Q.1
For non-Catholic British people, the 'nearest English-speaking Catholics' (apart from those living amongst them) are probably the Irish, some of whom have certainly had cultural influence through the world of entertainment. Which of the following popular series tells of the activities of a trio of disgraced priests and their housekeeper?
  • All Gas and Gaiters
  • Holy Smoke!
  • Father Ted
  • Mrs Brown's Boys
Q.2
Many practising Catholics regard it as part of their life's duty to take, and express, a clear moral stance on a range of issues such as public and private ethics. The Hays Code, which dominated Hollywood film-making during its formative years (1930-66 usually being quoted), was principally the outworking of concerns from which pressure group?
  • Father Daniel Lord SJ and the Catholic/National Legion of Decency
  • The Catholic Daughters of America
  • Joseph I Breen and the Production Code Administration
  • The (Catholic) Crusaders for Clean Cinema
Q.3
An easy enough, but hopefully thought-provoking question: which of the following mechanical aids were available to the builders of mediaeval abbeys and cathedrals?
  • Diesel-engined heavy haulage trucks
  • Gantry cranes to 25m and above
  • CAD software
  • None of the above
Q.4
What artist from the Low Countries, who died in 1516, remains deservedly famous for his extraordinary pictures such as the triptych altarpieces on 'The Last Judgment' and 'The Garden of Earthly Delights', that feature proto-surrealist and deformed people and animals?
  • Hieronymus Bosch
  • Giovanni Battista Piranesi
  • Rembrandt van Rijn
  • Moritz Escher
Q.5
In which part of a traditional monastery would the beautiful hand-written copies of books be made, before the days of movable-type printing (which came in as powerful 'new technology' around the same time as the Reformation, and indeed was instrumental in spreading its ideas)?
  • The dormitories
  • The scriptorium
  • The chapel
  • The refectory
Q.6
Europe's largest Gothic cathedral is at Ulm in Germany: built in 1890 (with the benefit of what we might call Victorian technology: steam-cranes, rail freighting of stone etc.) but by the Protestants. Its spire deliberately surpasses that of the world's tallest Catholic cathedral, also in Germany and built just 10 years earlier. In which city does this second cathedral stand?
  • Berlin
  • Cologne
  • Augsburg
  • Munich
Q.7
How did the mediaeval craftsmen at Chartres Cathedral (in France) achieve the spectacular blue tint in their stained-glass which is known as 'bleu de Chartres'?
  • They followed a recipe from the Roman archives that had previously been on the same site
  • They relied on prayer and heavenly guidance
  • They used vegetable dyes to replicate a blue tint associated with relics of the cloak of the Virgin Mary
  • Nobody knows: there is no other glass quite like it, no chemical explanation nor process to explain its composition, and one theory has it that airborne pollution within the past century may have contributed in some subtle way
Q.8
To evoke the setting of a monastery (or similar institution) onscreen, it seems almost obligatory to play the sound of monks chanting in Plainsong as they have done since time almost immemorial. Another more formal label for this simple style of music comes from the name of the Pope under whom it was (supposedly) codified: who was he?
  • Saint Francis
  • Saint Benedict
  • Pope Saint Gregory
  • Saint Cecilia
Q.9
To complement the visual arts, the Church has a magnificent repertoire of music to enrich worship and encourage religious contemplation. All the following composers wrote settings of the Mass, but we have intercalated one Protestant (Lutheran) composer among the Catholics. Who was this odd one out?
  • Franz Joseph Haydn
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  • Johann Sebastian Bach
  • Franz Schubert
Q.10
Probably the most famous single example of Renaissance religious art is the painted ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican ... done by whom?
  • Michaelangelo
  • Leonardo da Vinci
  • Donatello
  • Piranesi
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