Berndt David Assarsson (14 January 1892 – 31 December 1955) was a Swedish Catholic

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deity, deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in parti ...

monsignor Monsignor (; ) is a form of address or title for certain members of the clergy in the Catholic Church. Monsignor is the apocopic form of the Italian ''monsignore'', meaning "my lord". "Monsignor" can be abbreviated as Mons.... or Msgr. In some ...

, historical author and psalmist who resided in

Helsingborg Helsingborg (, , ), is a Urban areas in Sweden, city and the seat of Helsingborg Municipality, Scania County, Scania (Skåne), Sweden. It is the second-largest city in Scania (after Malmö) and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, ninth ...

and

Stockholm Stockholm (; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, most populous city of Sweden, as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in the Nordic countries. Approximately ...

. He made efforts to develop

Roman Catholicism The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

in Sweden. He was born in

Lund Lund (, ;"Lund"
(US) and ) is a city in the provinces of Sweden, province of Scania, southern Swed ...

and died in

. He was the brother of diplomat

Vilhelm Assarsson Per Vilhelm Gustaf Assarsson (22 April 1889 – 11 October 1974) was a Swedish diplomat. Assarsson was born in Lund, Sweden, in 1889, the son of a law professor. He graduated with a law degree in 1911 and began his career as a court clerk and dis ...

Career

He wrote the book ''Fädernas kyrka: En programskrift'' (1918). In 1920 he agreed to edit the Catholic magazine ''Credo'' and served as its editor until 1937. In 1922 he translated

John Henry Newman John Henry Newman (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890) was an English Catholic theologian, academic, philosopher, historian, writer, and poet. He was previously an Anglican priest and after his conversion became a cardinal. He was an ...

's "

Lead, Kindly Light "Lead, Kindly Light, Amid the encircling gloom" is a hymn with words written in 1833 by John Henry Newman as a poem titled "the Pillar of the Cloud", which was first published in the '' British Magazine'' in 1834'','' and republished in ''Lyra Ap ...

" to Swedish "Led, milda ljus." He was editor of ''Psalmer för kyrkoåret'' ("psalms for the Church") in 1937, and of the 1950 edition of the . He worked against the Swedish ban on creating Catholic monasteries, making reference to public statements about

freedom of religion Freedom of religion or religious liberty, also known as freedom of religion or belief (FoRB), is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice ...

and to

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

and

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

's allowance of such monasteries.

Publications

* ''Fädernas kyrka: En programskrift''. Stockholm, 1918. * ''Det skånska problemet''. Stockholm, 1923. * ''Den katolska kyrkan i Sverige i närvarande tid''. Stockholm, 1925. * ''Katolska kyrkan i Sverige''. Uppsala, 1938. * ''Skånelands historia i Skånelands skolor''. Lund, 1949. * ''Katolska kyrkan i Sverige''. Göteborg, 1953.

Career

Publications

References

Further reading