The fourteenth York Catholic History Day will be held at the Bar Convent on Saturday 6th June. Last year’s programme featured three young scholars from the University of York whose papers covered a range of topics of local, national and European Catholic interest. Adam Morton spoke on ‘The Coverdale Bible: putting Holbein’s frontispiece in perspective’, Emma Watson on ‘Ringing the Changes: Popular Reaction to the Elizabethan Settlement of Religion in Yorkshire, 1560 to 1580’ and Simon Johnson on ‘Educating under Penalty: the IBVM and the Lisbon Connection’.

The talks on 6th June will cover an even wider range, chronologically and geographically. This year, the community at the Bar Convent, together with the rest of the Congregation of Jesus and the IBVM sisters world wide, are celebrating the life and achievements of their founder with the Mary Ward 400 Jubilee and it is therefore most appropriate that Sr Patricia Harriss CJ will be speaking about ‘Mary Ward through her writings’. Fr Nicholas Hird has recently completed a biographical dictionary of clergy of the Leeds Diocese and will speak about ‘Fathers of Faith: insights into the founding clergy of the Diocese of Leeds, 1878 to 1914’. Dr Simon Ditchfield, University of York, is researching Catholicism in a wider context and his title is ‘A Catholic Reformation for the 21st century: the making of Roman Catholicism as a world religion 1500 to 1700?’

The History Days are sponsored by the Postgate Society, the Catholic Record Society and the English Catholic History Association and attract an audience whose interests include Catholic, local, national and family history. The programme on the 6th June begins at 10.30 am, with coffee from 10.00 am, and closes with the vigil Mass in the Bar Convent chapel at 5.00 pm. The cost is £13.50, students £6.00, including tea and coffee in the morning and afternoon. Further information is available from Judith Smeaton, tel (01904) 704525, judith.smeaton@btinternet.com