Static Website on its way out

Posted on Tuesday, 17 February, 2026 by Fr Anthony Chadwick

I have cancelled the website As the Sun in its Orb for reasons of the host’s subscriptions tripling over the past couple of years. Here are the two main pages, but many of the links will soon be dead. If you write a comment and ask me for the text in question, I will send it. The links to outside sites will still work.

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The Use of Sarum

The Church of Salisbury shines as the sun in its orb among the Churches of the whole world in its divine service and those who minister it, and by spreading its rays everywhere makes up for the defects of others. Bishop Giles de Bridport c.1256

This page has been around for about eight years, during which quite a lot of water flowed under the bridge. In 2005, I joined the TAC directly under Archbishop Hepworth’s Patrimony of the Primate and attended the College of Bishops meeting in Portsmouth in October 2007, officially as a translator. Bishop Peter Elliott, an Australian Roman Catholic prelate and former Anglican, encouraged hopes that Sarum would at least be an option in the yet future Ordinariates. Disillusioned in late 2011 and 2012 and “orphaned” by the Archbishop’s downfall, I did not apply to the Ordinariate but joined the ACC in April 2013. At this stage, I separate my work of reviving the Use of Sarum from my ecclesiastical title as a priest. I celebrate the Use of Sarum with the blessing of my Bishop, but it is not my Church’s official rite.

Time has shaped and developed my essential philosophy of this question, my attitude in regard to liturgical codification and reform as was characteristic of the Reformation;, the Counter-Reformation and the Liturgical Movement of the twentieth century. I go into these considerations in my introduction, because Sarum and other historical local rites are not for me a mere subject of academic study.

The question of reviving the present-day use of the Sarum liturgy is one of both love and hate. Most Anglicans and Roman Catholics, especially English and American, have been trained that positive law and authority outweigh jurisprudence and immemorial custom. There is also the notion that a custom falls if it is not maintained continuously, leaving only the 1570-1962 Roman liturgy, the Novus Ordo, the various Anglican Prayer Books or the new or experimental service books containing creations by liturgical “experts”. For me and a few others, there is a true need to revive medieval liturgical usages in the same spirit as the rites of Milan, the Dominicans, Rouen and the prevailing situation in France up to the mid nineteenth century (some remnants of local usages survived in areas like Normandy until the 1990’s).

There is no prospect of any large-scale revival of Sarum, even in the Continuing Anglican Churches. It will be gone again when I “kick the bucket” and my own use of it is irrelevant since I do not have a stable community of clerics and lay people. The greatest hope is continuing the work of university dons in the mid nineteenth century, men like Percy Dearmer and those who were influenced by the Arts & Crafts movement that fell into irrelevance on the outbreak of World War I. This site is intended to help keep the pot simmering, as is the purpose of some sites to which I link.

Sarum liturgical books are hard to find, and when they do turn up as rare books in second-hand bookshops, the asking price is often high. The Latin edition by Dickinson and the English editions by Warren and Pearson are available from the Internet in pdf format. It suffices to collate the pages into a DTP programme and bind the books. Work is being done to publish Sarum texts and the plainchant books for both the Mass and the Office.

This part of my site is dedicated to promoting the Use of Sarum and helping readers to understand its significance in the Anglican patrimony as a liturgical standard for supplementing familiar Anglican rites and usages, the Prayer Book in particular.

I will add files to this page from time to time, and will also collate valuable material from my Sarum e-mail list and its archives.

Facebook groups

Use of Sarum with 448 members as of September 2016. Another group worth joining is Medieval Catholicism and Culture with 2,569 members.

Blog posts on Sarum and Liturgy

Major Resources

  • The Sarum Rite by Dr William Renwick. This is a monumental ongoing project of making the Sarum Missal and Breviary, complete with the plainsong notation from the Gradual and Antiphoner, available for practical use and study. These books are being done both in Latin and classical English. This site also contains a liturgical calendar for each year following the Gregorian computation. All pages can be downloaded in pdf format.
  • Vitrearum’s Medieval Art – “Articles, links and features about all aspects of medieval and medieval revival church art.” Rev’d Allan Barton.
  • My own ongoing project of compiling a complete Sarum missal designed to be practical at the altar (keeping cross references to a minimum). The translation is that of Canon Warren (see below) and the King James Bible for the lessons, epistles and gospels. These are unfinished compilations in Word (doc) format: Temporal and Sanctoral. These texts may be copied into booklets or other formats as needed. I have just added the Order of Mass in its full version with the rubrics and a simplified version for use at the altar which presumes that the priest has learned the ceremonies.

Most of the links below from archive.org open pages with available texts (no longer under copyright) in various formats including pdf or text format for re-editing and printing.

 

Videos and Practical

 

Further reflections

Please note, as mentioned above, these “reflections” were written in 2011-2012 when I was in the TAC and Archbishop Hepworth’s situation was not yet clear. There were still naïve hopes that Anglicanorum coetibus would involve the corporate union of the TAC with Rome in spite of Archbishop Hepworth’s irregular situation as a former Roman Catholic priest and being divorced and remarried. Having left the TAC to join the ACC, I am no longer thinking in that perspective (the Ordinariates are what they are), but I see little point in rewriting these articles. We all change as circumstances force us to evolve and learn in life.

 

To study the Use of Sarum

I recommend the following links to articles about Sarum (academic and historical):

Files to copy onto your hard disk

Right button of your mouse – Save target as…

Practical Sarum Revival work – Victorian Ritualism and in our own time : links to choral groups, interested laymen and priests

Victorian Ritualist era

[Note: Percy Dearmer did not attempt to revive the Use of Sarum, but to adapt the Prayer Book by the introduction of Sarum customs.]

Contemporary

“NIHIL OPERI DEI PRAEPONATUR”

Let nothing be preferred to the Work of God

(Rule of Saint Benedict, 43)

Home page

 

Reform of the Reform

In this section, I will be publishing some of my own reflections together with other Roman Catholic and Anglican commentators.

History of the Liturgy

Here are a few links on topics related to liturgical history.

Victorian Anglican Ritualism

This following link from the Canterbury Project gives information on some of the leading protagonists of Victorian Anglican ritualism together with some texts from the period.

 

Musical Resources for the liturgy in English and Latin

  • Musica Sacra – The “Chant Books” section is amazing, as is this whole site.

 

The Reforms of Pius XII and John XXIII

The reforms to the Missal and Breviary in the 1950’s and early 60’s were not universally welcomed, as attested by a criticism dating from 1960.

The Post-Conciliar Reforms

The reforms by Paul VI and John Paul II have caused a considerable amount of contestation. I include here a paper on the subject that expresses original thought.

The Roman Rite

Since the summer of 2007, there are two officially recognised “uses” of the Roman rite in the Roman Catholic Church: the “extraordinary use” (1570-1962) and the “ordinary use” (1969).

  • The Canonical Mass of the English Orthodox by Dr. Raymond Winch (pdf file). This was an attempt dating from 1988 at reconstructing the Mass of Ordo Romanus Primus and the Gregorian Sacramentary for use in a western rite Orthodox context.
  • The Latin Rite Mass – what was in use in the Roman Catholic Church until Vatican II, and still used by a number of traditionalist communities. In 1969 Pope Paul VI replaced it by a newly composed Novus Ordo.
  • Roman Rite (1570) – amost identical with the Ordo Missae of the 1474 Princeps Edition, broadly speaking a restoration of the Roman liturgy of the 11th century, but with a number of new elements derived from existing use and scholastic theology. It was codified by Pope St Pius V following the directives of the Council of Trent.
  • Tridentine Latin Mass Project – a site containing texts from the Roman Missal in Latin and English.
  • Novus Ordo (1969) – the work of Msgr Annabile Bugnini and the Consilium, promulgated by Paul VI in 1969. This artificial rite is now the official usage of the Roman Catholic Church (“Latin” Rite), and its refusal motivated the existence of a traditionalist movement. The Vatican allows the usage of the 1962 edition of John XXIII (simplified calendar and rubrics, new 1955 Holy Week ceremonies of Bugnini / Pius XII)
  • Altar cards for the old Roman Mass (Latin) in Microsoft Publisher 2000 format : file – Click with your right mouse button to save the file onto your hard disk. Note: this file works only with MS Publisher (part of the Office 2000 package). You must adapt the printer and page setup parameters to your own system, and you can change the text style and size within the contraints of the text frames and general size desired. Click here for the altarcards in pdf format – but this file cannot be modified and is designed for European A4 paper format. Then print the cards on off-white or cream coloured paper and frame them.
  • Learn how to celebrate the Tridentine Mass (the same rules apply to the English Missal)

Non-Roman Latin Rites

  • Lyons Rite – of the Archdiocese of Lyons (France) and surrounding area. St Jean Viannay, the Curé d’Ars, celebrated according to this rite. Note certain similarities with the Dominican rite.
  • Dominican Rite – the rite of the Order of Preachers. It is used by the Fraternity of St. Vincent Ferrer (Chemeré-le-Roi, France), by the SSPX Dominicans at Avrillé near Angers, France, and by a few Dominican priests in Rome and elsewhere. It is strikingly similar to Sarum and other diocesan uses, but is based on 13th century Roman usage.
  • The Dominican Liturgy Blog – Fr. Augustine Thompson OP
  • Ambrosian Rite – the rite of the Archdiocese of Milan until its reform on Novus Ordo lines around 1970. It had been used in much of the north of Italy and Switzerland, and a few parts of southern France. It was found used in the English parish of Telford in the 15th century. We are informed that there are some textual errors in this page. Use www.google.com to find alternative versions.
  • Mozarabic Rite (Toledo, Spain) – the rite of the Cathedral of Toledo, Spain, used once a year in a special chapel since being replaced by the Roman Rite.

The Use of Sarum

 

Post-Reformation Anglican Liturgies

  • I have added this small section dedicated to the diverse world of Anglican liturgies. I have counted the Use of Sarum as an Anglican rite, since it was used during the Henrican schism from 1534 to 1549 before being replaced by Cranmer’s first reformed Prayer Book.
  • The Anglican Use of the Pastoral Provision – a special rite of Mass authorized by Rome in 1980 for a handful of convert Episcopalian parishes in the USA. It includes the offertory rite and the Consecration formula from the Novus Ordo, but with a classical English translation of the Roman Canon.
  • An Anglican Liturgical Library – all the Rites used in the Worldwide Anglican Communion
  • The Book of Common Prayer – another resource, from the Use of Sarum to the most modern rites
  • Anglican Breviary – promoting the traditional Latin Rite Breviary in Anglican style English and its recitation by the faithful
  • The English Office – a reprint of an extremely rare book, the Prayer Books Offices of Mattins and Evensong with additional material (antiphons, hymns, prayers, etc.).
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