Tagore sculpture in Bloomsbury brings back memories of poetry and inspirational peace activists

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) ... Shenda Armery’s bronze sculpture in Gordon Square, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I was first introduced to the poetry and thinking of Rabindranath Tagore in the mid-1970s by the Irish poet Brenda (Meredith) Yasin (1921-1980), who was active in many peace campaigns and in social justice issues. Brenda was a daughter of James Creed Meredith (1875-1942), a Supreme Court judge who had once been involved in the Kilcoole gunrunning in 1914 and who became a Quaker and a pacifist later in life.

I got to know Brenda and her husband Said Ahmed Yasin (1917-1998) after I moved from Wexford to Dublin in 1974 . They had married in Delhi in 1946, and he worked for the UN and the World Bank, and served in the new Ministry of Agriculture formed after the creation of Pakistan in 1947.

After they moved to Dublin in 1961, Said studied to be a vet and lectured in veterinary medicine in TCD. He was Pakistan’s Honorary Consul-General in Ireland (1970-1994), and they maintained close family friendships with the Bhutto family, including Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (1928-1979), a former president and prime minister of Pakistan, Begum Nusrat Bhutto (1929-2011), an advocate of women’s rights and democracy, and their daughter, Benazir Bhutto (1953-2007), Pakistan’s only female prime minister to date.

I still remember the distress of Brenda and Said when the former President Bhutto was executed on 4 April 1979, and their concern weeks later when I was due to visit Pakistan on my journeys to and from Japan as a student.

Like her father, Brenda Yasin was a Quaker. She took part in protests against the Vietnam War in Dublin, campaigned for travellers’ rights, and was very supportive when I was involved in restarting the Irish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) later in 1979.

She was only 58 when she died on 11 April 1980 in Glengarriff, Co Cork, and she was buried in Friends’ Burial Ground, Temple Hill, Blackrock. A book of her poetry was published posthumously. Said died in 1998.

The bust of Rabindranath Tagore marked the 150th anniversary of his birth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

I rediscovered the poetry of Rabindranath Tagore when I discovered the Service of the Heart, one of my favourite Jewish anthologies. It was published in London by the Union of Liberal and Progressive Synagogues in 1967, and the edition I have is dated 1969. It a rich treasury of spiritual resources, and later I continue to use it in my prayers and reflections.

One of the poetic prayers I have used on occasions, ‘Lord, where shall I find You?’, is a translation by Rabbi Chaim Stern (1930-2001) from David Frischmann’s Hebrew version of Rabindranath Tagore’s poem Gitanjali.

I thought of Brenda and Said Yasin, and of so many ways in which I have been enriched by both Quaker and Jewish spirituality, earlier this week when I was in Gordon Square in Bloomsbury, close to Friends’ House on Euston Road, and when I saw Shenda Armery’s bronze sculpture of Tagore, which was unveiled in 2011.

The verses of ‘Thou hast made me endless’ from Tagore’s best know-poem, ‘Gitanjali’, in English on the plinth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) was a Bengali poet, playwright, songwriter, philosopher and environmentalist and the first Asian Nobel laureate. Two of his poems have become the national anthems of India and Bangladesh, and he also inspired the national anthem of Sri Lanka.

Tagore was born on 7 May 1861, in Kolkata, India. He wrote several poems, short stories and screenplays. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 for his contribution to literature, specifically for his collection of collection of poems, Gitanjali, Song Offerings. He was knighted in 1915 but rejected the knighthood in 1919 in protest after the Amritsar Massacre. He died on 7 August 1941.

The bronze sculpture of Tagore in Gordon Square was unveiled by Prince Charles (now King Charles) on 7 July 2011 to commemorate Tagore’s 150th birthday. Gordon Square is close to the faculty of law at University College London, where Tagore was a student in 1878.

The date of the unveiling also marked the anniversary of the suicide bombing on a bus at Tavistock Square, close to Gordon Square, six years earlier on 7 July 2005. The bomb was part of the 7/7 bombings, and 13 passengers, as well as the bomber, Hasib Hussain, were killed on the No 30 bus from Marble Arch to Hackney.

The sculptor Shenda Armery also sculpted busts of Margaret Thatcher and the former Speaker of the House of Commons, Betty Boothroyd. Her other public work includes the Ambrika fountain in London Zoo.

In his speech, Prince Charles said ‘Tagore has always been regarded as exceptional in the breadth and depth of his work as a philosopher and writer of songs, as poet and playwright, in his interest in education, rural renewal and farming and as a painter crossing the divide between East and West.’

He descried Tagore’s work as ‘very relevant for our time, particularly his understanding of a principle which is so dear to me, so much so that I have made it the title of a recently published book – Harmony.’ Prince Charles referred to the 7/7 anniversary and hoped ‘the inscriptions on this bust will shine out as a beacon of tolerance, understanding and of unity in diversity.’

At the unveiling, Kalyan Kundu, founder and chair of the Tagore Centre UK, also referred to the bombing and described ‘the unveiling of a statue of an apostle of peace’ as ‘a significant and timely reminder that a world of resentment and fear benefits no one and only brings with it pain.

The verses of ‘Thou hast made me endless’, from Tagore’s best know-poem, ‘Gitanjali’, in Bengali (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The bronze bust sits on of a substantial stone plinth, which has a carved inscription and two bronze plaques inscribed with the verses of ‘Thou hast made me endless’, from Tagore’s best know-poem, ‘Gitanjali (‘Song Offerings)’, in English and Bengali.

On the plaque on the right face of the plinth, the plaque looks like a facsimile of Tagore's handwritten original text, right down to the inserted word ‘very’:
Thou hast made me endless, such is thy pleasure.
This frail vessel thou emptiest again and again,
and fillest it ever with fresher life.

This little flute of a reed thou hast carried over hills and dales
and hast breathed through it melodies eternally new.

At the immortal touch of thy hands
my little heart loses its limits in a great joy and gives birth to utterance ineffable.

Thy infinite gifts come to me only on these very small hands of mine.
Ages pass and still thou pourest, and still there is room to fill.

Rabindranath Tagore

The plaque on the left of the plinth has the Bengali version of poem.

On the bust itself, the neck is inscribed on the right: ‘Shenda Amery, 2011’.

Gordon Square was developed by Thomas Cubitt as one part of a pair with nearby Tavistock Square. Much of the square is still occupied by ranges of four- and five-storey yellow London brick terraces, with the tallest group having balconies and a decorated cornices. The gardens of Gordon Square were restored in recent decades by the University of London.

Gordon Square was developed by Thomas Cubitt and the gardcens have been restored by the University of London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 33, Wednesday 11 June 2025, Saint Barnabas the Apostle

An icon of Saint Barnabas in Saint Barnabas Church in Jericho, Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The 50-day season of Easter, which began on Easter Day (20 April 2025), came to an end on Sunday with the Day of Pentecost or Whit Sunday (8 June 2025), and once again in the Church Calendar we are in Ordinary Time.

The Church Calendar today commemorates Saint Barnabas the Apostle (11 June). Later day, I have a lunchtime meeting in Saint Mary’s Church, Wavendon, I hope to join the choir rehearsals this evening in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading 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.

An icon of Saint Barnabas in Saint Barnabas Church in Jericho, Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

John 15: 12-17 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 12 ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. 16 You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. 17 I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.’

Saint Paul (left), the Prophet Elijah (centre) and Saint Barnabas (right) in a window in Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

Shortly before my ordination, Bishop Noel Willoughby, who had retired as Bishop of Cashel and Ossory and was then living in Wexford, told me about what he called his ‘Barnabas File.’

As a bishop, he regularly got letters moaning and groaning about what he had done or what he had failed to do. He read them, acted on them if he needed to, and then dumped them. But when he got encouraging letters, praising him, or just simply nice letters, he filed them away in his ‘Barnabas File’ and then take them out and read them when the pressures of ministry and the critics were grinding him down. Those letter writers were to him what Saint Barnabas was to the Apostle Paul on their shared missionary journeys.

In the Church Calendar, today is the Feast of Saint Barnabas. The lectionary readings for the Eucharist today include Acts 11: 19-30, set in Antioch, where we are called Christians for the first time. Earlier, Barnabas had sold all his goods and had given his money to the apostles in Jerusalem (Acts 4: 36-37). Now, in Acts 11, Barnabas arrives in Antioch. He then brings Saul from Tarsus to Antioch, and the two are sent out together.

Barnabas and Paul travel together for such a long time that their names are almost inseparable. When a dispute arises about taking John Mark with them, that dispute ends with Paul and Barnabas taking separate routes.

In today’s Gospel reading (John 15: 12-17), we are reminded that the great commandment Christ gives us is to love one another as Christ loves us (verse 12), and that we are called to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last (verse 16).

Christ tells us we have been given his commands so that we may love one another (verse 17). If we love one another, and if that becomes our priority in ministry, then we too can be like Barnabas to the other Pauls we meet in our Christian life.

Love one another. And that is enough.

Saint Barnabas (left) among the icons in the Baptistry in the west apse of Saint Barnabas, Jericho (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 11 June 2025, Saint Barnabas the Apostle):

‘Pentecost’ is the theme this week (8-14 June) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel). This theme was introduced on Sunday with reflections by Dr Paulo Ueti, Theological Advisor and Regional Manager for the Americas and the Caribbean, USPG.

The USPG prayer diary today (Wednesday 11 June 2025, Saint Barnabas the Apostle) invites us to pray:

Lord, we pray for your blessing on the Church of Saint Barnabas in Limassol and the Diocese of Cyprus and the Gulf more widely. May they follow the example of Saint Barnabas, Patron Saint of Cyprus, in faith, generosity, and perseverance.

The Collect:

Bountiful God, giver of all gifts,
who poured your Spirit upon your servant Barnabas
and gave him grace to encourage others:
help us, by his example,
to be generous in our judgements
and unselfish in our service;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

Almighty God,
who on the day of Pentecost
sent your Holy Spirit to the apostles
with the wind from heaven and in tongues of flame,
filling them with joy and boldness to preach the gospel:
by the power of the same Spirit
strengthen us to witness to your truth
and to draw everyone to the fire of your love;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

With Canon Norman Ruddock (left) and Bishop Noel Willoughby (right) in Wexford in 1998 … a reminder of the ‘Barnabas Files’

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 Rising Sun’s stucco Gothic work in Fitzrovia has been rescued from a disaster in the 1980s

Ihe Rising Sun is Victorian stucco pub in the Elaborate Art Nouveau Gothic style at corner of Tottenham Court Road and Windmill Street in Fitzrovia (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

Perhaps the work of my great-grandfather on buildings in Dublin such as the Irish House on Winetavern Street and the Oarsman in Ringsend has left me with an abiding interest in Victorian stucco pubs, and I find myself looking out for them when I am walking through a city or town.

In London in recent days, I have stopped to look at the Rising Sun is an ornate, 19th-century pub at 46 Tottenham Court Road in Fitzrovia. I returned again yesterday to look at its elaborate façades and to see what happened in the 1980s and the 1990s to its interiors.

The Rising Sun dates back to 1730, and was rebuilt in the Elaborate Art Nouveau Gothic style in 1897 to designs by the Victorian architects Treadwell and Martin. It has survived a drastic rebuilding in the 1980s, and is now a Grade II listed building.

Because of its associations with good weather and good fortune, the Rising Sun seems to be a natural name for a pub. But it also forms a large part of the coat of arms of the Distillers’ Company, which makes it even more popular as a pub name.

The Rising Sun was rebuilt in 1897 to designs by the Victorian architects Treadwell and Martin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Tottenham Court Road runs a distance of about three-quarters of a mile (1.2 km) from Euston Road in the north to Saint Giles Circus and the junction of Oxford Street and Charing Cross Road in the south, with Tottenham Court Road tube station just beyond the south end of the road. Tottenham Court Road is sometimes used to distinguish Fitzrovia to the west from Bloomsbury to the east.

The street takes its name from the former Manor of Tottenham Court, whose lands lay to the north and west of the road, in the parish of Saint Pancras. Tottenham Court had no direct connection with the district of Tottenham, now part of the London Borough of Haringey. The manor house of the former Manor of Tottenham Court lay just to the north of the road’s junction with Euston Road.

The Rising Sun dates back to a pub that was first licensed as the Sun in 1730. It is one of the pubs Karl Marx is said to have requented in the 1850s, at a time when there were 18 pubs along the length of the Tottenham Court Road.

The Windmill Street frontage of the Rising Sun (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The pub was rebuilt in the Elaborate Art Nouveau Gothic style by FA Rhodes in 1897 to designs by the Victorian architects Treadwell and Martin. The partnership was formed by Henry John Treadwell (1861-1910) and Leonard Martin (1869-1935), and was in practice for 20 years from 1890 to 1910.

Henry John Treadwell was born in Lambeth in 1862. He was articled to Franklin and Andrews of Ludgate Hill, and was then an assistant to the Giles Gough and Trollope in London. He practised with Leonard Martin in London from 1890 to 1910, specialising in developing small, narrow-fronted sites in London’s West End. He died in London on 24 October 1910.

Leonard Martin was born in London on 12 July 1869 and he too was articled to Giles Gough and Trollope. He attended the National Art Training School in South Kensington, London, and Lambeth School of Art. He met Henry John Treadwell at Giles Gough and Trollope and they formed a partnership in 1890.

The Treadwell and Martin partnership was dissolved after Treadwell died in 1910. From 1929 on, Martin was in partnership with EC Davis. Later, Martin exhibited at the Royal Academy in London between 1912 and 1929. He died in Surrey in 1936.

A plaque on the Tottenham Court Road frontage reads ‘Built by FA Rhodes 1897, Treadwell & Martin’(Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Stylistically, Treadwell and Martin worked in an eclectic mix of Art Nouveau, Baroque, late-Continental Gothic, and dashes of other styles, used in a very free way. They designed several public houses and breweries, and left a ‘trail of remarkable little buildings across London’s West End,’ according to the architectural historian A Stuart Gray.

The firm designed Scott’s restaurant, 18-19 Coventry Street (1892-1894), the Old Shades, a Grade II listed pub at 37-39 Whitehall, and 80 Fetter Lane, built for Buchanan’s Distillery, as well as the Rising Sun on Tottenham Court Road. Among their best buildings are 23 Woodstock Street, 7 Dering Street, 7 Hanover Street, 74 New Bond Street, 20 Conduit Street, 78 Wigmore Street, 106 Jermyn Street and 61 Saint James’s Street, all in the early 1900s.

Other works by the firm include the rebuilding and later addition of Saint John’s School, Leatherhead, Surrey (1890s); Sandroyd School, Cobham (1905-1906), hospitals in Carshalton and Cobham, Surrey, and Dartford, Kent, and Saint John’s Hospital, Lisle Street, Leicester Square, London (1904).

Their churches include the Presbyterian Church in West Norwood, the Holy Trinity Mission Church at Tulse Hill, London, and Saint John’s Church (1910), Herne Hill, Surrey. Their design for the Glasgow Art Gallery and Museum was shortlisted but unsuccessful.

Rising from the first to the third floor on a splayed corner is a bartizan with a corbel including a male figure (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Rising Sun is a late Victorian stucco pub designed by Treadwell and Martin in an Elaborate Art Nouveau Gothic style. The pub has four storeys and a basement; one bay has a three-bay return and there is a one-bay extension to Windmill Street.

It has a ground floor pilastered frontage and an entrance in a splayed corner. There are three-light transom and mullion windows with leaded panes on the first floor, and two-light windows on the second and third floors.

Each bay is separated by tourelles with pinnacles. The gables over the window bays are surmounted by segmental pediments. There is lavish use of vertical strips, scrollwork, heraldic beasts, cupids heads, and similar features in relief.

Rising from the first to the third floor on a splayed corner is a bartizan with a corbel including a male figure. To the right of this, a plaque reads ‘Built by FA Rhodes 1897, Treadwell & Martin’.

The brick extension has three-light transom and mullion windows and a stone-capped Dutch gable.

The interior of the Rising Sun was entirely remodelled in an historicist style after the Victorian interior was destroyed in the 1980s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Their pub was the victim of one of the worst excesses of brewery greed in the early 1980s when the pub was renamed ‘The Presley’ and decorated with images of Elvis Presley. The owners lowered the ceiling and destroyed the Victorian interior, including the Grade II listed high ceilinged interior.

The litigation the followed led to the forced restoration of many of the original features in 1993, when the interior was entirely remodelled in an historicist style.

The pub was renamed the Rising Sun by the next owners, the intricate stucco exterior remains, and the current decor is much more welcoming. The Rising Sun is one of the pubs on the many Karl Marx-themed pub crawls based on the pubs Karl Marx was known to have frequented or, more speculatively, may have visited when he lived with his family in abject poverty nearby at 21 Dean Street from 1848 to 1856.

The Rising Sun is one of the pubs Karl Marx is said to have frequented in the 1850s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 32, Tuesday 10 June 2025

‘You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste how can its saltiness be restored?’ (Matthew 5: 13) … ‘Sal Sapit Omnia’ (‘Salt Savours All’), the motto of the Worshipful Company of Salters at the former gates of Salters’ Hall in London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The 50-day season of Easter, which began on Easter Day (20 April 2025), came to an end on Sunday with the Day of Pentecost or Whit Sunday (8 June 2025), and once again in the Church Calendar we are in Ordinary Time.

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

1, reading 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.

‘But if salt has lost its taste how can its saltiness be restored?’ (Matthew 5: 13) … salt on a café table in Cobh, Co Cork (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 5: 13-16 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 13 ‘You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

14 ‘You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.’

‘You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hidden’ (Matthew 5: 14) … the lights of the Monastery of Serra do Pilar in Vila Nova de Gaia above Luiz I Bridge, the River Tagus and the city of Porto (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Matthew 5: 13-16) continues a series of weekday readings from the Sermon on the Mount that began with the Beatitudes yesterday. The scene opens with Christ leaving the crowds and climbing up the mountain, like Moses in the Book Exodus leaving the crowd behind him, and climbing Mount Sinai. In the Sermon on the Mount in Chapters 5 to 7, Saint Matthew presents us with a covenant renewal document.

The images of salt and light as explanations of true discipleship and true religion offer interesting illustrations of what true religion is.

In today’s reading, Christ uses two metaphors to show the disciples the essential qualities of being his followers.

The disciples are to be ‘the salt of the earth’ (verse 13). In reality, despite what is said here, salt does not easily lose its taste. However, in Judaism, salt symbolised purity and wisdom and was used to season incense and offerings to God in the Temple. Should it become ritually unclean, it had to be thrown out and was no longer to be used by the worshipping community or in its liturgies. Similarly, if Christians lose their faith they are no longer part of the worshipping community and its liturgy, and may as well be discarded or thrown out.

Roman soldiers were given salt rations and this sal is the origin of the word ‘salary.’ A soldier failing in battle or falling asleep at his post was ‘not worth his salt.’

The disciples are to be ‘the light of the world’ (verses 14-16). They are to stand out, like a city on a hill, and to lead others to Christ, who is a light to the Gentiles (see Luke 2: 32) and the true Light of the World (see John 8: 12).

As people of faith, let us be worth our salt; let us never lose our taste for justice, let our light shine before others, so that they may see our good works and give glory to our Father in heaven.

‘No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket’ (Matthew 5: 15) … candles in the Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Rethymnon on the Greek island of Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 10 June 2025):

‘Pentecost’ is the theme this week (8-14 June) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel). This theme was introduced on Sunday with reflections by Dr Paulo Ueti - Theological Advisor and Regional Manager for the Americas and the Caribbean, USPG.

The USPG prayer diary today (Tuesday 10 June 2025) invites us to pray:

Lord, help us to practise humility, truly listen to silenced voices, and recognise the worth and dignity of all people.

The Collect:

O Lord, from whom all good things come:
grant to us your humble servants,
that by your holy inspiration
we may think those things that are good,
and by your merciful guiding may perform the same;
through our Lord Jesus Christ,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

Gracious God, lover of all,
in this sacrament
we are one family in Christ your Son,
one in the sharing of his body and blood
and one in the communion of his Spirit:
help us to grow in love for one another
and come to the full maturity of the Body of Christ.
We make our prayer through your Son our Saviour.

The Collect on the Eve of Saint Barnabas:

Bountiful God, giver of all gifts,
who poured your Spirit upon your servant Barnabas
and gave him grace to encourage others:
help us, by his example,
to be generous in our judgements
and unselfish in our service;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven’ (Matthew 5: 16) … light lights up the parish church in Laytown, Co Meath, in the darkness (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

Liberty’s 100-year-old Tudor-revival store has outlived the critics and continues to inspire

Liberty’s department store on Great Marlborough Street, off Regent Street, was built with the timber from two old wooden sailing ships (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

Book shops, yes. Coffee shops, yes. Greek or Italian food shops, most times. Wine shops and bread shops, generally. Antique or curio shops, sometimes. But that’s too long a list. Most of the time, I have a strong aversion to shopping. Even when I need to go shopping. Shopping for food, clothes or furniture is a necessity and functional, but seldom if ever a pleasure.

Perhaps I may soon have to admit to exceptions. On the other hand, I admit to particular aversions to big department stores and brand names. So, for example, I have never in my life been inside the doors of Harrods or of Fortnum and Mason, and I don’t think I’m missing out on anything.

I appreciate 19th century arcades, from Paris, Milan and Brussels to London, Birmingham and Norwich. But, while I have visited them to appreciate their architectural beauty, that does not mean I have gone shopping in any one of them.

Liberty’s was started on Regent Street by Arthur Lasenby Liberty in 1875 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Some days ago, when we were visiting west London, Charlotte suggested I would enjoy Liberty’s, a well-known luxury department store on Great Marlborough Street, off Regent Street and close to Oxford Street, not to go shopping, but to see its architecture and its interior. And she was right – the experience became an interesting afternoon.

The vast mock-Tudor building spans from Carnaby Street in the east to Kingly Street in the west, where it forms a three-storey archway over the northern entrance to the Kingly Street mall. At the centre of the archway is the Liberty Clock.

Liberty’s is a vast shop known for its close connections to art and culture, artists and designers, and it is celebrated for its print fabrics. The shop sells men’s, women’s and children’s fashion, beauty and homewares from a mix of high-end and emerging brands and labels, and is known for promoting the work young, emerging designers.

Liberty’s has a history of collaborative projects – from William Morris and Dante Gabriel Rossetti in the 19th century to Yves Saint Laurent and Dame Vivienne Westwood in the 20th century.

Liberty’s has a history of collaborative projects – from William Morris and Dante Gabriel Rossetti to Yves Saint Laurent and Vivienne Westwood (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The business was started 150 years ago in 1875 in by Arthur Lasenby Liberty (1843-1917). He was born in Chesham, Buckinghamshire and began working with Farmer & Rogers in Regent Street in 1862, the year of the International Exhibition. He decided to start his own business in 1874, and with a £2,000 loan from his future father-in-law in 1875, he took a lease of half a shop at 218a Regent Street with three staff members. The shop sold ornaments, fabric and objets d’art, especially from Japan and the Far East. Within 18 months, he had repaid the loan and acquired the second half of 218 Regent Street.

As his business grew, Liberty bought and added neighbouring properties. In 1884, he introduced the costume department, directed by Edward William Godwin (1833-1886), an architect and a founding member of the Costume Society. Together, Godwin and Liberty created in-house apparel to challenge the fashions of Paris.

Liberty acquired 142-144 Regent Street as the Eastern Bazaar in 1885 to sell carpets and furniture, and he named the property Chesham House after his home town. Later that year, Liberty brought 42 villagers from India to stage a living village of Indian artisans.

He encouraged many English designers in the 1890s, including Archibald Knox. Many of these designers worked in the Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau styles and Liberty’s became associated with the Art Nouveau style, to the extent that in Italy Art Nouveau became known as the Stile Liberty.

Liberty’s was designed at the height of the fashion for Tudor revival architecture in the 1920s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Liberty’s Tudor revival building on Great Marlborough Street was first built so that Liberty could continue trading continue while his other premises were being renovations.

The shop was designed in 1922 by Edwin Thomas Hall (1851-1923) and his son Edwin Stanley Hall (1881-1940). The father ET Hall is known primarily for his design of Liberty’s, but he also designed the Old Library at Dulwich College (1902-1903) and several hospitals, and the flats designed by his large practice included Sloane Mansions in Sloane Square and Saint Ermin’s Mansions, later Saint Ermin’s Hotel in Westminster.

Hall was a vice-president of the Royal Institute of British Architects and was an active participant in drawing up the institute’s charter in 1887. He was known as ‘Bye law Hall’ because of his incisive legal mind and for the major part he played in drafting and updating the London Building Acts in the 1890s. He also provided the initial concept for the Sunray Gardens Estate. This advanced concept advocated a garden city layout with innovative integral community facilities.

Three light wells form the main internal focus of the building (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Halls designed Liberty’s at the height of the 1920s fashion for Tudor revival architecture. Although the landowner, the Crown Estate, required all buildings on Regent Street to be in a classical style, Hall built the black and white timber Elizabethan-style frontage of Liberty’s so that it was facing onto Great Marlborough Street instead.

The mock Tudor style was designed by the Hall around Arthur Liberty’s ideas. Both Liberty and Hall died before the shops were completed: Arthur Liberty died in 1917, Hall died aged 72 on 15 April 1923; and the shops were completed in 1924.

The timber for the outside façade came from two old wooden sailing ships: HMS Impregnable and HMS Hindustan. The frontage on Great Marlborough Street is the same length as the Hindustan.

The longest chandelier in Europe is best appreciated fully on the back stairs (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Three light wells form the main internal focus of the building. Each of these wells was surrounded by smaller rooms to create a homely atmosphere. Many of the rooms had fireplaces and some of these are still in place.

A series of miniature glass paintings in the windows in among the wood-panelling was taken straight from the captain’s quarters. Carved wooden animals are hidden around the store, especially on the third floor central atrium.

The longest chandelier in Europe is best appreciated fully on the back stairs from the fourth floor down or the lower ground floor up.

The gilded copper weathervane represents The Mayflower taking migrants to the New World in 1620 – it is more than 4 ft high and weighs over 112 lb.

The Liberty Clock, completed 100 years ago in 1925, is almost as well-known as the shop building (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Halls also designed the Liberty Clock, which was completed 100 years ago in 1925 and is almost as well-known as the shop building. It protrudes from the three-storey archway that spans the north end of the Kingly Street mall and is part of the west end of the Liberty department store.

The clock face is round and slightly recessed into the stonework. It is a deep blue in colour and is decorated by concentric gold bands on either side of the numbering that runs around the perimeter of the face. A ion of the radiant sun in gold fills the bulk of the centre of the face. The clock is numbered with golden, radially oriented Roman numerals in an otherwise plain serif typeface. The hands are ornate, coloured gold and feature deep blue insets.

Set into the relief panels on either side of the clock are stone sculptures of birds. The bird on the left panel, representing dawn and daylight, is a cockerel with the sunrise behind it. The right panel represents night and includes the nocturnal owl and the moon. Around the clock face, in each of the four corners, winged heads represent each of the four winds.

Above the clock, in an opening in the stone, is a mechanical depiction of Saint George in combat with the dragon. It is activated every 15 minutes and on the hour the dragon is ‘slain’. Under the clock face in golden upper case lettering are wise words: ‘No minute gone comes ever back again, take heed and see ye nothing do in vain’.

Beneath the inscription, Father Time is carved in relief, holding an hour glass in his hands.

Sir Nikolaus Pevsner was critical of the building's architecture ‘and the goings-on of a store behind such a façade and below those twisted Tudor chimneys’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner was very critical of the building's architecture, saying: ‘The scale is wrong, the symmetry is wrong. The proximity to a classical façade put up by the same firm at the same time is wrong, and the goings-on of a store behind such a façade (and below those twisted Tudor chimneys) are wrongest of all.’

Despite its critics, the design was a success with the public, and the shop became a Grade II* listed building in 1972.

Meanwhile, Liberty’s continued its tradition for fashionable and eclectic design during the 1950s, promoting and encouraging new designers, and several shops were opened in other cities.

Liberty’s has a tradition for fashionable and eclectic design and of promoting and encouraging new designers (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Later, the influential designer Bernard Nevill became the design director. He reinvigorated Liberty’s textile collections and attracted clients including Yves Saint Laurent, who bought 13 different designs from the winter 1970 collection.

Liberty’s closed the 20 shops outside London in 1996, and in 2006 closed the Regent Street outlet, moving all operations into Hall’s Tudor revival building on Great Marlborough Street.

As for the Liberty clock, the clock and its mechanical display were fully restored in 2010 by Gillett & Johnston. The track unit has been fitted with new electronics and a radio signal monitoring system to ensure the accuracy of time keeping.

Liberty’s moved all its operations into Hall’s Tudor revival building on Great Marlborough Street in 2006 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 31, Monday 9 June 2025

The Berliner Dom in Berlin, popularly known as Berlin Cathedral … the images inside the dome illustrate the Beatitudes (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The 50-day season of Easter, which began on Easter Day (20 April 2025), came to an end yesterday with the Day of Pentecost or Whit Sunday (8 June 2025), and we return in the Church Calendar today to Ordinary Time. The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today recalls Saint Columba (597), Abbot of Iona, Missionary, and Saint Ephrem of Syria 373), Deacon, Hymn Writer, and Teacher of the Faith.

Later this morning, I have an appointment in London. But before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading 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.

‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted’ (Matthew 5: 4) … a child’s painting in Ukrainian Space in Budapest (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 5: 1-11 (NRSVA):

1 When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. 2 Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying:

3 ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4 ‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

5 ‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

6 ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

7 ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

8 ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

9 ‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

10 ‘Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11 ‘Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.’

‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted’ (Matthew 5: 4) … ‘Divine Teardrop’ by Peter Cassidy in an exhibition in Wexford in 2016 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Matthew 5: 1-11) begins a series of weekday readings from the Sermon on the Mount, beginning with the Beatitudes. The scene opens with Christ leaving the crowds and climbing up the mountain, like Moses in the Book Exodus leaving the crowd behind him, and climbing Mount Sinai. In the Sermon on the Mount in Chapters 5 to 7, Saint Matthew presents us with a covenant renewal document.

The Beatitudes are a declaration of the happy or fortunate state of the children of God who possesses particular qualities, and who, because of them, will inherit divine blessings.

It is interesting to compare the delivery of the Beatitudes to the delivery of the Ten Commandments. Here we have the renewal of the covenant, and a restatement, a re-presentation, of who the Children of God are.

Just as we sometimes find the Ten Commandments grouped into two sets, so we might see the Beatitudes set out in two groups of four, the first four being inward looking, the second four being outward looking.

We might see the first four Beatitudes as addressing attitudes, while the second four deal with resulting actions.

Are they ethical requirements for the present?

Or are they eschatological blessings for the future?

Or are they are statements of present fact, identifying the qualities of a child of God and the consequent blessings that follow?

Few among us, I imagine, are ever going to commit murder.

But we all get ‘angry with a brother’ sooner or later.

The Sermon on the Mount exposes our own present reality in a very stark and real way, and the Beatitudes are a core text for Dietrich Bonhoeffer in The Cost of Discipleship and in the writings of towering Christian figures such as Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King, Thomas Merton and Oscar Romero.

Father Brian D’Arcy once recalled during a radio interview how Dorothy Day once spoke of how her fellow Roman Catholics went to confession regularly and confessed to ‘breaking’ one of the Ten Commandments, but she wondered how often they confessed to ‘breaking’ one of the Eight Beatitudes.

Μακάριοι (Makárioi): Does this mean ‘blessed’? Archbishop Makarios was the President of Cyprus in 1974 when he was deposed in a coup that was followed by the Turkish invasion of the island. ‘His Beatitude’ is a term of respect for archbishops and metropolitans in the Orthodox Church.

The word ‘blessed’ is not the best translation for μακάριος (makários). ‘Fortunate,’ ‘well off,’ or ‘happy’ might fit better.

Christ is telling those who hear him that they are fortunate to be this way. They are fortunate to possess these qualities of life. Why? Because it means they inherit the blessings or fortunes of God’s promised kingdom.

The Beatitudes are culturally embedded in our society, in our literature, in our arts. They are so familiar that we all understand the irreverent humour found in a scene in Monty Python’s The Life of Brian.

‘Blessed are the Meek’ – which means the humble, patient, submissive and gentle – is misheard in The Life of Brian as: ‘Blessed is the Greek – apparently he’s going to inherit the earth.’ When they finally get what Jesus actually says, a woman says, ‘Oh it’s the Meek … blessed are the Meek! That’s nice, I’m glad they’re getting something, ’cause they have a hell of a time.’

The political activist and agitator Reg then says: ‘What Jesus blatantly fails to appreciate is that it’s the meek who are the problem.’ This sums up the growing annoyance of the violent with the peaceful attitude of Christ. But it also highlights that the Beatitudes are about ordinary, everyday people.

Too often we see the saints celebrated by the Church as martyrs and apostles, missionaries and hermits, bishops and theologians. How often do we see them as ordinary, meek, everyday people, the people who too often are dismissed as problems, who are living with problems, who often go without attention from politicians and activists alike?

The mother and child separated at birth in the ‘mother and baby’ home and blocked at every stage as they tried to find each other.

The middle-aged mother who hopes that life is going to get better as the years move on, but then finds instead every waking hour is devoted to an adult child with special needs, or to an elderly parent who now needs to be looked after like a child.

The couple filled with faith but afraid to come to church, marginalised because of their colour, class, language, marital status or sexuality.

The lone protester who stands outside a government office or embassy, ignored by those inside and berated outside by passing, hooting motorists, but who knows right is on her side … ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.’

If the Church is a sign of the Kingdom of God, a foretaste of that heavenly liturgy, how does our life as the Church, in the parish and in the diocese, offer solace, comfort, a foretaste, hope for the meek, the downtrodden, the lonely, the oppressed, who are praised in the Beatitudes and who are invited as part of the great multitude, the countless number from every nation, tribe, people and language, to gather before the Lamb on the throne?

‘Blessed are the poor in spirit … those who mourn … the meek … those who hunger and thirst …’

May theirs be the kingdom of heaven, may they be comforted, may they inherit the earth, may they be filled.

‘Blessed are the merciful … the pure in heart … the peacemakers … those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake …’

May we be generous in showing mercy, may we see God, be called children of God, find ourselves in the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are we even when others revile us for standing up for these values … when we stand up for those values, may we rejoice and be glad.

Writing on the Financial pages of The Guardian many years ago (17 January 2011), Terry Macalister wrote: ‘From Tolstoy to Dostoevsky to Chekov, if anyone can tell a good story it’s the Russians.’ Well, in Chapter 2 of Boris Pasternak’s great Russian novel Doctor Zhivago, we meet Larissa Feodorovna Guishar, who ‘was not religious’ and ‘did not believe in ritual,’ but was startled by the Beatitudes, for she thought they were about herself.

How do we apply the Beatitudes to ourselves, to our own lives?

The reredos in the Unitarian Church, Dublin, is inscribed with the Beatitudes, one on each panel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 9 June 2025):

‘Pentecost’ is the theme this week (8-14 June) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel). This theme was introduced yesterday with reflections by Dr Paulo Ueti - Theological Advisor and Regional Manager for the Americas and the Caribbean, USPG.

The USPG prayer diary today (Monday 9 June 2025) invites us to pray:

Heavenly Father, we praise you for sending your Holy Spirit, connecting our hearts to you and igniting them with courage, hope, and love for a world in need.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
who filled the heart of Columba
with the joy of the Holy Spirit
and with deep love for those in his care:
may your pilgrim people follow him,
strong in faith, sustained by hope,
and one in the love that binds us to you;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

Holy Father,
who gathered us here around the table of your Son
to share this meal with the whole household of God:
in that new world where you reveal
the fullness of your peace,
gather people of every race and language
to share with Columba and all your saints
in the eternal banquet of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God’ (Matthew 5: 8) … a window in Saint Mary’s Collegiate Church, Youghal, Co Cork (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

Saint Guthlac’s Church in Passenham remains an example of the survival of ‘the beauty of holiness’

Saint Guthlac’s Church in Passenham, across the Great Ouse River from Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

There was an open day with cream teas last weekend, at Saint Guthlac’s Church, the parish church in the tiny Northamptonshire hamlet of Passenham, across the Great Ouse River from Stony Stratford.

Charlotte and I walked across the river and through the fields on Bank Holiday Monday to Saint Guthlac’s Church, which is lovingly maintained by local parishioners. It’s a short walk, yet Passenham is in the Diocese of Peterborough while Stony Stratford is in the Diocese of Oxford.

After Holy Trinity Church, a new and larger church, was built in neighbouring Deanshanger in 1853, Saint Guthlac’s was left in slow decline, falling into disuse and dilapidation and facing imminent closure. But the church in Passenham was saved fortuitously by the discovery in the 1950s of the wall paintings in the chancel that date back to the 1620s and that had been covered in a layer of whitewash in the 18th century.

Saint Guthlac’s Church in Passenham has choir stalls that date from 1628, with contemporary misericords (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

These wall paintings were restored by Ann Ballantyne and E Clive Rouse, and over a ten-year programme of restoration an entire scheme of church decoration, furniture, paining and carving emerged. This was all of such exceptionally quality that the church was given a Grade I listing.

The elaborate decorations in Saint Guthlac’s Church 400 years has puzzled church historians ever sense they came to light in the middle of the last century. The panels on the east wall on each side of the High Altar depict the death, anointing and burial of Christ, with separate images of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus.

Other wall paintings in the chancel depict four Biblical figures – Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and David – on the north wall, and the four evangelists on the south side, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John – although Saint Mark was hidden at an early date by a memorial erected to Robert Banastre after he died in 1649.

The memorial erected to Robert Banastre after he died in 1649 hides Saint Mark in the the arrangement of the four evangelists on the south chancel wall in Saint Guthlac’s Church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

As well as these elaborate paintings, Saint Guthlac’s has choir stalls that date from 1628, with contemporary misericords in the form of a mask, arms upheld by angels, an ox, a male head with ass’s ears, a goat, head, a winged cherub’s head, a lion, a cat’s head, a lamb, a female head and a griffin. Each stall has the name of one of the 12 apostles, and above them is decoration reflecting the classical style of Inigo Jones, with painted shallow niches, fluted pilasters and a strapwork frieze.

The gallery at the west end of the church is supported by a carved frieze that may once have been part a chancel screen that was moved to the other end of the church in the 18th century.

These works combine to create an example of early 17th century High Church decoration in line with the High Church principles of William Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury (1633-1645).

The gallery at the west end ofSaint Guthlac’s Church is supported by a carved frieze that may once have been part a chancel screen (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Sir Robert Banastre was a city man and a rising star in the court of James I and his son Charles I. He was comptroller to James l and became Clerk Victualler to Charles l, responsible for food and drink at the royal court. He was also member of the Court of the Green Cloth and was responsible for the collection of Ship Money in the county.

He accumulated lands in Passenham from the early 17th century, and leased land in the adjacent royal forest. He bought Passenham Manor in 1624, reflecting his growing status at court. By 1640, Banastre was wealthy enough to pay for the new chancel roof of Towcester Church. In Passenham, his coat of arms appears on his tomb and also on the exterior wall of the church behind his tomb.

Since the wall paintings were restored by Ann Ballantyne and E Clive Rouse, and the church decorations were refurbished, many church historians have discussed the significance of this elaborate scheme at a time when the Puritans were about the take power in England in the years immediately before the execution of Charles I.

There is no evidence that Banastre ever went on the ‘Grand Tour’ of Europe, still less that he ever saw the work of Palladio in Italy. But there are suggestions that his interior scheme at Passenham was influenced by the refurbishment of the Chapel Royal in Greenwich by Inigo Jones in 1623-1625, at a time when Banastre was a courtier. But hints of other influences have been identified in the chapel of Lincoln College Oxford and Lincoln’s Inn Chapel in London.

The figure of Nicodemus beside the Altar Saint Guthlac’s Church is a representation of faith concealed and gives rise to suspicions that Robert Banastre was a secret recusant or had Catholic sympathies (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

In his study of Saint Guthlac’s, Robin Goodfellow says the Italianate characteristics of the scheme of decoration and the portrayal of Christ himself, with strong connotations of the Pieta, suggest Catholic influence.

While popular Elizabethan portrayed Joseph of Arimathea as the person who first brought Christianity to England, Goodfellow suggests the presence of Nicodemus beside the Altar is a representation of faith concealed, and it has given rise to suspicions that Banastre was a secret recusant or had Catholic sympathies. Indeed, local traditions suggests that he ‘held the faith his father loved.’

Banastre came from a traditional Catholic family, and his father, Lawrence Banastre, had been committed to the Tower of London in 1572 following the arrest and execution of his patron, Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, for his part in a plot to replace Queen Elizabeth with Mary Queen of Scots.

Despite Lawrence Banastre’s subsequent release, his family remained under suspicion, at least until his death in 1588.

During Robert Banastre’s decoration of Saint Guthlac’s Church, 22-year-old John Hall as rector in 1632. Hall was a recent graduate of Magdalen Hall, Oxford, when William Laud was the Chancellor of Oxford University, and remained at Passenham for over 20 years.

The altar in Saint Guthlac’s Church, Passenham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Guthlac’s Church was part of Banastre’s church-building in the Diocese of Peterborough, and of a wider construction programme in Passenham that included a rectory, a large barn and a manor house.

Banastre began this work in Passenham at the time of his wedding in 1620, and he completed it after Charles I ascended the throne 400 years ago in 1625. He died in 1649, and his monument in Saint Guthlac’s usurps the place of Saint Mark among the four evangelists on the south wall of the chancel. But the wall paintings survived both the iconoclasm of the Puritans during the Cromwellian era and the Protestant reordering of the church in the 18th century, albeit under layers of whitewash that had the effect of protecting and preserving the paintings for the next 180 years.

There is no surviving evidence of Sir Robert Banastre’s personal piety or artistic sophistication; perhaps he was motivated merely by a desire to impress the king; perhaps he was inspired by both the Catholic faith of father’s family and the religious and strongly royalist sympathies of his wife Margaret Hopton.

Whatever his motivation and inspiration were, Robin Goodfellow sees the decoration of Saint Guthlac’s as an example of the survival of ‘the beauty of holiness’ in action, and in it a unique record of and monument to English Christianity before, during and after the civil wars in the mid-17th century.

Climbing the steps in the tower of Saint Guthlac’s Church in Passenham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Further Reading:

Robin Goodfellow, ‘Robert Banastre and the Beautification of Passenham Church’, Ecclesiology Today (issue 63, December 2024).

Robin Goodfellow, Robert Banastre and the Beautification of Passenham Church (privately published 2024, 24 pp).

Daily prayer in Easter 2025: 50, Sunday 8 June 2025, Day of Pentecost (Whit Sunday)

The Day of Pentecost depicted in a fresco in the Church of the Transfiguration in Piskopiano in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

Easter is a 50-day season, beginning on Easter Day (20 April 2025) and continuing through Ascension Day until today, the Day of Pentecost or Whit Sunday (8 June 2025).

Later this morning, I hope to be part of the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading 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.

‘Come Holy Spirit’ … the holy water stoup in the Chapel of Saint John’s Hospital, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

John 14: 8-17 (25-27), NRSVA:

8 Philip said to him, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.’ 9 Jesus said to him, ‘Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father”? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. 12 Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. 13 I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.

15 ‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you for ever. 17 This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.

25 ‘I have said these things to you while I am still with you. 26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. 27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.

Pentecost or the Descent of the Holy Spirit, by Titian in the Church of Santa Maria della Salute, Venice (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

Rabbi David Aaron opens one of his books with a story about the comedian Henny Youngman, the ‘King of One-Liners,’ who once said, ‘I tried being an atheist, but I gave it up. There are no holidays.’

There are three great holidays in the Calendar of the Church when canon law expects the Eucharist to be celebrated in every cathedral and church: Christmas Day, Easter Day and the Day of Pentecost, today.

Each of these holidays or holy days is a day that celebrates how God has come among us and how God invites us to be with him.

They are just like our own holidays.

How often do you remember a holiday as a time when someone came to visit you, or you went to visit someone special in your family?

I have fond memories of long, extended holidays spent on my grandmother’s farm near Cappoquin in West Waterford.

How many of us know Christmas would not be Christmas without visiting the homes of family members, or special people in our lives and families coming to visit us, or even stay with us?

We have had a family member visiting our small flat in Stony Stratford over the last few days. We have tried to make this a place of hospitality, where people can come and visit us, and sometimes stay with, live with us, even if only for a short time.

These principal holy days or holidays in the life of the Church – Christmas, Easter and Pentecost – are holidays to celebrate how God comes to dwell with us.

1, At Christmas, we celebrate the Incarnation: God comes as Christ to live among us, as one of us.

2, At Easter, God invites to us to come and dwell with him, to become what we are truly made to be.

3, At Pentecost, God as the Holy Spirit comes and dwells with us.

In a typical American way of telling it, David Aaron in that book, Inviting God In (Boston and London: Trumpeter, 2006), makes a distinction between a vacation and a holiday.

He argues that a vacation is a time to get away, such as time on the beach, time playing golf or going to a good concert.

A holiday, on the other hand, is a time to celebrate. ‘A holiday,’ he says, ‘is not an escape from everyday life to paradise. Rather, it is a time to infuse paradise into everyday life.’

Playing with the words celebrate and celestial, he says a holiday is a holy day in which we see the celestial within the terrestrial.

The Hebrew name for a holy day, moed (מועד), is used especially for the three great Biblical festivals of Passover, Shavout or Pentecost, which was celebrated last Sunday (1 June 2025), and Sukkot (Booths). This Biblical word describes special days set apart from non-sacred days. It actually means ‘date,’ ‘appointed time’ or ‘meeting.’ In other words, these great holidays are actually times to meet God, they truly are dates with God.

And a date, with someone special, involves getting dressed up, going somewhere special, perhaps having a special meal together, all with the hope and promise of getting to know each other better, and of enjoying each other’s company.

David Aaron points out that each of these holy days is a date with God and celebrates a critical ingredient in the recipe for a loving relationship with God and with our fellow human beings – freedom, responsibility, fallibility, accountability, forgiveness, spontaneity, integrity, wholeness, intimacy, anticipation, hope and trust.

Those great holy days are about recalling the great encounters, dates with God in the past, making them real in the present, and looking forward to the promises that they are imbued with, that they may become real in the future.

David Aaron points out that each of these holy days is a date with God. Each holiday is an opportunity to relive the dramatic events that occurred on those days – to remember and celebrate God’s timeless love for us.

In the Feast of Pentecost, we remember how God the Holy Spirit comes to dwell with us, and the Church is formed on the Day of Pentecost.

Until then, they were a small collection of followers of Jesus. Now they become one body. And the Holy Spirit is living in this body.

There is a wise old maxim that you do not really know someone until you live with them. As Sean O’Casey has Joxer say in his play Juno and the Paycock (1925), ‘if you want to know me, come an’ live with me.’

In the television series First Dates on RTÉ, when people have their first dates, they behave so nicely to one another. They put on their best clothes and finest perfume or aftershave, they are polite, they try to have the best table manners, show they know the best wine and food, and are oh so courteous, considerate and caring.

But when you live with someone, you get to know that person really. Their highs and their lows, their habits and their fads, what they really smell like, how short their fuses may be … even what they really think.

Pentecost celebrates how the Holy Spirit comes to dwell among us, how God wants to live with us and wants us to live with God.

This is the promise of Jesus to his Disciples at the Last Supper that we hear in the Gospel reading this morning (John 14: 8-17, 25-27):

He tells them first that he is alive in God the Father, and that God the Father is alive in him, and that he will ask the Father to send the Holy Spirit, who ‘abides with you, and he will be in you.’

It is the promise at our Confirmation, it is the promise at my ordination. But it is God’s promise to all, at Pentecost.

Because of Pentecost, God lives with us, and we live with God. We have been formed into one body, the Body of Christ. There are no more barriers, based on social class, gender, birth, job title, language, sexuality, nationality, ethnicity … or any of the other barriers we search for to separate us one from another.

The Holy Spirit breaks down all those barriers.

It sounds crazy.

It is crazy … by the normal pushy standards we see all around us. No wonder some people who saw what happened that first Pentecost in Jerusalem sneered and said, ‘They are filled with new wine’ (Acts 2: 13).

But then, God loves us, and wants more than a first date. God wants to live with us, and wants us to live with God.

Like a holy date, our Pentecost Eucharist or Holy Communion later this morning includes some of the elements we might expect on a date with God. We dress up nicely, we tell stories, we ask about one another, in our prayers we share our hopes and dreams and sorrows, we eat with another.

God has come to live with us, and now invites us to share his love, and to show this love in how we care for one another, pray for another, and how we now look at the world through the love-tinted glasses of being filled with the Holy Spirit.

Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!

Pentecost breaks down the doors we lock and the walls we build to separate ourselves from God and from each other … a locked old door in the streets of the old town in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Acts 2: 1-21 (NRSVA):

1 When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

5 Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. 6 And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. 7 Amazed and astonished, they asked, ‘Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? 9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11 Cretans and Arabs – in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.’ 12 All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, ‘What does this mean?’ 13 But others sneered and said, ‘They are filled with new wine.’

14 But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them: ‘Men of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. 15 Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. 16 No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:

17 “In the last days it will be, God declares,
that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
and your young men shall see visions,
and your old men shall dream dreams.
18 Even upon my slaves, both men and women,
in those days I will pour out my Spirit;
and they shall prophesy.
19 And I will show portents in the heaven above
and signs on the earth below,
blood, and fire, and smoky mist.
20 The sun shall be turned to darkness
and the moon to blood,
before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day.
21 Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

The Day of Pentecost depicted in the iconostasis in the Greek Orthodox Church in LondStony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Today’s Prayers (Sunday 8 June 2025, Day of Pentecost, Whit Sunday):

The new edition of Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), covers the period from 1 July to 20 November 2025. ‘Pentecost’ is the theme in the prayer diary this week (8-14 June) and is introduced today with reflections by Dr Paulo Ueti - Theological Advisor and Regional Manager for the Americas and the Caribbean, USPG:

Read Acts 2: 1-21

The beauty of Pentecost is that the Spirit refused to privilege one language, or one voice, or one way of doing things over another. It challenged imperial and colonial hierarchies and theologies of the time that determined which voices mattered. Imagine what it must have felt like to sense God saying: ‘All voices matter. I see you. I hear you. You are welcome as you are.’ What beautiful and simple truths.

This message is not just one of comfort but a call to action – urging us to challenge injustice and stand in solidarity with voices so often silenced.

Pentecost reminds us that the Spirit groans with creation (Romans 8: 22-23). The same Spirit that hovered over the waters at creation (Genesis 1) and breathed life into humanity (Genesis 2) now empowers us to confront the exploitative economies that devastate Indigenous lands and coastal communities.

Pentecost also confronts systems of exclusion. When Peter cites Joel’s prophecy – ‘your sons and daughters will prophesy’ – it directly challenges patriarchal structures that silence women’s voices. The outpouring of the Spirit dissolves gender-based exclusion and calls us to recognise and uplift women’s leadership in our churches and societies.

Perhaps most radically, Pentecost established a community where resources were shared equitably (Acts 2: 44-45). The Spirit calls us to a way of life where generosity and mutual care replace greed and exploitation.

Which of these most resonates with you? How might you act in light of Pentecost?

The USPG prayer diary today (Sunday 8 June 2025, Day of Pentecost, Whit Sunday) invites us to pray reflecting on these words from today’s Gospel reading:

Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son (John 14: 12-13).

The Collect:

God, who as at this time
taught the hearts of your faithful people
by sending to them the light of your Holy Spirit:
grant us by the same Spirit
to have a right judgement in all things
and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort;
through the merits of Christ Jesus our Saviour,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

Faithful God,
who fulfilled the promises of Easter
by sending us your Holy Spirit
and opening to every race and nation
the way of life eternal:
open our lips by your Spirit,
that every tongue may tell of your glory;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Holy Spirit, sent by the Father,
ignite in us your holy fire;
strengthen your children with the gift of faith,
revive your Church with the breath of love,
and renew the face of the earth,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

The Day of Pentecost depicted in the iconostasis in the Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral in London (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