• The Daily Telegraph
• Le Figaro
• The New York Post
• L’Orient-Le Jour
• L'Osservatore Romano
• The Irish Times
• Conservative Home
• The Jewish Chronicle

• FAZ / Eng.
• NZZ / Eng.
• Magyar Nemzet
• ABC.es
• The Catholic Herald
• Il Foglio
• London Playbook
• Financial Times

France

Mitteleuropa

Knickerbockers

Argentina

The Levant

Africa

Cape of Good Hope

Netherlands

Scandinavia

Québec

India

Muscovy

Germany

A while ago, we reported on the planned expansion of St. Nersess Armenian Seminary, the only Armenian seminary outside Armenia over in New Rochelle. Unfortunately, the seminary’s uppity neighbors got their proverbial knickers in a twist over the expansion and have pressured the City Council to deny planning permission (something that sounds very familiar to any Thorntonian; I guess the City of New Rochelle just doesn’t want outstanding educational institutions). Because of this the Board of St. Nersess met and decided it had to move elsewhere, so anyone who has a cool $15,000,000.00 to spare: it’s yours!

The house, on Stratton Road near Iona Prep, was built in the 1920’s by none other than William Randolph Hearst. He never lived there though, but just had it on hand for friends of his who were visiting New York and needed a place to stay. The building, to my recollection, is in fairly good condition, but the 8.65 acres it sits on seems rather small when you’re actually there.

Back in school we had some random day off that no other school had (Founder’s Day, I believe) and so Lucas de Soto and I, ever the adventurers, decided to pop over to the Armenian seminary to see what it was all about. (A Presbyeterian and a Catholic walk into an Armenian Seminary… sounds like the set-up for a bad joke). We turned up unannounced and everyone there was terrifically friendly. The secretary offered us cake, showed us around a bit and then introduced us to “the greatest expert on Armenian history ever” who was leaving for Philadelphia in under half an hour but would no doubt take a few minutes to answer any of our questions (unfortunately I’ve forgotten his name). He too was very friendly indeed and answered all our questions and told us about Armenia, the Church, the Armenian Patriarch of Jerusalem, and about the Divine Liturgy and how it differs from the Mass. We also got to chat with a few of the seminarians who were mulling about the kitchen. The historian even offered to teach us the Armenian language for free, and I was tempted to take them up on it. Lucas and I found it quite fascinating; well worth a day off from school.

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