The Mitre claims to be the oldest pub in Buckingham, and Mitre Cottage next door dates back to 1420

The Mitre Inn and Mitre Cottage on Mitre Street in Buckingham may date back over 600 years to 1420 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025

Patrick Comerford

As I was walking last week between Buckingham and Gawcott, the home village of the Gothic revival architect Sir George Gilbert Scott (1811-1878), the Mitre pub and Mitre Cottage on Mitre Street in Buckingham caught my attention. Both were once historically part of the Manor of Gawcott and Lenborough, and I wondered whether the Mitre could be the oldest pub in Buckingham, as it likes to boast.

A devastating fire in Buckingham in 1725 destroyed 138 houses and left 507 people homeless. This explains why Buckingham has a range of interesting Georgian architecture, but it also explains why few if any pubs in the town can match the claims to antiquity of the Mitre.

For centuries, Gawcott had a church and mediaeval Gawcott was part of a prebend of Buckingham. At the time of the Domesday Survey, the estate that became known as Prebend End Manor, or Buckingham with Gawcott Manor, formed part of the endowment of Buckingham Church.

Prebend End was a district with a priest but no church. The local economy was supported by nearby farms, businesses, and pilgrims visiting Saint Rumbold’s Well, a sacred spring said to have emerged upon the saint’s death. The greater part of Buckingham formed part of the large prebendal estate whose landlords were generally absentees. Prebend End includes the vicarage and Prebend House, a two-storey building dating from the 16th century.

Until after the Reformation, Prebend End Manor or Buckingham with Gawcott Manor belonged to the prebendaries of Sutton cum Buckingham in Lincoln Cathedral. In 1254, Matthew, also Archdeacon of Buckingham, claimed jura regalia in Gawcott as part of his prebend.

Another early prebendary was Cardinal Napoleone Orsini (1263-1342), cardinal deacon of San Adriano al Foro, Archpriest of Saint Peter’s Basilica, Rome, and a nephew of Pope Nicholas III, who appears to have held the prebendal stall for about 40 years. He is first mentioned ca in 1298, but he seems to have spent little time in England, and in 1303 he was ‘staying beyond seas’. Cardinal Neapolio crowned Cardinal Jacques Fournier as Pope Benedict XII in 1335. He lived until 1347, but he resigned his prebendal stall at least five years before that. The prebendal stall was again held by an absentee cardinal in 1376. Cardinal Peter of Saint George was the prebendary in 1388 and Cardinal Henry of Naples in the following year.

After the Dissolution of the monastic houses at the Tudor Reformations, the manor became a lay fee and was subject to temporary or life grants. It was held by Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, brother of Queen Jane Seymour and uncle of Edward VI, in 1547, and by Seymour in 1569 and in 1595. But by 1609 it was held again by the Crown. The manor was sold in 1613 to the Denton family, and passed by marriage to the Coke family. It was bought in the 19th century by Richard Plantagenet Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville (1797-1861), 2nd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, shortly before he went bankrupt, having accumulated massive debts through extravagant spending, ill-judged land purchases and an unsustainable lifestyle. The Prebendal House is now part of the University of Buckingham.

The Mitre Inn claims to be the oldest pub in Buckingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025

The Mitre Inn and Mitre Cottage, which give their name to Mitre Street, may date back to ca 1420. They were originally linked to the Lord of the Manor of Gawcott and Lenborough, paying a quit rent in exchange for exemption from military service.

The Mitre Inn is a half-timber and brick house of two stories and attics, and the pub claims to be the oldest pub in Buckingham. It appears on John Speed’s map of Buckingham in 1610, when it is shown beside Mitre Cottage at the corner of Bonehill Lane (now Mitre Street) and Hunter Street. The pub also features on a Rutgers map in 1661.

Originally a thatched, stand-alone building, the Mitre was expanded in the late 17th or early 18th century. After renovations in the late 18th century, the bar was laid out with multiple rooms with doors between them, and a central off-sales counter. The bar was further forward, with the beer being served using jugs from barrels on stillages in the room immediately behind the bar.

The cellar was excavated in the 1970s, and the barrels moved downstairs. At the same time, the bar was moved back to its previous position before we then installed the new bar nearer to its original position, which can be seen today.

The garden and patio areas were laid out in 2007-2008, having been previously divided into two as public and private areas. The fireplace in the lounge came from No 7 Mitre Street and was installed in 2009. Before then it held a gas fire with a 1960s surround.

During renovations in 2012, fragments of the original thatch were uncovered in the top-floor walls. Additions from this period include a set of stables to the left and a small lounge with a fireplace, which now shares a wall with Mitre Cottage. At the same time, the pub’s upper floors were extended, the roof was tiled, and loft space was converted into three bedrooms. A new brick façade was added at the time, and the windows to the front were extensively renovated or replaced in 2014. Further evidence of the working past of the Mitre emerged when the stable floor was unearthed in 2015. The outline of the hayloft door and an original window can still be seen from outside.

Mitre Cottage is on the market with an asking price of £425,000 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025

The Mitre is a friendly local pub, with beams, an open fire, and real ales served from the cellar. It has won the Milton Keynes and North Buckinghamshire Camra ‘Pub of the Year’ award in 2015, 2020, 2023 and 2025 and the Buckinghamshire Camra ‘Pub of the Year title in 2025.

Mitre Cottage next door is a Grade II listed building. It a timber-framed cottage with a thatch roof and full cruck trusses either end and to the left of centre. The cottage was originally built in the 15th century and was altered in the 17th and 19th centuries. Part of Mitre Cottage was once a butcher’s shop, and part of it was demolished for road-widening in the 20th century.

Today Mitre Cottage is on the market through Russell and Butler of Buckingham with an asking price of £425,000.

The Prebendal House was bought by the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos in the 19th century and is now part of the University of Buckingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025

Daily prayer in the Kingdom Season: 25, Tuesday 25 November 2025

‘Many will come in my name and say … “The time is near!” Do not go after them’ (Luke 21: 8) … the clock at Donegal House and the Guildhall in Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the Kingdom Season, the time between All Saints’ Day and Advent, and this week began with the Sunday next before Advent and the Feast of Christ the King (23 November 2025). The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers Saint Catherine of Alexandria, Martyr in the 4th century, and Isaac Watts (1674-1748), hymnwriter.

Saint Catherine of Alexandria is the Patron Saint of the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies, where I have studied in Cambridge. IOCS is celebrating her Feast today at the Greek Orthodox Church of Saint Athanasios, Cambridge, today (25 November 2025), starting with Matins at 9 am, followed by the Divine Liturgy at 10 am, and with a Thanksgiving Service in the evening at 6 pm, followed by refreshments and fellowship in the parish hall.

Meanwhile, before the day begins, I am taking some quiet time early this morning, even before breakfast, to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.

‘When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified’ (Luke 21: 9) … the 1798 Rising recalled in street art in a laneway behind Anne Street and North Main Street in Wexford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 21: 5-11 (NRSVA):

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

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

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

‘Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom’ (Luke 21: 10) … ‘Fuascailt’, Eamonn O’Doherty’s sculpture of the 1798 Wexford pikemen on the N25 near Barntown and Taghmon, Co Wexford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s reflection:

The Gospel reading at the Eucharist this morning (Luke 21: 5-11) is part of Saint Luke’s ‘Little Apocalypse’, to which we were introduced on the Sunday before last (see Luke 21: 5-19, Sunday 16 November 2025, the Second Sunday before Advent).

On his arrival in Jerusalem, Christ weeps, invokes sayings from the Prophet Jeremiah against a city that ‘did not recognise the time of your visitation from God’ (Luke 19: 41-44), and then faces up to three attempts by the authorities to entrap him, each concluding with Christ silencing his opponents (Luke 20: 1-19; 20: 20-26; and 20: 27-38).

The scene has been set in the verses in this chapter that immediately precede today’s reading. Christ is sitting by the Temple Treasury, where he watches the poor widow offer the smallest of coins (verses 1-4), as we read yesterday.

The scene does not change as he goes on to speak about the Temple, the Nation, and the looming future. But, instead of questioning him about what he has just said about this widow, which might have offered a focus for how the politics of God work, those around him, probably a wider group than just his own disciples, cannot get past the physical presence and appearance of Herod’s Temple in Jerusalem, then revered as a sign of God’s presence, even as the dwelling place of God’s sheltering protection for Israel (see Luke 13:34-35).

Christ is no longer facing attacks from others. Instead, he alerts his followers to the hardships they face ahead, beyond the time of his journey. But as he approached Jerusalem, Christ had declared that God’s ‘visitation’ had come with his reign, that the very stones of the Temple would testify against those who rejected him (19: 41-44).

Now he again predicts that all the stones will be thrown down (21: 6), as one scene in the divine drama.

A web of prophetic citations is woven through these verses. These include words and phrases from Jeremiah 4, 7, 14, and 21; Isaiah 19; and Ezekiel 14 and 38. Maybe we might say that Christ, like the prophets before him, was not very original in what he said. But there is still the question: how faithfully did these prophetic words and warnings of destruction speak to the people of the time, to the people who heard Christ speak?

But Christ also differentiates his teaching from the teaching of the false prophets, who also quoted the ancient words of God. While announcing the coming judgment, Christ cautions against following prophets who claim to know God’s timetable, even invoking Christ’s own name.

The account in this chapter of Christ’s words could be compared with Mark 13, and its intensity of the coming ‘tribulation.’ Or we might go back to Luke 17: 22-37, which also reminds us that Christ’s death is an integral part of God’s timetable: ‘But first he must endure much suffering and be rejected by this generation’ (17: 25). Saint Luke’s longer account of Christ’s discourse (21: 5-36) assures his readers they are experiencing not ‘the end’ … but the period of ‘tribulations’ or ‘persecutions’ through which believers will enter the kingdom (see Acts 14: 22).

And so, Saint Luke’s account of Christ’s speech does not provide yet another programme or timetable to predict the working out of God’s plan, down to the last second. The prophets and Christ teach us that the struggles in history and in disturbances in nature are more than accidental. They remind us that God triumphed over chaos in creating the natural world, and yet both human and supra-historical forces are still contending for the earth. Christ’s followers are aware, therefore, that his death and resurrection is God’s ultimate act in a struggle of cosmic proportions. Only the final outcome is sure.

As the Apostle Paul writes: ‘We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labour pains until now; and not only the creation, be we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies’ (Romans 8: 22-23).

The hope to which Christ testifies in this passage, therefore, is no trivial denial of the struggles, the pain and agony of human life, or the catastrophic forces of nature. These are real, and the prophets of old have interpreted such devastations as the context of God’s saving work. Christ joins this chorus, bringing it close to the concrete realities of early Christians. But he says: ‘This will give you an opportunity to testify’ (verse 13) and ‘By your endurance you will gain your souls’ (verse 19).

The ‘opportunity to testify’ does not require Christ’s followers to know every answer to the question: ‘Why do bad things happen to good people.’

Christ is promising that he will give us ‘words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict.’ His earlier promise of the Holy Spirit’s wisdom in times of testimony (see Luke 12: 11-12) now becomes his own promise. When he commissions them as ‘my witnesses’ (Acts 1: 8), he assures them of the power and the presence of his Holy Spirit, and the stories in Acts will display the fulfilment of this promise of God’s ‘mouth and wisdom’ (see Acts 4: 13-14; 16: 6-7). And so, even these harsh prophecies in Luke 21 are filled with the confidence of Christ’s enduring presence.

And the ‘endurance’ that ‘will gain your soul’ (verse 19) is also not mere heroic persistence.

The early Christians knew all about endurance, and that endurance was often tested. Paul echoes that theme in Romans 5: 3-5, then transformed this endurance from reliance on human strength to trusting in God’s love: ‘… we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.’

Saving endurance is a gift of the presence of the Holy Spirit.

A problem that continues to dominate parish priorities is the emphasis on buildings rather than people. Are there ‘building blocks’ we need to knock down so we can start again and care for little people like the poor widow who was at the centre of yesterday’s reading?

Is it time to rebuild, to become the kind of temples God really wants?

Should we change church politics and priorities for God’s politics and priorities?

In pursuing God’s vision for the future of the Church and the Kingdom, are we relying on our own knowledge and strengths?

What risks are we willing to take for our core values?

How would you be prophetic and offer hope in the face of the rise of the far-right across Europe or Trump’s behaviour in office in the US?

How do you read the signs of the times when it comes to global events, such as the conflicts in Ukraine, Russia, Gaza, Israel, Palestine and Lebanon?

Have we a vision for a new heaven and a new earth (see Isaiah 65: 17-25)?

How do we balance concerns for the wider world with those for the widow and her small coin in our parishes?

‘When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified’ (Luke 21: 9) … a plaque recalling the executions and deaths on Wexford Bridge in 1798 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 25 November 2025):

The theme this week (23 to 29 November) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Gender Justice’ (pp 58-59). This theme was introduced on Sunday with Reflections by Rachael Anderson, former Senior Communications and Engagement Manager, USPG.

Today is International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and Girls, and the day is being marked in Milton Keynes with a vigil at the Rose in Campbell Park from 6 pm to 6:45 ‘to raise Awareness, Reflection and Action’. The USPG Prayer Diary today invites us to pray:

We pray that this year’s 16 Days campaign might make governments, churches and communities around the world take notice and support an end to gender-based violence.

The Collect:

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

Post Communion Prayer:

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

Additional Collect:

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

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Saint Catherine of Alexandria (25 November) is patron of the IOCS in Cambridge … an icon in the Greek Orthodox Church in Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

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

The Methodist chapel in Gawcott dates from 1868, but the Scott family had early Methodist links

The Methodist Chapel on Main Street, Gawcott, Buckinghamshire, dates from 1868 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I was visiting Gawcott, a small village on the fringes of Buckingham, late last week, to see Holy Trinity Church, built in 1827 by the Revd Thomas Scott (1780-1835), and to learn more about Gawcott’s connections with his son, the Gothic revival architect Sir George Gilbert Scott (1811-1878), who was born in the village on 13 July 1811.

I was writing about Holy Trinity Church yesterday (23 November 2025). But, in fact, Gawcott has two churches: Holy Trinity Church and Gawcott Methodist Chapel. The Scott family were known at first for their evangelical sympathies, and had connections with early development of Methodism, to the point that it is said the family were ostracised for their low-church leanings.

Family lore says that George Gilbert Scott’s aunt Gilbert had once been kissed by John Wesley, which she esteemed a great privilege. The Revd Thomas Scott’s guests at his parsonage in Gawcott were often evangelical neighbours who came to Gawcott to hear him preach.

The Methodist movement in Gawcott started out in a cottage on Main Street before moving to the present building on Main Street in 1868.

The Back Street or south side of Gawcott Methodist Chapel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Gawcott Methodist Chapel is part of the Northampton District in the Methodist Church and of the Buckingham, Bicester and Brackley Circuit. The churches in the circuit are in in three counties – Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Northamptonshire – and the circuit includes Methodist churches in Bicester, Brackley, Buckingham (Well Street United Church), Gawcott, Silverstone, Steeple Claydon, Thornborough and Towcester.

The Methodist Chapel in Gawcott has been modernised in recent years, and it has an open-plan sanctuary, kitchen, small room and disabled access and disabled toilet. The chapel holds a drop-in café from 10 am to 12 noon every Thursday, and a parent/carer and toddler group meets in the chapel on Thursday afternoons.

Today, the Methodist Chapel and Holy Trinity Church in Gawcott support one other and share in their work.

The Revd Tim Edworthy, the Minister of Well Street United Church in Buckingham, is also the minister of Gawcott Methodist Chapel. Sunday services in the Methodist Chapel in Gawcott are at 6 pm.

Chapel House on Back Street, facing the south side of Gawcott Methodist Chapel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in the Kingdom Season: 24, Monday 24 November 2025

‘He looked up and saw rich people putting their gifts into the treasury’ (Luke 21: 1) … the Treasury at Delphi (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the Kingdom Season, the time between All Saints’ Day and Advent, and this week began with the Sunday next before Advent and the Feast of Christ the King (23 November 2025).

Before today day begins, I am taking some quiet time early this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.

‘He looked up and saw … a poor widow put in two small copper coins’ (Luke 21: 1-2) … small coins for sale in an antique shop in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 21: 1-4 (NRSVA):

1 He looked up and saw rich people putting their gifts into the treasury; 2 he also saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. 3 He said, ‘Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them; 4 for all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in all she had to live on.’

Old 1, 5 and 10 lepta postage stamps from Greece … the widow’s two lepta were the smallest coins in the Mediterranean world

Today’s Reflections:

There is a saying in the US that refers to something as rare or as odd as a $2 bill. $2 bills or notes exist, but their scarcity means many people are not aware they are still being printed and in circulation. This has inspired several urban legends and misinformation about $2 bills and people often find it difficult if not impossible to spend them.

Some shops and businesses are unfamiliar with $2 bills and question their validity or authenticity. Significant numbers of the notes are removed from circulation and collected by people who believe $2 bills are scarcer and more valuable than they actually are.

In the mid-20th century, $2 bills acquired a negative reputation as it was said they were widely used for betting at horse races, tips at strip clubs, and for bribery when politicians were seeking votes. For most of their history, $2 notes have been unpopular, and are seen as unlucky or awkward to spend. $2 notes were often returned to the Treasury with corners torn off, making them mutilated currency and unfit for reissue.

So, I was surprised during our visit to Singapore last year to find a $2 note is in common circulation and the most common small note in general use.

In the Gospel reading at the Eucharist this morning (Luke 21: 1-4), the poor widow at the Treasury in the Temple donates not a $2 dollar bill but two small copper coins, two lepta. The version of this story in Saint Mark’s Gospel says these two small copper coins are worth a κοδράντης (kodrantes), the smallest Roman brass coin, rendered as a penny in the NRSV translations and a farthing in the KJV (Mark 12: 41-44). It was also equal to one-sixty-fourth of a denarius, which was considered a fair day’s wage.

This poor widow arriving at the Treasury in the Temple would have had nothing of her own. All her husband’s or husbands’ wealth has gone to her husband’s or husbands’ family – think of the social considerations implicit in Saturday’s reading about the widow being married off to seven brothers, one after another (Luke 20: 27-40, 22 November 2025).

Without children, this poor widow is left with no visible means of support. All she has are two of the smallest coins known in the Mediterranean basin – two lepta in Greece are worth only two cent. Until recently there were 100 lepta to the drachma, and until the drachma was withdrawn from circulation there were 370 drachmés to the Euro.

At any time in history, the two lepta coins she had were worthless. But they are all she has. She has little to live for, and little to live on. Yet all she has to live on she offers to God. Christ-like, she gives up everything.

In the Kingdom of God, there will be neither lost lepta nor squandered zillions, neither high priests nor widows. All that will matter is whether we have lived our lives as lives that point to the Kingdom of God.

The wealth of the Sadducees, like their faith, died at death. The wealth of the woman, like her faith, multiplied beyond calculation in the Kingdom of God.

Generosity, as in this reading, must always be freely given, but should never be sought.

When it is sought, it becomes coercive, and can never be properly measured.

When it is freely given, it can never be measured but always becomes a sign, a real expression not just of the generosity of the giver, but of the faith of the giver. And then, God becomes the true giver, and the true receiver.

$2 bills are the smallest banknotes in general circulation in Singapore (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 24 November 2025):

The theme this week (23 to 29 November) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Gender Justice’ (pp 58-59). This theme was introduced yesterday with Reflections by Rachael Anderson, former Senior Communications and Engagement Manager, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today invites us to pray:

Father God, we pray for everyone to follow Christ’s example of treating women equally and respectfully. We pray for a world where justice and peace prevail, and where one's gender no longer increases the likelihood of suffering abuse.

The Collect:

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

Post Communion Prayer:

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

Additional Collect:

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

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

A handful of ancient Greek coins (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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

Holy Trinity Church, Gawcott, the Buckinghamshire village church built by the father of Sir George Gilbert Scott

Holy Trinity Church in Gawcott, near Buckingham, was built in 1827 by Revd Thomas Scott (1780-1835) (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

When I walked from Buckingham to the nearby village of Gawcott last week, I was particularly interested in seeing the village where the Victorian Gothic revival architect Sir George Gilbert Scott (1811-1878) was born, and the parish church built in 1827 by his father, the Revd Thomas Scott (1780-1835).

Although Gawcott was long without a church, mediaeval Gawcott was a prebend of Buckingham, and the estate known as Prebend End Manor, or Buckingham with Gawcott Manor, formed part of the endowment of Buckingham Church at the time of the Domesday Book.

Gawcott probably had a church by 1580, although little is known about its history. After the church disappeared, the villagers were left with the option of attending church in either Padbury or Hillesden, or in Buckingham, Radclive or Tingewick.

Inside Holy Trinity Church in Gawcott, Buckinghaminghamshire, facing east (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

John West, a wealthy lace buyer in Gawcott, decided to build a church in Gawcott in 1806 out of his own resources. By 1817, however, the roof needed major repairs, and due to the long, dry summers in 1825 and 1826 the building subsided and the whole building gave way. At first the church was held up by 19 strong props, but by the end of 1826 it had to be closed. The last service there was held on Christmas Day 1826, and demolition began the following day.

At the time, the Vicar of Gawcott was the Revd Thomas Scott, who had arrived in the village 20 years earlier. Scott was the grandson of the biblical commentator Thomas Scott (1747-1821), a friend of the hymn writer John Newton, who was a curate nearby in Olney. Both the elder Thomas Scott and Newton were among of the founders of the Church Missionary Society (CMS) in 1799, and Scott was the Rector of Aston Sandford in Buckinghamshire from 1803 until his death in 1821.

John Henry Newman described the elder Thomas Scott as ‘the writer who made a deeper impression on my mind than any other, and to whom (humanly speaking) I almost owe my soul’.

The altar and apse in Holy Trinity Church, Gawcott (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Soon after his arrival, the younger Thomas Scott’s son, George Gilbert Scott, was born in Gawcott on 13 July 1811. Later, Thomas Scott set about designing the basic church that still stands today, raised the necessary financing, and supervised the building work by James Willmore of Buckingham.

Unlike other churches in neighbouring villages, Holy Trinity Church in Gawcott does not stand on a prominent position within the street scene. Instead, it is screened by surrounding buildings and a high hedgerow along the south side of Main Street.

Scott’s church is rather plain in appearance and it is said that it did not impress his son, the architect Sir George Gilbert Scott. It was dismissed scathingly by John Camp in his book Portrait of Buckingham (1972), where he descried it as ‘hideous pseudo-classicism’.

Holy Trinity Church was completed in 1827, and since then it has seen alterations and renovations. Gawcott was formed into an ecclesiastical parish on 4 November 1862.

Looking towards the west end of Holy Trinity Church, Gawcott (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The classical-style church is a Listed Grade II* building. It fronts onto the small village green and the south side of Main Street, with Charlotte Cottage (Grade II listed) to the east. Under the supervision of Thomas Scott’s grandson and George Gilbert Scott’s son, the architect John Oldrid Scott, the gallery at the west end of the church was removed in 1894 and the present ceiling was installed.

The church has a polygonal apse, a wide aisleless nave and a small west tower. The apse is lower than the nave and has blank east wall, and the windows have round-arched heads. The west end has six-paned, double-leaf doors on either side of the tower with plain raised stone surrounds and low pediments on console brackets, with windows above the doors.

The front is surmounted by half pediments that flank the tower. The tower has three stages and a west window similar to those in the nave and on same scale.

The monument to the Revd Thomas Scott behind the pulpit in Holy Trinity Church, Gawcott (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Inside the church, the chancel arch has an elliptical-arched head imposts, the nave and apse have flat plaster ceilings. Items of interest in the church include two round arch-headed boards that have survived from the earlier church demolished in 1826. They have been moved from the east end to the north wall, with the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed on one board, and the Ten Commandments on the other.

The original communion rails have been moved forward from the entrance to the apse and has symmetrical turned balusters. The early 19th century hexagonal pulpit has panel mouldings on its sides. The organ dates from the early 19th century. The chandeliers were installed in 1894, and were restored and rehung in 1995.

The wall monumentsin the church include a white marble monument to the south of the apse to the parish benefactor John West who paid for previous chapel, and one to the north of the apse, behind the pulpit, in memory of Revd Thomas Scott (1780-1835).

The inscription on Scott’s memorial records his 27 years of service and building the present church ‘on the site of the former Chapel which had fallen to decay, by assistance of friends tho not without considerable personal expense.’

Scott left Gawcott to become the Rector of Wappenham, Northamptonshire, where his son, Sir George Gilbert Scott, was the architect of a new vicarage.

Some Scott family graves in the churchyard in Gawcott (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

In recent years, the roof and the parapets of the church have been repaired, new windows were installed and the lighting update. The tower was reduced during major work in 1979, and as a consequence the bell chamber was lost. The bell was then rehung above the roof of the tower and the clock has been silent since.

Another major restoration was carried out in 1990, beginning with the north wall of the main churchyard. The north slope of the roof was removed after the architect declared the roof was dangerous, with rot in the north end of each of the three western single span joists.

The church interior was restored after the plaster on the lower walls was found to be damp, and new panelling was installed, matching the panelling in the sanctuary. The nave floor was been replaced.

After these renovations and alterations, Holy Trinity Church was reconsecrated by Bishop Richard Harries of Oxford in June 2002. More recently, new kitchen and toilet facilities have been installed in the church.

Holy Trinity Church, Gawcott, seen from the south-east (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

• Holy Trinity Church, Gawcott, is part of the Lenborough Benefice, which also includes Saint Cecilia’s, Adstock, All Saints’, Hillesden, and Saint Mary’s, Padbury. The interim vicar is the Revd Dr Quentin Chandler, who is also Head of Vocations and Director of Ordinands (DDO) in the Diocese of Oxford. Sunday services at 10:30 rotate between the four churche in the benefice and include: ‘Café Sunday (first Sunday); Benefice Communion (second Sunday); ‘Care and Share’ (third Sunday); and Holy Communion (fourth Sunday).

The Old Rectory in Gawcott, facing the west end of Holy Trinity Church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in the Kingdom Season: 23, Sunday 23 November 2025, Christ the King

Christ enthroned in majesty in the centre of the Christ the King or Cooper Window in Saint Peter’s Church, Berkhamsted (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the Kingdom Season, the time between All Saints’ Day and Advent, and today is the Feast of Christ the King, the Sunday next before Advent. Later this morning, I hope to be part of the choir at the Parish Eucharist in the Church of Saint Mary and Saint Giles in Stony Stratford. The music this morning includes the motet Locus Ipse composed in 1869 by Anton Bruckner (1824-1896) and a version of Psalm 46 (Deus Noster Refugium, God is our hope and strength) by Martin Luther.

Before the day begins, before having breakfast, I am taking some quiet time early this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.

Three royal crowns for Christ the King … a window in Saint Mary’s Church, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 23: 33-43:

33 When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. [34 Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.’] And they cast lots to divide his clothing. 35 And the people stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, ‘He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!’ 36 The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, 37 and saying, ‘If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!’ 38 There was also an inscription over him, ‘This is the King of the Jews.’

39 One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, ‘Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!’ 40 But the other rebuked him, saying, ‘Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? 41 And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.’ 42 Then he said, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ 43 He replied, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.’

Christ the King depicted in the East Window (1948) by Lilian Josephine Pocock in the Church of Christ the King in Gordon Square, Bloomsbury (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today’s Reflections:

Today is the Feast of Christ the King and the Sunday next before Advent (23 November 2025). Our readings bring us to the end of the Church Year. The Gospel reading also marks the last Sunday at the end of our journey in the Lectionary with Christ on his journey to Jerusalem. We will begin it all again next Sunday, with a new cycle of readings, beginning with Advent Sunday (30 November 2025), and reading through Saint Matthew’s Gospel.

But this morning’s Gospel reading (Luke 23: 33-43) gives us time to pause and reflect on the fact that we have followed Christ for seven months or so through Saint Luke’s Gospel. We have seen Saint Luke’s distinctive emphases on the poor and their inclusion in the Kingdom, the inclusion of those not normally invited as guests to the great feasts.

In the Gospel reading, we are at the moment when Christ is crucified. The crucifixion is truly emphasised on Good Friday, but this morning the emphasis is on Christ the King and the request by one of the criminals to ‘remember me’ in the kingdom.

The Epistle reading (Colossians 1: 11-20) includes a hymn praising Christ as the king of this kingdom, listing his royal attributes in poetic form (verse 15-20):

‘In him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.’

The Gospel reading may seem out of sequence as we approach Advent and prepare for Christmas. However, the Crucifixion is one of the ways in which we see Christ revealed to the world as King. The Crucifixion is his triumph rather than his defeat, and it leads not to our death but to his Resurrection and our promise of life in all its fullness, personalised in the way Christ assures the second criminal of the immediate promise of a place with him in Paradise.

This reading challenges to accept that today, this day (σήμερον, símeron), this very day, is the time to respond to the claims the kingdom makes on us (verse 43).

This reading may seem to be a little out of sequence on a Sunday morning. We are preparing for Christmas, you may think, not for Good Friday and Easter. But we forget that so easily. I hear on all the radio chat shows people already talking about this being the Christmas Season … before Advent has even started. In Britain, people are even talking about a Christmas election, rather than an Advent election.

But Advent is the season of preparation for Christmas, with the Lectionary readings telling us about the Coming of Christ.

We have made Christmas a far-too comfortable story. Christmas is a story about poverty and about people who are homeless and rejected and who can find no place to stay.

It is a messy story about a child born surrounded by the filth of animals and the dirt of squalor.

It is a story of shepherds who are involved in dangerous work, staying up all night, out in the winter cold, watching out for wolves and sheep stealers.

It is a story of trickery, deceit and the corruption of political power that eventually leads to a cruel dictator stooping to murder, even the murder of innocent children, to secure his own grip on power.

That is why in the weeks before Advent we have readings that remind us about what the coming of Christ into the world means, what the Kingdom of God is like, and how we should prepare for the coming of Christ and the coming of the Kingdom of God.

Marking the Sunday before Advent by crowning Christ as King helps us to focus on Advent from next Sunday (30 November), and Advent is supposed to be a time and a season of preparing for the coming of Christ.

Kingship may not be a good role model for people living in modern democratic societies where the heads of state are elected – although many of the elected heads of state in many countries good models for democratic leadership either. Nor are the models of kingship in history or in contemporary society so good. Let me share some examples:

• We are familiar with a model of monarchy that paradoxically appears to be benign on the one hand and appears aloof and remote on the other hand, at the very apex of a class system defined by birth, title and inherited privilege.

• In other northern European countries, the model of monarchy is portrayed in the media by figureheads who are slightly daft do-gooders, riding around on bicycles in parks and by canals in ways that threaten to rob kingship of majesty, dignity and grace.

• Or, take emperors deposed in my own lifetime: Halie Selassie sat back in luxury as his people starved to death; Emperor Bokassa, was a tyrant accused of eating his people and having them butchered at whim.

• In the United States, it seems Trump would rather be king than a President with the usual checks and balances of a democratic society. • Even in Britain and Ireland, we sometimes need to be reminded that the word minister, whether we use it for government ministers or church ministers, is supposed to convey the idea of service, serving the people and serving God. The petition in the Book of Common Prayer pleads: ‘Endue thy ministers with righteousness’; and the response is ‘And make thy chosen people joyful’.

This morning, this Sunday before Advent, gives us time to pause and reflect on why, as we were reading our way through Saint Luke’s Gospel, we have been following Christ on his journey to Jerusalem. For it is there that he will be revealed in glory as the Son of Man and the King.

Discussing how the Lectionary can at times provide readings that are incongruous or out of season, Canon Giles Fraser – who resigned as Canon Chancellor of Saint Paul’s because of the cathedral’s response to the Occupy protests – wrote in the Church Times many years ago [4 November 2011]:

‘For too long the Church has been obsessed with its own internal workings and with silly arguments about sex. Now is the time for a new debate and a new emphasis. For if we are not fully involved with complex discussions about the relationship between financial justice and the way our financial institutions work, then we might as well give up on being a proper Church and admit that we are the spiritual arm of the heritage industry.’

He recalls that the Evensong readings set for his last sermon in Saint Paul’s Cathedral included: ‘Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God… But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation’ (Luke 6: 20, 25).

This morning’s Gospel reading challenges us in a way that is uncomfortable, but with things that must stay on the agenda of the Church.

The genius of power is revealed in those who have it and can use it but only do so sparingly. Christ’s choice is not to gratify those who want a worldly king, whether he is benign or barmy. Instead, he displays supreme majesty in his priorities for those who are counted out when it comes to other kingdoms.

Christ rejects all the dysfunctional models of majesty and kingship. He is not coming again as a king who is haughty and aloof, daft and barmy, or despotic and tyrannical. Instead he shows a model of kingship that emphasises what majesty and graciousness should mean for us today – giving priority in the kingdom to the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick, the prisoner and the refugee.

In the current negative stormy debate about refugees, asylum seekers and migrants on small boats, a debate fuelled by racism, prejudice and extremism, I find comfort in the opening words of the Psalm this morning and its descrption of God as ‘our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble’ (Psalm 46: 1). The Psalmist goes on to say, ‘Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea; though its waters roar and foam’ (verses 2-3).

As we prepare for Christmas, we should be preparing to enjoy time with our families and friends, time for a good winter’s holiday. But we should also remember the reason we have Christmas, the reason Christ came into the world, and the reason he is coming again.

We can look forward to seeing the Christ Child in the crib and to singing about him in the carols. But let us also look forward to seeing him in glory.

Let us be prepared on this Feast of Christ the King to see him in the hungry, the thirsty, the unwelcome stranger, those who are naked and vulnerable, those who have no access to adequate health care, the refugees and asylum seekers facing endless taunts and bullying day-by-day, those who are prisoners, those who have no visitors and those who are lonely and marginalised.

A sculpture of Christ the King at the Church of Christ the King in Gordon Square, Bloomsbury (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today’s Prayers (Sunday 23 November 2025):

The theme this week (23 to 29 November) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Gender Justice’ (pp 58-59). This theme is introduced today with Reflections by Rachael Anderson, former Senior Communications and Engagement Manager, USPG, who writes:

Since its launch 30 years ago, the Global 16 Days Campaign has brought together over 6,000 organisations across 185 countries, reaching more than 300 million people in the fight against gender-based violence (GBV). I first encountered it when I worked for a grassroots women’s organisation and now, over eight years on, I am pleased that USPG also lend their voice to the campaign. The ‘16 Days’ initiative enables USPG to amplify our commitment to gender justice, raise awareness, and reflect on the progress that our church partners have made in ending gender-based violence.

However, the campaign lives on because there is still so much work to be done in the fight against gender-based violence. These 16 days provide us with an opportunity to reflect on the ongoing reality of GBV across the globe and to consider our responsibility, as Christians, to demand accountability and work towards an end to GBV and discrimination in all areas of life. As we are called to ‘mourn with those who mourn’ (Romans 12: 15), true activism cannot exist without empathy. Yet, mourning alone is not enough – our faith compels us to take action and make a tangible difference for the women and girls who endure injustice.

During these 16 days, I encourage you not only to reflect but also to look within your own communities for ways to practically support survivors of GBV and advocate for an end to discrimination.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Sunday 23 November 2025, Christ the King) invites us to pray as we read and meditate on Luke 23: 33-43.

Christ the King in the Selby-Lowndes family war memorial window in Saint Mary’s Church, Bletchley (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

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

This Post Communion prayer may be used as the Collect at Morning and Evening Prayer during this week.

Additional Collect:

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

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Christ the King … an image in this weekend’s notices at the Anglican Church of Saint Thomas in Kefalas, Crete,

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

A morning stroll in Gawcott near Buckingham, the birthplace and childhood home of Sir George Gilbert Scott

Gawcott is a small village in the Aylesbury Vale district, about 2.4 km south-west of Buckingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

During my visits to Buckingham during these weeks, I have been noticing the way the architect Sir George Gilbert Scott has left a deep impression on the town, including his restoration of the parish church, Saint Peter and Saint Paul, the early workhouse that was eventually replaced by the hospital designed by his son, the architect John Oldrid Scott (1841-1913), and Scott’s advice that helped save Castle House in the 1830s.

Sir George Gilbert Scott (1811-1878) was a prolific Gothic Revival architect who worked mainly in the design, building and renovation of churches and cathedrals, although he started his career as a leading designer of workhouses.

Scott designed or altered over 800 buildings, including the Midland Grand Hotel at St Pancras Station, the Albert Memorial and the Foreign Office, Whitehall, in London; Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Glasgow, and Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Edinburgh; the Martyrs’ Memorial in Oxford; the workhouse in Lichfield, now the Samuel Johnson Community Hospital, and the restoration of Lichfield Cathedral (1855-1861 and 1877-1881).

Sir George Gilbert Scott was born in Gawcott in 1811 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Scott was born in Gawcott, about 2.4 km (1.5 miles) south-west of Buckingham, where his father, the Revd Thomas Scott (1780-1835), was the perpetual curate or vicar. Scott’s first work, built in 1833, was a vicarage for his father in Wappenham, Northamptonshire, and he went on to design several other buildings in the village.

Scott’s works can be seen throughout Britain, and so one morning this week I decided to walk out from Buckingham to Gawcott to see the village where he was born.

Gawcott is a small compact, rural village with a population of about 500 people in the Aylesbury Vale district of Buckinghamshire, about 2.4 km (1.5 miles) south-west of Buckingham. It stands on elevated ground south of the Great Ouse and west of Claydon Brook, and is surrounded by beautiful countryside, making it a popular destination for walkers and cyclists.

The name of Gawcott comes from the Old English for ‘cottage for which rent is payable’. The Domesday Book in 1086 records the village as Chauescote or Gaukote. Other sources say the name comes from the old Norse word for the cuckoo, Gaukr (Gawk) and ‘cott’ for house, home or cottage.

The village was originally a farming community and remained so until the 19th century. The oldest parts of the village, which have remained largely unchanged over the years, extend principally along Main Street, Church Street and Back Street. Newer developments run off from Main Street and along the roads from Preston Bissett, Radclive, Hillesden and Buckingham.

The oldest parts of the village have remained largely unchanged over the years (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Uncharacteristically for the area, the parish church, Holy Trinity Church, does not stand on a prominent site within the street scene, but is screened from view by surrounding buildings and a high hedgerow along the south side of Main Street.

Despite the small size of Gawcott, the almost continuous line of brick and stone buildings along Main Street gives Gawcott what some see as an urban character, distinguishing it from the rural feel of the surrounding villages, matched locally only by Great Horwood, five miles to the east.

The estate known as Prebend End Manor or Buckingham with Gawcott Manor, formed part of the endowment of Buckingham Church at the time of the Domesday Book. It remained largely unchanged until the Enclosure Acts when blocks of land were allocated to the Marquis of Buckingham and several farmers, including William Eagles. Old Eagles farmhouse remains today in Main Street.

The centre of the village consists of mainly two-storey terraced houses and cottages fronting directly onto the footpaths that run the length of Main Street. The majority of these buildings date from the 18th and 19th centuries in origin, and they are built mostly of brick, with some of roughcast and colour-washed. The few older 16th and 17th century properties are of rubble stone, some with newer brick facings.

Charlotte Cottage, beside the churchyard, dates from the mid or late 17th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The oldest parts of the village have remained largely unaltered, and extend mainly along Main Street, Church Street and Back Street. Post-war developments have taken place in Buckingham Road, Radclive Road, Old Barn Close and Hillside, in the north part of the village and also off New Inn Lane, Cow Lane and The Rise, at the west end of the village.

There is a collection of listed buildings close to the junction of Main Street and Radclive Road, particularly Red Lion House, Westcott House and Old Eagles Farmhouse. In all, Gawcott has 17 Grade I, Grade II* and Grade II buildings.

Charlotte Cottage, beside the churchyard, dates from the mid or late 17th century. Inside, this thatched cottage has spine beams and an open fireplace with a bressumer.

The White House, is a thatched cottage dating from the 17th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The White House, another thatched cottage that dates from the 17th century, with chamfered spine beams inside, and an open fireplace with and unusual bressumer, moulded and cambered with an incised head at the centre and other incised ornamentation.

Honeysuckle Cottage and Ediecote Cottage form a pair of cottages that date from the 18th century.

The Crown public house is a former inn that dates from the mid or late 17th century. It was re-fronted and extended ca 1800, altered and extended in the 20th century.

From the 1700s, as many as a quarter of the women in the village were involved in lacemaking, and Gawcott became known for its black lace. Lacemaking continued as a cottage industry throughout the 19th and into the 20th century.

The Gawcott Labourers’ Movement became national news in 1867 when they went on strike for higher pay. Subsequently, the Gawcott Sick and Benefit Club was formed and remnants of the club’s banner still exist.

The administrative Parish of Gawcott with Lenborough was established as a separate entity from Buckingham in 1982. The parish council owns the playing field at Lenborough Road, donated to the village by Richard Roper, with the extension later donated by the Faccenda family.

The Crown public house is a former inn dating from the mid or late 17th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today, Gawcott is a thriving community with a range of amenities including the village hall built in 1924, a primary school, a pub and a post office. The centre of the village and its buildings are protected by Conservation Area status established in 1990. Gawcott hosts several local events during the year, including a summer fete, a fireworks display and a Christmas market, and the local clubs and societies include a cricket club and a football club.

As for Sir George Gilbert Scott, his works in Buckinghamshire and neighbouring Northamptonshire include the extension and alterations at Buckingham Gaol; churches in Ashley, Buckingham, Flaunden, Hillesden, Northampton and Spratton; vicarages and rectories in Blakesley, Dinton, Wappenham and Weston Turville; and workhouses in Amersham, Buckingham, Hillesden, Kettering, Northampton, Oundle, Towcester and Winslow.

But more about Holy Trinity Church, built in 1827 by Scott’s father, the Revd Thomas Scott, tomorrow, hopefully.

Gawcott is surrounded by beautiful countryside and is a popular with walkers and cyclists (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in the Kingdom Season: 22, Saturday 22 November 2025

The Seven Brothers Taverna at a corner in the old Venetian harbour in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the Kingdom Season, the time between All Saints’ Day and Advent, and tomorrow is the Sunday next before Advent and the Feast of Christ the King. The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today (22 November) today remembers Saint Cecilia, Martyr at Rome ca 230.

Later this evening, I may go to Saturday night Vespers in the Greek Orthodox Church in Stony Stratford, followed by a talk on the Divine Liturgy. But, before the day begins, I am taking some quiet time early this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.

A sign at the Seven Brothers Taverna in the old Venetian harbour in Rethymnon, Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 20: 27-40 (NRSVA):

27 Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him 28 and asked him a question, ‘Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. 29 Now there were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; 30 then the second 31 and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. 32 Finally the woman also died. 33 In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her.’

34 Jesus said to them, ‘Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage; 35 but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. 36 Indeed they cannot die any more, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection. 37 And the fact that the dead are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. 38 Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.’ 39 Then some of the scribes answered, ‘Teacher, you have spoken well.’ 40 For they no longer dared to ask him another question.

The old Venetian harbour in Rethymnon, with the Seven Brothers Taverna to the left (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s reflections:

The Gospel reading at the Eucharist in the lectionary today (Luke 20: 27-40),offers an opportunity to reflect both on how we treat the marginalised today and how we how we imagine heavenly life.

This reading which is similar to the Gospel reading we hear on Remembrance Sunday (9 November 2025, Luke 20: 27-38), comes close to the end of November, a month in which we have been remembering the dead, including All Saints’ Day (1 November), All Souls’ Day (2 November), Remembrance Sunday (9 November) and Remembrance Day (11 November).

When I read this passage, I also think of an old Hollywood musical, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954), starring Jane Powell and Howard Keel, of the many Irish superstitions about the seventh son of a seventh son, and even about a restaurant I know in the old Venetian harbour in Rethymnon in Crete called ‘The Seven Brothers’ (Τα Επτά Αδέρφια).

But this reading about seven brothers and one bride is primarily a story about questions about the resurrection (for parallel readings see also Matthew 22: 23-33; Mark 12: 18-27). How does this relate to tomorrow’s celebration of Christ the King or to the approaching themes of Advent?

After his arrival in Jerusalem, Christ is in the Temple each day, teaching kingdom values (Luke 19: 47). But his teaching is ignored by those who see him as a threat to their power and their privilege, by those who want to get rid of him at any cost (Luke 19: 47-48; 20: 20) … without realising that their choice, their actions, are part of the climax that ushers in Christ’s reign.

As an example of his kingdom values, his rejection of the either-or options, the black-or-white, the take-it-or-leave-it values of the world, Christ refuses to enter the debate about paying Temple taxes with imperial Roman coins (Luke 20: 21-25).

So another trap is set – this time by the Sadducees, the Temple priests. They held that only the first five books of the Bible, the Torah or the Pentateuch, were authoritative. They had very traditional views of the Law and rejected what they saw as the novel idea of life after death. They saw it as a dangerous innovation, an importation from the Babylonian exile, a Persian idea adapted by the Pharisees. The more traditional view accepted that people were rewarded or punished by God in this life.

So, seeking to trap Jesus into speaking against the Law, they pose this puzzle about a woman who ends up marrying seven brothers, each of whom dies in turn. In the new life, whose wife will she be?

The apostles later have a similar encounter with the Sadducees when they are preaching the Resurrection (see Acts 4: 1-4), as does the Apostle Paul when he faces the council (Acts 23: 6-10).

This question about ‘levirate’ marriage is not about the marriage of Levites, but comes from the Latin word levir, meaning a brother-in-law. There was a sense in which a man was seen to live on in his son. So, if a man died without sons and heirs, his brother was required to marry his widow and give her a son, thus continuing the family line (see Deuteronomy 25: 5-10; Genesis 38: 8).

Saint Luke makes the same point that human relations in the home do not exist in the same way beyond death. Christ distinguishes two ages and kinds of existence. Mortals are part of this age by the very fact of our physical birth, and of the age to come by resurrection (verse 36; see Romans 1: 4).

‘This age’ (verse 34) is the current era; ‘that age’ (verses 35-36) is the era to come, when Christ returns. In God’s kingdom, marriage will no longer exist. Those who are admitted into eternal life for their faith (‘considered worthy of a place …’, verse 35) will all be ‘children of God’ (verse 36). This will be the new family relationship. They will be immortal (‘cannot die anymore’) and will be like ‘angels.’

Christ argues for life after death, and for the resurrection, from the Pentateuch, the very five books to which the Sadducees limited their understanding of what is Scripture. In the story of the Burning Bush, God tells Moses: ‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham …’ (see Exodus 3: 6). Because God says he is (not was), Abraham is alive now. He died, so he must have been brought back to life, resurrected. God is truly ‘God … of the living’ (verse 38). God is not frustrated by physical death (verse 38).

What happens afterwards?

Some scribes, who are believers in resurrection, are pleased with Jesus’ argument (verse 39). The Sadducees ‘no longer dared to ask him [Christ] another question’ (verse 40). Christ has evaded the trap that was set for him. What does this say about how we should deal with those who question and challenge the Christian faith?

This reading also poses some pastoral questions for the practice of pastoral ministry in parish life, What response to this reading do we expect from people in a parish who are widowed or divorced, or in difficult or broken marriages, or people who have never married?

A sign at the Seven Brothers Taverna in the old Venetian harbour in Rethymnon on Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Saturday 22 November 2025):

The theme this week (16 to 22 November) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), has been ‘In the Shadow of the Carneddau’ (pp 56-57). This theme was introduced last Sunday with Reflections from Bishop Andrew John, who stepped down as Archbishop of Wales and Bishop of Bangor on 27 June.

The USPG Prayer Diary today invites us to pray:

Pray for a strengthened vision within the Church that we are not powerless and able to do more than we could ask or imagine.

The Collect:

Heavenly Father,
whose blessed Son was revealed
to destroy the works of the devil
and to make us the children of God and heirs of eternal life:
grant that we, having this hope,
may purify ourselves even as he is pure;
that when he shall appear in power and great glory
we may be made like him in his eternal and glorious kingdom;
where he is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion Prayer:

Gracious Lord,
in this holy sacrament
you give substance to our hope:
bring us at the last
to that fullness of life for which we long;
through Jesus Christ our Saviour.

Additional Collect:

Heavenly Lord,
you long for the world’s salvation:
stir us from apathy,
restrain us from excess
and revive in us new hope
that all creation will one day be healed
in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Collect on the Eve of Christ the King:

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

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Saint Cecilia (centre) with Saint Barbara and Saint Agnes in a window by JW Knowles (1891) in Saint Olave’s Church, York … Saint Cecilia is celebrated today (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025) (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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

Today is Saint Cecilia’s Day (22 November) … over the years, I have been elected a Fellow of both the Fraternity of Saint Cecilia and the Academy of Saint Cecilia