22 November 2020

Sunday intercessions on
22 November 2020,
the Kingship of Christ

Christ the King in the central tympanum of Saint Colman’s Cathedral, Cobh (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)

Let us pray:

‘O be joyful in the Lord, all the earth.’
Let us ‘enter his gates with thanksgiving
and his courts with praise’ (Psalm 100: 1, 3):

Heavenly Father,
we pray for the rulers and nations of the world,
so that the values of the kingdom are reflected
in their search for justice, mercy and peace.

We pray for all nations torn and divided by war and strife today,
and we pray for all peacemakers,
and all who defend democracy and human rights.

Lord have mercy,
Lord have mercy.

Lord Jesus Christ,
when you come in your glory,
seated on the throne of glory (Matthew 25: 31):

we pray that you may find that the Church
saw you hungry and gave you food,
thirsty and gave you something to drink,
a stranger and welcomed you,
naked and gave you clothing,
sick or in prison and visited you (Matthew 25: 37-39).

In the Anglican Cycle of Prayer,
we pray this week for the Church of Bermuda
and the Right Revd Nicholas Dill, Bishop of Bermuda.

Throughout the Church of Ireland this month,
we pray for the Diocese of Cork, Cloyne and Ross,
for Bishop Paul Colton,
and for the people and priests of the diocese.

We pray for our bishop, Kenneth,
and for his ministry, mission and witness …

In the Diocesan Cycle of Prayer, we pray this week
for those in these dioceses engaged in
communications and information technology.

We pray for our own parishes and people and for ourselves …

Christ have mercy,
Christ have mercy.

We pray that God the Father of glory
may give us the Spirit of wisdom and revelation
so that we come to know Christ when he comes in glory
(Ephesians 1: 17):

We give thanks for new life …
We pray for those in need and those who seek healing …
In our hearts, we name individuals, families, neighbours,
care homes, hospitals, voluntary groups …

We pray for those who are sick or isolated,
at home or in hospital …

Sylvia … Alan … Margaret … Lorraine …
Ajay… Ena … Eileen … Simon … Ralph …

We pray for those we have offered to pray for …
and we pray for those who pray for us …

We pray for all who grieve and mourn at this time …

We remember and give thanks those who have died …
may their memories be a blessing to us …

Lord have mercy,
Lord have mercy.

A prayer for Racial Justice and Equality
from the resources on Taking the Knee,
prepared for use in the Church of Ireland:

Good and gracious God, you invite us to recognise and reverence your divine image and likeness in our neighbour. Enable us to see the reality of racism and free us to challenge and uproot it from our society, our world and ourselves.

We acknowledge and lament the conscious and unconscious racism encountered by many black, Asian and minority ethnic communities in our churches and society.

Give us the courage to stand unequivocally for justice, and for truth. Help us to dismantle racist agendas and to transform unjust structures. Help us to love you with all our heart, soul, and minds. Help us to love one another as you commanded us to do. Help us to treat each other as we would have others treat us. Help us together to find lasting solutions to end injustice and inequality in our world. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

Merciful Father …

The Hebrew inscription at the entrance to the Stadttempel, Vienna’s main synagogue, reads: ‘Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise’ (Psalm 100: 4) (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

These intercessions were prepared for use in the Rathkeale and Kilnaughtin Group of Parishes on Sunday 22 November 2020.

‘Truly I tell you, just as you
did it to one of the least
of these … you did it to me’

‘King of Kings and Lord of Lords’ … Christ the King depicted in a stained-glass window in a church in London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Sunday 22 November 2020

The Sunday before Advent, the Kingship of Christ

(Mission Sunday)

The Readings: Ezekiel 34: 11-16, 20-24; Psalm 100; Ephesians 1: 15-23; and Matthew 25: 31-46.

Christ the King … a stained-glass window in Mount Melleray Abbey, Cappoquin, Co Waterford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)

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

Many of us may remember this Sunday from our childhood as ‘Stir-up Sunday.’ It was a play on words: the traditional collect in the Book of Common Prayer on this Sunday, the last Sunday in the Church Year, invited us to pray:

Stir up, we beseech thee, O Lord, the wills of thy faithful people;
that they, plenteously bringing forth the fruit of good works,
may of thee be plenteously rewarded;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen


This was, of course, the time of the year that mothers and families began to stir-up the mixture for Christmas cakes and puddings, ‘stirring up’ the mixture that played on those words about ‘the fruit’ as they went about their good works.

After the mixture was poured out into baking trays, how we begged our mothers or grannies to lick the big yellow mixing bowl and the wooden spoons!

The year was coming to a close, the evenings were getting darker, and now we shared the sweet taste of the promises of Christmas, a child’s way of preparing for the coming of Christ and new beginnings.

This Sunday before Advent, however, invites us to think about the coming Christ as Christ the King.

The concept of Christ as King may be difficult for many people in a modern, democratic European society, particularly in an Ireland where we have been blessed with the bravery and charisma of not one but three successive elected Presidents as heads of state.

The mere mention of kingship and monarchy may evoke images of the extravagance of Versailles, the anachronism of Ruritarian-like pretenders, or inherited privilege in a class-ridden society.

However, since 1925, the celebration of Christ the King or the Kingship of Christ has been part of the calendar of the wider Western Church. It was first suggested by Pope Pius XI in an encyclical (Quas Primas), when he castigated secularism in Europe and declared the secular powers ought to recognise Christ as King and that the Church needed to recapture this teaching.

At the time, the entire idea of kingship was quickly losing credibility in western societies, not so much to democracy but to the rise of fascism: Mussolini was in power in Italy since 1922, and a wave of fascism was about to sweep across central Europe.

The concept of Christ the King challenged the idea that presidents and dictators could hold power based on prejudice and populism, without any promise of justice or attention to the needs of the oppressed, and the sufferings of the impoverished, the marginalised and minorities.

A king – no matter how absurd and anomalous that concept seems to us today – was supposed to exercise or hold on to power not for himself or for his own enrichment and pleasure, but to embrace, embody, express, the needs of all the people, especially those in danger of being exploited or oppressed.

That fading – today, almost irrelevant – concept of the ‘Divine Right of Kings’ was not for the benefit of the monarch, but to save the people.

And it is in sharp contrast to the troubling images today of a president who refuses, in the face of the democratic choice of the people, to leave office or to prepare to hand over to his elected successor.

True majesty is reflected in being truly gracious. In a democracy, it should always be about the people – especially those who are in danger of being counted out – and never about the office-holder.

The values of the Kingdom of God can never give way to the cat-calls and the rabble-rousing of populist protesters or presidents who think they are more valuable than their people.

The Sunday before Advent is a challenge to think not only about Christ’s coming, at his second coming, and the coming of the Kingdom of God.

In this diocese, this Sunday is also marked as Mission Sunday.

I spent a good part of last week at a two-day meeting of the trustees of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel). It was a ‘virtual’ meeting, hosted on Zoom, and we discussed how the values of the Church in mission can be signs or foretastes of the coming Kingdom of God. We talked about empowering women, caring for the sick, challenging racism, acting on climate change … and many other important challenges.

Mission Sunday is an opportunity to draw breath and think of what the Kingdom of God might be like, how the Church reflects that, and how we should be calling into the kingdom those who are in danger of being marginalised and oppressed

This year, for Mission Sunday, the Diocesan Mission Council has decided to support the work of two projects whose work has become even more crucial – life-saving – during the pandemic for people in danger of being counted out.

Jigsaw is the National Centre for Youth Mental Health, providing vital support to young people who feel alone, isolated and disconnected, creating a society that values and supports youth mental health.

‘I was sick and you took care of me’ (Matthew 25: 36).

Women’s Aid works to stop domestic violence against women and children, offering support and providing hope. They are reporting a 43% increase in calls during the lockdown, and a 71% rise in visits to their website. And these are not just shocking statistics: these are real women, reaching out, often in the dead of night, to be heard, believed and supported.

‘I was a stranger and you welcomed me’ (Matthew 25: 36).

Finally, the bishop (Bishop Kenneth Kearon) has also asked for prayers this Sunday that respond to ‘Taking the Knee’ by praying for racial justice and equality.

The resources produced for this Sunday call us to affirm that racism is an affront to God and contrary to the Christian faith; that racism denies the reconciling work of Christ is for all people and breaks down the walls of division across all human distinctions; and that racism denies our common humanity in creation and our belief that all are made in God’s image. They remind us that our fundamental identity is found in Christ and not, as racism asserts, in terms of race.

‘Just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me’ (Matthew 25: 40).

This Sunday reminds us that Christmas is coming, that Christ is coming, that the Kingdom of God is coming.

We can prepare for these three events by responding to these three needs as reflections of our hopes for the Kingdom of God: youth mental health, domestic violence, and the need for racial justice.

And when the Kingdom of God comes, may we bring ‘forth the fruit of good works,’ may we ‘Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise’ (Psalm 100: 4).

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

‘He will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats’ (Matthew 25: 32) … sheep and goats grazing together in a field in Platanias near Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2019)

Matthew 25: 31-46 (NRSVA):

31 [Jesus said:] ‘When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, 33 and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. 34 Then the king will say to those at his right hand, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; 35 for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” 37 Then the righteous will answer him, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38 And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? 39 And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?” 40 And the king will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” 41 Then he will say to those at his left hand, “You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; 42 for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.” 44 Then they also will answer, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?” 45 Then he will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.’

‘He will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left’ (Matthew 25: 33) … sheep and goats in a sculpture in a garden in Knightstown on Valentia Island, Co Kerry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)

Liturgical Colour: White.

The Collect of the Day:

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 and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Mission Collect:

Almighty God,
who called your Church to 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. Amen.

Post-Communion Prayer:

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

Post-Communion Prayer (Mission):

Eternal Giver of love and power,
your Son Jesus Christ has sent us into all the world
to preach the gospel of his kingdom.
Confirm us in this mission,
and help us to live the good news we proclaim;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Christ the King … a large sculpture by John Maguire above the entrance to the Church of Christ the King in Turner’s Cross, Cork (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)

Hymns:

281, Rejoice, the Lord is King! (CD 17)
427, Let all mortal flesh keep silence (CD 25)

Christ the King in the reredos in Saint Mary’s Church, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2019)

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

Material from the Book of Common Prayer is copyright © 2004, Representative Body of the Church of Ireland.

‘He has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things’ (Ephesians 1: 22) … a statue of Christ the King in the grounds of the parish church in Broadford, Co Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)



Tales of the Viennese Jews:
19, Adele Bloch-Bauer and
Gustav Klimt’s ‘Lady in Gold’

‘The Kiss by Gustav Klimt’ … is it an ‘idealised portrait’ of Adele Bloch-Bauer?

Patrick Comerford

The Tales from the Vienna Woods is a waltz by the composer Johann Strauss II (1825-1899), written just over a century and a half ago, in 1868. Although Strauss was baptised in the Roman Catholic Church, he was born into a prominent Jewish family. Because the Nazis had a particular penchant for Strauss’s music, they tried to conceal and even deny the Jewish identity of the Strauss family.

However, the stories of Vienna’s Jews cannot be hidden, and many of those stories from Vienna are told in the exhibits in the Jewish Museum in its two locations, at the Palais Eskeles on Dorotheergasse and in the Misrachi-Haus in Judenplatz.

Rather than describe both museums in detail in one or two blog postings, I decided after my visit to Vienna a year ago to post occasional blog postings that re-tell some of these stories, celebrating a culture and a community whose stories should never be forgotten.

The Kiss was painted by Gustav Klimt , the leading Austrian Symbolist painter in 1908-1909, at the high point of his ‘Golden Period,’ when he painted a number of works in a similar gilded style.

Klimt’s The Kiss is so popular that it is impossible for visitors to Vienna to avoid finding copies of it everywhere – on postcards, mugs, cheap prints, chocolate wrappings, and cheap souvenirs. Yet it continues to fascinate and enthral in a way that gives it iconic status.

Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) was an Austrian symbolist painter and the most prominent member of the Vienna Secession movement. His primary subject was the female body, and his work is marked by a frank eroticism.

The Kiss is painted on a canvas that is a perfect square, 180 cm × 180 cm. We see a kissing, embracing couple whose bodies are entwined in elaborate robes decorated in a style influenced by both the Art Nouveau style and the earlier Arts and Crafts movement. The two are locked in intimacy, while the rest of the painting dissolves into a shimmering, extravagant flat pattern, lost on the edge of a patch of flowery meadow.

Klimt painted The Kiss with oil and applied layers of gold leaf that give the painting its strikingly modern, yet evocative, appearance. The painting is now in the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere museum in the Belvedere Palace, Vienna. It is a symbol of Vienna Jugendstil – Viennese Art Nouveau – and is Klimt’s most popular work. It was received enthusiastically, but earned Klimt his reputation as an enfant terrible.

Klimt’s biographer Adam Whitford points out that some preliminary sketches for The Kiss show a bearded figure that was possibly a self-portrait, and he claims the female partner is an ‘idealised portrait’ of Adele Bloch-Bauer.

The only evidence to support this theory is the position of the woman’s right hand, as Adele had a disfigured finger following a childhood accident.

On the other hand, Adele Bloch-Bauer was the model for Klimt’s 1901 painting Judith and the Head of Holofernes and she sat for two portraits by Klimt – Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (also known as The Lady in Gold or The Woman in Gold) in 1903-1907 and Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer II (1912).

Adele Bauer was born into a wealthy Jewish Viennese family. Her father was a director of the Wiener Bankverein, the seventh largest bank in the Austrian Empire, and the general director of Oriental Railroads. She met Klimt in the late 1890s, but opinion is divided on whether they had an affair.

The artist Catherine Dean believed Adele was ‘the only society lady painted by Klimt who is known definitely to be his mistress.’ Melissa Müller and Monica Tatzkow say ‘no evidence has ever been produced that their relationship was more than a friendship.’

Adele’s parents arranged a marriage with Ferdinand Bloch (1864-1945), a banker and sugar manufacturer who was born in Prague. Her older sister had previously married Ferdinand’s older brother. When Adele and Ferdinand married in 1899, she was 18 and he was 35, and they decided to share the family name Bloch-Bauer. Adele suffered two stillbirths and her third child died two days after birth.

Adele brought together writers, politicians and intellectuals for regular salons at their home. The couple shared a love of art, and patronised several artists, collecting 19th-century Viennese paintings, modern sculpture and porcelain.

Adele Bloch-Bauer was the model for Klimt’s ‘Judith and the Head of Holofernes’ (1901)

Klimt painted Judith and the Head of Holofernes in 1901. Adele was the model for the work, and wore a heavily-jewelled deep choker given to her by Ferdinand. It has been described as ‘Klimt’s most erotic painting.’

In 1903, Ferdinand bought his first Klimt work from the artist, Buchenwald (‘Beech Forest’).

‘Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I’ … painted by Klimt in 1903-1907

Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I, painted by Klimt in 1903-1907, was commissioned by her husband Ferdinand. The painting, later known for being stolen by the Nazis in 1941, is the final and most fully representative work of Klimt’s golden phase. Klimt’s second portrait of Adele was completed in 1912, and the two are among several works by Kilmt owned by the family.

Meanwhile, Ferdinand acquired the Jungfern Breschan and Odolena Voda estate in Bohemia in 1909, where he lived in the Lower Castle and housed his art collections. After the collapse of the Habsburg Monarchy, he opted for Czechoslovak citizenship in 1918/1819 and his estate 15 km north of Prague became his main residence.

When Adele died in 1925, she asked in her will that the artworks by Klimt be left to the Galerie Belvedere in Vienna, although they belonged to Ferdinand, not her. Following the Nazi invasion and occupation of Austria, Ferdinand fled Prague to Paris and then to Zurich. He left behind much of his wealth, including his large art collection, and died in poverty in 1945.

Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I was stolen by the Nazis in 1941, along with the remainder of Ferdinand’s assets, after the pretext of tax evasion. The lawyer acting for the Nazi state gave the portrait to the Galerie Belvedere, claiming he was following Adele’s wishes in her will. In his will, Ferdinand stated his estate should go to his nephew and two nieces.

The Austrian journalist Hubertus Czernin revealed in 1998 that the Galerie Belvedere held several works stolen from Jewish owners during the Holocaust and World War II. The gallery had refused to return the art to their original owners, or to acknowledge any theft.

Ferdinand’s nieces, Maria Altmann took a case against the gallery for the return of five works by Klimt. After a seven-year legal action, an arbitration committee in Vienna agreed that the portrait and other paintings had been stolen from the family and that it should be returned to Altmann. She sold it the same year for $135 million to the businessman and art collector Ronald Lauder, who placed it in the Neue Galerie, the New York-based gallery he co-founded.

The history of the Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I and the other paintings taken from the Bloch-Bauers has been recounted in three documentary films, Stealing Klimt (2007), The Rape of Europa (2007) and Adele’s Wish (2008).

The painting’s history is described by the journalist Anne-Marie O’Connor in her book The Lady in Gold: The Extraordinary Tale of Gustav Klimt’s Masterpiece, Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer (2012). The history, as well as other stories of other stolen art, is told by Melissa Müller and Monika Tatzkow in Lost Lives, Lost Art: Jewish Collectors, Nazi Art Theft, and the Quest for Justice (2010). The story of Adele Bloch-Bauer and Maria Altmann formed the basis of the novel Stolen Beauty (2017) by Laurie Lico Albanese.

Maria Altmann died in 2011, aged 94. Her story was dramatised in the film Woman in Gold (2015), starring Helen Mirren as Maria and Ryan Reynolds.

‘Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer II’ … completed by Klimt in 1912

Tales of the Viennese Jews:

1, the chief rabbi and a French artist’s ‘pogrom’

2, a ‘positively rabbinic’ portrait of an Anglican dean

3, portraits of two imperial court financiers

4, portrait of Sigmund Freud, founder of psychoanalysis

5, Lily Renée, from Holocaust Survivor to Escape Artist

6, Sir Moses Montefiore and a decorative Torah Mantle

7, Theodor Herzl and the cycle of contradictions

8, Simon Wiesenthal and the café in Mauthausen

9, Leonard Cohen and ‘The Spice-Box of Earth’

10, Ludwig Wittgenstein and his Jewish grandparents

11, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and his Jewish librettist

12, Salomon Mayer von Rothschild and the railways in Vienna

13, Gustav Mahler and the ‘thrice homeless’ Jew

14, Beethoven at 250 and his Jewish connections in Vienna

15, Martin Buber and the idea of the ‘I-Thou’ relationship

16, Three Holocaust survivors who lived in Northern Ireland.

17, Schubert’s setting of Psalm 92 for the synagogue.

18, Bert Linder and his campaign against the Swiss banks.

19, Adele Bloch-Bauer and Gustav Klimt’s ‘Lady in Gold’.

20, Max Perutz, Nobel laureate and ‘the godfather of molecular biology’.