David Russell Mosley Holy Week Holy Tuesday 2018 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, First it was Tintagel, now Glastonbury, Arthur seems to be rising up out of the ground of Britain. For those unfamiliar, about two years ago archaeologists discovered the remains of a 5th or 6th century palace on the grounds of Tintagel Castle (13th century ruins in Cornwall). As I noted at the time, this is important news for fans of Arthur since according... Read more
David Russell Mosley Holy Week Holy Monday 2018 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, We’re coming up on the liturgical anniversary of my reception into the Church. As Easter draws nearer I find myself reflecting on where I was a year ago. One of the hardest things for me as I was going through my confirmation class was deciding on a confirmation saint. There were so many I loved, whose writings or lives had influenced me. In... Read more
David Russell Mosley Lent 2 March 2018 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, It’s a miserable day here in New Hampshire as a nor’easter blows through the east coast. It’s a perfect day, however, to sit by the fire, maybe enjoy a nice scotch, tea, or hot chocolate (unless you gave those things up for Lent), and read a good book. Well, I just got a shipment of On the Edges of Elfland, a perfect book for... Read more
David Russell Mosley Lent 27 February 2018 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, A reader recently sent me a link to the CBC Radio article, “Jesus Christ is my chief Druid”: meet the Anglican Priest who is also a pagan. I wasn’t entirely sure what I was going to find. The image at the top of the article was of Rev. Shawn Sanford Beck. On one side there was a picture of him in robe and alb... Read more
David Russell Mosley Lent 25 February 2018 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, Lately I’ve been on something of a Malcolm Guite kick. If you’re unfamiliar with him, I highly recommend checking him out. He’s an Anglican priest, a rock n’ roller/folk artist, a poet, and a theologian. A friend pointed me to Guite’s podcast and there I listened to a series of lectures he once gave on the Inklings. His talk on Barfield was particularly inspiring... Read more
David Russell Mosley Ordinary Time 10 February 2018 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, Goodness me, where have I been? It’s been a busy few months. Teaching keeps me busy, of course (especially I work full-time at a high school and part-time at a university, teaching online). And my lovely twin three year olds also keep me plenty busy. But still, I should have been writing here more often. Mea culpa. As an update, for those who... Read more
David Russell Mosley Christmastide 2 January 2018 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, I am pleased to announce that I will be delivering a paper (more giving a presentation) entitled “Seeing Things as They Are: Reality according to the Catholic Imagination” for the group Spirited Theology in Nashua, New Hampshire on January 9th. Here’s my brief abstract for the presentation: Catholics see the world differently. As Andrew Greeley describes us, “Catholics live in an enchanted world, a... Read more
David Russell Mosley Christmastide 30 December 2017 The Edge of Elfland Hudson, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, There is a poem with which I have long been enamoured, but have not, until recently, sought to understand more. The poem is Richard Corbet’s “Farewell Rewards and Fairies.” I reproduce here for you in full: Farewell rewards and fairies Good housewives now may say, For now foul sluts in dairies Do fare as well as they; And though they sweep their hearths no... Read more
David Russell Mosley Christmastide 29 December 2017 The Edge of Elfland Manchester, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, Recently I finally purchased my own copy of Robert Kirk’s The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies. The book, which I have discussed before, is really quite fascinating. Written in the 17th century but went, seemingly unpublished until the 19th century, the book lays out how and why humans might interact with the subterranean creatures often called elves or fairies. Kirk was a... Read more
David Russell Mosley Advent 14 December 2017 The Edge of Elfland Manchester, New Hampshire Dearest Readers, I’m home with pneumonia at the moment and today is the first day I’ve had someone to take my kids to school. So I’m relaxing, by thinking about the Culture Wars. We hear so much about these wars: there’s the war on Christmas, for instance; or a general turn away from Western Civilization (whatever one may mean by that); there’s a war on traditional... Read more
Letters from the Edge of Elfland
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