Yes, it’s an Anglo-Saxonist’s favorite week of the sanctoral cycle. Let’s dust off those feast day books and get ready…

May 19–Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury and one of the main architects of the Benedictine Revival

May 20–Alcuin, the learned Deacon of York, right-hand man of Charlemagne who brought liturgical uniformity and better orthography to the liturgy and Scriptures

May 25–Bede, my personal patron, the “Candle of the Church” as Wynfrith, er, Boniface, put it so well

May 26–Augustine of Canterbury, first archbishop of Canterbury

Not only that, this year the Temporale aligns perfectly too; the 22nd, 23rd and 24th are the Rogation Days! Gangweek as it was known was an intensive time of catechesis and long processions with relics which included the custom of (I kid you not) slamming the heads and other body parts of the youths of the community into the various trees, rocks and other hard obstacles that served as boundary markers. Apparently Angl-Saxon peasant pedagogy felt that you wouldn’ forget where the field boundaries were if you were slammed into them enough times…