Pope Benedict XVI in the Czech Republic

It is interesting to see that Pope Benedict XVI is addressing a number of his well known themes during his visit to the Czech Republic. Whilst this should not be a surprise, it is interesting to see these themes still coming to the fore in a country whose culture is now decidedly non-religious. Vaclav Hawel, though not himself a religious believer, did recognise in a positive way the part played by religious believers in the unofficial "civil society" of the communist era. When we visited Prague about a year ago, it was quite striking to see such small numbers at Mass (in St Vitus Cathedral on the Solemnity of All Saints and at St Gabriels on a Sunday). The shrine of Our Lady of Victories, where the statue of the Infant of Prague "lives", attracts more visitors. The Czech's own awareness of their recent history is more focussed around figures like Jan Palach, not I understand a religious believer, but in some sense a secular version of a saint. In my post about Jan Palach I reflected on a possible indifference of Czech society today to its past.

In this context, Pope Benedict is recalling Catholic figures from the history of the Czech lands: St Wenceslaus, St Ludmilla, St John Nempomuk and more recent confessors:

I recall the experiences of two Archbishops of this local Church, Cardinals Josef Beran and František Tomášek, and of many Bishops, priests, men and women religious, and lay faithful, who resisted Communist persecution with heroic fortitude, even to the sacrifice of their lives.

Noting that the president of the Czech Republic wishes to see a greater role for religion in the life of the country, Pope Benedict ended his address during the welcome ceremony at the airport in Prague with these words:

The authentic progress of humanity is best served by just such a combination of the wisdom of faith and the insights of reason. May the Czech people always enjoy the benefits of that happy synthesis.

The texts of Pope Benedict's addresses at the airport in Prague, and in St Vitus Cathedral, in which he addresses the themes of the Christian heritage of the Czech lands, the witness of Catholics during communist persecution and the challenges of increasing secularisation in Czech society, can be found here and here, on the Vatican website.

Prague 8: Seven Men at Daybreak

"Seven Men at Daybreak" is the title of a book by Alan Burgess. It tells the story of a group of Czech resistance fighters who were parachuted into then German occupied Czechoslovakia to kill Reinhard Heydrich, the SS officer who commanded occupied Czechoslovakia. A film "Operation Daybreak" was based on the book.

The mission to kill Heydrich was, as I have understood it, an operation initiated by the leaders of the Czech government in exile in London, headed be Edvard Benese. In part at least, their motiviation was to enhance their own standing in relation to the allied powers by bringing off a high profile assassination. The British trained the fighters involved and parachuted them into Czechoslovakia - I suspect they were willing to support a mission that would cause problems for the Germans in occupied Europe. I can't help but be a little cynical about the pragmatism of Benese's decision, and this has been reinforced by reading Vaclav Havel's account (follow the link from this page)of Benese's stance with regard to both the Nazi's before the Second World War and the communists afterwards.

At the time of the mission, Czechoslovakia was one of the most docile of the territories occupied by the Germans, something the British were quite keen to see change. This made it a difficult mission, as the parachutists could not rely on support except from the most determined Czechs in Prague and the nearby area. After Heydrich's death, and the German retaliations against the Czech population, there was a wave of support for the Czechoslovak people and a strengthening of anti-German feeling in the world at large. The Western powers repudiated the Munich accords, which had ceded part of Czechoslovakia to Germany, something that no doubt delighted the Czech government in exile.

The attempt on Heydrich's life in a Prague street did not go to plan. A Sten gun jammed at the key moment, and it was the back up of hand grenade thrown into his car which eventually killed him. Heydrich died three days later, of blood poisoning caused by fragments driven into his body from the exploding hand grenade. The German retaliation is estimated to have killed some five thousand Czechoslovak citizens, in Prague and elsewhere. The most notorious part of this massacre was the destruction of the village of Lidice - burnt to the ground, and its citizens either executed or sent to concentration camps.

The parachutists were eventually cornered in the crypt of the Orthodox church of St Cyril and Methodius on Resslova street. They fought to the end of their ammunition, and then killed themselves rather than be captured by the Germans.

This crypt is now a museum and memorial to all those who died in the German retaliation after the death of Reinhard Heydrich. The memorial below is in the wall of the crypt, above an opening through which the Germans pumped water and smoke in attempts to force the Czech fighters to surrender.

Inside the crypt itself, we saw a number of small wreaths and crosses left in memory of those who died there. The parachutists are still seen very much as heroes who died for the freedom of their country.

Note: the above account is based on memories of reading "Seven Men at Daybreak" (many years ago) and on the content of the displays in the museum at the crypt.

Prague 7: "I don't want to die like Tycho Brahe"

Apparently - or at least according to one of the guide books that we took to Prague with us - this is the English translation of a colloquial Czech phrase meaning that one needs to visit the toilet. How true this is, I have no way of knowing. If we assume it is true, I don't know whether it is a polite expression to use or a rude one - so herewith my apologies if necessary.

Tycho Brahe (1547-1601) was a Danish astronomer. He had built an observatory on the island of Uraniburg where, for twenty years, he undertook the precise series of astronomical observations which were probably his greatest contribution to the development of astronomy at the time, and certainly the envy of Johannes Kepler. Tycho also produced a theory of the motion of the planets that was an alternative to Copernicus theory of a system with a stationary sun at the centre. Tycho's theory had a stationary Earth at the centre, with the Sun going round the earth. All the other planets known at the time - Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn - moved in orbits round the Sun (which was going round the earth). This theory could account for the astronomical observations of the time. [Further reading: I Bernard Cohen The Birth of a New Physics p.78 footnote.]

Tycho Brahe might have been a very precise and careful observational astronomer. But he appears to have been a spectacularly unpleasant character. He lost a part of his nose during a duel as a student, and acquired an artificial nose made of silver and gold (according to Arthur Koestler's The Sleepwalkers, made of tin according to our guide book) to fill the missing part. He eventually got completely the wrong side of the authorities in Denmark, and went into exile, along with his haughty and arrogant personality, finally finding his way to Prague. There he met and worked with Kepler, through a fraught professional relationship.

In Prague, Tycho Brahe was the Imperial Mathematicus to the Emperor Rudolph II - some sort of equivalent to an Astronomer Royal in the UK. In theory, this attracted a very handsome salary; in practice Tycho Brahe had to fight for his pay, as the Emperor's finance's weren't in a brilliant state.

Tycho Brahe is buried in the Church of Our Lady at the Tyn, just off the main town square in Prague. We were able to visit him there, though I am not sure what other visitors made of us trying to spot the artificial nose on the sculpture on his gravestone (now mounted on a pillar overlooking the grave itself).

The traditional story of Tycho Brahe's death is cited, from the original document, in Arthur Koestler's The Sleepwalkers:

Tycho Brahe, in the company of Master Minkowitz, ahd dinner at the illustrious Rosenberg's table, and held back his water beyond the demands of courtesy. When he drank more, he felt the tension in his bladder increase, but he put politeness before his health. When he got home he was scarcely able to urinate ... After five sleepless nights, he could still only pass his water with the greatest pain, and even so the passage was impeded ... On 24th October, his delirium ceased for several hours, nature conquered and he expired peacefully.

This account has passed into folklore as a death from a ruptured bladder, and hence the reported Czech expression. The suggestion of politenss attributed to Tycho Brahe doesn't ring true with the rest of his reported behaviour. According to the web, recent studies of Tycho Brahe's hair during an exhumation suggest that he actually died of mercury poisoning. How boring ...

Prague 6: the Municipal House

The Municipal House is the foremost Art Nouveau building in Prague. As well as housing a cafe and a famous restaurant, it also houses a large concert hall (the Smetana hall). If you like tiling, this is the place for you.

Zero's "portrait" in a foyer area of the building.

One for a lover of tiling!

This is my attempt to be artistic with the mirrors on the stair way.

This photo of the bar has been taken from the web, as mine was a bit blurred.

Now, somewhere I am sure there must be a Church built and decorated in this style ...

Prague 5: Exclusive - St Gabriel's Church, Smichov

I am claiming this as a blog exclusive on the grounds that I doubt that any other English visitors to Prague have found this Church, or, having found it, have been able to find it open, or, having found it open, have been able to go to Mass there. We managed all of this! I understand that the Church is open on Sunday mornings, for Mass at 11.15 am. There was a young and energetic priest saying Mass; I think he was newly appointed to the Church and anxious to develop the life of the congregation. Mass was sung, in Czech, with black vestments for All Souls. A decade of the Rosary and the Salve Regina before the altar of Our Lady at the end of Mass.

I first learnt about this Church from reading a book about the Beuron School of Art (I believe the book is still in print, and I obtained it with little difficulty by ordering it through a local bookshop), which made a reference to St Gabriel's as being important because it is the most complete, surviving work of Desiderius Lenz, the monk who is seen as the founder of the Beuron School. It was a conversation about this Church that prompted Zero to comment, "Well, let's go to Prague then", though is is probably overstating things to say that it was the purpose for our going.

I first encountered the Beuron School when I visited the Abbey of St Hildegard, Eibingen, during a visit to my parish's twin parish in Germany. The guided tour of the Church on the Abbey website gives an excellent first glance at the Beuron School and its implementation at St Hildegard's. Do explore the whole tour, as it is catechetically and Liturgically superb. There is quite a technical understanding of the principles of the Beuron School - a relation to Egyptian representation of human figures, a complex geometric rule for the representation of male and female figures that is explicitly linked to what we would now talk about as male-female gender complementarity in Adam/Eve and in Christ/Mary - but it is not necessary to follow all this in order to appreciate the work of the Beuron School.

I next encountered it during a visit to the Abbey at Monte Cassino. The crypt, particularly enshrining the tombs of St Benedict and St Scholastica, is decorated in the Beuron style. A good account of the crypt, including pictures can be found here.

According to Wikimedia:

Church of Saint Gabriel (more precisely Church of Annunciation) and adjacent abbey in Prague-Smíchov (in Czechia) were built at the end of the 19th century and belonged to the Order of Saint Benedict. In 1919, after the declaration of Czechoslovak Republic, Benedictine sisters left for Austria and sold the buildings to the Czechoslovak Ministry of Postal Services. In present, both the church and the abbey belong to Czech Post.

Though the photographs may make the Church appear bright and well maintained, I am not sure that substantial effort is being made to preserve the paintings. Some of the paintings, particularly in the nave, appeared to be darkened and faded. I haven't been able to find anything in English on the web, so herewith some photographs, either scanned from post cards, found on Czech sites or taken myself. If I have time, I will try to post more about the Church later.

This full picture is taken from a post card, and makes the paintings look much brighter than they are now. The grille that you can see on the right is also no longer there, but the arrangement of the high altar has not been changed. I loved the image of the Father in the apse (the text either side of the image reads "I am who am", though you can't see it on this picture), so that, offering Mass at the altar, there is a real representation of the offering being made "to the Father". Over the arch you have the Lamb, standing above the new Jerusalem with its towers and four streams of life; the saints in their white dress approach offering incense in adoration of the Lamb. The text beneath reads: "Blessed are they who have washed their clothes in the blood of the Lamb". This, and the many other images of saints in the Church, gave a real sense of the Liturgy being a presence of heaven on earth

This is my own photograph of the sanctuary as it was for Sunday Mass. You can see the angels around the side of the apse - giving a real sense of a Liturgy that is first of all a heavenly Liturgy, and then a Liturgy that is celebrated on earth.

These two statues, of the Angel Gabriel and the Virgin Mary, face each other across the Sanctuary - you can see them in the photograph above. They look strikingly modern - particularly the stance of the Virgin - but I think they date from the same time as the decoration of the Church. On the column beneath St Gabriel you have the words "Hail, full of grace" and beneath the Virgin Mary "Behold the handmaid of the Lord" - and this represented across the altar at which, during the celebration of Mass, the Lord again becomes flesh under the forms of bread and wine.

The most striking image in the Church is that of the Virgin Mary, Seat of Wisdom. This is behind the high altar, beneath the painting of the Father in the apse. It can be seen from the nave, framed by the four columns that support the baldechino over the altar.

St Joseph blurred a little bit, I am afraid, but I have to put him in!

Prague 4: C & A and trams

We tended to make use of the tram system more than the buses or metro during our stay. All rather more fun than one is generally used to, here in the UK. (I have yet to ride on Croydon or Manchester trams - and I suspect Blackpool's trams are being allowed to fall into decay rather than being the subject of investment). Zero didn't quite get the hang of waiting for the tram in the middle of the road, as was necessary at stops like that shown in the first picture, and sometimes had to be retrieved from the pavement. And that was before worrying about which direction we wanted to go ...

Prague 3: Charles Bridge

This is the place to be seen in Prague (if you are a tourist - I doubt the locals go anywhere near it). As you cross it you pass a series of statues of different saints, on both sides of the bridge. And lots of portrait sketching or busking musicians. While we were there, about half of one side of the bridge was behind fencing and plastic sheeting for repair. This channelled the pedestrian crowd into an even narrower passage and hid a number of the saints. Needless to say, most of the crowd just ignored the saints.

The Calvary half way across the bridge is particularly lovely. My apologies to the group for catching them in the photo - but my other photo clipped the top off the crucifix.

As we came off the bridge, a pigeon posed for a photo opportunity.

Prague 1: Jan Palach and the state of Czech society

We made it to Prague -and back again. It was interesting to visit two sites associated with Jan Palach - the memorial in Wenceslaus Square, at the spot where he set himself on fire, and his grave in the Olsanske cemetery.

Jan Palach set himself on fire in January 1969, protesting against the Soviet invasion and occupation of then Czechoslovakia the previous August. He died a few days later. His suicide note indicated the reason for his suicide. A month later, another student, Jan Zajic also committed suicide at the same spot. Both names appear on the memorial cross at the site in Wenceslaus Square. Whilst their protest had a direct purpose in opposing the Soviet occupation of their country, it also expressed a protest against the lack of freedom of people under a communist regime.

An immediate reflection is that their suicide is not morally justified, and that one should not therefore celebrate it. On the other hand, as Vaclav Havel writes, a feature of "living in the truth" within the context of the lies of an imposed totalitarian state is the willingness to pay the ultimate price for a defence or exercise of freedom against the regime. The memory of Jan Palach in particular has become part of the Czech consciousness.

Jan Palach's grave in the Olsanske cemetery quickly became a place of pilgrimage. The communist authorities then exhumed his remains, cremated them, and sent them to his mother in their home village. Another person was buried in the grave - but it still continued as a shrine to Jan Palach. After the fall of communism, the ashes were returned to the original grave.

Visiting both sites left me with a mixed assessment of Czech society. As we visited the site in Wenceslaus Square after dinner one evening, another group of visitors were just leaving as we arrived. So Jan Palach seems to be definitely remembered. However, the vast majority of visitors to the square, both tourists and Czechs, simply pass on their daily business with little attention to the memorial. Similarly, at the cemetery there were three or four other visitors during the time we were there, one person in particular staying for a while and leaving a lighted candle. Again, I got the impression he was remembered, but not by everyone.

Is Czech society becoming indifferent to its painful recent history?