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We all grew up, even a nice Jewish boy like me,
但凡国人--包括像我一样的犹太人
with the idea that the English reformation was a historic inevitability,
都自幼被灌输着一个观念 即英国宗教改革 是历史之大势所趋
the culling of an obsolete, unpopular,fundamentally un-English faith.
它淘汰了原有的陈腐 过气 从根本上有悖英格兰精神的信仰
But on the very eve of the Reformation,
然而宗教改革前到来的前夕
Catholicism in England was vibrant, popular and very much alive.
天主教在英格兰却如日中天 生机盎然
This is Walsingham in Norfolk,once the home of the miracle working shrine of our Lady of Walsingham.
此地是诺福克郡的沃尔辛厄姆 曾是沃尔辛厄姆圣母行神迹的圣祠所在
Along with the Becket shrine at Canterbury,
同坎特伯雷的贝克特圣祠一样
Walsingham was the must-see place for all serious 16th-century pilgrims,
对十六世纪虔诚的朝圣者而言 沃尔辛厄姆是必见的圣地
a tradition revived this century by High Church Anglicans.
这是本世纪才被高教会派重拾的传统
Today, you get only the faintest echoes of what Walsingham once was,
时至今日 沃尔辛厄姆曾经的繁华已消失殆尽
a gaudy, rowdy mix of hucksterism and holiness,piety and plaster saints;
这里曾喧闹而俗丽 既有圣洁与虔诚 亦有强卖的石膏圣像
the kind of place you'd expect to find, say, in Naples or Seville,not in the depths of sober East Anglia.
这样的地方 你大概觉得会在那不勒斯或是塞维利亚见到 而绝非冷僻的东英格兰深处
But even then, as today,not everybody approved.
但往昔亦如当代 并非未得到所以人认可
Erasmus, the Catholic scholar superstar of the age,came here on a monk pilgrimage
当年的天主教学术巨星伊拉斯谟 作为一个修士来此朝圣
and poured scorn on tales of sacred milk and chapels airmailed in from the Holy Land.
对神圣的牛奶的故事 或是从圣地降临的教堂 都不屑一顾
But his was the minority intellectual view,safely expressed in Latin and tolerated, though not necessarily endorsed,by members of the ruling Tudor dynasty.
但他所持不过是少数知识分子的观点 安全地用拉丁文表达 都铎王朝的掌权者们对其态度是容忍但不支持
