Patrick Comerford
Easter is a 50-day season, beginning on Easter Day (20 April 2025) and continuing until the Day of Pentecost (8 June 2025), or Whit Sunday. This week began with the Fifth Sunday of Easter (Easter V, 18 May 2025), known in the Orthodox Church as the Sunday of the Samaritan Woman.
Later this morning I may go to the mid-week morning Eucharist in All Saints’ Church, Calverton, which is about 20 minutes’ walk from Stony Stratford, and I have an appointment with the dentist later this afternoon. 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.
John 15: 9-11 (NRSVA):
[Jesus said:] 9 ‘As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. 10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. 11 I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.’
Today’s Reflection:
While Mervyn Stockwood (1913-1995) was Bishop of Southwark (1959-1980), the term ‘South Bank Religion’ came into vogue in the 1960s and was associated with the Bishop and the Diocese and those in his theological circle.
Mervyn Stockwood was known for making unusual, radical, but successful appointments, including John Robinson, David Sheppard and Michael Marshall as his suffragan Bishops of Woolwich, and Hugh Montefiore and Keith Sutton as Bishops of Kingston.
Bishop Stockwood memorably appeared with Malcolm Muggeridge on the BBC’s Friday Night, Saturday Morning in 1979, arguing that the film Monty Python’s Life of Brian was blasphemous and telling John Cleese and Michael Palin they would ‘get [their] thirty pieces of silver.’
Bishop Stockwood was born in Wales, and became an Anglo-Catholic at All Saints’ Church, Clifton. He then studied theology at Christ’s College, Cambridge, and Westcott House, where he became a socialist. As the Vicar of Great Saint Mary’s, Cambridge, his sermons drew large numbers of undergraduates and earned him a national reputation.
The term ‘South Bank Religion’ was particularly associated with John Robinson’s Honest to God and Layman’s Church, a collection of essays introduced by Timothy (later Lord) Beaumont, and including essays from several of the figures associated with ‘South Bank Religion’, including John Robinson. Its cover features ‘Christ in Majesty’, made for Llandaff Cathedral in 1954-1955 by Jacob Epstein, who also sculpted ‘Saint Michael and the Devil’ (1956-1958) for the exterior of Coventry Cathedral.
I had a memorable taste of another brand of ‘South Bank Religion’ once at a day-long meeting of the trustees of the Anglican mission agency USPG in the offices in Southwark.
The offices are just a short walk from Southwark Cathedral, the Tate Modern and the Globe Theatre on the South Bank. As the meeting opened, we were led in a Bible study of the same Gospel reading provided in the Lectionary today at the Eucharist (John 15: 9-11) and that continues our readings from the ‘Farewell Discourse’ in Saint John’s Gospel:
9 As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. 10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. 11 I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.
I was then invited to introduce a reading about the life of Peter Chanel (1803-1841), a 19th century French missionary and martyr in the South Pacific, who was clubbed to death on 28 April 1841.
One of his catechumens said of him: ‘He loves us; he does what he teaches; he forgives his enemies. His teaching is good.’
And that seems a perfect summary of what Christianity is about – whether it is branded as ‘South Bank Religion’, or Woke, or anything else. And it seems a perfect summary of what mission is about too.
Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!
Today’s Prayers (Thursday 22 May 2025):
‘That We May Live Together: A Reflection from the Emerging Leaders Academy’ is 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). This theme was introduced on Sunday with a programme update from Annsli Kabekabe of the Anglican Church of Papua New Guinea.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 22 May 2025) invites us to pray:
Lord of peace, we pray for healing in Japan, where the scars of disaster run deep. May your grace guide efforts towards reconciliation, fostering forgiveness and rebuilding relationships rooted in empathy and understanding.
The Collect:
Almighty God,
who through your only-begotten Son Jesus Christ
have overcome death and opened to us the gate of everlasting life:
grant that, as by your grace going before us
you put into our minds good desires,
so by your continual help
we may bring them to good effect;
through Jesus Christ our risen 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:
Eternal God,
whose Son Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life:
grant us to walk in his way,
to rejoice in his truth,
and to share his risen life;
who is alive and reigns, now and for ever.
Additional Collect:
Risen Christ,
your wounds declare your love for the world
and the wonder of your risen life:
give us compassion and courage
to risk ourselves for those we serve,
to the glory of God the Father.
Yesterday’s Reflections
Continued Tomorrow
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
