In the last week or so, I had a LOT of emails from people who wanted to know what’s up with the Breeves for Nuns project, and could they still help. Below is the group email I just sent out to everyone who contacted me.

Additional news is that we should know in a day or so how many there are left to send, but given how many people have already contacted me I think we should have enough now to cover the whole project. So, YAAAY YOU GUYS!

I’m always impressed when putting out a general call for any project, how eager and ready people are to help. Just today I had a long phone conversation with Mike Matt and we were talking about how the innernet has become like a gigantic gladiatorial arena, and anyone at any time could end up being the poor schmuck tossed into the ring. But this kind of thing shows what the real power of the net actually is.

Also, gold stars go out to two of our contestants today, first to longtime reader and supporter Leo who was the very first to respond with an offer to buy a full set, and second to Linda whose email came right after Leo’s but whose set arrived at the monastery first. The sisters have asked me to pass along their very great thanks and their promises to pray for all the benefactors that made this possible. It’s going to mean a massive change for them, and a real opening to some beauties and truths in their liturgical celebration that have been closed off from most religious for a long time.

For the moment, we have enough people, I think, to fulfil the quest, but if in a day or so we still have a few spots, I’ll post again with a second request…

~

Hello everyone,

for the sake of privacy I’ve put all the email addresses in the BCC line, but this is the group email to everyone (15!!) who has offered either to buy a set of breviaries outright for the nuns, or who wanted to contribute to a group purchase. Sorry it’s taken me so long to get this organised, but other things (life) got in the way for a bit. But we’re back and with good news.

1) the nuns have already received 5 sets of breviaries from Baronius Press, all in very good time and excellent condition… So the first round went really well.

2) after we discovered that we had emptied the shelves at the UK branch of Baronius I sent an email to the company and they did in fact get back to me pretty promptly telling me that there are more at the US branch and that the UK branch is now re-stocked. The email went into my spam file though, and like a big dummy I failed to think of it, and posted a Tweet saying I hadn’t heard anything.

So, here it is below.

Dear Miss. White,

Thank you for your email.

We are definitely not out of stock in the USA. While we were out of stock in the UK, the stock arrived last Friday and the Breviary will also be available in the UK from today.

You may have been getting the UK version of our website, hence why you saw the Out of Stock notice. Please follow the below instructions to get the US version of our website.

According to the sales figures, we have approximately 1 year worth of stock of the Roman Breviary in the USA. If you still need any help, please email us your telephone number and a convenient time to call (please bear in mind that we are 6 hours ahead of EST) so we can get in touch with you.

3) the one smart thing I did was create an email file and put absolutely all the emails I received about this into it, so I don’t now have to go fishing through hundreds of emails to find out who had said they wanted to help when we got confirmation from the company. If you are getting this and have already sent a set, please accept my sincere thanks on behalf of the nuns who are in great need, and just ignore the rest of this email.

4) if you want to buy a new set on your own, just send me a response email to this and I’ll give you the shipping address right away.

5) if you want to go in with a group, please respond to this email, but put in the subject line, “group purchase”. This way I will be able to just stick people together right away. What I did last time was just create a group email with the people involved giving the shipping address, usually in groups of 3 at a time, and they sorted out between them who was to do the actual purchase on the Baronius website and how to chip in. Like going Dutch at a restaurant. Generally people used Paypal, which was the easiest since Baronius takes it directly, so no one had to incur any credit card charges.

OK? So, all together now… cry God for Harry, England and St. George!!! (Or appropriate rousing Shakespearean cheer of your choice.)