Intertwined: Plants and the Religious Imagination

23 January 2019
7.30pm, Old Library 
Monastic Brewing: Its History and Future
Mr Roger Protz, beer writer 
 

Belgium has a rich diversity of beer and is famous for the ales brewed by monks in six Trappist monasteries. Leading beer writer Roger Protz has visited all six monasteries and has been permitted to tour the breweries and interview abbots and the monks who make the beer and to unravel the fascinating story of how they came to brew. Other Trappists are following in the Belgian monks' footsteps. In the summer of 2018, monks at Mount St Bernard Abbey in Leicestershire launched their interpretation of a Trappist beer. Monks in Massachusetts in the United States are brewing, too, while a Trappist monastery in Rome has also followed suit. Roger Protz will discuss the history of monastic brewing and the styles now being produced.

6 February 2019
7.30pm, Old Library 
‘Ne’er had the apple taken been’: Plants in Christian Iconography
The Revd Canon Professor John Rodwell

Faiths themselves determine, one way or another, which aspects of their beliefs and practice, if any, may be represented symbolically.  And the diversity of the plant kingdom - its particular species, its patterns and processes - is among the sources which suggest and mediate the form symbols can take.  This talk will explore how this negotiation has worked through the ages among Christian iconography, for the delight of the senses, to challenge the imagination and for the salvation of souls.

John Rodwell has been an Anglican priest and natural scientist together for over forty years.  He was Professor of Plant Ecology at Lancaster University but now works independently for environmental agencies across Europe and on research at the interface of science and theology.   

20 February 2019
7.30pm, Old Library 
Monastic Herbals and Medieval Medicine
The Very Revd Oswald McBride OSB

When St Benedict wrote his Rule for Monks c.540 AD, he included a short chapter on the care of the Sick Brethren, establishing an Infirmary in each community with its guardian, the Infirmarian. This evangelical concern for the sick and elderly began a relationship between monks and medicine which lasted more than 900 years in England. Each community probably had its “leechbook” and its “herbal”, giving details of procedures and potions – many of them plant-based – and many of these survived the Dissolution. This talk will aim to give some account of this important relationship between mediaeval monks and medicine, using some of the extant manuscripts as guide and illustration.

The Very Rev. Dr Oswald McBride is a Benedictine monk of Ampleforth Abbey in Yorkshire. He studied Medicine at Edinburgh, and worked as a Junior Doctor in Scotland, before joining the monastic community in 1991. After many years teaching Biology and Health Education at Ampleforth College, he is now Prior and Chaplain at St Benet’s Hall, Oxford.