The politician from Rethymnon who became Prime Minister of Greece

The name of Tsouderon Street in Rethymnon honours a former Greek prime minister who was born in the town (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

For the next week I am staying in Pepi Studios on Tsouderon Street in Rethymnon. The name of the street honours the former Greek Prime Minister, Emmanuel Tsouderos (Εμμανουήλ Τσουδερός) (1882-1956), who was one of the best-known Greek political figures to have been born in Rethymnon.

Tsouderos was involved in the moves that led to Crete being integrated into the modern Greek state 100 years ago in 1913; he played a critical role in establishing the Bank of Greece during another financial crisis in the 1920s; and during World War II, he was involved in the resistance movement. He served briefly as Prime Minister of Greece, then as Prime Minister in the Greek government-in-exile, and he came close to securing an agreement with Britain that would have seen Cyprus becoming part of the modern Greece state in lieu of war reparations.

Emmanuel Tsouderos was born in Rethymnon in 1882, when Crete was still a part of the Ottoman Empire. He left his native Crete to study law at Athens University, and economics in Paris and London. When he returned to Crete at the age aged 24, he was elected to the Cretan Legislature (1906–1912), which ruled the island while Crete had autonomous status under the protection of Russia, Britain, France and Italy.

After ενωσις (enosis) or the union of Crete with Greece 100 years ago in December 1913, Tsouderos was elected to the Greek Parliament. Soon after, he joined the Liberal Party of the Cretan-born Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos and was elected to the National Assembly again in 1915 and 1920. From 1919 to 1929 he represented Greece in many international meetings on commercial and economical issues and in talks on the Greek national debt.

He was Transport Minister under Venizelos, Finance Minister under Themistoklis Sophoulis (1860-1949), who was born in Samos, and Transport Minister again in the fourth Venizelos cabinet in January-February 1924.

Emmanuel Tsouderos was the first Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Greece

As Deputy Governor of the National Bank, Tsouderos negotiated with representatives of the League of Nations in 1927 on establishing the Bank of Greece as a new central bank. The bank was officially formed on 15 September 1927 and began operating on 14 May 1928. Tsouderos became the first Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Greece, and when Alexandros Diomidis resigned as Governor of the Bank in 1931, Tsouderos succeeded him.

He was a vocal opponent of the Metaxas dictatorship, and Metaxas sacked him from the bank in 1939. Then, in 1941, as the Nazi army advanced towards Athens, the Greek Prime Minister, Alexandros Koryzis, committed suicide on 18 April, and Tsouderos succeeded him as Prime Minister of Greece on 21 April 1941. Eight days later, on 29 April 1941, as the army command prepared to capitulate, a defiant and heroic Tsouderos fled from Athens to Crete with King George II. Back in his native Crete, Tsouderos reorganised the Greek forces to resist the inevitable German invasion.

Tsouderos fled again during the Battle of Crete a month later. He went to the Middle East and later to Egypt. Tsouderos then headed the Greek government in exile from 29 April 1941 until 13 April 1944. The government was initially located in London, but subsequently moved to Cairo.

As Prime Minister in exile, he was at times also Foreign Minister (April 1941), Finance Minister (April to September 1941 and June 1943 to April 1944) and Interior Minister (May 1942 to April 1944).

As Prime Minister, he signed a memorandum with the British government in 1942 that agreed that Greece would receive control of Cyprus as a war indemnity. However, under British pressure, he resigned as Prime Minister on 13 April 1944. He later served in the government-in-exile under Sophocles Venizelos.

Emmanuel Tsouderos, who was born in Rethymnon, was the war-time Prime Minister-in-exile of Greece

In the first post-war, centre-left cabinet of the by-then elderly Themistocles Sophoulis, he was Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Co-ordination from November 1945 to April 1946. In the cabinet of General Alexandros Papagos (1883-1955), an ageing general who had crushed the left in the Greek Civil War, he was Minister without Portfolio from November 1952 to October 1955.

Tsouderos died at the age of 74 in Nervi, Genoa, on 10 February 1956. He donated his papers to the Gennadius Library in the American School of Classical Studies at Athens.

His daughter, the journalist, writer and economist Virginia Tsouderou, is a former Deputy Foreign Minister and New Democracy deputy. She was born in Iraklion in Crete and studied at Oxford, the University of Minnesota and Radcliffe-Harvard. She is a founding member and honorary president of the Greek branch of Transparency International.

Recently, she has been critical of the parlous state of Greek politics and public life. “There has been a silent agreement between the two main parties for decades that there was no political corruption in Greece,” she said recently. “But people are so angry now that if the government does not open up and crack down on corruption there will be big trouble.”

. .

A week in Rethymnon as Crete celebrates 100 years of enosis

Coffee for two? Or three? A table on the corner of Ethn. Anistasseos and Tsouderon streets in Rethymnon this afternoon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

I arrived back in Rethymnon this afternoon [30 August 2013], and for the next week I am staying once again on Tsouderon Street in Pepi Studios – a small hotel in this charming old-world town on the north coast of Crete.

Tsouderon Street is the heart of a small coastal city that many regard as one of the best-preserved Venetian Renaissance cities in Greece.

I first stayed in this town a quarter of a century ago in 1988, and I was back in Rethymnon for a week last summer.

The entrance to Pepi Studios ... I am staying here for the next week (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Pepi Studios is a small, quiet hotel at No 22 Tsouderon Street, housed in a charming old Venetian building in a side street off Arkadiou Street.

The entrance to the hotel is squeezed between an ATM for the local branch of the National Bank of Greece, which is housed in an impressive neoclassical villa, and Bistro 22, which is both a café and a bar, and in the morning it becomes the breakfast room for Pepi’s guests.

The charming gardens and the pool at Pepi Studios (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Pepi has 14 studios and four maisonettes, arranged around a charming garden and a small outdoor swimming pool. Each studio has a kitchen, free Wi-Fi internet and a flat screen TV with satellite channels.

We are staying Studio 7, with a balcony looking straight down onto Tsouderon Street. Behind the white walls and gardens around the pool, I can see the library behind Aghia Barbara Church, and the minaret of the former Valide Sulana Mosque juts up above the roofs of the shops and houses to the south.

The long stretch of sandy white beach in Rethymnon is only a few hundred metres walk from Pepi Studios on Tsouderon Street (Photograph Patrick Comerford)

This afternoon, we walked down to the corner with Arkadiou Street, and then took a lazy ramble through the streets of the old town. I am only a few hundred metres walking distance from both the old harbour and the town’s lengthy, sandy beach, which stretches for miles to the east as far as one can see.

The fortezza and the old Venetian harbour are nearby, and there are museums, galleries and old Venetian and Ottoman buildings around every corner, with tavernas, restaurants, cafés and bars on every street, corner and square.

A poster for tonight’s play in the Fortezza as part of the centenary celebrations

This year in Crete, people are celebrating the one-hundredth anniversary of ένωσις (enosis) or Crete’s incorporation into the modern Greek state after two and half centuries of Ottoman rule. As part of the centenary celebrations and this year’s programme for Rethymnon’s Renaissance Festival, an adaptation of Patouchas by Ioannis Kondylakis is being staged in the Erofili Theatre in the Fortezza tonight. It tells the story of a young Cretan shepherd’s efforts to understand and conform to the social values of his parents’ village, recording the ways and mores of the Greek countryside.

Or, perhaps, this evening I’ll see if I can find some traditional Cretan music. The Renaissance Festival continues in Rethymnon until Sunday [1 September], and I hope to catch some of the remaining items on the programme, including an icon exhibition which opened in the Artillery Hall in the Fortezza the weekend before last [17 August 2013] and continues until Sunday.

Last year, I spent some time photographing and cataloguing the fountains, mosques and doorways of Rethymnon. But the town also has numerous Byzantine churches and monasteries, enchanting Venetian monuments and palazzos, Ottoman balconies, and narrow alleyways, quiet squares and side streets that are oozing with charm and curiosity.

Akri, one of my favourite restaurants, is a charming taverna in a quiet corner off Kornaru Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

During our stroll this afternoon, we had a late lunch in Akri, which has been one of my favourite restaurants since the 1980s. It is a charming taverna in a quiet corner off Kornaru Street, offering traditional, home-made Cretan dishes. The courtyard has patches of green everywhere with a refreshing scent of jasmine and with small tables under a wooden trellis with dripping, overhanging vines.

And during the coming week I plan to find time for long, lingering meals with friends, walks on the beach, time to visit the olive groves and the monasteries in the mountains above Rethymnon, and time to photograph the unique Ottoman hanging wooden balconies in this town.

Bistro 22 on Tsouderon Street ... Pepi Studios are just behind and above the bar (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Bradley Manning to receive Sean MacBride Peace Prize, Irish CND President tells Hiroshima Day commemoration

Patrick Comerford

This morning’s edition of the Church of Ireland Gazette [30 August 2013] carries a half-page report and a three-column photograph on page 6 following my address as President of the Irish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (Irish CND) at the annual Hiroshima Day commemorations in Merrion Square, Dublin, earlier this month [6 August 2013].

Bradley Manning to receive Seán MacBride Peace Prize,
Irish CND President tells Hiroshima Day commemoration

The President of the Irish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (Irish CND), Canon Patrick Comerford, has announced that this year’s Seán MacBride Peace Prize is to go to the jailed US whistle-blower, Bradley Manning.

Canon Comerford was speaking at Irish CND’s recent annual Hiroshima Day commemoration at the Hiroshima Cherry Tree in Merrion Square, Dublin.

During the commemoration, a wreath was laid at the Cherry Tree by the Lord Mayor of Dublin, Cllr Oisín Quinn. Other speakers included the poet, Hugh McFadden; Tomoko Matsumoto, First Secretary of the Japanese Embassy; and Dr David Hutchinson Edgar, a parishioner of Tallaght.

Also present were the Ambassador of Mexico, Carlos Garcia de Alba, and Grete Ødegaard, Counsellor and Deputy Head of Mission, the Royal Norwegian Embassy.

The Seán MacBride Peace Prize is named after the Irish Nobel Peace Prize winner, the late Seán MacBride, a former President of Irish CND and of the International Peace Bureau (IPB) in Geneva, to which Irish CND is affiliated.

The prize is presented each year by the IPB and Canon Comerford said that this year’s award to Bradley Manning was “for his courageous actions in revealing information about US war crimes.”

Canon Comerford continued: “When Bradley Manning revealed to the world the crimes being committed by the US military, he was engaging in an act of obedience to this high moral duty. Already, he has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

“Bradley Manning has also revealed the whereabouts of US tactical nuclear weapons, as well as the location of key US military facilities.

“War operations, and especially illegal ones, are frequently conducted under the cover of secrecy. To penetrate this wall of secrecy by revealing information that should be accessible to all is an important contribution to the struggle against war.”

The President of Irish CND described the heavy sentence facing Bradley Manning as “not only unjust but also having a very negative effect on the right to freedom of expression that the US claims to uphold.”

Canon Comerford asserted: “It is to the shame of Ireland that neither of these modern-day heroes, holders of the banner of morality in the immoral nuclear age, has not been offered asylum in this country.

“We ought to be grateful to them, each for taking the risk that comes and raising … subjects which ought to be discussed in public and which no statesman cares to approach.”

Sale of Loreto Abbey must raise questions about Rathfarnham’s unique Pugin chapel

Loreto Abbey ... back on the market once again (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

The Commercial Property supplement of The Irish Times reported this week [29 August 2013] that Loreto Abbey, a collection of former college, school and church buildings in Rathfarnham, is up for sale at a “knockdown price” of €2.5 million after lying idle for the past 14 years.

In its report this week, The Irish Times noted: “Whatever enterprise ends up in Loreto Abbey, the promoters will obviously have to consider the provision of a car park under part of the front grounds.”

However, I think a more important consideration is the future of Rathfarnham House, which is an important work by Edward Lovett Pearce. But even more important, perhaps, is the future of the abbey church, which represents a significant stage in the work of the great Gothic Revival architect, Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin.

The estate agents Savills have been appointed by the receiver David Carson to handle the sale of the Georgian house, Pugin chapel and other buildings which stand on 1.82 hectares (4.49 acres) on Grange Road in Rathfarnham.

The property developer Liam Carroll bought Loreto Abbey and an adjoining 12 acres in 1999, supposedly for €14 million, and later built and sold 10 blocks of apartments with 271 units.

Carroll also had planning permission to convert some of the buildings into a 113-bedroom nursing home but the Irish financial crisis put an end to those plans. His company, Danninger, was one of the first to fall in the property crash.

Since NAMA took over Loreto Abbey, the buildings and grounds have fallen into disrepair, and the gates have been padlocked, barring entry to anyone with an interest in local or architectural history and heritage.

The buildings have an overall floor area of 8,627 square metres (92,860 sq ft) and it is reported they have been extensively weather-proofed over the last six months. The site’s residential zoning means the buildings could become apartments, a nursing home, or be used for medical facilities or education.

Pugin’s chapel in Rathfarnham ... behind rusting gates that are chained and padlocked (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Jill Horan of Savills told The Irish Times this week that the property provides developers, speculators and owner-occupiers with a “truly superb canvass to work from.” She said the buildings had huge development potential and offered developers an opportunity to create a unique residential or commercial scheme.

Most of the buildings on the site are linked by the central Georgian house once known as Rathfarnham House, which is flanked by the Irish granite wings of the church (1846) and Saint Anne’s to the south, with Block L and the concert hall added between 1863 and 1903.

The buildings are a treasure trove of architectural gems, from the beautiful church with its Gothic vaulted ceilings and stained glass windows to the abbey, with its splendid plasterwork and gracious living accommodation.

The buildings are set back from Grange Road and are approached by a double driveway. They overlook attractive pleasure grounds with mature trees.

Rathfarnham House was designed in 1725 for William Palliser (1695-1762) by Sir Edward Lovett Pearce, who also designed Parliament Buildings in College Green, Drumcondra House (now part of All Hallows’ College), many of the houses in Henrietta Street, including Nos 9, 11 and 12.

William Palliser’s father, William Palliser (1646-1727), was once Professor of Divinity in Trinity College Dublin and later Archbishop of Cashel (1694-1727). It is said Palliser’s guests at Rathfarnham House included Dean Jonathan Swift, George Frideric Handel, who first visited Dublin in 1741, and Thomas Moore, who is believed to have written ‘Oft in the Stilly Night’ here. The story is told that during a banquet one night, the gathering wanted Moore to compose a poem, and he was locked in one of the rooms until he came out with the masterpiece. However, Moore was born in 1779, and was only 16 when the last of Pallisers died, and ‘Oft in the Stilly Night’ was probably written in 1815, when Rathfarnham House may have been vacat..

When William Palliser died in 1762, he had no children and Rathfarnham House was inherited by his cousin, the Revd John Palliser. When John died in 1795, the house was bought by George Grierson, the King’s Printer in Ireland. When Grierson moved to a new house in Woodtown, Rathfarnham House was left unoccupied for a few years until 1821, when the house and 40 acres were bought for £2,000 by Archbishop Daniel Murray for the newly-founded Loreto Order.

Rathfarnham House then became known as the Abbey, and between 1838 and 1840, a new chapel was built for the nuns according to designs by AWN Pugin (1812-1852). In parts of the chapel, Pugin’s designs were inspired by the lantern in Ely Cathedral.

Pugin’s chapel in Rathfarnham dates from March to May 1839, the same time as his plans for Saint Michael’s Church, Gorey, Co Wexford, and Saint Chad’s Cathedral, Birmingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Pugin’s drawings for the church were prepared at the same time as his plans for Saint Michael’s Church, Gorey, Co Wexford, and Saint Chad’s Cathedral, Birmingham. They all date from 1839, and together they mark the end of the first phase of his career.

His drawings were completed by 28 May 1839. However, the building was simplified in execution John Benjamin Keane working with Patrick Byrne. The angels on either side of altar by the sculptor John Hogan are believed to be based on Hogan’s two eldest daughters.

The chapel has been closed to the public for a decade and a half or more. This is the Pugin work nearest to where I live and work, but when I tried to visit it about two years ago I was allowed through the gates to see the exterior of the chapel, but unfortunately I was unable to see inside.

I called by again this evening on my way home from work, but the gates are rusty and remain padlocked.

A major concern at this stage must be about securing the preservation of this unique part of our architectural heritage.

The unique Octagon or Lantern Tower is the glory of Ely Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Praying for Syria and Egypt as we recall the beheading of Saint John the Baptist

An icon of the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist in a church in Koutouloufari in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Today [29 August] is observed liturgically by most Christian traditions, including most Anglican, Roman Catholic, Orthodox and Lutheran churches, as a day commemorating the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist.

Saint John the Baptist was beheaded on the orders of Herod Antipas through the vengeful request of his daughter Salome.

The story of the beheading of Saint John the Baptist is a story that places personal integrity, morality and honour in stark contrast to self-centred arrogance, vengeance, and the tyrannical abuse of power.

According to the Synoptic Gospels, Herod, who was Tetrarch of Judea, had imprisoned Saint John the Baptist after he reproved Herod for divorcing his wife and unlawfully marrying Herodias, the wife of his brother Herod Philip.

On Herod’s birthday, Salome, the daughter of Herodias, danced before him and his guests. The drunken Herod was so pleased that he promised her anything she desired, including half his kingdom. When her mother prompted Salome to ask for the head of Saint John the Baptist on a platter, he was executed in prison. The disciples took his body and buried it, but the Gospel accounts say nothing about what happened to his head (Matthew 14: 1-12; Mark 6: 14-29; see Luke 9: 7-9).

Today’s liturgical commemoration is almost as old as the commemoration of the Birth of Saint John the Baptist on 24 June. In some Orthodox cultures, today is a day of strict fasting.

A traditional icon showing scenes from the life of Saint John the Baptist

According to some Orthodox traditions, Saint John’s disciples buried his body at Sebaste, near present-day Nablus on the West Bank, but Herodias took his head and buried it in a dung heap. Later, Saint Joanna, the wife of one of Herod’s stewards, secretly recovered the head and buried it on the Mount of Olives, where it remained hidden for centuries. In the fourth century, a monk named Innocent is said to have found the buried head, but hid it again.

Over a century later, in the year 452, when Constantine the Great was Emperor, two monks in Jerusalem on a pilgrimage claimed to have found the head once again, but it fell into the hands of an Arian monk, Eustathius. Eventually, Archimandrite Marcellus brought the head to Emesa in Phoenicia.

Yet other traditions say Herodias had the head buried in Herod’s fortress at Machaerus or in Herod’s palace in Jerusalem. It was found during the reign of Constantine and secretly taken to Emesa, where it was hidden until it was found once again in 453.

From Emesa, the head was brought to Constantinople. Although it was moved to Cappadocia in the early ninth century during the iconoclastic persecution, it was returned later to Constantinople.

According to another tradition, the body of Saint John the Baptist remained in Sebaste. However, his shrine was desecrated under Julian the Apostate ca 362. A portion of the rescued relics was brought first to Jerusalem and then to Alexandria in 395. Today, the former tomb in Nablus is at the Nabi Yahya Mosque or Saint John the Baptist Mosque.

Today, several places claim to have the severed head of Saint John the Baptist, including the Church of San Silvestro in Capite in Rome, Amiens Cathedral in France, Antioch in Turkey, the Romanian skete of Saint John Prodromos (Saint John the Baptist) on Mount Athos in Greece, and the former Basilica of Saint John the Baptist in Damascus. Because of the traditions relating the head to the Syrian capital, many Muslims believe that Christ’s second coming will take place in Damascus.

Father Irenaeus, a monk in the Monastery of Saint Macarius in Wadi Natrun, shows me the relics in the crypt of Saint John the Baptist below the northern wall of the church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

In Egypt, when I visited the Coptic Orthodox Monastery of Saint Macarius the Great at Wadi el-Natrun, about 100 km north-west of Cairo, in the Desert of Sceits, Father Irenaeus, a monk in the monastery, showed me the relics of Saint John the Baptist in the crypt of the main church in the monastery.

The Church of Saint Macarius was restored in recent decades at the request of the late Pope Shenouda III. We were told that during the restoration of the church, the monks unearthed the crypt of Saint John the Baptist and the crypt of the Prophet Elisha below the northern wall . The relics were then gathered into a special reliquary and placed before the sanctuary of Saint John the Baptist in the Church of Saint Macarius.

The monastery has spiritual, academic and fraternal links with several monasteries outside Egypt, including Chevetogne in Belgium, Solesmes Abbey and the Monastery of the Transfiguration in France, Deir el-Harf in Lebanon and the Community of the Sisters of the Love of God at the Convent of the Incarnation at Fairacres in Oxford.

Each day, the monastery receives large numbers of Egyptian and foreign visitors, sometimes as many as 1,000 people a day. The monks give special priority to priests, full-time lay workers and Sunday school teachers as visitors, and during the summer holidays, the monastery offers many young people opportunities to spend a few days on retreat, with spiritual direction and guidance.

The monastery is playing a significant role in the spiritual awakening of the Coptic Church. “We receive all our visitors, no matter what their religious conviction, with joy, warmth and graciousness, not out of a mistaken optimism, but in genuine and sincere love for each person,” says the monastery website.

In his book, Church and State, one of the monks, Father Matta el-Meskeen, declares that politics should be entirely separated from religion. “Give therefore to emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22: 21). In other writings, such as Sectarianism and Extremism, Father Matta warns against the common tendency of minorities to be wrapped up in themselves and to despise others.

The monks say they live out fully the unity of the Church in spirit and in truth, “in anticipation of its visible attainment ecclesiastically. Through our genuine openness of heart and spirit to all men, no matter what their confession, it has become possible for us to see ourselves, or rather Christ, in others. For us, Christian unity is to live together in Christ by love. Then divisions collapse and differences disappear, and there is only the One Christ who gathers us all into His holy Person.”

And they add: “It is our hope that the desert of Scetis will become once more the birth place of good will, reconciliation and unity between all the peoples on earth in Christ Jesus.”

These monks are an example to us all. Meanwhile, those places associated with Saint John the Baptist in the Middle East, including Syria, Turkey, the West Bank and Egypt must be in our prayers this morning as we pray that integrity, morality and honour should triumph over arrogance, vengeance and the tyrannical abuse of power.

With Father Irenaeus, a monk in the Monastery of Saint Macarius in Wadi Natrun in the Western Desert in Egypt

Readings:

Jeremiah 1: 4-10; Psalm 11; Hebrews 11: 32 to 12: 2; Matthew 14: 1-12.

Collect:

Almighty God,
who called your servant John the Baptist
to be the forerunner of your Son in birth and death:
strengthen us by your grace
that, as he suffered for the truth,
so we may boldly resist corruption and vice
and receive with him the unfading crown of glory;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post-Communion Prayer:

Merciful Lord,
whose prophet John the Baptist
proclaimed your Son as the Lamb of God
who takes away the sin of the world:
grant that we who in this sacrament have known
your forgiveness and your life-giving love
may ever tell of your mercy and your peace;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The door into the chapel at the Hospital of Saint John the Baptist, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

‘I have a dream’ ... remembering the speech half a century later

It is fifty years today since the Revd Dr Martin Luther King made his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech on 28 August 1963

Patrick Comerford

It is fifty years ago today since the Revd Dr Martin Luther King made his “I Have a Dream” speech on 28 August 1963.

Twenty years later, as I was writing my first book, Do You Want to Die for NATO? (Dublin and Cork: Mercier Press, 1984), I selected quotation for Martin Luther King to head three of the seven chapters:

“Our world is threatened by the grim prospects of atomic annihilation because there are still too many who know not what they do” (Chapter, 1, p. 9).

“We have guided missiles and misguided man” (Chapter 2, p. 16).

“In our day of space vehicles and guided ballistic missiles, the choice is either non-violence or non-existence” (Chapter 7, p. 89).

Those quotations have not lost their relevance and significance three decades later. Nor have the points made by King in his “I Have a Dream” speech half a century later.

Last weekend, the Economist pointed out that King’s “I Have a Dream” speech was a simple clarification of America’s founding promise that "all men are created equal,” and have a right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” But, while it pointed out that America has changed beyond recognition over the past 50 years, the legacy of discrimination is hard to shake off.

Despite the end of most forms of segregation and the election of a black President, black Americans remain likelier that white Americans to lack jobs, be poor, get arrested and spend time in prison, and the gap in household income has widened from 2000 to 2011 and is enormous.

The fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman on the night of 26 February 2012, in Sanford, Florida, Zimmerman's acquittal of second-degree murder and of manslaughter charges last month [13 July 2013], and the subsequent reactions and protests show how divided and insensitive many sections of American society are to this day.

In his speech to over 250,000 civil rights marchers on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at the end of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on 28 August 1963, Martin Luther King called for an end to racism in the United States. The speech has since become a defining moment in the American Civil Rights Movement.

Dr King waxed eloquently as he went out live on radio and television. At the end of his speech, he left his prepared text for an improvised set of excited exhortations beginning: “I have a dream …” His improvisation was probably prompted by Mahalia Jackson as she cried out: “Tell them about the dream, Martin!”

You can listen to the speech here.

‘I have a dream,’ the Revd Dr Martin Luther King jr, 28 August 25, 2013:

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free.

One hundred years later the life of the still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination.

One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity.

One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land.

So we have come here today to dramatise a shameful condition.

In a sense we have come to our nation’s capital to cash a cheque. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men – yes, black men as well as white men – would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of colour are concerned. Instead of honouring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad cheque, a cheque which has come back marked “insufficient funds.”

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation.

So we have come to cash this cheque – a cheque that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now.

This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilising drug of gradualism.

Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy.

Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.

Now is the time to open the doors of opportunity to all of God’s children.

Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.

Now is the to make justice a reality for all God's children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to underestimate the determination of the Negro. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.

1963 is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.

There will be neither rest nor tranquillity in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvellous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today. They have come to realise that their destiny is tied up with our destiny and their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.

As we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights: “When will you be satisfied?”

We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality.

We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.

We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one.

We can never be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote.

No. No, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations.

Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells.

Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality.

You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi. Go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.

I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.”

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a stat, sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will be judged not by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor whose lips are presently dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, will be transformed into a situation where little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls and walk together as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning: “My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true.

So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”

For the past half century, there has been public controversy about the copyright status of the speech. I am making it available on this anniversary for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, which constitute a ‘fair use’ of copyrighted material under Title 17 USC section 107 of the US Copyright Law, and this material is not being distributed for profit.

Copyright inquiries and permission requests may be directed to: Estate of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Intellectual Properties Management, One Freedom Plaza, 449 Auburn Avenue NE, Atlanta, GA 30312.

‘Grafton Street’s a wonderland’ ... with its rich architectural heritage

Grafton Street attracts high rents, a high number of buskers and a large number of tourists (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

I was recalling yesterday the words of Noel Purcell and Leo Maguire in ‘The Dublin Saunter’:
Grafton Street’s a wonderland,
There’s magic in the air.
There are diamonds in the lady’s eyes
And gold-dust in her hair.
And if you don’t believe me,
Then come and meet me there,
In Dublin on a sunny summer’s morning.

I had sauntered up and down the wonderland that is Grafton Street three times on Sunday afternoon in the summer sun. Each time I stopped every now and then to photograph buildings of architectural interest.

Grafton Street dates from the early 18th century, when it was developed as a mixed residential and commercial street, and it was redeveloped later that century when it became an important north-south inner city crossing.

Today, it still regards itself as Dublin’s most elegant shopping street, but it also attracts high rents, a high number of buskers and a large number of tourists.

In the summer sunshine, and at many other times too, despite many of the ugly 20th century shop-fronts and the wilful destruction of many of the attractive Georgian, Victorian and Edwardian ground-floor features, it is an attractive and endearingly-entertaining street to saunter along.

But most people walk along with their eyes on the shop-fronts, the buskers, or the people in front of them, instead at looking up at the next levels and at this great collection of architectural styles and buildings.

McDonnell’s two-tier oriel window on the corner of Nassau Street and Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Starting on the corner of Nassau Street on the left (east) side, heading up Grafton Street towards Saint Stephen’s Green, the first building to look at has a two-tier oriel window, designed by Laurence A McDonnell.

The former Mitchell’s Hotel once looked down Wicklow Street ... today it is a sad image of the neglect of Dublin’s architectural heritage (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

It is a sad statement of where Dublin is today – just as the Town Hall in Bray is a sad statement – that McDonalds occupies the ground floor of the former Mitchell’s Hotel at 9-11 Grafton Street. A five-bay building, it was designed by the partnership of WM Mitchell, in which Charles H Mitchell and John M Mitchell continued the name of their father, William Mansfield Mitchell (1842-1910), whose father started in business in Grafton Street as a confectioner at No 10. WM Mitchell’s work can be seen all along Grafton Street.

The former Royal Hotel stood at Nos 12-13 Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Mitchell’s Hotel was built in 1926 with a central balcony that had a vista down the full length of Wicklow Street. Next door, at Nos 12-13, from 1860, stood the Royal Hotel. But I imagine few people dropping in for a Big Mac take time to step back into Wicklow Street and look up at this once majestic hotel.

The window pattern of No 14 indicates that this was once a Dutch Billy building (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The window pattern on No 14 is the last surviving example on Grafton Street of the old Dutch Billys that dominated the skyline of central Dublin in the 18th century. This Anglo-Dutch building style was named after William of Orange, and it was more reminiscent of Amsterdam than of London.

The broad first-floor window has a handsome stucco frame and lettered finial that were added in 1868, when the building was trading as a carpet shop.

A surviving stucco figure on the first floor above Davy Byrne’s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The facades of Nos 15-20 have survived over the generations, despite extensive rebuilding for Brown Thomas, which began at Nos 16-17 and Marks and Spencer, which now sweeps around the corner into Duke Street, to meet Davy Byrne’s where, James Joyce tells us, Leopold Bloom had a glass of burgundy and a gorgonzola sandwich on Bloomsday.

The original Romanesque facade of 24-25 Grafton Street was inspired by churches and cathedrals throughout Ireland (from an engraving in The Irish Builder, 1863)

On the east side of Grafton Street, between Duke Street and Ann Street, Nos 24-25, built “Celtic revival” style for William Longfield, was once one of the finest Romanesque facades until the ground floor was vandalised to make way for modern shopfronts. The building was designed by Sir Matthew Digby Wyatt (1820-1877), a descendant of John Wyatt (1675-1742), of Weeford near Lichfield, a member of an outstanding family of architects, the pre-eminent example of an artistic dynasty that continued to work in architecture for at least eight generations: at the end of the 18th century, James Wyatt (1746-1813), was involved in a reorganisation Lichfield Cathedral that was later criticised by AWN Pugin; Sir Jeffrey Wyattville (1766-1840) was responsible for the Gothic appearance of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge; and Matthew’s brother, Thomas Henry Wyatt (1807-1880), designed Saint Bartholomew’s Church, Ballsbirdge, and was involved in the restoration of Saint Canice’s Cathedral, Kilkenny.

The original shopfront at Nos 24-25 combined details from many churches and cathedrals, including the doorway in Saint Lachtain’s Church, Freshford, Co Kilkenny, crosses from Monasterboice, Co Louth, and the chancel arch and crosses from Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Tuam, Co Galway.

Nos 24-25 Grafton Street today ... deprived of its original ground-floor shopfront (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The first and second floors, which have survived, have two super-imposed Romanesque arcades. Above them, the third or attic floor is designed like a Venetian loggia. The rich details throughout these three floors include interlaced capitals, keystone masks, foliated string courses, and chevron or saw-tooth ornamentation.

The Irish Builder on 18 July 1863 described this as “neither more nor less than an effort to adapt some of the more picturesque elements of ancient Irish ornamentation to the decoration of a structure ministering to the directly utilitarian exigencies of the present day.”

The Irish Builder hoped Wyatt would “stimulate many an Irish architect to ... recreate a national style,” and praised it for being “at once novel and successful.”

The Gothic, pointed, triple-light window on the first floor of 42 Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

No 42 Grafton Street is also the work of William Mitchell, who refurbished the building in 1870 for Rathborne’s as a shop, billiards room and apartments. The building has an attractive Gothic facade, with a pointed, triple-light window on the first floor.

Millar and Symes designed the ‘Tudor Revival’ front of 62 Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Returning back down Grafton Street on the west side from Saint Stephen’s Green towards College Green, No 62 has an attractive ‘Tudor Revival’ front designed by Millar and Symes (1911).

No 64 Grafton Street is a fine corner building designed by Laurence McDonnell (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

On Grafton Street’s north corner with Chatham Street, No 64 was also designed by Laurence McDonnell. It is built in red brick, with narrow gabled fronts, tall brick pilasters, a fine balcony on the third floor, and terracotta dressings.

Phil Lynnott’s statue is ‘back in town’ in Harry Street, looking out onto Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Recently, Phil Lynnott’s statue was returned to its place outside the Bruxelles (Zodiac) in Harry Street, looking out to Grafton Street.

No 70 Grafton Street, standing on the corner with Harry Street, is also the work of Laurence McDonnell, who designed it in 1900 for the American Shoe Company in Jacobean style with brick pilasters. Next door, No 71 Grafton Street shows the influence of John Ruskin’s interpretation of the Gothic style.

No 72 Grafton Street is a combination of Tudor Revival and Arts and Crafts styles (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The next building, No 72, is the former Grafton Cinema which ran all-day cartoon shows in the 1960s and 1970s. It is a combination of Tudor Revival and Arts and Crafts styles, and was designed in 1911 by RFC Orpen (1863-1938), a brother of the painter William Orpen (1878-1931).

Nos 81-82 Grafton Street was rebuilt in 1861 with a handsome stucco skin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

On the corner with Johnson’s Court, which leads onto Clarendon Street, Nos 81-82 Grafton Street was rebuilt as one premises in 1861. It has a handsome stucco skin added to the first and second storey by John C Burne, with corner quoins, a bracketed cornice and window pediments.

The Art Deco frontage on the former Turkish Baths at 97-99 Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

It is hard to believe that Grafton Street once had its own Turkish Baths. Nos 97-99, above Weir’s the jewellers, was rebuilt by George O’Connor in 1934 as the Maskora Turkish Baths, with an Art Deco frontage that includes piers pierced by narrow vertical windows.

Richard Norman Shaw strongly influenced the design of 102-103 Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Nos 102-103 Grafton Street, now River Island, was designed for Weir’s in 1912 by WH Byrne and Son, with Jacobean elevations in brick and Portland stone and elaborate carvings that are the work of Charles W Harrison, who also did the carvings throughout Saint Bartholomew’s Church in Ballsbridge. The style was heavily influenced by Edwardian Classicism and the work of Richard Norman Shaw (1831-1912), who had been trained by George Edmund Street and William Burn, and whose works included New Scotland Yard.

Barnardo’s at 108 Grafton Street with the remains of a 19th century stucco facade (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Moving further north down Grafton Street from the junction with Suffolk Street towards College Green, No 108 Grafton Street has been the premises of Barnardo’s the furriers for over 200 years, since 1812, and it still has some remains of a 19th century stucco facade.

WH Lynn designed 114 Grafton Street for the Royal Bank in 1904 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

No 114 was originally a branch of the Royal Bank designed by WH Lynn in 1904. Now a clothes shop, it has an over-the-top, three-bay facade, with a heavy, yellow sandstone, palazzo-style ground floor and polished granite and red marble columns that climb up the first and second storey.

Lucius O’Callaghan designed 116 Grafton Street for Edward Ponsonby in 1906 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

No 116 was designed in 1906 for the bookseller Edward Ponsonby by Lucius O’Callaghan (1877-1954), who set up an independent practice when he was only 26. This building, with its narrow sandstone frontage, has giant Ionic columns that frame a bowed, two-storey Doric screen on the windows of the second and third floor.

The former Commercial Union building on the corner of Grafton Street and College Green (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

My walks up and down Grafton Street on Sunday afternoon began or ended at the junction of Grafton Street and College Green, where the former offices of the Commercial Union Assurance Company was designed in 1879-1885 by Sir Thomas Newneham Deane and Thomas Manly Deane in the Scottish Baronial style.

This is the only surviving non-classical building on College Green. Built in yellow sandstone, it is a delightful riot of turrets, gable fronts, mullioned windows, a pointed ground-floor arcade, the romantic heads of a queen and king, and a pair of plaques representing Dublin and London in harmony – a confident statement of late Victorian Dublin unionism opposite the former Parliament buildings and Trinity College Dublin.

Dublin and London in harmony – a confident statement of late Victorian Dublin unionism (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Thank goodness, despite the changes in commercial use over almost a century and a half, this one piece of Grafton Street architectural grandeur has not been bowdlerised at ground floor level.

Further reading: The Irish Builder; the Irish Architectural Archive; Christine Casey, The Buildings of Ireland: Dublin (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2005), Pevsner Architectural Guides series.

‘There’s no need to hurry, There’s no need to worry’

‘For Dublin can be heaven ... at eleven’ ... Saint Ann’s Church in Dawson Street, seen from Grafton Street in the summer sunshine today (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

For Dublin can be heaven,
With coffee at eleven
And a stroll in Stephen’s Green.
There’s no need to hurry,
There’s no need to worry ...

– ‘The Dublin Saunter’ (Noel Purcell/Leo Maguire)

It was less coffee and more heaven at 11 this morning, as I was preaching at Morning Prayer near Saint Stephen’s Green in Saint Ann’s Church in Dawson Street.

After a leisurely mid-day saunter down Grafton Street, I joined five others for lunch in The Larder in Parliament Street. Later, three of us headed back up Grafton Street for a stroll around the Open-Air Photographic Exhibition on the railings on the north side of Saint Stephen’s Green, followed by a short stroll through the Green.

Enjoying the Open-Air Photographic Exhibition on the railings of Saint Stephen’s Green this afternoon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The two-day exhibition, yesterday and today, was organised by People’s Photography, a non-profit group of volunteers, which donates all surplus monies remaining after administration costs to registered charities.

In this afternoon’s sunshine, we found the truth of those words from Noel Purcell and Leo Maguire:

There’s no need to hurry
There’s no need to worry

Many of the exhibitors were award-winning members of well-known camera and photographic club, and many had also exhibited last month in Pearse Street Library in Photo 2013, the annual exhibition of the Dublin Camera Club.

There were photographs taken in Cuba, New York, Spain, Morocco, Italy, Nepal, France and Cambodia, and photographs taken in many familiar places throughout Ireland. But even when the locations were familiar and well-known, in each case it was interesting to see how someone else looks through a view-finder and uses a lens.

Inside the open, seven-bay pavilion by the lakeshore was erected in 1898 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

In Saint Stephen’s Green, I wondered how many people walking through it this afternoon knew the names given to the different tree-lined walks as they were being laid out in the mid-18th century.

As we walked along Beaux Walk on the north side, we stopped to admire the open, seven-bay pavilion near the north-east corner, by the shores of the lake, erected in 1898.

Enjoying the artificial lakes in Saint Stephen’s Green this afternoon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

We left the Green by through the Royal Dublin Fusiliers’ Arch, designed by J Howard Pentland and Sir Thomas Drew to commemorate the Irish casualties in the Boer War, and erected in 1907 on the north-west corner of Saint Stephen’s Green, facing the stop of Grafton Street.

‘The Dublin Saunter,’ written by Leo Maguire in the 1940s and first recorded by Noel Purcell, continues:

Grafton Street’s a wonderland,
There’s magic in the air.
There are diamonds in the lady’s eyes
And gold-dust in her hair.
And if you don’t believe me,
Then come and meet me there,
In Dublin on a sunny summer’s morning.

In the sunny summer’s afternoon, we strolled back down the wonderland that is Grafton Street. It was my third time along Grafton Street today, and each time I stopped every now and then to photograph buildings of architectural interest. But they make up a story for another day.

The Royal Dublin Fusiliers’ Arch, on the corner of Saint Stephen’s Green and Grafton Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

What binds us to the past? What stops us from moving on?

Christ healing an infirm woman on the Sabbath, by James Tissot (1886-1896)

Patrick Comerford

Saint Ann’s Church, Dawson Street, Dublin,

Sunday 25 August 2013,

11 a.m., Morning Prayer

Readings:

Jeremiah 1: 4-10; Psalm 71: 1-6; Hebrews 12: 18-29; Luke 13: 10-17.

Luke 13: 10-17

10 Ην δὲ διδάσκων ἐν μιᾷ τῶν συναγωγῶν ἐν τοῖς σάββασιν. 11 καὶ ἰδοὺ γυνὴ πνεῦμα ἔχουσα ἀσθενείας ἔτη δεκαοκτώ, καὶ ἦν συγκύπτουσα καὶ μὴ δυναμένη ἀνακύψαι εἰς τὸ παντελές. 12 ἰδὼν δὲ αὐτὴν ὁ Ἰησοῦς προσεφώνησεν καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῇ, Γύναι, ἀπολέλυσαι τῆς ἀσθενείας σου, 13 καὶ ἐπέθηκεν αὐτῇ τὰς χεῖρας: καὶ παραχρῆμα ἀνωρθώθη, καὶ ἐδόξαζεν τὸν θεόν. 14 ἀποκριθεὶς δὲ ὁ ἀρχισυνάγωγος, ἀγανακτῶν ὅτι τῷ σαββάτῳ ἐθεράπευσεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς, ἔλεγεν τῷ ὄχλῳ ὅτι Ἓξ ἡμέραι εἰσὶν ἐν αἷς δεῖ ἐργάζεσθαι: ἐν αὐταῖς οὖν ἐρχόμενοι θεραπεύεσθε καὶ μὴ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τοῦ σαββάτου. 15 ἀπεκρίθη δὲ αὐτῷ ὁ κύριος καὶ εἶπεν, Ὑποκριταί, ἕκαστος ὑμῶν τῷ σαββάτῳ οὐ λύει τὸν βοῦν αὐτοῦ ἢ τὸν ὄνον ἀπὸ τῆς φάτνης καὶ ἀπαγαγὼν ποτίζει; 16 ταύτην δὲ θυγατέρα Ἀβραὰμ οὖσαν, ἣν ἔδησεν ὁ Σατανᾶς ἰδοὺ δέκα καὶ ὀκτὼ ἔτη, οὐκ ἔδει λυθῆναι ἀπὸ τοῦ δεσμοῦ τούτου τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τοῦ σαββάτου; 17 καὶ ταῦτα λέγοντος αὐτοῦ κατῃσχύνοντο πάντες οἱ ἀντικείμενοι αὐτῷ, καὶ πᾶς ὁ ὄχλος ἔχαιρεν ἐπὶ πᾶσιν τοῖς ἐνδόξοις τοῖς γινομένοις ὑπ' αὐτοῦ.

10 Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. 11 And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, ‘Woman, you are set free from your ailment.’ 13 When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14 But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, ‘There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.’ 15 But the Lord answered him and said, ‘You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16 And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?’ 17 When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.

The Kahal Shalom Synagogue, with the women’s gallery behind and above the tevah (Photograph: RhodesPrivateTours.com)

May I speak to you in the name of + the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

This morning’s Gospel readings reminds me of the Kahal Shalom Synagogue, the last surviving, functioning synagogue on the Greek island of Rhodes, and an elderly woman who gave me a guided tour of that synagogue, not just once but twice during a hot summer’s week in Greece.

The interior of the synagogue follows the traditional Sephardic style of having the tevah or reading platform in the centre, facing south-east towards Jerusalem. Behind it and above is the balcony, created in 1935 as a result of a liberalisation of religious policy, for use as a women’s prayer area.

Before that, the women sat in the rooms beside the south wall of the synagogue, and could see into the main body of the synagogue, through curtained openings. Those rooms are now used for the Jewish Museum of Rhodes.

The brave woman with an extraordinary story who showed me around the synagogue and the museum, Lucia Modiano Soulam, was bent over and in her 80s. She was a woman of exceptional bravery with an extraordinary story too. She was a survivor of Auschwitz and she spoke Greek, Ladino, Italian, a little French and Turkish and very little English.

Because there are only seven Jewish families left on Rhodes, the synagogue depends on tourists to make up a minyan and to lead public prayers.

As a family, we attended a sabbath service in the synagogue as her guest, and she sat with us, so that there were two women among a congregation in which the minyan was made up thanks to Israeli and American tourists.

I think of her as having been captive to Satan in Auschwitz for many years because of the sins of so many men. Now she was old and bent over, but taking her place in a synagogue where once she would only have been seen in the balcony above and behind the tevah, or behind the screens and curtains in the adjoining women’s rooms.

In her suffering, Lucia had become, truly, a Daughter of Abraham.

But let me ask some questions about this Gospel reading.

Which images, which characters leap out at you in this story?

Perhaps Jesus, but in what role? As a teacher (verse 10, verses 16), as a keen observer of humanity (verse 12), as a healer (verses 12-13), as the Lord God (verse 15), as a judge (verse 15), as an affirmer (verse 16) or as a wonder worker (verse 17)?

The woman? She is unnamed. But then, so too is the town in which this synagogue is located.

How do you see her in your mind’s eye? In her previous physical condition? Or as she looks after Jesus heals her?

Or were you struck first by the leader of the synagogue? He too is unnamed. But his demeanour should be a challenge to all clergy at all times. As clergy, do we ever behave like him?

Who are the hypocrites in verse 15? Who are the opponents in verse 17? The leader of the synagogue and … who else? As congregations or parishes, do we ever behave like them?

An icon of the Nativity of Christ … the ox and the ass are inseparably linked with the manger, but are not mentioned in the Gospel accounts of the Nativity

What about the ox and the ass? Do they remind you of the ox and ass at the first Christmas – although they are not identified in Saint Luke’s Nativity narrative? Or of the colt who is to be untied so Christ can ride into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday (see Luke 19: 30, 33)?

Did you think of Abraham? No? Yet, apart from Jesus, he is the only other character who is named in this story.

The crowd, the many? The fickle crowd that rejoices now, like the crowd that is going to rejoice at Christ’s entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday … and then call out “Crucify Him”?

Let us look at some of the figures in this story.

What makes this woman unusual, or what makes this healing story unusual?

No other woman in the Bible is referred to as a daughter of Abraham. Indeed, the Book Genesis records no named daughter of Abraham, and the rabbis argued over whether Abraham had any daughters (see Babylonian Talmud, Bava Batra, which records an argument between R. Meir and R. Yehuda).

So, seeking to compare her with a daughter of Abraham, or to compare her with other women in the New Testament, is chasing after shadows.

There are two men in Saint Luke’s Gospel that she might be compared with too:

1, The unnamed rich man in the story of ‘Dives’ and Lazarus (Luke 16: 19-31) who addresses Abraham as ‘father’ or ‘Father Abraham,’ and who is addressed by Abraham as ‘Child.’

But in this morning’s Gospel story, the child of Abraham is the outsider who has been left waiting on the margins for too long and is brought in. So the woman is more like Lazarus than ‘Dives’.

In this morning’s story, Christ shows what it means to be a citizen of God’s kingdom – through his actions. He heals this woman and calls her a “daughter of Abraham,” which makes her, remarkably, a full member of Jewish society. Christ is saying the Kingdom is open equally to women and to the sick and to the disabled and to those on the margins.

2, The description of the woman as daughter of Abraham is matched later in this Gospel when Christ insists that Zacchaeus is “a son of Abraham” (Luke 19: 9), a point that is also made in the face of a crowd, this time a crowd that rejects Zacchaeus the tax collector as a sinner. Think of how this woman’s physical position of being bent over is symbolic in the same way that Zacchaeus is short in stature.

It is also worth noting that the woman does not ask to be cured, and no one asks so on her behalf. Christ notices her himself (verse 12). This involves his turning round.

She enters while Christ is teaching. If he has the scrolls in front of him, he is facing forward in the bema in the synagogue, and so she is behind him, either above in a balcony, if it is a large synagogue, or, in a smaller synagogue, hidden behind a curtain. She is unlikely to have been visible to Christ unless he turns around.

What does Christ do?

He turns around, and he calls the woman down or calls her over. He tells her she is free, and he lays his hands on her. He has not yet addressed her as “Daughter of Abraham.” So it is not this label that causes offence.

Is the difference in calling the woman into the centre of the assembly? The ritual implications for many men present are outrageous and even incalculable.

Ever since this story was written, I imagine, the synagogue leader has been typecast as the bad guy. Yet it is he who twice describes what Christ does as healing (θεραπεύω, therapeuo twice in verse 14). Would he have been seen as the “bad guy” on the day itself?

His indignation is neither unusual nor outrageous, but is justified given who he is speaking on the behalf of, given the religious culture within which he is living.

His first concern may have been for the men in his synagogue who risked being ritually tainted on the day. He voices his objections not when Jesus calls her over, not when he lays his hands on her, but only when she stands up and praises God – a man’s task in the synagogue.

Twice in our Gospel story this morning, we are told that the woman has had this illness for 18 years. What difference would a few more hours make? Why heal her on the Sabbath day and deliberately stir up all this conflict?

Jesus is not performing a good deed that, if delayed, could not be performed at a later time. This is not a woman who needs immediate rescue. If this woman has been able to bear her disability for 18 years, surely Christ can wait out the afternoon and heal her after sunset without flying in the face of the Torah?

Could he not wait until sunset? In the meantime, he and the synagogue elders could search the Law and the Prophets together, and then the healing could be seen in all its unquestionable rightness.

Perhaps if Christ had waited until sundown, his wonderful miracle would have supported the people’s expectations of a victorious, triumphalist Messiah. But he constantly announces the coming Kingdom in words and deeds that run counter to their expectations for the Kingdom.

One way of dealing with a message we do not want to hear is to shoot the messenger. Perhaps Christ could have spent all day arguing with the synagogue elders about whether or not it was legal to heal this woman on the sabbath – while she remained ill.

But why does the leader not direct his words to Christ? Instead, he addresses his complaints to the woman and to the crowd.

He does not doubt Christ’s ability to heal; it is the woman’s action rather than Christ’s action that draws his condemnation.

He has no problem about her coming to the synagogue or coming for healing. Instead, he upbraids her for coming on a Saturday, and he tells her to come for healing on any one of the other six days of the week. Yet, it does not appear that this woman comes seeking healing at all. She asks for nothing. Her release comes through Christ’s own initiative.

In his rebuttal, Christ does not attack traditional Judaism. He simply offers one of a number of traditional points of view. This story continues the story in Luke 4, where Christ reads from and teaches from the scroll in the synagogue. He is now putting into action in the synagogue what he has taught in the synagogue.

Meanwhile, Christ has set free or untied the woman. But what was she tied to? To her disability and her infirmity? To Satan? To her community’s refusal to accept her? To one interpretation of what could or could not be done on the sabbath?

Her ailment is described literally as “a spirit of illness” (verse 11) and “weaknesses” (verse 12). The word used here (ἀσθένεια, asthéneia) is used in both verses. Its literal meaning is without strength of body, in other words weakness or incapacity. Often this inability to do something is caused by a physical problem, such as a disease or an illness.

The result of Christ’s action is literally “to set straight again” (ἀνορθόω, anorthoo, verse 13). But it also means “to restore,” “to rebuild,” or “to set right again.” Figuratively, Christ restores her to the Abrahamic covenant or way.

Christ says to the woman, “… you have been set free” (ἀπολέλυσαι, apolélusai) “from your weakness” (verse 12). It is translated here with the present tense, “you are set free.” This word (απολουω, apoluo) is not usually associated with healing. Its general meaning is “to loose,” to unbind, to release, to send away, even to divorce (see Matthew 5: 32; 19: 3, 7, 8, 9).

It can refer to the bandages used to tie a woman to her husband. It is closely related to a word used twice by Christ in this story (λύω, luo) – to “untie” an ox or donkey (verse 15) and to “set free” from bondage (verse 16).

Is this a story about divorce after 18 years of an abusive marriage?

Is this is a story about controversy and division?

Is this a story about healing, wholeness and restoration?

Or – given the two synagogue settings we have seen this morning – is this a story about the practical relationship between what we believe and what we do – getting the balance right between believing and doing, between being and doing?

The woman is not named in this story, and, once she stands up and praises God, she disappears from the story, never to be seen or heard again. She is written out of the controversy at the end of the story. So is this a story about her, or about the reaction of the crowd, our reaction, to the promise of restitution and wholeness that Christ offers?

Apart from teaching that women and people with disabilities have a place in the centre of the community and at the heart of the kingdom, are there other meanings to be found in this story?

Asking what it is saying to us may be more important a question than asking what is it saying about the woman.

But let me leave us with some questions:

When should we do things in the church we believe are right, and only deal with the repercussions afterwards?

When do we need to discuss and come to an agreement before taking action?

What holds people in bondage?

In what ways does legalism bind them?

How are we held in bondage to past successes, defending our habits by saying: “This is the way we’ve always done it”?

Does the way we behave in our churches on Sundays free people or kept them tied up?

And so, on that note, may all we think, say and do be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Collect:

Almighty God,
who called your Church to bear witness
that you were in Christ reconciling the world to yourself:
Help us to proclaim the good news of your love,
that all who hear it may be drawn to you;
through him who was lifted up on the cross,
and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Lecturer in Anglicanism, Liturgy and Church History, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute, and an Adjunct Assistant Professor, Trinity College Dublin. This sermon was preached at Morning Prayer in Saint Ann’s Church, Dawson Street, Dublin, on 25 August 2013.