This contains nearly 3000 volumes from the private library of Rev. William Heidt, O.S.B. Rev. Heidt was the editor in chief of Liturgical Press in Collegeville, Minnesota for nearly twenty five years, both prior to and after the liturgical reform that Vatican II initiated. A Benedictine monk at St. John’s Abbey and University in Collegeville, Fr. Heidt’s collection reflects the remarkable liturgical renewal movement of the second half of the 20th century. The collection is rich in historical, sacramental, and liturgical texts. Originally trained in Old Testament Studies at the Catholic University of America in the 1930’s, Fr. Heidt’s collection also contains many works in biblical theology and spiritual theology. In addition to monographs, there is a wide-ranging collection of pamphlets. The collection came to Boston University School of Theology from Holy Apostles Seminary in Comwell, Connecticut, where Fr. Heidt spent the last 10 years of his teaching career.
This collection contains a small group of early homilies. It is supplemented by 475 electronic texts scanned from documents held at other theological schools as part of the ATLA/ATS Cooperative Digital Resources Initiative (CDRI), funded by the Luce Foundation. Most of the titles are pre-1900.
This collection contains the worship collection of Rev. James Sanders, an ecumenical collection containing worship books and companion works, histories and studies of liturgy. Received in 1974, it is cataloged on-line but not separately identified. The Sanders Collection has been supplemented by our own collection of Common Lectionary and other contemporary materials.
The collections listed here are located in our Archives and Research Collection. Access to archival holdings (e.g. paper church records, personal papers, baptism certificates, etc). are by appointment only; please send an email to our reference librarians at sthref@bu.edu. For access to books in our special collections, please find a full-time librarian on staff during daytime hours (see the right sidebar on the School of Theology Library homepage for regular hours during the current academic period) who will be happy to pull the material for you.