Russell and Carol - hayle and hearty

November 1 marked as All Saints' Day, and in the pre-Reformation calendars the last day of October was marked All Hallow Eve, and the 2nd of November as All Souls'; indicating clearly a three days' festival of the dead, commencing in the evening, and originally regulated by the Pleiades—an emphatic testimony how much astronomy has been mixed up with the rites and customs even of the English of[Pg 125] to-day. In former days the relics were more numerous, in the Hallowe'en torches of the Irish, the bonfires of the Scotch, the coel-coeth fires of the Welsh, and the tindle fires of Cornwall, all lighted on Hallowe'en. In France it still lingers more than here, for to this very day the Parisians at this festival repair to the cemeteries, and lunch at the graves of their ancestors.

It is the Feast Day of St Bugga of Thanet. pic.twitter.com/iaMjunWSnL

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) December 12, 2018

It is the Feast of St Magloire of Dol, a 6th C Breton who became Abbot of Sark. He struggled so terribly with abstinence that an angel visited and gave him permission to have wine and beer. He is patron of those who abandon diets. pic.twitter.com/TJOAXlcTOr

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) October 24, 2020

pic.twitter.com/RNMlBMD3UE

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) October 24, 2020

"England has in all times given foreigners flying for refuge against oppression" #migrantcrisis

"England has in all times given foreigners flying for refuge against oppression" #migrantcrisis pic.twitter.com/bUFhgTpIA5

— Telegraph Letters (@LettersDesk) August 27, 2015

It is the Feast of St Peter and St Paul. On this day on 1899 the Doukhobors, sort of Russian Quakers, burned all their weapons and ...

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 29, 2013

... ever after have protested against government and church interference by talking all their clothes off and singing.

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 29, 2013

It is the Feast of St Marcella. A Roman it-girl, she gave away her frocks, fired her stylists and make up artists, and put on a...

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 28, 2013

...sack instead. She became very fashionable and other Society women followed, forming the Brown Dress Society, doing good works....

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 28, 2013

...Widowed, wealthy, she attracted the attention of St Jerome, notorious for this sort of thing, but the Vandals got her in the end.

It is the Feast of Sts John and Paul. They were eunuchs in the household of the Empress Constantia and so good at logistics they were lent..

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 26, 2013

...to a general and won a war with the Scythians. Unfortunately they fell out with Julian the Apostate who had them secretly beheaded....

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 26, 2013

...When people asked where they were he said they’d gone on a cruise and looked menacing. No-one asked again.

It is the Feast of the Holy Fairies in the western Carpathian Mountains today. Lovely maidens gather Yellow Bedstraw in the fields and...

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 24, 2013

...braid it into crowns. While the plainer girls look on they thrown their crown at their houses, then jump over a bonfire and make...

— Richard Coles (@RevRichardColes) June 24, 2013

...extra-strong love potions. The fairies then dance around blessing crops but if they encounter any men they drive them mad and maim them.

I nearly choked on my old man's sherry recently when I read about a 'science' teacher in the USA (where else?) who liked to add christian commentary to his science lessons basically saying the science he was teaching was wrong and that his religious view was correct.  He had been sacked it seemed and there was a 'reinstate him' movement from the concerned kids who were praying for him because they now believed science was unreliable.

Correction to the much quoted

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president of Iran, has not "called for Israel to
be wiped off the map" (Holocaust denial writer jailed for five years,
page 21, February 16). The Farsi phrase he employed is correctly
translated as "this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the
page of time". He was quoting a statement by Iran's first Islamist
leader, the late Ayatollah Khomeini.

...