Successful Summer School at Ardingley College

The St Catherine's Trust for Traditional Catholic Education held its sixth Annual Summer School from Sunday 1st to Sunday 8th August 2010 at Ardingley College in West Sussex. It was attended by 40 enthusiastic students aged from 11 to 18, and a volunteer staff of 16 including a chaplain Fr Andrew Southwell. The students studied a range of subjects covering every aspect of Catholic belief, history and culture and heard a piano recital by the professional pianist Matthew Schellhorn, and a talk from the Catholic journalist Dominic Scarborough. There was daily Sung Mass in the Extraordinary Form, including a Mass in Arundel Cathedral, by permission of Bishop Kieran Conry. As part of the Summer School the Latin Mass Society held its first residential Latin course, directed by Philip Goddard, the LMS's adviser on Latin, which made use of the LMS's teach yourself Latin primer,'Simplicissimus'. The course was based on the Latin in the liturgy, and examples and exercises were taken from liturgical texts. Students were divided into 'Beginners' and 'Intermediates', although all joined together for lectures on psalmody and liturgical poetry, the history of liturgical texts, and Latin in Philosophy. Students were delighted with the amount of Latin they were able to absorb, describing the course as "transforming" and "enriching" their engagement with the liturgy of the Church. Doctor Joseph Shaw, Chairman of the LMS, said: "The Summer School is always exhausting but exhilarating; it is inspiring to see so many children being so prayerful. This is surely what Pope Benedict wants as part of the re-evangelisation of Europe." The St Catherine's Trust Summer School is financially supported by the Latin Mass Society and other benefactors, and accepts students regardless of their ability to pay. Next year it will be held in Ushaw College in Co Durham from Sunday 23rd July to Sunday 30th July 2011: see www.stcatherinestrust.org for more details.