Morning prayers in Easter with USPG: (40) 18 May 2023, Ascension Day

The Ascension Window by Sir Edward Burne-Jones in Saint Philip’s Cathedral, Birmingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Patrick Comerford

Today is Ascension Day and this is the Sixth Week of Easter. Eastertide continues throughout this week and next week, until the Day of Pentecost.

Before this day gets busy, I am taking some time this morning for prayer and reflection. As today Ascension Day (18 May 2023), I am reflecting each morning this week in these ways:

1, Looking at a depiction of the Ascension in images or stained glass windows in a church or cathedral I know;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

The top half of the Ascension Window by Sir Edward Burne-Jones in Birmingham shows Christ surrounded by the heavenly host (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

The Ascension Window, Saint Philip’s Cathedral, Birmingham:

Four remarkable stained-glass windows in Saint Philip’s Cathedral, Birmingham, were designed by Birmingham born pre-Raphaelite artist Sir Edward Burne-Jones. They depict: the Ascension (1885), with the Nativity (1887) and the Crucifixion (1887) at the east end, and the Last Judgement (1897) at the west end.

These four windows were manufactured by the firm of William Morris & Co. Burne-Jones and William Morris also created windows for Saint Martin in the Bullring and Saint Mary the Virgin, Acocks Green.

Sir Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898) was born in Birmingham on 28 August 1833 and baptised in Saint Philip’s. He once said he wanted to do ‘my best to illuminate the contemporary darkness’ of his home city.

Burne-Jones and William Morris (1834-1896) had together begun their studies at the University of Oxford with the intention of being ordained coming priests in the Church of England. This solid grounding in theology underpinned their designs for church decoration.

The stained-glass designs in Saint Philip’s Cathedral are extraordinary, unsurpassed in their scale as the images fill the huge arched windows, uninterrupted by tracery. They were the culmination of decades of experimentation, in Burne-Jones’s studio and in the Morris & Co. workshop, weaving together rich colours and the networks of leading.

These windows demonstrate immense skill and the fine craftsmanship of William Morris & Co. They are known for their vibrancy, the life-likeness of the figures, their ability to tell a story and their inspiring and dramatic qualities.

Burne-Jones’s visionary art flourished when he imagined angels and saints. He used his exceptional understanding of Byzantine and Gothic art to create works that transcended the naturalism of his contemporaries. He once said that he wanted to show ‘heaven beginning six inches over the tops of our heads, as it really does.’

The windows in the chancel were commissioned by Emma Chadwick Villiers-Wilkes in memory of her brother. Her family were successful brass-founders, she worshipped in Saint Philip’s and lived in nearby Old Square. She maintained a strong interest in their subject matter and design.

Burne-Jones records, ‘it was in the year 1885 that visiting my native city Birmingham I was so struck with admiration at one of my works in St Philips’s church [that] I undertook in a moment of enthusiasm to fill the windows on either side.’

These windows are characteristic of Burne-Jones’s later style, with elongated bodies that have small heads in relation to body length and designs that divide in two equal halves, horizontally. This technique separates heaven from earth in each of the windows.

The Ascension window depicts Christ parting with his followers and ascending into heaven 40 days after Easter. It was installed in 1885 and was intended to be the only stained-glass window in the Cathedral. But he later designed two more windows at the east end – the Nativity and the Crucifixion in 1887 – and subsequently added a fourth window at the west end depicting the Last Judgement (1897).

The top half of the Ascension Window displays Christ surrounded by the heavenly host. Six angels stand around him, three on each side, their hands clasped as if in prayer. They are draped in long flowing fabric in various pastel shades drapes that in some light appears almost neon.

Halos are visible among a mass of feathers above the heads of Christ and the angels. These feathers flood the top of the window with vibrant red. Like many of Burne-Jones’s figures, the angels who surround Christ have proportionally small heads and long bodies. This heightens the impression of the angels as other worldly beings. They have serene and placid expressions and appear two-dimensional.

Burne-Jones uses bold, vibrant tones to depict Christ’s disciples and followers. The deep blues of the sky that divide the two halves of the window emphasise this contrast, and symbolise the separation between the earthly and spiritual realms.

The disciples display evident emotion in their expressions and gestures as they look up to Christ. Gazing up at him, they are surrounded by the angels in heaven. Christ extends his left hand towards them – but his right hand points towards his heavenly destination.

Burne-Jones intended this to be the only stained-glass window in Saint Philip’s Cathedral. But, inspired by its beauty, he decided to design two more shortly afterwards: the Nativity and the Crucifixion.

The Last Judgement window, installed in the west end of the cathedral in 1897, is now regarded as his finest work in stained-glass.

Towards the end of his life, Sir Edward Burne-Jones was asked about the purpose of his work. He was surprisingly clear. Through his designs, he said, he was ‘making God manifest.’ He went on: ‘It is giving back her Child that was crucified to Our Lady of Sorrows.’ He died on 17 June 1898.

Saint Philip’s became the cathedral of the new diocese of Birmingham in 1905. There are Burne-Jones windows in Saint Martin’s-in-the-Bullring, Birmingham, as well as Saint Mary the Virgin, Acocks Green, and a posthumous crucifixion installed in Saint Bartholomew’s, Edgbaston.

His significant works in Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery include a magnificent watercolour, ‘The Star of Bethlehem,’ more than 12 ft long. It shows the Adoration of the Magi set in an English woodland. Burne-Jones was working on it from 1887, at the same time as he was working with the cathedral windows.

His windows in Saint Philip’s were moved to a Welsh mine shaft for safe-keeping during World War II and they were returned in peacetime.

The cathedral has embarked on a project to conserve these windows, which are some of his last great works. The cleaning and repairs of the windows began next February. The final celebration of the revitalised windows, with a festival of voices and outreach art therapy, is planned for spring and summer next year (2024).

The disciples show emotion in their expressions and gestures as they look up to Christ in the Ascension Window in Saint Philip’s Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Acts 1: 1-11 (NRSVA):

1 In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning 2 until the day when he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. 3 After his suffering he presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over the course of forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. 4 While staying with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait there for the promise of the Father. ‘This’, he said, ‘is what you have heard from me; 5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.’

6 So when they had come together, they asked him, ‘Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?’ 7 He replied, ‘It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.’ 9 When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. 10 While he was going and they were gazing up towards heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. 11 They said, ‘Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up towards heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.’

Luke 24: 44-53 (NRSVA):

44 Then he said to them, ‘These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you – that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.’ 45 Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, 46 and he said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, 47 and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things. 49 And see, I am sending upon you what my Father promised; so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.’

50 Then he led them out as far as Bethany, and, lifting up his hands, he blessed them. 51 While he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven. 52 And they worshipped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; 53 and they were continually in the temple blessing God.

The Ascension Window by Sir Eward Burne-Jones in the chancel in Birmingham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s prayer:

The theme this week in the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel) is ‘The Ascension.’ USPG’s Global Theologian, the Revd Dr Peniel Rajkumar, reflected on the Ascension in the prayer diary on Sunday.

The USPG Prayer invites us to pray this morning (Thursday 18 May 2023, Ascension Day):

Let us pray for each other on our journeys of faith. May we let go of things that impede our growing in faith and open our hearts to receive Christ in unexpected people and places.

Collect:

Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that as we believe your only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ
to have ascended into the heavens,
so we in heart and mind may also ascend
and with him continually dwell;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion:

God our Father,
you have raised our humanity in Christ
and have fed us with the bread of heaven:
mercifully grant that, nourished with such spiritual blessings,
we may set our hearts in the heavenly places;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Ascension window by Sir Eward Burne-Jones seen from inside the cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

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

Whitby Abbey, the scene of the Synod of Whitby, and its many literary associations

Whitby Abbey played a crucial role as the venue for the Synod of Whitby in the year 664 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023; click on images for full-screen viewing)

Patrick Comerford

Whitby Abbey, overlooking the North Sea on the East Cliff above Whitby in North Yorkshire, is associated most popularly with Bram Stoker’s Dracula. But, for me, the most important reason for two of us climbing the 199 steps from Whitby to visit the abbey last week lies in its crucial role in church history as the venue for the Synod of Whitby in the year 664.

Whitby is also important in church history as the monastic centre of Saint Hilda and for the role of the Northumbrian kingdom in spreading Christianity to Mercia and other parts of England in the seventh century. In literary and church history, Whitby is also important as the home of the Northumbrian poet Cædmon (614-680).

For seafarers, Whitby Abbey has long been a distinctive landmark on the Yorkshire coast.

Saint Hilda (614-680), the founding Abbess of Whitby, depicted in a window in Saint Mary’s Church, Whitby (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The monastery at Whitby was first founded by Oswy (Oswiu), the Anglo-Saxon King of Northumbria, at a place named Streoneshalh in the year 657. The name Streoneshalh may signify Fort Bay or Tower Bay and refer to an earlier Roman settlement on the site.

Recent excavations have shown that the headland was settled during the late Bronze Age. A round house within a ditched enclosure was found near the cliff edge, and a number of Bronze Age objects have been recovered.

The headland may have been occupied by a Roman signal station in the 3rd century AD. After the collapse of Roman rule, Britain fragmented into a number of small kingdoms. By the seventh century Northumbria – corresponding to Northumberland and Yorkshire – was the most powerful Anglo-Saxon kingdom.

Edwin, the Anglian King of Northumbria, converted to Christianity in 627 and was baptised by the Roman missionary Saint Paulinus of York. King Oswy appointed Saint Hilda (614-680) of Hartlepool as the founding Abbess of Whitby in 657. She was a daughter of Hereric, a nephew of Edwin, the first Christian king of Northumbria.

The double monastery of monks and nuns was home to the Northumbrian poet Cædmon (ca 657-684).

Cædmon is commemorated with a cross in Saint Mary’s churchyard (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Cædmon was a monk who cared for the animals at the monastery when Saint Hilda was the abbot. He was originally ignorant of ‘the art of song’ but learned to compose one night in the course of a dream, according to the eighth century historian Bede.

His only known surviving work is Cædmon's Hymn a nine-line alliterative vernacular praise poem in honour of God. The poem is one of the earliest attested examples of Old English, making Cædmon the first English poet whose name is known.

And so, Whitby claims to be the birthplace of English literature. Cædmon is commemorated with a cross in Saint Mary’s churchyard.

The Synod of Whitby was called in 664 to resolve differences, including the calculation of the date of Easter (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Christianity had been brought to Northumbria by both missionaries from Rome and by Celtic missionaries from Iona in Scotland. The Synod of Whitby was called in 664 to resolve their differences on the calculation of the date of Easter, the style of monastic clothing, and the shape of monastic tonsures.

Some historians see the Synod of Whitby as early evidence of a clash between the centralising, authoritarian papacy in Rome and an independent native ‘Celtic’ or British Church. They see the debates in seventh century Northumbria foreshadowing the Reformation in the 16th century and rejection of papal authority.

However, Irish and Roman missionaries shared the same fundamental beliefs. By the time of the synod, the southern Irish had already adopted the Roman calculation of Easter, and this was being followed by the monks of Iona by the early eighth century.

Eventually, King Oswiu decided that the Roman side should prevail, and the Pope’s authority was gradually established over the Church in these islands.

The monastery was laid waste by Danes in successive raids from 867 to 870. The Anglian town and monastery were abandoned at some point in the ninth century, probably as a result of the Viking raids, and it remained desolate for more than 200 years.

By the time of the Norman Conquest, the headland seems to have been abandoned, although there was a substantial town down by the harbour called Whitby or Hwitebi, the ‘white settlement’ in Old Norse. An area named ‘Prestebi’ was recorded in the Domesday Survey, which may indicate religious life was revived in some form after the Danish raids.

A new monastery was founded at Whitby in 1078 and adopted the Benedictine rule (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Reinfrid, a former soldier, became a monk and travelled to Whitby, then known as Prestebi or Hwitebi. There, William de Percy granted him the ruined monastery of Saint Peter to found a new monastery in 1078.

The original grant included Saint Peter’s Monastery and the town and Port of Whitby, with its parish church of Saint Mary and six dependent chapels at Fyling, Hawsker, Sneaton, Ugglebarnby, Dunsley, and Aislaby; five mills including Ruswarp; the village of Hackness with two mills and Saint Mary’s Church; and Saint Peter’s Church in Hackness, ‘where our monks served God, died, and were buried.’

William de Percy’s brother, Serlo de Percy, joined the new monastery, which adopted the Benedictine rule. Reinfrid was the prior for many years until he died in an accident. He was buried at Saint Peter’s in Hackness, and was succeeded as prior by Serlo de Percy.

At an early stage, this community split and the two parts each developed into a fully-fledged Benedictine monastery: one on the headland at Whitby and the other at Saint Mary’s Abbey in York.

The Benedictine monastery at Whitby initially had timber buildings or reused the Anglian ruins on the headland. A stone church and conventual buildings were built ca 1100 in the Romanesque style, as well as a large parish church close by.

The monastery was rebuilt on a larger scale ca 1225-1250, when the monastery church was rebuilt in the Gothic style. The eastern arm, the crossing and the transepts, a central tower, and part of the nave were built before funds seem to have run out.

Work resumed on the nave in the 14th century, but it was not finished until the 15th century. Its architecture closely resembles other great churches in Yorkshire, including York Minister and Rievaulx Abbey. There were extensive monastic buildings south of the abbey church too.

Sir Walter Scott sets part of his epic poem ‘Marmion’ (1808) in Whitby Abbey (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Sir Walter Scott sets part of his epic poem ‘Marmion’ (1808) in Whitby Abbey during the early years of the reign of Henry VIII. The poem tells how Lord Marmion lusts for Clara de Clare, a rich woman. He and his mistress, Constance de Beverley, forge a letter implicating Clare’s fiancé, Sir Ralph de Wilton, in treason. Constance, a dishonest nun, hopes that her aid will restore her to favour with Marmion.

When de Wilton loses the duel he claims to defend his honour against Marmion, he goes into exile, and Clare enters a convent rather than risk Marmion’s attentions.

In Canto 2 (‘The Convent’), the Abbess of Whitby, with a party of nuns including a novice Sister Clare, journeys by sea to Lindisfarne, where she forms one of a tribunal in sentencing Constance de Beverly to be immured alive together with an accomplice in the planned murder of Clare.

In her final speech, Constance tells how she had escaped from a convent to join Marmion who had then abandoned her for the wealthy Clare, charging Clare’s fiancé with treason and defeating him in armed combat.

Whitby Abbey was suppressed in 1539 at the dissolution of the monastic houses (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Whitby Abbey was suppressed in 1539 at the dissolution of the monastic houses during the Tudor Reformation. Whitby Abbey was stripped of all the fixtures and fittings of value, including glass from the windows and lead from the roof, and it was left to decay. The roof of the great church and the central tower all eventually fell leaving behind the ruins.

After the suppression, Sir Richard Cholmley (died 1578) bought the abbey buildings and the core of its estates. These remained in the Cholmley family and their descendants in the Strickland family for generations.

The Cholmley family built an impressive private house beside the Abbey, and plundered the abbey ruins heavily in building their grand residence. Local people wreaked further damage, scavenging material for their own building projects and gardens.

The Cholmley family was originally from Cheshire, but already were major landowners in Yorkshire. Sir Hugh Cholmley I (1600-1657) played a notable part in the Civil War (1642-1651), defending Scarborough Castle for the king before surrendering it in 1645. Parliamentarian troops later captured and looted the Abbey House at Whitby.

After the Civil War, Sir Hugh Cholmley II (1632-1689) restored the family estates and he added a grand new wing, known locally as the Banqueting House, to the Abbey House around 1672. He laid out a new entrance courtyard to provide a formal approach and setting. The Cholmley family moved away in the 18th century, abandoning the Abbey House. The roof of the 1670s wing was removed after storm damage in the late 18th century.

The shell of the abbey church was substantially complete until the 18th century. It was weakened, however, by erosion from wind and rain. The south transept collapsed in 1736, much of the nave in 1763, the central tower in 1830 and the south side of the presbytery in 1839.

Whitby Abbey stands above the town and bay at Whitby (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Whitby became a popular seaside resort in the 19th century, with new terraces laid out on the West Cliff. The abbey ruins became a tourist destination, and a rising interest in the site is shown in numerous engravings and paintings.

In Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897), Mina Harker describes the abbey in her diary: ‘Right over the town is the ruin of Whitby Abbey, which was sacked by the Danes, and which is the scene of part of Marmion, where the girl was built up in the wall. It is a most noble ruin, of immense size, and full of beautiful and romantic bits; there is a legend that a white lady is seen in one of the windows.’

During World War I, Whitby Abbey was shelled from the North Sea in December 1914, by the German battlecruisers Von der Tann and Derfflinger, whose crews ‘were aiming for the Coastguard Station on the end of the headland.’ Scarborough and Hartlepool were also attacked. The abbey buildings, including the west wall and nave, sustained considerable damage during the 10-minute attack.

The Strickland family handed over the abbey to the government by in 1920. The ruins have since been declared a Grade I listed building and are maintained by English Heritage. The site museum is housed in Cholmley House.

English Heritage carried out archaeological excavation and survey work in 1993 and 2008, in connection with the construction of the visitor centre and to rescue archaeological remains threatened by the steady erosion of the cliff. Whitby Abbey reopened in 2019 after a major project at the visitor centre, museum and interpretation across the site.

Cholmley House houses the site museum at Whitby Abbey (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)