraments Rome considers utterly null and void.

Dear Bishop Manchester,

In an interview for the BBC "So Weird" http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/talkwales/va ... ript.shtml you claim to have encountered "scores" of vampires. Why have you only published accounts of two of those encounters, Highgate and Kirklees?


Regards,
Jenny W.

Most accounts? Which accounts are we talking about?

There is my own and those of my colleagues, eg Peter Underwood.

Then there are also latter-day accounts by those who have never met or spoken with me and rely on select and often inaccuarte press-cuttings plus speculation on the internet.

To which do you refer?

It was less an interview, more an edited quick-fire response via someone paraphrasing what I was saying on their keyboard. My image had appeared on the screen on BBC2 television (following the end of a season of vampire programmes) and viewers were invited to talk to me on the BBC's website. Not everything translated accurately as it was reduced down to a minimum of words. It is nonetheless true to say that my colleagues and I over half a century have probably encountered a significant number of demonic entities which fall into the predatory category, ie vampires.

I would not want to get involved in just how many have been encountered for obvious reasons. Avoiding wherever possible the media in all its forms to ensure confidentiality to those who need help and whose help and co-operation is sought has allowed the ministry for dealing with such demonic molestation to become increasingly effective over the decades.

Suffice that a world famous case was written about over the last four decades where media intrusion was impossible to prevent. Innumerable film documentaries have been made about it and there have been televised dramatisations in countries other than my own. The film rights to my bestselling book The Highgate Vampire are optioned for a cinema movie with a British cast (not to be confused with a small budget, unrelated project currently in pre-production with an American cast, that has hijacked the title of my book). Surely that is enough to satisfy most aficionados? There would have been no justification in repeating the unavoidable process of media co-operation applicable in the Highgate case over and again.

By not discussing subsequent cases and by not exposing private people to a limelight they would certainly not welcome, my colleagues and I have been able to continue to operate with a reputation which precedes us for keeping confidences and not compromising people and places. Almost forty years after that first case was both reported and sensationalised by the media, I am still being asked to discuss it. While remaining open to debating the topic generally, I try to avoid the particular when it comes to unpublicised incidents and cases; having resolved not to allow investigations in the wake of Highgate to become similarly blighted.

Mention of Kirklees Park and Abney Park in subsequent years was academic due to these already being in the public domain owing to the discussion of vampire-like spectres by others. Had that talk not already been made public, nothing would have been heard from me on the matter.

I believe it to be a sacred object with mystical properties. How this is deemed a bit materialistic is difficult to comprehend.

It is probably the most important symbol in Christendom.

"This cup is the new covenant sealed by My blood." (1 Corinithians 11: 25)

sacred object = material object...no?

I was incorrect, it is not Wikipedia, but the Catholic Encyclopedia...I was correct in that I had read it on the internet...

http://www.catholic.org/encyclopedia/view.php?id=10387



Salt has been used as a representation of different 'things' in ritual throughout history. I believe its use is do to its ability to 'hold' the properties of whatever it is, it is being used to represent. Such as: a certain ritual is performed 'over' the salt...the salt becomes that particular ritual; and therefore can easily become an ingredient in another ritual.

I doubt very seriously if the ritual performed over the salt you used was a rite to make holy water or for preparation for baptism. [sigh]

So, thanks anyway!

When I described the Holy Grail as being the Sacred Cup of the Last Supper which symbolises ultimate union with God you responded to those words by saying they are a bit materialistic.

Obviously, the Cup used by Christ was and remains a material object, albeit being much more than an object, but this is surely not what is implied by your reply, or do you always state the obvious?

The Catholic Rite for making Holy Water is always the same; whether the use is for baptism, blessing, healing or exorcism.

Salt as a purifying, protective barrier is also sometimes employed by exorcists, including Catholic exorcists.

I am frequently indebted to the traditional Catholic Encyclopedia. A better source would be difficult to find and, unlike Wikipedia, I thoroughly recommend it.

Wikipedia I have found too often to be a source of misinformation which remains uncorrected. Even when attempts are made these are thwarted by those whose agenda lies elsewhere.

That notwithstanding, those of my own generation tend to both prefer and adhere to the traditions of an older and altogether more polite period of history.

Its a shame that we've only known you for so short a time here on the Forum so we cannot really tell whether or not you are possessed of a sense of humour.
Your rose-tinted recall of the halcyon days of a more polite period of history might be construed as dripping with heavy irony.
As a spikey and defensive poster you certainly are in the same league as Roscoe. He's just a grumpy and obstinate scientist. He makes no claim to be a man of God.
Now that we can begin to calibrate your episcopal demeanour your brief stay will, no doubt, be highly entertaining, if nothing else.

Hope you have a great weekend!
Kind regards,
TD

sorry, re-phrase time...so you see the "Holy Grail" as a sacred cup/chalice material object?

Hello again bishop,

You said: "I would not want to get involved in just how many have been encountered for obvious reasons." Which is a bit lame.
Perhaps you haven't encountered any vampires at all

Maybe you should have spent a bit less time on fancy hats and a bit more on writing a credible account of what happened at Highgate.

Jenny.

I agree. However, the online edition of the Catholic Encyclopedia has not been without mistakes. At one time the online edition showed the Battle of Bannockburn as having been fought in November...totally removing the importance of the battle being fought at Summer Solstice.

As always, it is best to check as many different sources as can be reliably found.

Bishop, shall we get to the chase? I think we should.

I've asked the one to whom you do not speak, who believes the Highgate entity to be a ghost, what he thinks a ghost might actually be.

Here's my question to you. On what basis do you believe vampires actually exist? Outside of a wonderful heritage of books, movies, and TV shows? I have seen people on the Jerry Springer show who claim to drink blood. They usually wear Goth clothing and just strike me as eccentric.

They seem to be folkloric creatures, not unlike the werewolf, to whom they are often compared. Yet there are few people who claim werewolves exist anywhere outside of the realm of legend. Generally books discussing such things suggest that while there may be rare conditions that render people extremely hirsute, thus starting the "wolf man" legends, there is no reality to werewolves. As for zombies, those legends started in Haiti, and to make a long story short, it seems like my colleague Wade Davis has come up with an answer for how and where such thing started.

Aside from the question of whether or not the Highgate entity was a vampire, or if there even was an entity, my main question to you is why you think vampires are real, and what evidence would you present to suggest they are?

BTW, I do know that exorcism has been a rite of ecclesiastics, but vampire hunting, per se, the church has generally left to the Van Helsings of this world.

Incidentally, it appears the official Catholic position on vampires is that they are mythical.

http://www.catholic-vision.org/catholic ... n-vampires

But then, you are in schism.

EDIT: and, I see, you appear to believe in werewolves, as well.
http://www.gothicpress.freeserve.co.uk/Werewolves.htm

Do you also deal with the Frankenstein monster?

Seeker1:

Frankenstein was the Doctor/Scientest the monster was his creation.

I refer to the time of my own childhood and early adulthood. Halcyon indeed.

http://pathofreconciliation.blogspot.com/2009/11/share-your-reconciliation-reflections.html

I thought I had when I penned The Highgate Vampire which has received accolades aplenty from accredited researchers and scholars.

My fancy hat, as you call it, is a biretta, which is the religious headwear for Anglo-Catholics, traditional Old Catholics, traditional Roman Catholics and a variety of other Catholics within denominations found in both eastern and western hemispheres.

Your unwelcome and certainly unprovoked derision is heading in a direction some will find uncomfortable. Were I rabbi, mullah or Hindu priest, I somehow doubt this derogatory reference to religious attire would be made.

What you call the official Catholic position is actually the liberal position held by most modernists in the post-Vatican II Roman Catholic Church, prior to which you would find the reverse to be true. Traditional Catholics, like their Eastern Orthodox counterparts, mostly susbscribe to the existence of vampires as I understand them, ie predatory demonic manifestations requiring blood to sustain their materialisation.

The overwhelming majority of chroniclers of vampires, authors on vampirism, pursuers of vampires and vampire exorcists down the centuries have been clergy in all the mainstream denominations.

The notion of vampirism has existed for millennia; cultures such as the Mesopotamians, Hebrews, Ancient Greeks and Romans had tales of demons and spirits that are considered the same phenomenon as modern vampires. The entity we know today is best identified with that found in early 18th century Southeastern Europe when traditions of the multi-ethnic groups of the region were recorded and published. In most cases, vampires are revenants of evil beings, but they can also be created by a malevolent spirit possessing a corpse or by a victim being bitten by a vampire, though being bitten as a cause is considered the exception rather than the rule. Belief in vampires became so pervasive that in some areas it caused panics and mass vampire exorcisms where graveyards squelched with blood. Although vampiric entities have been recorded in most cultures, the term vampire was not popularised until the early 18th century following the influx of vampire reports from areas where vampire cases were frequent, such as the Balkans and Eastern Europe, although local variants were also known by different names, such as vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania. Vampires are recorded in England as far back as the 12th century in Historia Rerum Anglicarum by William of Newburgh (1136-1208) which tells of "the extraordinary happening when a dead man wandered abroad out of his grave."

"If ever there was in the world a warranted and proven history, it is that of vampires: nothing is lacking, official reports, testimonials of persons of standing, of surgeons, of clergymen, of judges; the judicial evidence is all-embracing."

- Jean Jacques Rousseau, “Lettre à Mgr. de Beaumont, Archevêque de Paris,” (Annex to the Contrat social) Librairie Garnier Frères, Paris, p489.

Sorry if I offended you Bishop,

It wasn't just your purple biretta I was referring to, you also sported an amazing African Kufi hat during your birthday bash in July!


Knowing me it probably would! I haven't got anything against your church, at least it is not run by the bearded, left-wing puppet that my church calls its leader.


Best wishes,
Jenny.

Why yes Bishop, I understand.

There are legends of such things existing throughout the world. We agree on that.

There are also legends of unicorns, dragons, centaurs, satyrs, sea serpents, pegasi, and bunyips. That does not mean legends of these creatures establish their existence.

As you may have heard, the modern world is a bit more demanding. Of multiply witnessed eyewitness testimony, video and photo recordings, other hard scientific evidence. Really, I was wondering what you've got of that type.

[quote="Jenny"]
It wasn't just your purple biretta I was referring to, you also sported an amazing African Kufi hat during your birthday bash in July!

Knowing me it probably would! I haven't got anything against your church, at least it is not run by the bearded, left-wing puppet that my church calls its leader.


Best wishes,
Jenny.[/quote]

Hello Jenny, Welcome.
Just so we can understand who has joined in the flurry of activity around the Bishop:
Were you
A. A guest at the party ?
B. Waitering at the party?
C. A gatecrasher at the party?
D. An onlooker?
E. Read it in Hello ! ?
F. None of the above?
Many thanks,
TD

Edited to improve dreadful syntax and add another option for Jenny, friend to Prelates and international girl of mystery.

"Rumors Swirl as Teapot Cozy Goes Missing"

Some people seem to have it in for his hat -
You can see the lovely Kufi here...

http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgur ... X%26um%3D1

And some footage from a Discovery programme where the Bishop gets to speak for himself -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7O6Vh7o9l_c&feature=fvw