Three pubs and a Georgian house in Newport Pagnell

The Rose and Crown at 74-76 Silver Street, Newport Pagnell, is across the street from Lovat Bank (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I was in Newport Pagnell a few days ago, visiting Lovat Bank on Silver Street and taking photographs of the splendid Victorian mansion designed for the Taylor family by the Ston Stratford architect Edward Swinfen Harris.

It was a quick and short visit to complete a talk I am giving on Swinfen Harris later this month (25 February 2025) in the library in Stony Stratford.

It was a very focussed visit to Newport Pagnell this time. But between the bus stop on High Street and Lovat Bank on Silver Street, I could not help but notice three pubs, dating back to the 16th and 17th centuries.

The name Rose and Crown is second only to the Red Lion as the favourite pub name in England (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Silver Street is a quiet part of Newport Pagnell and is a short walk from the High Street, reached by walking down Bury Street, with Cedars School on the right. Across from Lovat Bank, the Rose and Crown is at 74-76 Silver Street.

The name Rose and Crown is second only to the Red Lion as the favourite pub name in England. Some sources say the Rose and Crown in Newport Pagnell was originally known as the Red Lion, while others say it was first called the Blue Boar.

The old Rose and Crown was a stone building several centuries old and inside today you can see the old beams running through it. It was modernised and lengthened in 1966 to include an old house next door. although the outer rendering makes this difficult to see.

There was once a large malting at the rear, and two other ancient cottages, built in brick, timber and thatched, were demolished in 1966 to make way for the car park. It has been refurbished again recently by new tenants, with grey-painted panelling and discrete beams.

No 84 Silver Street is one of the largest buildings on the street and probably dates back to 1810 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Close by, on the same side of the street, No 84 Silver Street is a Georgian house built in brick with stone quoins and a stucco finish. The roof has large slates were specially imported from Belgium.

This is one of the largest buildings on the street, and probably dates back to 1810. On the right hand side of the building you can see a stone wall, which runs through the whole of the house and on into an outside wall. It is thought that outbuildings at the back were once used for livestock.

A small neolithic axe head was discovered in the garden. The house was owned in the later part of the 19th century by William Cowley, who founded Newport’s Parchment Works.

The Coachmakers’ Arms at the junction of High Street and Bury Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

On my way back to the bus stop on High Street, I stopped to look at the Coachmakers’ Arms is in a quiet corner at the junction of High Street and Bury Street.

A sign outside says it was established in 1753, but it is an early 17th century stone and timber building. The stone-walls of the building are enormously thick in places, sometimes up to four feet. It has been a listed building since 1972.

On the High Street, I was tempted to skip the bus that was arriving, and cross the street to see the Dolphin Inn once again. This is a 16th century public house and another of the ancient inns in Newport Pagnell, and I have been there at least once before.

But the afternoon was beginning to close in, and I decided it was better to catch the bus and to promise myself to return to Newport Pagnell soon again.

the Coachmakers’ Arms was built in the early 17th century, although the sign outside dates it from 1753 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 3, Wednesday 5 February 2025

‘Is not this the carpenter?’ (Mark 6: 3) … ‘Christ in the House of His Parents’ (1850) by John Everett Millais

Patrick Comerford

Since the Feast of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple (2 February 2025) or Candlemas on Sunday, we have been in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar; the liturgical colour is now green, and it just four weeks from today until Ash Wednesday (5 March 2025) and the beginning of Lent.

Later today, I have two medical appointments in Milton Keynes University Hospital as my heart, lungs, kidneys and pulmonary sarcoidosis continue to be monitored. Before today begins, however, I am taking some quiet time 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.

‘Is not this the carpenter?’ (Mark 6: 3) … ‘The Shadow of Death’ (1870-1873) by William Holman Hunt

Mark 6: 1-6 (NRSVA):

1 He left that place and came to his home town, and his disciples followed him. 2 On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, ‘Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?’ And they took offence at him. 4 Then Jesus said to them, ‘Prophets are not without honour, except in their home town, and among their own kin, and in their own house.’ 5 And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. 6 And he was amazed at their unbelief.

‘Is not this … the son of Mary?’ (Mark 6: 3) … a recital poster on railings in Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

In the Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Mark 6: 1-6), Jesus returns to his home town. He has been acclaimed throughout Galilee as a teacher, a rabbi, he has even been called Lord. But in his own home town, those who think they know better are unwilling to acknowledge who he really is.

Instead they try to put him down, reminding him of where he comes from, who is family are, and telling him he is getting above himself.

Instead of confronting the leaders of the community, he turns to those they have marginalised … the sick, the maimed, and those in need of healing.

When we marginalise and demean people, when we only value them for the ways they are useful to us and enhance our own lifestyles, we sow the seeds of eventual disaster.

I am reminded of Leona Helmsley who said many years ago: ‘We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes’ (New York Times, 12 July 1989). Her dismissive ‘Only little people pay taxes’ was one way of saying ‘let them eat cake’, and has found political expression in the Trump administration.

She eventually became the author of her own misfortune, and Forbes came to list her at the top of the 10 greatest tax fraudsters in the US.

The little people matter little to the village elders in the town who look down on Jesus at his homecoming. Yet there is a simple message linking today’s Gospel reading with Gospel reading in a few weeks’ time (1 March 2025): the little people matter … ‘for it is to such as these that the Kingdom of God belongs’ (Mark 10: 14).

Saint Mark tells us that Christ is faced with rejection in his own hometown. He has returned to Galilee, where he is spoken of in ways that, put together, amount to a very public rejection. He is spoken of as ‘the carpenter’, ὁ τέκτων (ho tékton). Now, as we know, 1, being a carpenter is a very positive, beautiful craft exercise; and 2, the word τέκτων in the New Testament describes a variety of people with interesting skills, including architects, planners, singers and poets.

But in a way that any of us who has lived in a small community, or in a small town, knows only too well, they are looking down on him. Other people are describing him as Rabbi, Teacher … even Lord. But never let him get above himself … let him always remember that he began his working life at the lathe and with the saw and hammer, wood and nails … the very way he is going to end his life too.

And he is described as ὁ υἱὸς τῆς Μαρίας (ho uios tis Marias), ‘the son of Mary.’

In a small community or a small town in Ireland, people can always tell you when you return: ‘We know who your people are.;

They know Jesus is the son of Joseph the Carpenter, they know where he was brought up, they know where he got his first haircut, where he went to school, they know his mother, his family, as they say in some Irish villages, they know his ‘seed, breed and generation.’

Unlike the two other synoptic Gospel writers, Saint Matthew and Saint Luke, Saint Mark provides no lengthy genealogy for Jesus, back through David, the Prophets and the Patriarchs (see Matthew 1: 1-17; Luke 3: 23-38).

But to refer to Jesus as ‘the son of Mary’ is be dismissive, is to rob him of his legitimacy.

Christ already has had a difficult homecoming in this Gospel (see Mark 3: 19-35). So we are presented with a stark homecoming story where he is teaching in his home synagogue and is robbed of his reputation, his role and his legitimacy.

His healing and teaching ministry in Capernaum, on the seashore, throughout Galilee, is already well-known. But back home, in his own synagogue, he is rejected.

How do we respond to rejection?

Sometimes, we take stock, readjust, and move on.

Sometimes, we walk away in anger – the ‘I’ll-never-come-back-here-again’ attitude.

Sometimes, our desire for acceptance is so strong that we buckle under and accept what others say, so that we become quiescent, conforming, uncritical operatives.

Sometimes, we seek comfort – comfort in parental figures, or inappropriate comfort in alcohol, distracting hobbies or even in inappropriate relationships.

Sometimes, we accept the images others project onto us, so we remain imprisoned and never become ourselves fully and holistically.

Sometimes, we stand and fight … we stand on our dignity and aggressively assert ourselves, setting ourselves up for another put-down.

And sometimes we draw on a little bit of each of these defensive responses. We each know that we have responded with a little of one and a little of the other responses at different times, in different situations, to different people.

We say things to family members that we would never say to neighbours or employers; we say things to fellow employees that we would never say to our own family members.

What does Jesus do this morning?

His response is often quoted but seldom understood. He actually understands where the people of Nazareth are. It is difficult for them, but it is not difficult for him.

It is passage which in the Greek has four poetic openings to phrases in the space of three verses: οὐχ οὗτός εἰσὶν … οὐκ εἰσὶν … Οὐκ ἔστιν … οὐκ ἐδύνατο … (verses 3-5). No, no, no, no way.

In the face of this strong negativity, Jesus does nothing, apart from laying his hands on a few people and healing them, apart from treating as fully human those who are on the margins and rejected in the community.

There are people in the Church today who are rejected and marginalised. Why, who do they think they are?

And there are people who sit in judgment on them, who believe they alone have access to a secret knowledge that permits them to make exclusive claims not only for Christ, but for their interpretation of the Church and the Bible.

They boast of exclusive revelations; they claim to speak for the only true Anglicans; they play power games in contrast to the self-emptying of Christ and the weakness of Saint Paul; they reject and deride any other interpretations of the Bible but their own; and they boast of their success based on filling pews and holding large conferences.

But size and numbers seem to disguise and excuse negativity and bigotry. None of this matches the self-emptying Christ displays in the Gospel reading today.

‘Is not this … the son of Mary?’ (Mark 6: 3) … Sir Jacob Epstein’s sculpture of the Madonna and Child above the entrance to Dean’s Mews on the north side of Cavendish Square, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 5 February 2025):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Common Humanity and Love for Religious “Other”.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday with a Reflection by the Revd Dr Salli Effungani, a minister in the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon (PCC), Programme Officer for the Programme for Christian-Muslim Relations in Africa (PROCMURA), and Adjunct Lecturer on Interfaith Relations at Saint Paul’s University, Limuru, Kenya.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Wednesday 5 February 2025) invites us to pray:

Our dear Father, we bring before you the mission of the church in a growing, changing context. Grow us to trust you through the highs and lows of change, so that you may get the glory.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
by whose grace alone we are accepted
and called to your service:
strengthen us by your Holy Spirit
and make us worthy of our calling;
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:

God of truth,
we have seen with our eyes and touched with our hands the bread of life:
strengthen our faith
that we may grow in love for you and for each other;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:
God of our salvation,
help us to turn away from those habits which harm our bodies
and poison our minds
and to choose again your gift of life,
revealed to us in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

‘Is not this … the son of Mary?’ (Mark 6: 3) … the west door of Lichfield Cathedral (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