The Parthenon Marbles and the destruction of cultural heritage in times of conflict

Part of the Parthenon frieze in the British Museum (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

There are reports that senior Greek officials have been in ‘preliminary’ talks with the British Museum in what could amount to a tectonic shift in resolving the long-running cultural dispute over the repatriation of the Parthenon marbles to Athens.

Revelations about the negotiations were first reported in Greece last weekend by Ta Nea, which said the Greek Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, and other Greek officials had met George Osborne, the chair of the British Museum, in London hotel in recent days.

Insiders in Athens say the report is ‘not only credible but very exciting.’

The reports in Ta Nea in Athens, the Guardian and the Sunday Times in London, and other newspapers came only days after Kyriakos Mitsotakis told a gathering at the London School of Economics that he ‘sensed’ headway was being made on the issue and that a ‘win-win solution’ was possible. He has made a cultural priority of reunifying the Parthenon marbles in London with the carvings that have remained in Athens.

The row over the marbles has lasted for more than 200 years. The British Museum acquired the antiquities, which include 75 metres of the Parthenon’s original 160-metre-long frieze, in 1816 when Lord Elgin parted with them, having removed them with force and violence, using saws to hack them from the Parthenon on the Acropolis.

Ta Nea reports several behind-the-scenes meetings have taken place in London between Mitsotakis and Osborne, a former British chancellor, and meetings have also involved the Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias and Minister of State Giorgos Gerapetritis.

The dispute over ownership of the sculptures has descended into acrimony, with the Greek Culture Minister accusing Elgin of committing a ‘blatant act of serial theft’.

The British Museum’s deputy director, Jonathan Williams, said earlier this year that the museum was eager to ‘change the temperature of the debate’ after Unesco ruled it imperative that the affair was discussed at an inter-government level. The Museum has described the talks as part of efforts to create ‘a new Parthenon partnership with Greece.’

Four of us visited the British Museum last weekend after lunch earlier in the day in Tas, a Turkish restaurant in Bloomsbury, just a few steps away from the museum.

As we wandered through the museum, it was interesting in one display to read that the deliberate destruction of cultural heritage is today classed as a crime against humanity.

The Acropolis at night, seen from Monastiraki (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The long dispute over the Parthenon Marbles, and Britain’s failure to return them for over 200 years, is in sharp contrast to the British Museum’s stand against the looting of archaeological sites and destruction of monuments and museums, which are problems that are particularly extreme during periods of conflict.

One of the sad but often unnoticed consequences of the war in Ukraine is the destruction of Ukraine’s museums, monuments, cultural heritage and archaeological sites. The British Museum says it works closely with the affected countries and British law enforcement agencies, as well as the art trade and with private individuals, to identify and advise on the origin of antiquities believed to have been stolen or illegally exported from abroad.

One showcase displays recently identified examples from Ukraine and Yemen. Careful study and scientific analysis at the museum enables objects like these to be returned to their country of origin.

In recent years, a number of objects acquired by illicit metal detector users in Ukraine have been sold to private collectors in Russia, Germany and Britain. ‘We are facing gigantic transnational looting of Ukrainian heritage which needs to be stopped through common efforts,’ Dr Fyodor Androschuk, director general of the National Museum of History of Ukraine, said last March.

A small collection of metalwork, some recent but mostly of mediaeval date, comes from illegal metal detecting in Ukraine. These objects were posted from Kyiv to England in 2021 with the intention of being sold online. They were seized by the British Border Force, and jointly identified by curators from the British Museum and the National Museum in Kyiv.

Uncontrolled treasure hunting at archaeological sites around the world is causing huge damage and loss of historical information. The British Museum says it works closely with British law enforcement, the art market, colleagues at other museums around the world and others to ensure that stolen or illegally trafficked antiquities are investigated and repatriated to their countries of origin.

Among the exhibitions from Ukraine on display in the British Museum is a collection of pendants and rings, mostly dates about the 1000s to the 1300s.

The cross pendants are connected with Greek Orthodoxy. There are similar crosses from the district of Kyiv in the National Museum of Ukraine, believed to be local copies of prototypes used in the Byzantine Empire centred on Constantinople (modern Istanbul). The disc pendants are widespread in eastern Europe and also show the impact of Christianity on the local population. These objects were probably found in graves or possibly a hoard.

The other objects are finger rings, some also early medieval but others more recent. These pieces will be sent to the National Museum of Kyiv when the current conflict is over.

Culture is fragile yet precious. The safeguarding and neutrality of culture during conflict is crucial to the future rebuilding of society afterwards. The British Museum is working together with other organisations to provide aid and support to museums in Ukraine.

It would be interesting to see similar approaches, values and policies in the British Museum when it comes to returning the Parthenon Marbles to Athens.

A collection of pendants and rings from Ukraine, mostly dating from the 1000s to the 1300s, in the British Museum (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

A ‘virtual tour’ of a dozen churches and cathedrals named after Saint Nicholas

An icon of Saint Nicholas in a church in Crete … in time, he became Santa Claus (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

One of my favourite restaurants in Milton Keynes must be the Olive Tree, a Turkish Mediterranean Restaurant and Bar on Midsummer Boulevard.

As our Christmas shopping began, Charlotte and I had a late lunch there last week, and were amused to see the Olive Tree is offering a special Christmas menu. At top of the menu, it asks: ‘Did you know that Santa Clause (sic) also known as Saint Nicholas was born in Turkey, who was much admired for his kindness and generosity. So here is our freshly prepared dishes in honour of Santa Clause.’

Tomorrow is the Feast of Saint Nicholas of Myra, the ‘real Santa Claus’ (6 December 2022). But, instead of retelling the story of the bishop who risked his life when he defended Orthodox doctrine against the Arains at the Council of Nicaea in the year 325, I thought it would be interesting to follow in his footsteps, visiting or revisiting a number of cathedrals, churches or former church sites to which he has given his name.

During the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown, I offered a number of ‘virtual tours’ of churches and other sites. My offering this evening, on the eve of the Feast of Saint Nicholas, is a ‘virtual tour’ with Saint Nicholas of a half-dozen churches in Greece, and a half-dozen more spread across the Czech Republic, Malta, Italy, Spain, Slovakia and Turkey.

1, Saint Nicholas, Rethymnon Harbour:

The Church of Saint Nicholas, near the bus station in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Church of Saint Nicholas is in a small square formed at the corner of Priskosoridi street and Emmanouil Kefalogianni avenue, the street that runs around the shore of the rocky bay beneath the western slopes of the Venetian Fortezza.

This small chapel or church, close to the bus station, is surrounded by good fish restaurants and tavernas. This is now a suburban part of western Rethymnon, and is slowly becoming a part of the tourist area. But, only a few decades ago and within living memory, this was an area closely associated with fishers and their fishing boats.

Saint Nicholas, as well as being the patron saint of children and the inspiration for Santa Claus, is also the patron saint of sailors, fishermen, ships and sailing, which explains the presence of this modern church dedicated to his name in this part of Rethymnon.

2, Saint Nicholas, Fortezza, Rethymnon:

The former Venetian Cathedral of Saint Nicholas on the Fortezza in Rethymnon … the stump of the former minaret is to the right (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Fortezza towers above the city of Rethymnon. It was built by the Venetians during their rule in Crete (1204-1669) to protect the city and people from Ottoman invasions, on the hill of Paleokastro and the site the acropolis of ancient Rithymna.

The cathedral of Rethymnon was destroyed during a Turkish attack on the city by the Pasha of Algeria, Ulu Ali Reis, in 1571. A new Episcopal Palace was also built on the Fortezza in 1575, and the foundation stone for a new cathedral was laid in 1583 by the Latin Bishop of Rethymnon, Bartolomeo Chiapponi.

The new Venetian cathedral on the Fortezza was dedicated to Saint Nicholas and stands next to the former Episcopal Palace. When the cathedral was completed in 1585, Bishop Chiapponi’s successor, Bishop Giulio Carrara, refused to celebrated the Mass there, claiming conditions in the cathedral were too cramped and there were no sacred vessels there.

During the Ottoman period, Saint Nicholas Cathedral was converted into the Sultan Ibrahim Khan, named in honour of the reigning sultan, adding an over-sized dome, with a base diameter of 11 metres, was added. The former mosque is now used for exhibitions and as a venue for music events and recordings.

3, Saint Nicholas Church (Nerantze Mosque), Rethymnon:

The former Santa Maria Church and Nerantze Mosque glimpsed through the streets of the old town of Rethymnon … it became Saint Nicholas Church in 1925 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

The Nerantze Mosque or Gazi Hussein Mosque is on the corner of Ethnikis Antistaseos and Vernardou streets, and faces onto what was once the grand Venetian piazza of the old city of Rethymnon.

In Venetian times, this was the Church of Santa Maria. It was built in the style of Saint Mark’s in Venice and faced a large open piazza that included a clock tower, fountains and public buildings. It was originally the church of an Augustinian Priory, but only the east and north side of the original building survive.

After the Turks left Crete, the mosque was reconsecrated as a church in 1925 with a dedication to Saint Nicholas. However, it was seldom if ever used as a church, and for many years housed a Music School. Now known as the Municipal Odeon, it is a venue for lectures, concerts and theatre performances, and is sometimes open to the public. The minaret has been restored in recent years.

4, Saint Nicholas, Aghios Nikolaos:

The mediaeval church of Saint Nicholas in Aghios Nikolaos (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Aghios Nikoloas in Crete takes its name from Saint Nicholas. The town is built around an inner lagoon, Voulismeni, and local people try to convince visiting tourists that the lake is fathomless.

The town takes its name from the tiny 11th century church of Aghios Nikólaos (Saint Nicholas). Many years ago, a visit to this Church of Aghios Nikólaos, with its icons of the saint, was enough to end the doubts about Santa Claus that were beginning to emerge in hearts of two small children.

5, Aghios Nikolaos, Georgioupoli, Crete:

The picturesque modern Church of Saint Nicholas on a tiny islet off Georgioupoli in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The tiny white-washed chapel of Aghios Nikolaos (Άγιος Νικόλαος, Saint Nicholas) is on a small rocky islet off Georgioupoli in Crete. Rather than reaching the chapel by boat many tourists take the challenge each day of walking out to the chapel along a narrow rocky causeway.

It is said the chapel was built about 100 years ago by an anonymous sailor to give thanks for his rescue. Today, it is a much-photographed landmark that has become a symbol of Crete in the way that the Vlacherna Monastery close to the southern tip of the Kanoni peninsula has become an image of Corfu.

The rocky outcrop of Aghios Nikolaos is officially listed as a Greek island, and the chapel is a popular choice for weddings.

6, Aghios Nikolas, Élos, Crete :

The modern parish church of Aghios Nikolas in Élos (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The small village of Élos is 60 km south-west of Chania in west Crete, on the road to the Monastery of Chrissoskalitissa and the sandy beach of Elafonissi. Élos is one of the nine villages that are known collectively as the Enneachora, and is known for its chestnut forests.

Behind a taverna in the village, an old arch is said to have been part of an ancient Roman aqueduct. But the real hidden treasure in Elos is the Byzantine Church of Saint John the Theologian. This is a single-room, vaulted church, measuring 11.20 x 4.46 meters, and probably dates from the first half of the 14th century. he frescoes of Christ and the saints are attributed to Ioannis Pagomenos, a well-known icon writer and painter from Kissamos.

This tiny church, hidden in a shaded corner among trees behind a taverna, is almost dwarfed by the neighbouring modern parish church of Aghios Nikolas of Élos.

7, Saint Nicholas, Prague:

The Church of Saint Nicholas at night in the Old Town Square in Prague, with the statue of John Hus in the centre of the square (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Church of Saint Nicholas stands on the corner of the Old Town Square, Pařížská Street and Franz Kafka Square in Prague. Its beautiful green baroque towers and dome can be seen throughout the old town centre.

This monumental church was built in 1732-1735 to designs by Kilián Ignaz Dientzenhofer, on the site of an earlier 13th century Gothic church, also dedicated to Saint Nicholas.

The church was the parish church of the Old Town and the meeting place until the Church of Our Lady Before Tyn the opposite side of the square was completed in the 14th century.

The church became part of a Benedictine monastery in 1620. The early mediaeval church was destroyed by fire, and the present church was completed in 1735, and its white façade decorated with statues by Antonin Braun. When the Emperor Joseph II closed all monasteries not engaged in socially useful activities in 1781, the church was stripped bare and the interior decorations were sold off.

The empty building was used as a granary and then as a registry archive. The church returned to its original purpose in 1871 when it was used by the Russian Orthodox Church. The Czechoslovak Hussite Church was founded here in 1920, reviving the legacy of the reformer Jan Hus. Since then, this has been the main church of the Czechoslovak Hussite Church and its Prague Diocese, and so it is often known as Saint Nicholas Cathedral.

During World War II, the church was used by Czech partisans as a hidden site for Radio Prague.

8, Saint Nicholas, Valletta, Malta:

The Church of Saint Nicholas in Valletta (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

The Church of Saint Nicholas also known as the Church of All Souls, in Valletta, the capital of Malta, is used by both the Greek Orthodox Church and the Greek Catholic Church.

The church was originally built as a Greek Orthodox church in 1569. It was handed over to the Confraternity of the Souls in Purgatory in 1639, which rebuilt the church in the Baroque style in 1652. Since 2014, the church has been used by both a parish of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople and a Greek Catholic parish.

9, Cattedrale di San Nicolò di Mira, Noto, Sicily

The Duomo or Cattedrale di San Nicolò di Mira in Noto, Sicily (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The old city of Noto was destroyed by the 1693 earthquake, and a new city was then built on the bank of River Asinaro, nearer the Ionian Sea. The new city was the vision of Giuseppe Lanza, Duke of Camastra, and was laid out on a grid system by Giovanni Battista Landolina. The architects Rosario Gagliardi, Vincenzo Sinatra, Paolo Labisi, Francesco Sortino and others, made the new Noto a masterpiece of Sicilian Baroque.

Most of the buildings are built with a soft tufa stone, and in the summer sunlight they reflect a warm, bright honey tone. They include cathedrals, churches, convents, bell towers, religious buildings, and several palaces. Halfway along the Corso Vittorio Emanuele, in the Piazza del Municipio, Noto’s imposing cathedral or Duomo, the Cattedrale di San Nicolò di Mira, in the Piazza, was finished in 1776. Dozens of steps climb up to the towering cathedral its twin towers and an imposing dome that was restored after it collapsed dramatically in 1996.

Noto and its churches were declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 2002.

10, The Church of San Nicolás de Bari and San Pedro Mártir, Valencia

The Church of San Nicolás de Bari and San Pedro Mártir has been called the ‘Sistine Chapel’ of Valencia (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Church of San Nicolás de Bari and San Pedro Mártir has been called the ‘Sistine Chapel’ of Valencia and a ‘Baroque jewel’. It is one of the finest examples of a Gothic church with baroque decorations. Frescoes and plasterwork cover the entire interior, from small pilasters in chapels, to the walls, apse and vaulted ceiling, creating a visual and colour spectacle.

The Church of Saint Nicholas was built ca 1242, and is tucked in the streets of the old town in Valencia. It almost hidden from view in a laneway off Calle Caballeros, adding to the surprise awaiting visitors. The church stands on the site of a Roman-Hispanic temple that later became a mosque with the Muslim conquest of the area. It was founded in the 13th century as one of the first 12 parish churches in the city following the reconquest of Valencia by King James I in 1238, and from an early stage was associated with the Dominicans.

The church was remodelled on the initiative of the Borja family in the Gothic style between 1419 and 1455, with the Gothic rib vault contracting in the central nave. The refurbishments include a rose window alluding to a miracle of Saint Nicholas. The interior was completed between 1690 and 1693, and was decorated in the baroque style by Juan Pérez Castiel, who filled it with frescoes depicting the lives and miracles of the two patrons, Saint Nicholas of Bari and Saint Peter of Verona or San Pedro Mártir (Saint Peter Martyr).

11, Saint Nicholas, Bratislava, Slovakia:

Saint Nicholas Church (left) seen from the ramparts of Bratislava Castle (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

On my way down the hill from Bratislava Castle during a visit three years ago, I stopped to look at the locked Saint Nicholas Church, an Orthodox church built in 1661 by Countess Frances Khuen, the widow of Paul Pálffy (1589-1655), before she died 1672.

This early baroque church is simple, single nave church with a small wooden bell tower. It was built on the site of an earlier Gothic church dating back to the 11th century. After the castle area was incorporated into Bratislava, the church was administrated by a Catholic funeral society in Saint Martin's parish.

The church was no longer in use by 1936 when it was given to the Greek Catholic Church of Bratislava, an Orthodox-style church in communion with Rome. At the end of World War II in 1945, the church roof caught fire and the church was rebuilt by the Greek Catholic Church in 1945-1950. A violent persecution of the Greek Catholic Church in Slovakia began in 1950 and the church was given to the Orthodox Church.

12, Saint Nicholas Church, Gemiler Island, Turkey:

Saint Nicholas Church on Gemiler Island … was this is true burial place of Saint Nicholas? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Gemiler Island is off the coast of Turkey, between near the city of Fethiye and the Greek island of Rhodes. The Turkish name Gemile from the Greek καμήλα (kamila, ‘camel’). The island has several church ruins on Gemiler, dating from the fourth and sixth centuries.

Archaeologists believe Saint Nicholas was buried there after his death in 326. His relics remained there until the 650s, when the island was abandoned as it was threatened by an Arab fleet. They were then moved to Myra, 40 km to the east.

Lighting candles at the chapel of Aghios Nikolaos on an islet off Georgioupoli in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Is Turkey voting this Christmas for a new Aegean conflict with Greece?

Ephesus, a major Greek classical site, is at the heart of a new Turkish tourism campaign for the Aegean (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The phrase about ‘Turkeys voting for Christmas’ is often used to describe a situation when a choice is made that is clearly against one’s self-interest. The phrase is not easily explained outside these islands, because while turkeys are commonly associated with (non-vegetarian) Christmas dinners here, in the US they are associated with Thanksgiving, which falls on the fourth Thursday in November.

‘Turkeys voting for Christmas’ is an idiom with a very recent history. It seems the first time that phrase was used in 1977 by the Liberal politician David Penhaligon, when he said Liberal MPs voting the proposed ‘Lib-Lab’ pact between the Liberals and the Labour party was ‘like a turkey voting for Christmas.’

The phrase was used again in 1979 when the Labour Prime Minister James Callaghan said Scottish Nationalists voting alongside Conservative MPs against the Labour government was ‘the first time in recorded history that turkeys have been known to vote for an early Christmas.’

Sunset in the Aegean at Kusadasi … a popular destination for Irish tourists (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

* * *

The ‘Avian Flu’ epidemic has created a shortage of turkeys in many places this year. And since earlier this year there has been no Turkey at the United Nations either.

Turkey is now known officially as Türkiye at the UN, following a formal request from Ankara. Several international bodies are being asked to make the name change too as part of a rebranding campaign launched a year ago by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

‘Türkiye is the best representation and expression of the Turkish people’s culture, civilisation, and values,’ he said last December.

Although most Turks know their country as Türkiye, the anglicised form Turkey is widely used, even within Turkey. The Anglicised forms of the names of many countries are commonly used in the English language – think not only of Ireland, but also Germany, Spain and Greece. Indeed, Erdoğan has no problems about using the name Yunanistan for neighbouring Greece when he is speaking Turkish.

The Turkish state television channel TRT explained the reason for the image rebrand, saying Ergdogan was unhappy of the association of his country’s name with the Christmas, New Year or Thanksgiving bird. TRT also pointed out that the word is also used in some dictionaries as a synonym for ‘something that fails badly’ or ‘a stupid or silly person.’

Turkish and Greek flags fly side-by-side on a ferry between Samos and Kusadasi (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Tension rooted
in old wounds

For the past year, tension has been growing between Greece and Turkey, rooted in old wounds, stoked by insults and causing frayed nerves. Hardly a day has gone by this year without shots being fired between the two armies. On national news channels, military and diplomatic experts daily debate the risks of conflict.

A visit to Istanbul in March by the Greek Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis was expected to lead to attempts to bridge the gap between both sides. But Erdoğan is known for his outbursts, anger and insults. In recent months, his insults have been directed in particular at the Greek government and Mitsotakis.

At the G20 meeting in Bali last month, Erdoğan issued new threats to Greece, warning Greeks that the Turks may ‘overnight come suddenly.’ Speaking at a press conference, Erdoğan was defiant as he took the advantage of a unique international to repeat the threat that ‘one night we will come suddenly.’

He was repeating the words of an old Turkish song that says: ‘I can come suddenly one night.’ The same song was regularly broadcast on Turkish radio during the Turkish invasion of Cyprus almost half a century ago in 1974.

He said: ‘I insist on one night we will come suddenly. This statement is important to me. Greece must know its borders and the terms of the neighbourhood ... If they read the past, they will see what has happened. What I said is not a question of power, it is a question of the heart.’

At the same time, Erdoğan told a Turkish television station: ‘What I’ve been saying for ever, that we can come suddenly one night, this is a basic principle. To me, this is a phrase that cannot be taken back … So, we can suddenly get there again.’

But he has been saying the same throughout the year. On the eve of the European Summit in Prague in October, the Greek prime minister left the official dinner during a speech in which Erdoğan once again threatened Greece with the words of that old Turkish song, ‘I can come suddenly one night.’

‘For me, no one named Mitsotakis will exist any longer from now on,’ Erdoğan said at the end of May. ‘I will never accept [seeing] him again,’ he added, accusing the Greek Prime Minister of being ‘dishonest.’

‘Warehouse: Greek Shop’ … a Greek sign seen in the Bazaar in Kuşadasi, once known to Greeks as Neopolis (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

* * *

Communications through normal diplomatic channels have all but broken down, and Turkish air patrols over Greek territory have never been so frequent as today.

Greek Ministry of Defence records show that between January and October this year there were 8,880 violations of Greek airspace by Turkish planes and drones, compared with 2,744 in 2021 and barely a few hundred in previous years.

A maritime and gas deal signed by Turkey and Libya earlier this year has been seen as an attempt by Turkey to expand its influence in the East Mediterranean. In response, the Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias called off the first leg of a visit to Libya, and refused to get off his plane in Tripoli.

Greece and Turkey are both NATO members, but they came close to armed conflict in 1996 and again in 2020. Periklis Zorzovilis of the Greek Institute for Security and Defence Analysis points out, ‘When so many fighter jets fly over such a small area, the possibility of an accident is very real.’

Windmills in the harbour in Rhodes … a narrow strait separates Rhodes from the thin peninsulas of Anatolian Turkey (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Aegean tensions on
identity and tourism

The tensions between Turkey and Greece are not only political and military, they have also become conflicts over culture, heritage identity and tourism. Turkey recently launched a campaign to lure tourists with a ‘TurkAegean’ promotional campaign – against a backdrop of historic Greek sites and the sound of bouzouki music.

Turkey’s west coast faces the Aegean Sea, and Turkey claims the time has come to stop associating the region exclusively with Greece. But the campaign has caused anger and embarrassment in Athens. The ancient Greek name is derived from Aegeus, the father of the mythical king Theseus who founded Athens, and the Aegean’s Hellenic heritage has rarely been disputed.

Turkey filed a request with the EU a year ago to trademark the term ‘TurkAegean.’ Angry Greek politicians and officials were caught off guard and accused Turkey of usurping Greek culture. ‘Obviously the [Greek] government will exhaust every legal possibility to deal with this development,’ Prime Minister Mitsotakis said. Margaritis Schinas, the Greek vice-president of the European Commission, demanded a review of the decision.

The TurkAegean slogan is being used in advertising and promoting what Turkey is labelling its ‘coastline of happiness’ with ‘idyllic beaches to soak up the beaming sun.’ The classical and historical sites in the area include ancient Troy, Ephesus, once the most important Greek port in the Mediterranean, and sites dating back to the second century BCE.

‘It is not just an innocent advert but another argument that is being used to ultimately question our sovereignty over Greek islands in the Aegean,’ the former foreign minister and Syriza MP, George Katrougalos, was quoted as saying. ‘… the term implies, as a corollary of their propaganda, that all, or most, of the Aegean is Turkish and that is clearly wrong.’

Analysts do not rule out these tensions escalating into a military clash, either deliberately or by accident. ‘There has been a very aggressive, almost apocalyptic upgrading of Turkish claims in the Aegean,’ Professor Constantinos Filis of the American College of Greece has warned. ‘It is like Turkey is preparing the international audience for what could possibly lie ahead.’

Fishing boats and tourist boats by night in the harbour in Fethiye, south-west Turkey (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

* * *

For many decades, Turkey accepted the maritime boundaries in the Aegean, defined by treaties and agreements with the Italians in 1923 and 1932, and ratified by the Treaty of Paris in 1947. The boundaries were never challenged until 1996, when Turkish journalists from the daily Hurriyet landed on the tiny Imia islets, tore down the blue and white Greek flag and hoisted the red and white star and crescent of Turkey.

As the crisis deepened, I was sent as a journalist to Rhodes and Kos to look at the potential of war. Two years later, I wrote in The Irish Times how, looking across the narrow strait that separates Rhodes from the thin, finger-like peninsulas that jut out from Anatolian Turkey, it is easy to understand why local people talk in terms of ‘when the Turks come,’ and rarely ‘if …’

This year marks the centenary of the Greek-Turkish war of 1919-1922 and its culmination in the massacre of Smyrna and the military defeat for Greece. Erdoğan repeatedly invokes that war, saying that, 100 years on, Greece should not be bristling for a fight that it would once again ‘regret’.

Canon Patrick Comerford blogs daily at www.patrickcomerford.com. This feature was originally prepared for the ‘Church Review’ (Dublin and Glendalough)

The Irish-born writer who never moved to Athens to become Queen of Greece

‘It’s dark and it’s wet in Stony Stratford tonight’ … a reminder of why Rosina Doyle Wheeler never became the Queen of Greece (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Patrick Comerford

In last week’s rain storms and cold dark nights, I posted a photograph last week of Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church in Stony Stratford. It caught the atmosphere of how winter has closed in on this town.

But a subsequent exchange on Facebook with an American member of the Comerford family served to remind me of the story of a Victorian Irish writer, heiress and feminist who, with another twist in the chain of events, might have become the Queen of Greece over a century and a half ago.

In my caption for that photograph on Wednesday evening, I said ‘It’s dark and it’s wet in Stony Stratford tonight.’

Peter Comerford, a lawyer in Rhode Island, was quick with his response: ‘A dark and stormy night, eh? Based on everything of yours I’ve read, I wouldn’t have put you in contention for a Bulwer Lytton.’

I told him: ‘I tried to avoid quoting him, but perhaps I fell into the trap of paraphrasing him. He declined the Crown of Greece; I’m no monarchist, but I’d find it difficult to decline an invitation to being paid to live out my days in Greece.’

Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873), 1st Baron Lytton, was an English writer and politician. Bulwer-Lytton’s works sold and paid him well, and as well as fiction, plays and poetry he wrote a three-volume history of Athens. He coined famous phrases such as ‘the great unwashed’, the ‘pursuit of the almighty dollar’, ‘the pen is mightier than the sword’, ‘dweller on the threshold’, and the opening phrase ‘It was a dark and stormy night.’

Bulwer-Lytton’s plays and great sprawling novels are now largely forgotten, but in his day he was more widely read than Charles Dickens or Sir Walter Scott. He is long gone out of fashion, and his writing style has resulted in the creation of the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, held each year since 1982 to seek the ‘opening sentence of the worst of all possible novels.’

But, in his day, Bulwer-Lytton was also a prominent politician. He was a Whig MP in 1831-1841 and returned as to Parliament as a Conservative MP in 1851-1866, and he was the Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1858-1859.

It is said he was offered the Crown of Greece in 1862 after King Otto abdicated. But he declined, and in 1863 the Greek National Assembly elected 17-year-old Prince William of Denmark as King of the Hellenes with the name of King George I. Instead, Bulwer-Lytton became a peer in 1866 with the title of Baron Lytton of Knebworth.

Had Bulwer-Lytton become King of Greece in 1862, would his Irish-born wife have become Queen?

‘The first mistake I made was being born at all’ … Rosina Bulwer Lytton (1802-1882) was born Rosina Doyle Wheeler in Ballywire House, on the borders of Co Limerick Co Tipperary

Rosina Bulwer Lytton (1802-1882) was an Irish writer and the author of 14 novels, a volume of essays and a volume of letters. She was born Rosina Doyle Wheeler on 4 November 1802 at Ballywire House, on the borders of Co Limerick Co Tipperary, close to Galbally and Limerick Junction. She was youngest of two surviving daughters of Francis Massy Wheeler (1776-1820), a landowner in Co Limerick and Co Tipperary, and the feminist philosopher Anna Doyle.

Her father was 19 and her mother was only 15 or 16 when they married. Francis Massy Wheeler was descended from two prominent land-owning families in Co Limerick, and a grandson of Hugh Massy, 1st Baron Massy; Anna Doyle, who was a women’s rights advocate, was the daughter of Canon Nicholas Milley Doyle, the Church of Ireland Rector of Newcastle, Co Tipperary, and the niece of Sir John Milley Doyle (1781-1856), who led British and Portuguese forces in the Peninsular War and the ‘War of the Two Brothers.’

Rosina was a beautiful but troubled writer, and today she would probably be diagnosed as bi-polar. ‘The first mistake I made was being born at all,’ Rosina once wrote. Her father had hoped for a son to inherit his family estates, but the surviving children from Anna’s six pregnancies were both girls: Rosina and her elder sister Henrietta.

Rosina’s early years in Ireland appear to have been unhappy, largely owing to her parents’ incompatibility, her father’s alcoholism, and her own indifference to her mother’s intellectual pursuits. Her parents separated in 1812, and Rosina, Henrietta and their mother moved to Guernsey to live with her great-uncle General Sir John Doyle, then Governor of Guernsey.

Rosina was educated in Guernsey by a governess and a series of masters and was brought to London after Sir John Doyle resigned. She then attended a fashionable boarding school in Kensington, and was educated in part by Frances Arabella Rowden, whose other pupils included the writers Lady Caroline Ponsonby, later Lady Caroline Lamb, and Anna Maria Fielding (Mrs SC Hall).

She later spent some time with her mother in Caen, Normandy, and with family members in Ireland, before returning to London to live with her uncle at Somerset Street.

Lively, impetuous, and attractive, Rosina became a familiar figure at London’s bohemian literary gatherings, along with her friends Lady Caroline Lamb and Laetitia Landon, and her future husband, then known simply as Edward Bulwer, who once had an affair with Lady Caroline Lamb, Lord Byron’s former mistress.

Rosina and Edward first met in December 1825. They were engaged after a brief courtship, but any marriage was opposed sternly his mother, who withdrew his allowance, forcing him to work for a living. They finally married in Saint James’s, London, on 29 August 1827, and they became the parents of two children, Emily (born 1828) and Edward Robert (born 1831).

Edward Bulwer-Lytton married Rosina Doyle Wheeler in 1827

Rosina enjoyed an extravagant lifestyle and her role as a society hostess. But she was quickly disillusioned and their marriage was marred by his political campaigns, his violent temper and his infidelities.

He was first elected to Parliament in 1831. Their relationship deteriorated rapidly during a visit to Italy in 1833. By their return in early 1834 the marriage was over, and they were legally separated in April 1836.

She went back to Ireland with her Emily and Robert, but when she returned to England she lost control of the children in 1838. She did not see Emily again until shortly before she died tragically in 1848, and saw Robert again only at the time of her own death in 1882.

Edward was given the title of baronet in 1838 and, although they were separated, Rosina used the title Lady Lytton and spelled her married surname without the hyphen used by her husband.

In her novel, Cheveley, or the Man of Honour (1839), Rosina bitterly caricatured her estranged husband. This is her first novel, and the protagonist, an aggressive, bullying philanderer, is a thinly disguised portrait of her husband. Facing the first in a series of legal disputes, Rosina went to live Paris.

She was unable to live within her allowance of £400 a year, and supplemented her income through further writing. Despite Edward’s efforts to block her publication, she produced a string of novels, including The budget of the Bubble family (1840), Bianca Capello (1842), Miriam Sedley (1851), Behind the scenes (1854), and Very successful (1856).

After returning to Britain in 1847, she lived at first in London and later in Llangollen in Wales (1853) and then in Taunton, Somerset (1855).

Increasingly frustrated by her financial difficulties, she travelled to Hereford in June 1858, and on the day of her husband’s election as an MP and indignantly denounced him at a public meeting. The scene was later recalled in sarcastic verse by her son Robert:

Who came to Hertford in a chaise
And uttered anything but praise
About the author of my days?
My Mother.

Edward’s immediate response was to have Rosina declared insane and detained under restraint in an asylum in Brentford. She was released three weeks later, due to a public outcry.

The Old Royal Palace facing onto Syntagma Square in Athens now houses the Hellenic Parliament … Edward Bulwer-Lytton was offered the throne of Greece in 1862 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Three years later, an unabashed and unashamed Edward was offered the throne of Greece after King Otho had been ousted in a coup in 1862. The Cork-born general, Sir Richard Church (1784-1873), had played a key role in an earlier attempted coup in 1843, presenting the king with an ultimatum demanding reforms or his abdication. But Otho continued to reign as a despot, and a popular revolt finally forced him to abdicate in 1862, when the throne was offered to Edward.

Had Edward ever accepted the invitation to become King of Greece, and had his marriage never broken up, would his estranged wife instead have become the Irish-born Queen of Greece?

Instead, Edward was made a peer in 1866 with the title Lord Lytton of Knebworth, and Rosina continued to denounce and attack him until he died in January 1873.

She wrote of her harsh experiences at Edward’s hands in A Blighted Life (1880). Although the book appeared after his death, it caused a rift with her son and she tried to disassociate herself from it. She spent her later years were spent as a recluse in Upper Sydenham, and she died there on 12 March 1882. Her husband had been buried in Westminster Abbey, in 1873, but she was buried in an unmarked grave.

Rosina and Edward were the parents of two children: Emily Elizabeth (1828-1848), who died in tragic circumstances, and (Edward) Robert Lytton Bulwer-Lytton (1831-1891), 1st Earl of Lytton, who was the first Viceroy of India (1876-1880). Robert too was a politician and poet, and wrote under the pseudonym Owen Meredith. While he was Viceroy of India, Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India. He was also the father-in-law of the architect Sir Edwin Lutyens.

As a young British diplomat, Robert Bulwer-Lytton spent a brief time in Athens in 1864, two years after it is said his father had been offered the Crown of Greece in 1862. Lytton was transferred to the Greek court to advise the teenage Danish Prince William who had recently become King George I. I wonder while he was there did he ever think that he might once have become the Crown Prince of Greece.

As for his literary legacy, Edward Bulwer-Lytton is still remembered for the opening words of his novel Paul Clifford (1830): ‘It was a dark and stormy night …’ Elmore Leonard once advised writers, ‘Never open a book with weather.’ Lytton ‘s opening words help to explain why he is not widely read any more.

His legacy is found, instead, in the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, an annual competition sponsored by San Jose State University in California to find a deliberately bad opening line for a new novel. Past winners have included Sue Fondrie in 2011: ‘Cheryl’s mind turned like the vanes of a wind-powered turbine, chopping her sparrow-like thoughts into bloody pieces that fell onto a growing pile of forgotten memories.’

And yes, now that you ask, it’s dark and windy but it’s not wet in Stony Stratford tonight.

The grave in Athens of the Cork-born general Sir Richard Church (1784-1873) … he played key roles in the attempts to force the abdication of King Otho (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Praying in Ordinary Time with USPG: Friday 25 November 2022

‘Breathe upon them, O Christ, and turn them into butterflies’ (Nikos Kazantzakis) … a butterfly in Platanias, Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This is the final week in Ordinary Time this year in the Calendar of the Church, the week between the Feast of Christ the King and Advent Sunday.

The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship commemorates Saint Catherine of Alexandria, Martyr, 4th century, and Isaac Watts, Hymn Writer, 1748.

Tradition says Saint Catherine of Alexandria was born into of a noble family and that, because of her Christian faith, she refused marriage with the emperor as she was already a ‘bride of Christ’. She is said to have disputed with 50 philosophers whose job it was to convince her of her error, and she proved superior in argument to them all. She was then tortured by being splayed on a wheel and finally beheaded.

Isaac Watts (1674-1748) was born in Southampton and educated at the local grammar school. He declined the opportunity to go to university, preferring the dissenting academy at Stoke Newington. He became the pastor of the Independent (or Congregationalist) Church at Mark Lane in London. Because of his deteriorating health, he resigned in 1712 and retired to Stoke Newington. He opposed the imposition of the doctrine of the Trinity on his fellow dissenting ministers, which led to the belief that he had become a Unitarian.

He wrote many collections of hymns and his own faith showed clearly through them. ‘When I survey the wondrous cross’, ‘Jesus shall reign where’er the sun’ and many other hymns are still used in worship. He died at Stoke Newington on this day in 1748.

Before this day gets busy, I am taking some time this morning for reading, prayer and reflection.

During this week, I am reflecting in these ways:

1, One of the readings for the morning;

2, a reflection or thought from the Greek writer Nikos Kazantzakis;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary, ‘Pray with the World Church.’

‘Look at the fig tree and all the trees’ (Luke 21: 29) … a fig tree coming into fruit in Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Luke 21: 29-33 (NRSVA):

29 Then he told them a parable: ‘Look at the fig tree and all the trees; 30 as soon as they sprout leaves you can see for yourselves and know that summer is already near. 31 So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. 32 Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all things have taken place. 33 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.’

Butterflies on the beach in Elafonisi, off the south-west coast of Crete … reminders of a prayer by Nikos Kazantzakis (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Nikos Kazantzakis, 5:

Last month marked the 65th anniversary of the death of the Greek writer and philosopher Nikos Kazantzakis in Freiburg, Germany, on 26 October 1957.

Nikos Kazantzakis (1883-1957) is a giant of modern Greek literature, and he was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature on nine separate occasions. His books include Zorba the Greek, Christ Recrucified, Captain Michalis (also published as Freedom or Death), and The Last Temptation of Christ (1955). He also wrote plays, travel books, memoirs and philosophical essays such as The Saviours of God: Spiritual Exercises.

His fame spread in the English-speaking world because of the film adaptations of Zorba the Greek (1964) and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988).

I recalled yesterday how Kazantzakis admired Saint Teresa of Avila, and how he derived from her his metaphor of silkworms, one of his favourite metaphors. The literary critic Tom Doulis extends Kazantzakis’s metaphor of the butterfly to render Kazantzakis’s Jesus as ‘God in the cocoon of man.’ In a prayer, Nikos Kazantzakis says:

The human heart is a tangle of caterpillars.
Breathe upon them,
O Christ, and turn them into
butterflies.

The prayer is found in his 1960s novel, The Fratricides, set in Castello, a village in Epirus, during Holy Week in the midst the Greek civil war in the late 1940s. At an early stage in the novel, Kazantzakis recalls the horrors of this conflict, and says of the villagers: ‘Their life is an unceasing battle with God, with the winds, with the snow, with death.’

In The Last Temptation of Christ, Kazantzakis depicts Christ readjusting a butterfly on a tree and referring to her as ‘my sister.’ In his fictional semi-autobiographical Report to Greco, Kazantzakis recalls:

‘It is impossible to express the joy I experienced when I first saw a grub engraved on one tray of the delicate golden balances discovered in the tombs of Mycenae and a butterfly on the other – symbols doubtlessly taken from Crete. For me, the grub’s yearning to be a butterfly always stood as its – and man’s – most imperative and at the same time most legitimate duty. God makes us grubs, and we, by our efforts, must become butterflies.’

But perhaps the most popular story by Kazantzakis about a butterfly is told in Zorba the Greek:

‘I remember one morning when I discovered a cocoon in the back of a tree just as a butterfly was making a hole in its case and preparing to come out. I waited awhile, but it was too long appearing and I was impatient. I bent over it and breathed on it to warm it. I warmed it as quickly as I could and the miracle began to happen before my eyes, faster than life. The case opened; the butterfly started slowly crawling out, and I shall never forget my horror when I saw how its wings were folded back and crumpled; the wretched butterfly tried with its whole trembling body to unfold them. Bending over it, I tried to help it with my breath, in vain.

‘It needed to be hatched out patiently and the unfolding of the wings should be a gradual process in the sun. Now it was too late. My breath had forced the butterfly to appear all crumpled, before its time. It struggled desperately and, a few seconds later, died in the palm of my hand.

‘That little body is, I do believe, the greatest weight I have on my conscience. For I realise today that it is a mortal sin to violate the great laws of nature. We should not hurry, we should not be impatient, but we should confidently obey the external rhythm.’

‘The grub’s yearning to be a butterfly always stood as its … most imperative and at the same time most legitimate duty’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Collect:

Eternal Father,
whose Son Jesus Christ ascended to the throne of heaven
that he might rule over all things as Lord and King:
keep the Church in the unity of the Spirit
and in the bond of peace,
and bring the whole created order to worship at his feet;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion:

Stir up, O Lord,
the wills of your faithful people;
that they, plenteously bringing forth the fruit of good works,
may by you be plenteously rewarded;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

God the Father,
help us to hear the call of Christ the King
and to follow in his service,
whose kingdom has no end;
for he reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, one glory.

The theme in the USPG Prayer Diary this week is ‘Prophetic Voice of the Nation.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday by Bishop Matthew Mhagama, from the Diocese of South-West Tanganyika in the Anglican Church of Tanzania.

The USPG Prayer Diary invites us to pray today in these words:

We thank God for the Christian organisations that support the Church’s efforts in various ways in building his kingdom.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

‘God makes us grubs, and we, by our efforts, must become butterflies’ (Nikos Kazantzakis) … butterflies in the village of Tsesmes near Rethymnon, Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

An icon of Saint Catherine in Saint Catherine’s Church on the Fortezza in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

Praying in Ordinary Time with USPG: Wednesday 23 November 2022

The former Church of Saint Francis on Saint Francis street in Rethymnon now hosts the Archaeological Museum of Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

Patrick Comerford

This is the final week in Ordinary Time this year in the Calendar of the Church, the week between the Feast of Christ the King and Advent Sunday.

Today, the calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship remembers Clement, Bishop of Rome, ca 100.

Saint Clement was active as an elder in the Church in Rome towards the end of the first century and is said to have been a disciple of the apostles. He wrote an epistle to the Corinthians which witnessed to ministry in the Church and concerned the authority and duties of the ministers. That letter clearly showed the authority of one senior priest intervening in a conflict in another Church and is full of valuable information about the history of the developing Church and its ministry at this time. His hierarchical view of Church order set a future pattern for episcopal practice and ministry.

Clement seems to have been president of a council of presbyters which governed the Church in Rome, and his letters are clearly written on their behalf. A fourth-century document has Clement being exiled to the Crimea where he was then put to death by being thrown into the sea with an anchor around his neck.

Before this day gets busy, I am taking some time this morning for reading, prayer and reflection.

During this week, I am reflecting in these ways:

1, One of the readings for the morning;

2, a reflection or thought from the Greek writer Nikos Kazantzakis;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary, ‘Pray with the World Church.’

The Franciscan Capuchin Church of Saint Anthony of Padua the only Roman Catholic church in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

Luke 21: 12-19 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 12 ‘But before all this occurs, they will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name. 13 This will give you an opportunity to testify. 14 So make up your minds not to prepare your defence in advance; 15 for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. 16 You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, by relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death. 17 You will be hated by all because of my name. 18 But not a hair of your head will perish. 19 By your endurance you will gain your souls.’

A statue of Saint Francis in the gardens of the Franciscan Capuchin Friary in Chania, the only Roman Catholic monastic house in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Nikos Kazantzakis, 3:

Last month marked the 65th anniversary of the death of the Greek writer and philosopher Nikos Kazantzakis in Freiburg, Germany, on 26 October 1957.

Nikos Kazantzakis (1883-1957) is a giant of modern Greek literature, and he was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature on nine separate occasions. His books include Zorba the Greek, Christ Recrucified, Captain Michalis (also published as Freedom or Death), and The Last Temptation of Christ (1955). He also wrote plays, travel books, memoirs and philosophical essays such as The Saviours of God: Spiritual Exercises.

His fame spread in the English-speaking world because of the film adaptations of Zorba the Greek (1964) and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988).

Kazantzakis prefaces his semi-autobiographical novel, Report to Greco, with a prayer: ‘Three kinds of souls, three kinds of prayers: 1, I am a bow in your hands, Lord, draw me lest I rot. 2, Do not overdraw me, Lord, I shall break. 3, Overdraw me, Lord, and who cares if I break!’ The prayer, said to be adapted from Saint Francis, is also quoted in Saint Francis (also published as The Poor Man of God).

Saint Francis of Assisi is one of the few Western saints from the period after the great schism who is also revered in the Eastern Church. Many Franciscan churches were built in Crete during the Venetian period, including churches in Iraklion, Rethymnon, Chania and Neapolis, and Petros Philargos, a friar of the Franciscan community in Iraklion who was born in Neapolis in eastern Crete, later became Pope Alexander V.

The most important church in Venetian Rethymnon was Saint Francis, which stands on Ethnikís Antistaseos Street, almost at the junction of Tsouderon Street, where I have sometimes stayed during my times in Rethymnon. The church now hosts the Archaeological Museum of Rethymnon.

The Church of Saint Anthony of Padua, on the corner of Mesolongíou Street and Salamínas Street in Rethymnon is run by the Franciscan Capuchins and is the only Roman Catholic Church in Rethymnon. I have also visited the Franciscan Capuchin church and house in Chania.

Saint Francis was popular in the Orthodox community of Crete and by the end of the 14th century was represented in Orthodox Churches throughout the Island. It is mainly due to the fictionalised biography by Nikos Kazantzakis, The Poor Man of God, also published as God’s Pauper and Saint Francis, that Saint Francis is known throughout the world as ‘God’s Pauper.’

This morning, I am reflecting on some other thoughts expressed by Kazantzakis in God’s Pauper:

‘What is love? It is not simply compassion, not simply kindness. In compassion there are two: the one who suffers and the one who feels compassion. In kindness there are two: the one who gives and the one who receives. But in love there is only one; the two join, unite, become inseparable. The 'I' and the 'you' vanish. To love means to lose oneself in the beloved.’

‘What do you have to fear? Nothing. Whom do you have to fear? No one. Why? Because whoever has joined forces with God obtains three great privileges: omnipotence without power, intoxication without wine, and life without death.’

‘I pity the village where no one is a saint, but I also pity the village where everyone is a saint!’

<< Δεν υπάρχει πράμα πιο κοντά μας από τον ουρανό. Η γής είναι κάτω από τα πόδια μας και την πατούμε, ο ουρανός είναι μέσα μας. >> ‘Nothing is nearer to us than heaven. The earth is beneath our feet and we tread upon it, but heaven is within us.’

‘What is the definition of heaven? Complete happiness. But how can anyone be completely happy when he looks out from heaven and sees his brothers and sisters being punished in hell? How can paradise exist if the inferno exists also? That is why I say—and let this sink deep down into your minds, my sisters—that either we shall all be saved, all of us together, or else we shall all be damned. If a person is killed at the other end of the earth, we are killed; if a person is saved, we are saved.’

‘To do the will of God means to do my own most deeply hidden will. Within even the most unworthy of men there is a servant of God, asleep.’

‘I had taken up my quill to begin writing many times before now, but I always abandoned it quickly: each time I was overcome with fear. Yes, may God forgive me, but the letters of the alphabet frighten me terribly. They are sly, shameless demons – and dangerous! You open the inkwell, release them: they run off – and how will you ever get control of them again! They come to life, join, separate, ignore your commands, arrange themselves as they like on the paper – black, with tails and horns. You scream at them and implore them in vain: they do as they please. Prancing, pairing up shamelessly before you, they deceitfully expose what you did not wish to reveal, and they refuse to give voice to what is struggling, deep within your bowels, to come forth and speak to mankind.’

<< Άγιος θα πει αυτός που απαρνήθηκε όλα τα επίγεια – κι όλα τα ουράνια. >> ‘Holy will he be called who renounced all earthly – and all heavenly.’

‘I am not going to kill sin by killing the sinners; I am not going to wage war against evildoers and infidels. I shall preach love, and I shall love; I shall preach concord, and shall practice brotherly love toward everyone in the world.’

‘Because what God wants, that, and only that, is also what we want—but we don't know it. God comes and awakens our souls, revealing to them their real, though unknown, desire. This is the secret, Brother Leo. To do the will of God means to do my own most deeply hidden will.’

The magnificent doorway of the former Saint Francis Church and its composite columns are unique in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

Collect:

Creator and Father of eternity, whose martyr Clement bore witness with his blood to the love he proclaimed and the gospel that he preached: give us thankful hearts as we celebrate your faithfulness, revealed to us in the lives of your saints, and strengthen us in our pilgrimage as we follow your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion:

God our redeemer, whose Church was strengthened by the blood of your martyr Clement: so bind us, in life and death, to Christ’s sacrifice that our lives, broken and offered with his, may carry his death and proclaim his resurrection in the world; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The theme in the USPG Prayer Diary this week is ‘Prophetic Voice of the Nation.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday by Bishop Matthew Mhagama, from the Diocese of South-West Tanganyika in the Anglican Church of Tanzania.

The USPG Prayer Diary invites us to pray today in these words:

Lord, help church leaders to stand faithfully as a prophetic voice to the nations.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

Inside the Franciscan Capuchin Church of Saint Anthony of Padua in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Inside the former Church of Saint Francis in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

Praying in Ordinary Time with USPG: Tuesday 22 November 2022

The bells in Preveli Monastery … a reminder of a story told by Nikos Kazantzakis in ‘Zorba the Greek’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This is the final week in Ordinary Time this year in the Calendar of the Church, the week between the Feast of Christ the King and Advent Sunday.

Today, the calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship remembers Saint Cecilia, Martyr at Rome, ca 230.

Saint Cecilia was one of the most revered martyrs of the Roman Church, but the only thing known for certain is that, at some point in the second or third century, a woman called Cecilia allowed the Church to meet in her house in Trastevere in the city of Rome and that, subsequently, the church erected on that site bore her name.

She was remembered as a brave woman who risked giving hospitality to the Christian Church when to do so was to court censure and possibly death. According to tradition, she converted her pagan husband and his brother to Christianity, and both were martyred before her. She is said to have been martyred on this day in about the year 230. She is honoured as the patron saint of musicians.

Before this day gets busy, I am taking some time this morning for reading, prayer and reflection.

During this week, I am reflecting in these ways:

1, One of the readings for the morning;

2, a reflection or thought from the Greek writer Nikos Kazantzakis;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary, ‘Pray with the World Church.’

‘As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down’ (Luke 21: 6) … classical remains in the Forum in Rome (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 21: 5-11 (NRSVA):

5 When some were speaking about the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God, he said, 6 ‘As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.’

7 They asked him, ‘Teacher, when will this be, and what will be the sign that this is about to take place?’ 8 And he said, ‘Beware that you are not led astray; for many will come in my name and say, “I am he!” and, “The time is near!” Do not go after them.

9 ‘When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end will not follow immediately.’ 10 Then he said to them, ‘Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; 11 there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.

‘Zorba the Greek’ … the film was released 58 years ago in December 1964

Nikos Kazantzakis, 2:

As I think today about Saint Cecilia, the patron of musicians and composers, I think too of the theme music composed by Mikis Theodorakis for the film Zorba the Greek

In my reflections on Saturday last, I referred to the actor Anthony Quinn, the star of Zorba the Greek, who was married for many years to Katherine Lester DeMille, granddaughter of Amy (Hunt) Lester, who is commemorated in a stained-glass window in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford.

The film Zorba the Greek is based on a well-known novel by the Greek writer and philosopher Nikos Kazantzakis. Last month marked the 65th anniversary of his death in Freiburg, Germany, on 26 October 1957.

Nikos Kazantzakis (1883-1957) is a giant of modern Greek literature, and he was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature on nine separate occasions. His books include Zorba the Greek, Christ Recrucified, Captain Michalis (also published as Freedom or Death), and The Last Temptation of Christ (1955). He also wrote plays, travel books, memoirs and philosophical essays such as The Saviours of God: Spiritual Exercises.

His fame spread in the English-speaking world because of the film adaptations of Zorba the Greek (1964) and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988).

Zorba the Greek was first published in Greek in 1946 as Life and Times of Alexis Zorbas (Βίος και Πολιτεία του Αλέξη Ζορμπά).

Zorba the Greek includes the story of a monastery with a treasured icon whose name changes from Our Lady of Mercy to Our Lady of Revenge, and Zorba also tells a story in which his grandfather takes a piece of wood and claims it is part of the True Cross.

I was reminded of these episodes when I visited the Monastery of Preveli. The monastery is famed for its role in struggles against both the Turks and the Germans in the 19th and 20th centuries, and is celebrated in Greek lore, literature and movies for its part in helping allied soldiers escape Crete during World War II.

In the film, the adventurous Zorba is the antithesis of the bookish Basil. Zorba is a potential symbol of freedom in Basil’s quest to find freedom. In Zorba’s view, only people who want to be free are truly human.

In many ways, the conflicts that unfold in the book provide a way for Kazantzakis to work through his own inner conflicts. At one time he had rejected Christianity and sought fulfilment in Buddhism and other philosophies. But he returned to Christianity and later wrote powerful novels about the sufferings of persecuted Christians in Asia Minor and about the life of Saint Francis of Assisi.

For Zorba, the journey is more important than the destination. He claims to be an atheist, yet realises that Christianity is central to the villagers’ way of life. He tells Basil: ‘the highest point a man can attain is not Knowledge, or Virtue, or Goodness, or Victory, but something even greater, more heroic and more despairing: Sacred Awe!’

In many ways, Zorba gives expression to Kazantzakis’ own spiritual struggles: ‘God changes his appearance every second. Blessed is the man who can recognise him in all his disguises.’

Given the inadequate conclusions to Cop27 in Egypt at the weekend, Kazantzakis now seems to have been ahead of his time too when he expresses his concern for the environment, nature and creation: ‘For I realise today that it is a mortal sin to violate the great laws of nature. We should not hurry, we should not be impatient, but we should confidently obey the eternal rhythm.’

Zorba and Basil dance syrtáki on the beach in ‘Zorba the Greek’ … the music was composed by Mikis Theodorakis

Collect:

Eternal Father,
whose Son Jesus Christ ascended to the throne of heaven
that he might rule over all things as Lord and King:
keep the Church in the unity of the Spirit
and in the bond of peace,
and bring the whole created order to worship at his feet;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion:

Stir up, O Lord,
the wills of your faithful people;
that they, plenteously bringing forth the fruit of good works,
may by you be plenteously rewarded;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

God the Father,
help us to hear the call of Christ the King
and to follow in his service,
whose kingdom has no end;
for he reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, one glory.

The theme in the USPG Prayer Diary this week is ‘Prophetic Voice of the Nation.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday by Bishop Matthew Mhagama, from the Diocese of South-West Tanganyika in the Anglican Church of Tanzania.

The USPG Prayer Diary invites us to pray today in these words:

Let us remember the evangelists working in difficult circumstances. May they be resilient, act honestly and be supported in their service.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

The Monastery of Preveli is celebrated in Greek lore, literature and movies (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Saint Cecilia, Patron of Musicians and Composers … a stained glass window in Saint John’s Church, Sandymount, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)