Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 132, Thursday 17 September 2026

‘A woman … began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair’ (Luke 7: 37-38) … a detail in a window by Michael O’Connor & Sons in Saint Peter and Saint Paul Church, Buckingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and this week began with the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XV, 13 September 2026). The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers Saint Hildegard (1179), Abbess of Bingen, Visionary. The calendar of the Greek Orthodox Church today commemorates Saint Sophia, whose name (Σοφία) means ‘wisdom’ in Greek, and her three daughters, Pistis, Elpis and Agape, or Πίστις (Faith), Ελπίδα (Hope) and Αγάπη (Love), martyrs in the second century.

I hope to be involved with a play-reading and drama group in Stony Stratford Library later this afternoon. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

Peter Paul Rubens, ‘The Feast of Simon the Pharisee’

Luke 7: 36-50 (NRSVA)

36 One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee’s house and took his place at the table. 37 And a woman in the city, who was a sinner, having learned that he was eating in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment. 38 She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair. Then she continued kissing his feet and anointing them with the ointment. 39 Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw it, he said to himself, ‘If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him – that she is a sinner.’ 40 Jesus spoke up and said to him, ‘Simon, I have something to say to you.’ ‘Teacher,’ he replied, ‘speak.’ 41 ‘A certain creditor had two debtors; one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. 42 When they could not pay, he cancelled the debts for both of them. Now which of them will love him more?’ 43 Simon answered, ‘I suppose the one for whom he cancelled the greater debt.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘You have judged rightly.’ 44 Then turning towards the woman, he said to Simon, ‘Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. 45 You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. 46 You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. 47 Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.’ 48 Then he said to her, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ 49 But those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, ‘Who is this who even forgives sins?’ 50 And he said to the woman, ‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace.’

James Tissot, ‘The Ointment of the Magdalene’ (‘Le parfum de Madeleine’) … however, the woman in Simon’s house, Mary Magdalene, Mary of Bethany and the woman caught in adultery are four different women (Photograph: Brooklyn Museum)

Today’s Reflections:

In today’s Gospel reading at the Eucharist in the lectionary (Luke 7: 36-50), Jesus is a guest, but the unwelcome guest at the meal, when he is invited to the house of Simon the Pharisee.

Jesus is accused at different times of eating with publicans and sinners. As we read yesterday, he knows that his detractors point to him and say: ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ (Luke 7: 34).

But Jesus also eats with Pharisees too. Indeed, he may have had many meals with Pharisees, although the Gospel writers simply make a passing reference to the host without naming him (see Luke 14: 1-24), or perhaps ignore the meals altogether.

However, at this meal, I imagine an evening when Jesus is found eating with an eminently respectable member of society, a Pharisee, and a leading Pharisee at that too.

Jesus is invited to dinner by a leading Pharisee, Simon, although it is some time before we learn the name of the host that evening. Nor is it clear which city he lives in. Is it Capernaum? Is it Nain or Bethany? Saint John’s Gospel has a similar incident in Bethany (see John 12: 1-8), but it is a very different story, set in the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus. But do the venue or location really matter? What matters is that the man who should have been the host fails at his task, and the guest at the dinner becomes the true host.

Have you ever been at a dinner where you know some of the guests were invited simply to boost the ego of those who had invited them? Do you know what I mean by the dinner-party-name-dropping-syndrome?

Some might think Simon was suffering from DPND syndrome when he invited Jesus to dinner. I am not inclined to think so: after all, just a few verses earlier, Jesus has come in for some severe criticism, and has given a robust response.

Simon may have thought he was doing the decent thing … a Pharisee inviting a visiting rabbi and preacher to dinner would have been common courtesy and a common experience.

Nor is there is anything unusual, anything offensive, about the behaviour of Jesus at this meal. He takes his allotted or allocated place at the table, and he probably enjoyed the conversation with the people beside him and opposite him.

But then the drama begins.

A woman in the city, a woman known as a sinner, manages to get in. Now, despite popular portrayal and the myths of centuries, it does not necessarily mean that this woman was an open and public sinner, a figure who was known for her sinful ways.

Those who were blind or who were suffering from leprosy or a physical ailment were often treated as sinners. They were seen as having brought their visible scars on themselves, or to be suffering because of the sins of their parents or their ancestors.

Perhaps she was not the easy woman of popular story-telling. Perhaps she was blind, or was disabled physically in some way. We are not told.

And some people ask: how did she get into the house anyway?

But on a balmy summer’s evening in a Mediterranean house, people will normally eat in the inner courtyard that is the part of any house of substance. I just love those long evening dinners in Greece, where you break bread and pour wine for each other at long tables, and as you hand the bread to and pour the wine for the person next to you, the natural response is σε ευχαριστώ (seh efcharisto, thank you), the very phrase that gives us the word Eucharist, thanksgiving.

Anyway, as they were sitting around, perhaps in the inner courtyard, giving thanks to each other, this woman slips in, unnoticed. There was no need for her to gatecrash, she probably just slipped in silently and unnoticed.

At first, even Jesus would not have noticed her, for she stands behind him.

What hurt this unnoticeable woman on the margins so much that she cried so profusely? She cries so much that she must have been deeply hurt, thoroughly dejected and rejected.

I think Rubens and the other great painters get it wrong when they show her in front of Jesus, washing and drying his feet. This woman’s very marginalisation is symbolised in four ways:

• No-one noticed her coming in, or if they did, she was not worth going to the bother of throwing out.

• When she is noticed, she is regarded by all present as being a sinner, although Jesus tells us that she has been forgiven … probably long before this incident took place.

• Although Saint John’s Gospel names her as Mary, she remains unnamed, anonymous, throughout this story. At the beginning, Simon is unnamed, but eventually we get to know who he is. This woman is obviously well-known in her town, but no-one calls her by her name. And in Christian tradition, we have continued to deny her identity, often confusing her with Mary Magdalene and with the woman caught in adultery – two completely different people altogether.

• By her physical place at the table: she is standing behind Jesus, at the back, perhaps just where the servants would have stood as they waited to bring more dishes, or clear away some empty plates. But she takes the place of the servant at the table … in other words, she is a true deacon.

The woman’s behaviour embarrasses Simon. He never went through the normal courtesies and formalities of welcoming a guest into the house, seeing that his shoes were taken from him, given water to wash his hands, his feet washed, his head anointed.

But her alabaster and tears used for anointing and washing Jesus, his head and his feet, also prefigures something else: the women who come to wash the corpse of the Crucified Christ, and to anoint him in his grave (Luke 24: 1-11).

This woman prefigures those women who will be the first witnesses of the Resurrection … perhaps she even is to become one of them.

If so, then wanting to eject her becomes a rejection of the Easter faith.

Simon thinks Jesus should know who this woman really is, failing to realise that Jesus knows what is really going on in Simon’s heart.

Simon is embarrassed, not by what Jesus might know about him, but by the woman.

But Jesus is not embarrassed at all. Instead of confronting the woman, he confronts Simon, and he commends this woman for her faith. He sends her out in peace – the very dismissal that we should experience at the end of the Liturgy every Sunday, week-by-week. She is sent out as a disciple, as an apostle, as a missionary.

And Simon wants to eject her.

Not because of who she is, nor because of her reputation, but because she has shown him up to be a poor host.

There is a sharp contrast between the shallow faith of Simon, the pillar of the Church, and the woman, who has been pushed to the margins, a sharp contrast between those with apparent faith and no response, and those dismissed for having no faith but who are full in their response to Christ’s presence among us.

Simon fails in offering the proper hospitality to his guest. This woman on the other hand receives the full and generous hospitality of God.

Simon has no place in his house for this woman – and, to be honest, no place in his house for Jesus. But God has a place for her in his kingdom.

The conversation between Jesus and this woman is a model for all our encounters with people we see as different or as strangers.

Am I like Simon, and only willing to count in within my inner circle those who are like me and who behave according to my standards?

If I am going to enter into conversation with the stranger, am I open to listening to them, to talking openly and honestly with them about where they come from and what they believe?

When the conversation is over, will they remain strangers?

How open am I to new friendships?

How often do I think people get what they deserve rather than sympathising with their predicaments?

Do I live up to my weekly commission to go out into the world in peace to love and serve the world in the name of the Risen Christ?

Mary anoints the feet of Jesus in Bethany … a window in the north aisle of Saint Mary’s Church in St Neot’s, Cambridgeshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 17 September 2026):

The theme this week (13 -19 September 2026) in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Witness as With-ness’ (pp 38-39). This theme was introduced on Sunday with a reflection by the Revd Canon Dr Peniel Rajkumar, Director of Global Mission and Theologian, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 17 September 2026) invites us to pray:

Christ who bore the cross, draw me into deeper discipleship that does not turn away from pain. Teach me to act with love where injustice burdens others.

The Collect:

Most glorious and holy God,
whose servant Hildegard, strong in the faith,
was caught up in the vision of your heavenly courts:
by the breath of your Spirit
open our eyes to glimpse your glory
and our lips to sing your praises with all the angels;
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:

Merciful God,
who gave such grace to your servant Hildegard
that she served you with singleness of heart
and loved you above all things:
help us, whose communion with you
has been renewed in this sacrament,
to forsake all that holds us back from following Christ
and to grow into his likeness from glory to glory;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

Saint Sophia and her daughters Pistis, Elpis and Agape depicted in a fresco in the Church of the Transfiguration in Piskopianó in Crete … they are commemorated on 17 September (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

Making music with Handel and Hendrix with blue plaques in harmony on two houses in Mayfair

The Handel Hendrix House on Brook Street in Mayfair (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Patrick Comerford

Who are the inseparable pairs in your mind? Morecambe and Wise? Laurel and Hardy? The Two Ronnies? French and Saunders? Simon and Garfunkel? Lennon and McCartney? Flanders and Swann?

Without prompting, would you have suggested Handel and Hendrix?

Handel Hendrix House (previously Handel & Hendrix in London and the Handel House Museum) is a London museum dedicated to the lives and works of the German-born baroque composer George Frideric Handel and the American rock singer-guitarist Jimi Hendrix. They lived lived next door to each other at 25 and 23 Brook Street, Mayfair, separated only by walls and a mere 2½ centuries or so.

I was writing the week before last about blue plaques (5 September 2026), and this unlikely pairing of composers are commemorated with blue plaques on the façades of the neighbouring houses that now form Handel Hendrix House, previously known as Handel & Hendrix in London and the Handel House Museum.

Handel made his home in London in 1712 and eventually became a British citizen in 1727. He lived at 25 Brook Street from 1723 until he died there in 1759. Almost all his works after 1723, including many of his operas, oratorios and ceremonial music, were composed and partially rehearsed in the house, where he had a variety of keyboard instruments, including harpsichords, a clavichord and a small chamber organ.

Handel moved into 25 Brook Street in 1723, shortly after he had been appointed by George II as composer to the Chapel Royal. The house had been newly built with Nos 23, 27/29 and 31 by George Barnes as part of the planned extension of Brook Street, linking Hanover Square with Grosvenor Square, between 1717 and 1726.

Handel’s immediate neighbours on either side were from the upper middle classes and initially included the MP John Monckton, who later became the first Viscount Galway in 1727.

From the 1730s on, there are references to rehearsals of operas and oratorios at Brook Street by Handel’s friends and fellow musicians. Handel used the house for entertainment, composition and rehearsal, and for business.

After Handel died in 1759, his musical instruments passed to John Christopher Smith and his son of the same name, while the tenancy of the house and Handel’s clothing passed to his servant John Du Burk. The house remained largely unchanged until 1905, when CJ Charles converted the house into a shop, removing the original façade and the internal dividing walls. It was bought by the Co-operative Insurance Society in 1971.

Although the house is a Grade I listed building, its survival was threatened when planning permission was sought in 1982 to demolish five Grade II listed buildings, including Handel’s house.

The Handel Museum Trust Fund was formed in the early 1990s with the object of creating a Handel museum at 25 Brook Street, and after a long period of negotiations and extensive renovation work, 25 Brook Street opened as the Handel House Museum 25 years ago on 8 November 2001.

The house has been restored to look as it did when Handel lived there for 36 years from 1723 to 1759. It is a typical early 18th-century London terrace house, with a basement, three main storeys and an attic, and Handel was the first resident. The interiors have been restored to the somewhat spartan style of the Georgian era, using mostly architectural elements from elsewhere, since, apart from the staircase, few of the original interior features survived.

The museum has restored period rooms on the first and second floors of 25 Brook Street and exhibition rooms in No 23, the adjacent house on the terrace. In 2016, the museum expanded to incorporate the upper floors of 23 Brook Street, home of Jimi Hendrix in the late 1960s.

The Handel House Collection Trust has a collection of Handel memorabilia, including the Byrne Collection of several hundred items that were acquired in 1998.

The museum incorporates the upper floors of its neighbour at 23 Brook Street, the home of the American rock singer-guitarist Jimi Hendrix (1942-1970) in 1968-1969. These rooms were used for temporary exhibitions and events, but after fundraising, these and the rest of the rooms from the Hendrix apartment were opened to the public in February 2016 as ‘Handel and Hendrix in London’. One exhibit is a collection of Hendrix’s old records.

Both houses have blue plaques for their respective occupants. The blue plaque to George Frideric Handel at 25 Brook Street reads: ‘George Frideric Handel 1685-1759 Composer lived in this house from 1723 and died here’. The blue plaque to Jimi Hendrix at 23 Brook Street reads: ‘Jimi Hendrix 1942-1970 Guitarist and Songwriter lived here 1968-1969’.

The house is open to the public five days a week, Wednesday to Sunday. The museum has a lively events programme including live music, changing exhibitions, lectures and children’s educational events. Several performances of Baroque music are staged each month.

Romeo and Juliet? Burton and Taylor? Plato and Socrates? Mutt and Jeff? Tom and Jerry? Holmes and Watson? Watson and Crick? Mapp and Lucia?

But Handel and Hendrix? Well, that was a first for me in Mayfair this summer.

There are blue plaques to George Frideric Handel on the façade of 25 Brook Street and to Jimi Hendrix at 23 Brook Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 131, Wednesday 16 September 2026

‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn’ (Luke 7: 31-32) … traditional Greek folk music celebrated at a restaurant in the old town in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and this week began with the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XV, 13 September 2026).

The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today (16 September) remembers Saint Ninian (ca 432), Bishop of Galloway and Apostle of the Picts, and Edward Bouverie Pusey (1800-1882), Priest and Tractarian.

Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn’ (Luke 7: 32) … ‘Τα κάλαντα’ (‘Carols’), Νικηφόρος Λύτρας (Nikiphoros Lytras)

Luke 7: 31-35 (NRSVA)

[Jesus said:] 31 ‘To what then will I compare the people of this generation, and what are they like? 32 They are like children sitting in the market-place and calling to one another,

“We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
we wailed, and you did not weep.”

33 ‘For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say, “He has a demon”; 34 the Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, “Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax-collectors and sinners!” 35 Nevertheless, wisdom is vindicated by all her children.’

Imagine going to a wedding but not getting onto the floor and dancing (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflections:

When we were looking at the Gospel reading yesterday, which told the story of the widow of Nain grieving her son at his funeral, I said how funeral stories and the stories of children being raised to life are not always the most cheerful Bible readings, and I recalled how that reading was particularly difficult when I was preaching one Sunday morning when I was baptising a little baby boy.

In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus compares ‘the people of this generation’ with children sitting in the market-place calling to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not weep’ (Luke 7: 31-32).

I have often stayed up late at weddings, at the receptions after funerals, and enjoying late night sporting events, especially rugby and football. Each time, in ways that were appropriate to each occasion, I have entered into the spirit of the event, and where possible, moved from being a mere spectator to being a full participant.

When we go to weddings and funerals … and as a priest I got my fair share of both … when we go to weddings and funerals, the attitude we go with makes a world of difference: do I go as a spectator or do I go as a participant?

Imagine going to a funeral and failing to offer sympathy to those who are grieving and mourning.

Shortly after my ordination, I was asked to officiate at my first wedding. Initially, I declined the invitation to go to the reception afterwards, until someone chided me gently and asked me: are you at this wedding as a spectator or as a participant?

Perhaps, as a new curate, I was too worried about sending out the wrong signals. If I stood back, would I be reproached for not eating and drinking with the people I was there to serve (see Luke 7: 33)? If I went, would I be seen as being there only for eating and drinking (verse 34)?

But it was never about me, surely; it was only ever about the couple getting married.

A student in the Church of Ireland Theological Institute was telling me once about her parish placement as an ordinand. Initially, she was uncomfortable with the style of worship and the theological emphasis of the parish she was placed in. But the parish reacted to her warmly and gently. And as the weeks rolled by she realised she had moved from being an observer on Sunday mornings, to being an engaged visitor, to being a participant.

When we join in waves and chants at a football match, join in the dance at weddings, sing the hymns and enter into the prayers at another church, cry and hug those who are grieving and mourning at a funeral, we move from being observers and spectators to being participants. And the great opportunity for this transformation is provided Sunday after Sunday, not at the Liturgy but in the Liturgy.

If you have been to the Middle East, or have just seen Fiddler on the Roof, you know that dancing at Jewish weddings was traditionally a male celebration. I have seen at funerals in Greece and the Eastern Mediterranean that the open mourning and weeping is usually expressed on behalf of the community by women in particular.

Indeed, we know since classical times how a man’s worth in life was once counted by the number of women crying at his funeral.

These traditions were passed on through the generations by children watching learning from adults and by children in turn teaching one other.

In today’s Gospel reading (Luke 7: 31-35), we see how Christ has noticed this in the streets and the back alleys as he moves through the towns and cities, probably in Galilee and along the Mediterranean shore.

He sees the children playing, the boys playing wedding dances, and the girls playing funeral wailing and mourning.

He notices the ways in which children can reproach each other for not joining in their playfulness:

We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
we wailed, and you did not mourn. (verse 32)

Even as he speaks there is playfulness in the way Jesus phrases his observation poetically. There is humour in the way he uses Greek words that rhyme for dance and mourn at the end of each line of the children’s taunts:

Ηὐλήσαμεν ὑμῖν
καὶ οὐκ ὠρχήσασθε·
ἐθρηνήσαμεν
καὶ οὐκ ἐκλαύσατε.

Perhaps he was repeating an everyday rebuke in Greek at the time for people who stand back from what others are doing. We might put poetic rhyme on his lips here:

A wedding song we played for you,
The dance you did but scorn.
A woeful dirge we chanted too,
But then you would not mourn.

The boys playing tin whistles and beating tin drums are learning to become adult men. The girls wailing and beating their breasts in mock weeping are learning to become adult women. Each group is growing into the roles and rituals that will be expected of them when they mature.

Like all good children’s games, the point is the game, not who wins.

The games we played as children may now seem silly and pointless. But when we were children they mattered as a communal and community experience. The fun was not because there was anything to win. The fun was in taking part. And in taking part we were helped in the process of growing and maturing and making the transition from childhood to adolescence, and from adolescence to adulthood.

To and fro, back and forth, these boys and girls in the market place play the games of weddings and funerals.

The music they play shifts and changes its tones and tunes. This endless, pointless, repetition is their inherited way of learning and socialising. Their playfulness ensures their tradition and culture is reinforced and is handed on to the next generation.

But if the boys make music and the girls do not dance, if the girls wail, and the boys do not weep, how can they have a shared story, a shared adulthood, a shared culture, a shared future, a shared humanity?

When we refuse to take part in the game, in the ritual, we refuse to take part in the shaping of society, we are denying our shared culture. When I try exclude others from the taking part in the game, in the ritual, I am refusing them their role rightful in shaping society.

When reciprocity collapses, we are denying our shared humanity.

We can become paralysed by our inability to enter into the game of others. And then the game turns from song and dance to what we might call ‘the blame game.’

It is so easy when I withdraw from the social activities of others to blame them.

Yes, there is a time for dancing and a time for mourning: each has its proper place, and they flow into each other, like the children’s game when it is working. But when vanity gets in the way, there is a breakdown in our understanding of time and of humanity.

If I stand back detached, and remain a mere observer of the joys and sorrows in the lives of others, I am not sharing in their humanity.

And in not sharing in your humanity, I am failing to acknowledge that you too are made in the image and likeness of God.

But when we rejoice with people in their joys, and when we mourn with people in their sorrows, we are putting into practice what the doctrine of the Trinity teaches us about us being not only made in the image and likeness of God individually but communally and collectively too as humanity.


The ‘Bottle Dance’ at the wedding in ‘Fiddler on the Roof’

Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 16 September 2026):

The theme this week (13 -19 September 2026) in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Witness as With-ness’ (pp 38-39). This theme was introduced on Sunday with a reflection by the Revd Canon Dr Peniel Rajkumar, Director of Global Mission and Theologian, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Wednesday 16 September 2026) invites us to pray:

Merciful God, when I am tempted to complain, remind me of the suffering you bore. Form in me a heart that listens before it speaks.

The Collect:

Almighty and everlasting God,
who called your servant Ninian to preach the gospel
to the people of northern Britain:
raise up in this and every land
heralds and evangelists of your kingdom,
that your Church may make known the immeasurable riches
of your Son our Saviour 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:

Almighty and everlasting God,
who called your servant Ninian to preach the gospel
to the people of northern Britain:
raise up in this and every land
heralds and evangelists of your kingdom,
that your Church may make known the immeasurable riches
of your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ,
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


‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn’ (Luke 7: 31-32) … music at the Hiroshima Day commemorations at the Peace Pagoda in Milton Keynes (Patrick Comerford, 2026)

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

56 million for frequent fliers, 56 million people in England, 56 million library books, and 56 million readers to date

Flying over Singapore … a small group of frequent flyers who travel 56,000 km (56 million metres) a year are responsible for more than half the global climate emissions from aviation (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This month continues to be an exceptionally busy time on this blog. There is a continuing, steady and overwhelming rise in figures for viewing and reading. These figures reached 56 million by mid-afternoon today (15 September), passing the million mark for the eighth time since the end of last month. The figures reached 55 million three days ago (12 September), 54 million two nights before that (10 September 2026), 53 million hits the day before that ago (9 September 2026), 52 million hits two days previously (7 September), 51 million on 5 September, 50 million on 4 September and 49 million on 31 August.

These viewing and readership figures are still overpowering, and this blog continues to reach volumes of readers I never expected when I first started blogging 16 years ago. At the end of last year, this blog had 21 million hits (31 December 2025). So far this year, there have been more than 35 million hits or visitors in 2026 alone.

This means half of all hits or reader figures have been within the past six months, with 28 million hits since 20 March 2026. I first began blogging in 2010, and it took almost two years until July 2012 to reach half a million readers. Throughout this year, the daily figures have often been overwhelming. Although we are just half way through September, this is already the busiest month for traffic on this blog, with over 7 million hits by late this afternoon.

Of the 10 days of busiest traffic on this blog, seven of them were in this month alone (1, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11 and 12 September), two were in May (1 and 14 May) and one was in April (29 April):

• 1,124,925 (1 May 2026)
• 671,341 (10 September 2026)
• 647,187 (5 September 2026)
• 618,234 (8 September 2026)
• 583,320 (11 September 2026)

• 563,301 (9 September 2026)
• 557,448 (12 September 2026)
• 525,719 (14 May 2026)
• 513,725 (7 September 2026)
• 509,644 (29 April 2026)

The daily average so far this month is 470,000-500,000 hits a day. Yet, I recall how 10 years ago, back in 2016, the daily average was around 1,000, or 30,000 a month.

England’s population is more than 56 million people, according to census and official statistics (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Some curious though random statistics help to put this new figure of 56 million into perspective:

England has a population of about 56.5 million people, according to census and official statistics. The 56,490,048 residents of England make up about 84 per cent of the total population of the United Kingdom.

The Open Library digital collection managed by the Internet Archive lists over 56 million books and texts, while the New York Public Library has about 56 million items in its extensive cultural collections.

A mere 1% of the world’s population is responsible for more than half the global climate emissions from aviation. This comes about through a small group of wealthy frequent flyers who travel about 56,000 km a year.

EBay and three former top executives agreed in July to pay almost $56 million ($55.7 million) to resolve a lawsuit by a Massachusetts couple who fell victim to a bizarre stalking and harassment campaign carried out by several of its employees in retaliation for their coverage of the e-commerce company in a newsletter they publish.

The settlement brings an end to a case brought by David and Ina Steiner after several former eBay employees were prosecuted for targeting them in a cyber-stalking campaign that involved sending them cockroaches, fly larvae and a bloody Halloween pig mask. As part of the settlement, eBay agreed to pay $46.15 million to the couple; fund $6 million in charitable contributions to nonprofit organisations; and issue a ‘strongly-worded’ statement about the conduct of the three former executives.

When Europeans arrived in the Americas, they caused so much death and disease that it changed the global climate, a new study finds. European settlers killed 56 million indigenous people over about 100 years in South, Central and North America, causing large swaths of farmland to be abandoned and reforested, researchers at University College London (UCL) have found.

56 million metres in 56,000 km and 56 million sq m is 56,000 sq km. The total land area of Croatia is approximately 56,594 sq km, making it the 127th largest country in the world. The Greater Bay Area of China, comprising Hong Kong, Macao and nine cities in Guangdong Province, has a total area of around 56,000 sq km.

56 million minutes equals 106 years, 6 months and 10 days. This means that if this blog was receiving just one hit a minute, I would need to have started blogging back in March 1920.

I retired from active parish ministry about 4½ years ago, on 31 March 2022. These days, though, about 150 people on average are reading my daily prayer diary posted on this blog each morning, or more than 1,000 people each week. As this blog moves beyond 56 million hits, I am truly grateful to the real readers among that 56 million. In particular, I am thankful for the faithful core group of people who join me in prayer, scripture reading and reflections each day.

Hong Kong is part of the Greater Bay Area of China, which includes Macao and nine cities in Guangdong Province, and has a total area of around 56 million sq metres or 56,000 sq km (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 130, Tuesday 15 September 2026

The Widow of Nain … a window by Hardman at the west end of the south aisle in Saint Mary’s Church, St Neots, Cambridgeshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and the week began with the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XV). The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today (15 September 2026) remembers Saint Cyprian (258), Bishop of Carthage and Martyr.

Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

The resurrection of the young man of Nain, by Lucas Cranach (1569)

Luke 7: 11-17 (NRSVA)

11 Soon afterwards he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went with him. 12 As he approached the gate of the town, a man who had died was being carried out. He was his mother’s only son, and she was a widow; and with her was a large crowd from the town. 13 When the Lord saw her, he had compassion for her and said to her, ‘Do not weep.’ 14 Then he came forward and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, ‘Young man, I say to you, rise!’ 15 The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus[b] gave him to his mother. 16 Fear seized all of them; and they glorified God, saying, ‘A great prophet has risen among us!’ and ‘God has looked favourably on his people!’ 17 This word about him spread throughout Judea and all the surrounding country.

Jesus Raising the Widow’s Son at Nain (James Tissot, ca 1890)

Today’s Reflection:s

Funeral stories and the stories of children being raised to life, like the story in the Gospel reading this morning, are not always the most cheerful Bible readings. This reading was particularly difficult when I was preaching one Sunday morning many years ago in Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate, north Co Dublin, when I was baptising a little baby boy.

But at the moment in the lectionary each weekday morning we are working our way through Saint Luke’s Gospel. It is full of stories about healing and wholeness. And I found myself that morning asking who does Jesus bring healing and wholeness to in this reading.

When we look at any Gospel story it is always good to ask a few basic questions, like who, what, where, when and why.

If you want to watch a movie on Netflix this evening, you would probably ask a few basic questions before making your choice:

• What’s the story all about?

• Who are the principal characters, the main actors?

• In other words, is there anything in this for me?

In a similar way, if we are to find anything in a Gospel story that not only makes it interesting but makes it relevant for me, then I suppose I could approach a Gospel reading with the same questions:

• What’s the story all about?

• Who are the main characters?

• Where’s the action?

In today’s Gospel story, there is a lot of action, and a lot of people. In fact, there are two large crowds, and the drama is created in the way they meet each other, in an unexpected and unplanned way.

The first crowd is made up of those following Jesus, who have just arrived after a long, 20-mile walk with him from Capernaum.

This group includes not just those who are his disciples. But a lot of other people too – people are there to see what he is doing, what’s going on. Like Netflix viewers after a hard day’s work, they are looking for the entertainment, looking for the drama, perhaps even hoping for a miracle or too … after all, at Capernaum they have seen him heal the centurion’s servant.

And we ought not to be too dismissive of this crowd following Jesus, or their motives. After all, that is the way a lot of people end up coming to church. They go with the flow, they like what is on offer for their children, it gives them a sense of identity. And, in coming along, they find out who Jesus really is, why it matters to follow him.

Perhaps they were expecting nothing. Perhaps they were just tired, and after a 20-mile walk are anxious about whether there are enough beds in the tiny village of Nain for them all to stay overnight.

And, unexpectedly – in a way that no-one could have planned – this large crowd bumps into another, second large crowd. Nain is called a town here, but it was more like a village, about nine or ten miles south of Nazareth. Until the mid-20th century, it had a population of less than 100 or 200, so we can imagine a tiny place in the days of Jesus.

So, one large crowd bumps into another large crowd. And it is bad news for the large crowd that has been following Jesus.

In a tiny place like Nain, to have a large crowd they must have been drawn from every house and dwelling place, every family in the village. If they are all in mourning, not only are they unlikely to be able to offer anyone bed and breakfast for the night, they probably are ritually unable to do so: a dead body, a corpse, a funeral, a burial, all make a practising, observant Jew ritually unclean.

The disciples and the other people who are following Jesus on the road from Capernaum to Nain must have taken pity on themselves. Where are they going to go tonight? What can they do? Where can they stay?

Perhaps the appeal of following Jesus, waiting for the miracle to happen, suddenly evaporated as this reality dawned on them.

Perhaps they even thought that Jesus should have pity on them, pity on their plight.

But instead, Jesus takes pity, not on them, and not even on the poor young lad who has died either. Instead, he takes pity on the boy’s widowed mother. He has compassion for her, he tells her not to weep.

However, having compassion and doing something about it make two separate sets of demands.

The love of a mother for her young son is incomparable, as people knew too that Sunday morning at the baptism in Donabate, Co Dublin.

Jesus recognises, Jesus identifies with, Jesus is consumed with, the love of this widowed, probably young widowed, mother. As a widow, left financially ruined, her only hope of survival in this world may have been in the livelihood her son would eventually attain.

She has already been widowed, now her son has died. She faces not only emotional devastation, but financial destruction and social ruin … she will have no-one to work her fields, no-one to provide an income, no-one to guarantee her safety and security.

Jesus recognises her plight … and he does something about it. First he does something that is shocking in his day, shocking behaviour for a rabbi in those days. He touches the bier, he touches the dead body. It is no wonder the bearers stood still. He has identified so much with the widow’s plight that he too becomes ritually unclean. In Christ, God’s identification with our humanity is so complete that he takes on everything about us. God so identifies with us in Christ that he even identifies with us in birth, in life, and in death.

The miracle is amazing. The fact that God identifies so much with us is even more amazing. God’s compassion should be more amazing than God’s miracles. It is because of his love and compassion in the first place that there are miracles.

No wonder the crowds, the two large crowds, all of them, are seized with fear. It is awesome.

And yet, in telling this story, Luke rises to some of his most poetic language in this Gospel.

He looks back to the words of the pregnant Mary and ageing Zechariah in the canticles Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis, when Saint Luke says they glorified God (7: 16, cf Luke 1: 47-48), when they realised a great prophet had risen among them (cf Luke 1: 69-70), when they said God has looked favourably on his people (cf Luke 1: 48), when they realised a new day had dawned. She has been shown mercy, she has been saved from the hands of her enemies, she has received the tender mercy of God.

Saint Luke looks forward to that moment when the suffering Christ meets the weeping women outside the gates of Jerusalem (Luke 23: 28-29). And he looks forward to that moment on the Cross, in Saint John’s Gospel, when the dying Jesus takes pity on his widowed mother and entrusts her and the Beloved Disciple to the mutual care of each other (John 19: 26-27).

What we are invited to be witnesses to is not some old-fashioned miracle show. That’s what the large crowd was hanging around Jesus for what the large crowd was hanging around the funeral procession for.

What we are being invited to is the realisation that in his compassion, in his actions, in his caring, Jesus shows us that God loves us, each of us individually, as a mother loves her only and precious child.

If you imagine for one moment the love that little boy who was being baptised in Donabate that morning could expect from his parents, then you can catch, just catch, a glimpse of the love that God has for each of us, individually. God loves you and God loves me as if were the only child in the world that matters … and even more than that.

This is a new dawn. That is what the promise of Baptism is: it is about dying to sin, to the old ways, rising to new life in Christ, and continuing for ever.

The raising of the son of the widow of Nain … a modern icon in a Greek Orthodox church

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 15 September 2026):

The theme this week (13 -19 September 2026) in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Witness as With-ness’ (pp 38-39). This theme was introduced on Sunday with a reflection by the Revd Canon Dr Peniel Rajkumar, Director of Global Mission and Theologian, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Tuesday 15 September 2026) invites us to pray:

God of the margins, open my eyes to the many ‘Simons’ around me who feel unseen and unwanted. Help me to walk beside them with humility and compassion.

The Collect:

Holy God, who brought Cyprian to faith in Christ,
made him a bishop in the Church
and crowned his witness with a martyr’s death:
grant that, after his example,
we may love the Church and her teachings,
find your forgiveness within her fellowship
and so come to share the heavenly banquet
you have prepared for us;
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:

Eternal God,
who gave us this holy meal
in which we have celebrated the glory of the cross
and the victory of your martyr Cyprian:
by our communion with Christ
in his saving death and resurrection,
give us with all your saints the courage to conquer evil
and so to share the fruit of the tree of life;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

or

God our redeemer,
whose Church was strengthened by the blood of your martyr Cyprian:
so bind us, in life and death, to Christ’s sacrifice
that our lives, broken and offered with his,
may carry his death and proclaim his resurrection in the world;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

Saint Cyprian’s Church on Glentworth Street, Marylebone … the Church calendar remembers Saint Cyprian (258), Bishop of Carthage and Martyr, on 15 September (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

A house on Bloomsbury Square that commemorates five leading figures in the field of education

No 2-3 Bloomsbury Square was built in 1887 for the College of Preceptors (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Patrick Comerford

Bloomsbury House at 2-3 Bloomsbury Square, on the south side of Bloomsbury Square was built in 1887 for the College of Preceptors. The building is familiar to many for its façade with the relief busts in roundels beneath the windows on the first and second floors of five pioneering figures in the field of education and teaching.

But as I looked up recently, I wonder how many passers-by can identify these five eminent figures who stare down on the people of Bloomsbury below, or who can tell what is a preceptor.

Bloomsbury is bounded by Tottenham Court Road, New Oxford Street, Euston Road and Woburn Place and Southampton Row to the east. Bloomsbury Square was first laid out in the early 1660s for Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton. The Russell family owned extensive estates in London by the end of the 17th century, and the Bloomsbury Estate became part of the Bedford Estate in 1723. The Bloomsbury Estate was developed in several phases, from the 1660s to the 1850s.

The five figures on the façade are an eminent educationalist and the busts represent: Johann Pestalozzi, John Milton, Friedrich Froebel, John Locke and Thomas Arnold. The College of Preceptors, now called the Chartered College of Teachers, moved out a few years ago and the building has been restored as a suite of meeting rooms for the Bonnington Hotel group.

The College of Preceptors was a Victorian institution founded to improve the standard and status of teaching by providing proper qualifications. It was founded in 1846 by a group including Joseph Payne, its first professor of education, and the formidable Frances Buss, headmistress of the North London Collegiate School.

The College of Preceptors began in 1846 when a group of private schoolmasters from Brighton met to discuss the their concerns about standards in the teaching profession. A committee formed in early 1846 was chaired by Henry Stein Turrell (1815-1863), principal of the Montpelier House School in Brighton. After meetings in London and Brighton, a general meeting in London in 1846 was attended by 300 schoolmasters attended and 60 members were enrolled.

The College of Preceptors was incorporated with a royal charter from Queen Victoria in 1849. The college created a system for the formal examination and qualification of secondary school teachers. It was one of the first bodies to examine and provide certificates for secondary school pupils.

The college helped to establish education as a subject at university level in the 1870s, and Joseph Payne was appointed as the first Professor of Education in 1873. The right to appoint Professors of Education is recognised in the college’s current royal charter.

In the 1950s the college pioneered management training schemes for teachers and school administration courses. A supplemental charter in 1998 changed the name to the College of Teachers, and a further supplemental charter in 2017 changed the society to its current name, and permitted granting members the status of Chartered Teacher.

Bloomsbury House, now a Listed Grade 1, was built in 1887. It was designed in a Flemish Renaissance style by the architect Frederick Pinches (1852-1925). His other buildings in London include: Hackney Baths (1894-1897), co-designed with Edward Harnor and later known as Kings Hall Leisure Centre; the Alliance Bank (1884), Regent Street; and Parr’s Bank, Stratford (1897-1898), now Burrows House.

The three-storey, three-bay house, with a basement and attic, house was built in red brick with enriched ashlar dressings, a steeply pitched, hipped slate roof with an elaborate pedimented ashlar dormer centre piece carried up with carved escutcheons.

The deeply recessed semi-elliptical central doorway had a moulded reveal and a double panelled door approached by steps.

There are two-light mullion and transom windows. The central three-light bowed oriel window on the first floor has an enriched apron and the dado of the second floor window above is carried on a round oriel parapet. There are composite pilasters defining the window bays of each floor carried in dados with carved, foliated panels and with busts centrally in each bay.

The centre bay projects slightly between paired pilasters with a continuous arcaded frieze capped by segmental pediments. There are arcaded parapets on the outside bays, and the windows on the second floor have arched heads.

On the façade are five roundels, under the windows on the first and second floor. Each displays a relief bust of a pioneering figure in education. The five famous educators who stare down onto Bloomsbury from two rows of roundels on the façade are:

Top left: Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827), Swiss educationalist and author

Top centre: John Milton (1608-1674), poet, polemicist and ‘acrimonious and surly republican’

Top right: Friedrich Froebel (1782-1852), German pedagogue, pioneer of modern education and inventor of the kindergarten

Bottom left: John Locke (1632-1704), empiricist philosopher, known as the ‘father of liberalism’, and at one time a political refugee in the Netherlands

Bottom right: Thomas Arnold (1795-1842), headmaster of Rugby School

Inside the building, the geometrical staircase has a wrought-iron balustrade staircase and there are stained glass windows portraying the founders.

The original preceptors elected against buying land to build their college, and chose a 99-year lease because it was a cheaper option. But when the lease ran out, land in Bloomsbury was worth a premium and they had to relinquish their premises. The College of Teachers moved into the Institute of Education, part of University College London, in Bedford Way in 2003.

The original terms of the lease of 2 Bloomsbury Square insisted that the building remained a teaching establishment. The auditors Coopers & Lybrand (now PWC) adopted it as their training centre. The building was restored in 2007 and is now run by the Bonnington Hotel group and is rented out for meetings and as an events space.

The five figures depicted in the roundels on the façade: Johann Pestalozzi, John Milton, Friedrich Froebel, John Locke and Thomas Arnold (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 129, Monday 14 September 2026, Holy Cross Day

The Elevation of the Holy Cross … an icon in the Monastery of Arkadi in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and the week began with the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XV).

Today in the Church Calendar is Holy Cross Day. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

The Elevation of the Holy Cross … an icon in Analipsi Church in Georgioupoli in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

John 3.13–17 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said to Nicodemus] 13 ‘No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. 14 And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

16 ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

17 ‘Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.’

The Elevation of the Holy Cross … an icon in the Greek Orthodox Church in Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The cross on which Christ was crucified has become the universal symbol of Christianity, replacing the Ichthus or fish symbol of the early Church. After the early persecutions ended, early in the fourth century, pilgrims began to travel to Jerusalem to visit the places associated with the life of Christ. Saint Helena, the mother of the emperor, was a Christian and, while she was overseeing excavations in the city, it is said, she uncovered a cross she believed to be the Cross of Christ. A basilica was built on the site of the Holy Sepulchre and dedicated on this day, 14 September 335.

Nicodemus only appears in Saint John’s Gospel, and in today’s Gospel reading at the Eucharist (John 3: 13-17) we read the first of his three appearances. He is a leading Jew of the day, a Pharisee and a rabbi, a doctor of the law, a member of the ruling Sanhedrin. He comes to visit Jesus at night, and he comes with a bundle of questions.

But, despite his erudite learning, he finds it difficult to understand the answers Christ gives. Yet, it is all so simple: ‘God so loved the world …’ (verse 16).

In fact, what Jesus says here is deeply profound. The Greek mathematician and philosopher Pythagoras was born on the island of Samos, the neighbouring island of Patmos, the island to which Saint John was exiled.

Most of us know about Pythagoras because of his calculations about right-angle triangles. But he also provides an insight into one of the key concepts in Saint John’s writings. His understanding of the cosmos (κόσμος) includes the earth, the planets, the stars, the whole created order.

It is an idea derived from the mathematician and philosopher, Pythageros of Samos. In Pythagorean thinking, the cosmos (κόσμος) includes the arrangement of the stars, ‘the heavenly hosts’ as the ornament of the heavens (see I Peter 3: 3). It is not just the whole world, but the whole universe, the whole created order. It is earth and all that encircles the earth like its skin.

It is as if everything is wrapped into and lives within God’s skin, that we live in God’s womb, and it is there that God loves us. It is not that God so loved the saved, or men, or humanity, or even the world. What Christ says here is that God so loved the cosmos, the whole created order, that he gave, or rather sent, his only-begotten Son.

This key phrase is often translated as ‘God so loved the world’ (John 3: 16). Indeed, in China, I was shocked to see this verse translated into Chinese in a way that it means ‘God so loved humanity’ … ‘that he gave his only Son.’

The original text tells us that God so loved the κόσμος – the whole pulsating, created order as imagined by Pythagoras and the philosophers – God so loved the cosmos that he sent his only son … [Οὕτως γὰρ ἠγάπησεν ὁ Θεὸς τὸν κόσμον, ὥστε τὸν Υἱὸν τὸν μονογενῆ ἔδωκεν …] Not that he gave insipidly, but that he sent actively, sent him on a mission.

Nicodemus is a little nonplussed, but he comes back again and again, a second time (John 7: 45-51) and a third time (John 19: 39-42), and the third encounter is on Good Friday.

When Christ dies on the Cross, and the women come to bury him, Joseph of Arimathea provides the grave (Matthew 27: 57; Mark 15: 43; Luke 23: 50-56; John 19: 39-40), and Nicodemus steps forward to provide the customary embalming spices, and he assists them in preparing the body of Christ for burial (John 19: 39-42).

Nicodemus brings a mixture of myrrh and aloes, estimated at about 33 kg, to embalm Christ’s body. In his book Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week, the late Pope Benedict XVI observes that ‘the quantity of the balm is extraordinary and exceeds all normal proportions. This is a royal burial.’

So, in the story of Nicodemus, we find birth is linked with death, new birth is linked with new life, and before darkness falls Nicodemus really comes to possess the Body of Christ, to hold the Body of Christ in his hands, and in anointing him to recognise him as priest, prophet and king.

If being a priest is about presenting God through Christ to the world in word and sacrament, and presenting the world through the Christ to God in word and sacrament, then Nicodemus both receives and presents the Body of Christ, in a very Eucharistic way, and is a model for priesthood.

But we could say the same too of the women who seek to comfort and console Christ as he carries his cross to Calvary, who stay with him at the Crucifixion, who bury him, and who at great personal risk set off early on Easter morning to anoint his body, not knowing then that the Cross is not the end of the Christ story, but that it reaches its climax at the Resurrection.

The Body of Christ is the Church. Nicodemus claims his place in the Church. He acts on his faith. But he could never have known what the consequences would be for him, for the Church and for the world because he first came to Jesus in the dark, because he engaged with the fact that this Jesus would die, because he claimed the Body of Christ and because he engaged in an Epiphany-like moment, revealing that the Christ who became his teacher, the Christ who was to be betrayed, the Christ who was executed, is also the Risen Christ.

Saint Constantine and Saint Helen hold the Holy Cross … an icon in the church in Arkadi Monastery in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 14 September 2026, Holy Cross Day):

The theme this week (13 -19 September 2026) in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Witness as With-ness’ (pp 38-39). This theme was introduced yesterday with a reflection by the Revd Canon Dr Peniel Rajkumar, Director of Global Mission and Theologian, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Monday 14 September 2026, Holy Cross Day) invites us to pray:

Gracious God, we thank you for the cross of Christ, where sin is defeated and your saving love is revealed. Help me to live in the freedom and hope won there, bearing witness with faith and courage.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
who in the passion of your blessed Son
made an instrument of painful death
to be for us the means of life and peace:
grant us so to glory in the cross of Christ
that we may gladly suffer for his sake;
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,
whose Son bore our sins in his body on the tree
and gave us this sacrament to show forth his death until he comes:
give us grace to glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
for he is our salvation, our life and our hope,
who reigns as Lord, now and for ever.

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

The Emperor Constantine and Saint Helena hold the Holy Cross … a fresco in Piskopianó in Crete (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

Saint Constantine and Saint Helen hold the Holy Cross … an icon in the church in Panormos, east of Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

55 million bottles of Champagne, 55 million famine deaths in China, 55 million displaced people, 55 million blog readers to date

Glasses at a reception in a Cambridge college … Champagne sales dropped by 55 million bottles in a two-year period (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This month continues to be an exceptionally busy time on this blog. There is a continuing, steady and frankly overwhelming rise in figures for viewing and reading.

These figures reached 55 million around 10:30 last night (12 September), passing the million mark for the seventh time since the end of last month. The figures reached a total of 54 million two nights before that (10 September 2026), 53 million hits four days ago (9 September 2026), 52 million hits two days before that (7 September), 51 million on 5 September, 50 million the day before (4 September) and 49 million four days previously (31 August).

These viewing and readership figures are still overpowering, and this blog continues to reach volumes of readers I never expected when I first started blogging 16 years ago. At the end of last year, this blog had 21 million hits (31 December 2025). So far this year, there have been more than 34 million hits or visitors in 2026 alone.

This means half of all hits or reader figures have been within the past six months, with 27.5 million hits since 16 March 2026. I first began blogging in 2010, and it took almost two years until July 2012 to reach half a million readers. Throughout this year, the daily figures have often been overwhelming. Although we are less than half way through September, this is already the busiest month for traffic on this blog with over 6.3 million hits by late this afternoon.

Of the 10 days of busiest traffic on this blog, seven of them were in this month alone (1, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11 and 12 September), two were in May (1 and 14 May) and one was in April (29 April):

• 1,124,925 (1 May 2026)
• 671,341 (10 September 2026)
• 647,187 (5 September 2026)
• 618,234 (8 September 2026)
• 583,320 (11 September 2026)

• 563,301 (9 September 2026)
• 557,448 (12 September 2026)
• 525,719 (14 May 2026)
• 513,725 (7 September 2026)
• 509,644 (29 April 2026)

The daily average so far this month is almost 500,000 hits a day. Yet, I recall how 10 years ago, back in 2016, the daily average was around 1,000, or 30,000 a month.

Outside the courts in Chichester Street, Belfast … £55 million has been paid out in the Troubles victims payment scheme in Northern Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Some curious though random statistics help to put this new figure of 55 million into perspective:

The Great Leap Forward was an industrialisation campaign in China from 1958 to 1962, led by the Chinese Communist Party. Chairman Mao Zedong launched the campaign to transform China from an agrarian society into an industrialised society through the formation of people’s communes. The Great Leap Forward led to between 15 and 55 million deaths in mainland China during the 1959-1961 Great Chinese Famine it caused, making it the largest or second-largest famine in human history.

Kenya has a population of about 55 million people. By 2100, Dhaka in Bangladesh is projected to be the largest city in the world, with 55 million people.

According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), the global total of internally displaced people has hit a record 55 million. Of these 55 million, 48 million were displaced due to conflict and violence, while seven million were displaced by natural disasters. Over 23 million of those displaced individuals were children under the age of 18.

About 55 million people face acute food insecurity, including 13 million malnourished children and 3 million facing emergency-level hunger. The food crisis is driven by severe humanitarian aid funding collapses and regional conflict rather than drought or poor harvests. Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon and Niger account for 77% of the food insecurity, with parts of northern Nigeria facing catastrophic conditions.

£55 million has been paid out so far in the Troubles victims payment scheme in Northern Ireland. The scheme offers financial support for people who suffered physical injury or psychological trauma during the conflict, but there are concerns over the length of time it takes to process applications.

After three consecutive years of declining shipments, Champagne closed 2025 with a further 2% drop, totalling 266 million bottles – the lowest level in two decades outside the pandemic year of 2020. The decline from the recent peak of 326 million bottles in 2022 has been steep, with the region losing 55 million bottles in just two years.

Individual Harry Potter novels, including titles such as Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, have each sold about 55 million copies. Terry Pratchett, the English fantasy author behind the Discworld series, sold more than 55 million books during his lifetime.

The Northern White Rhino subspecies survived for around 55 million years, weathering everything from ice ages to meteor strikes – but not human hunters and poachers. The Northern White Rhino is now functionally extinct, representing a devastating loss for global biodiversity. Decades of intensive poaching for their horns, valued in traditional medicine and as status symbols, combined with civil war and habitat destruction in their native regions of Central and Eastern Africa, drove the population to collapse.

The crisis peaked in March 2018 when the last male, Sudan, died in Kenya. Today, only two females remain alive, leaving the subspecies unable to reproduce naturally. This loss is deeply sad for the world and underscores the destructive impact of human greed on the planet.

55 million minutes is equal to 104 years, 6 months, 25 days, 19 hours, and 40 minutes, calculated using a standard calendar average. This means that if this blog was receiving just one hit a minute, I would need to have started blogging back in February 1922.

I retired from active parish ministry about 4½ years ago, on 31 March 2022. These days, though, about 150 people on average are reading my daily prayer diary posted on this blog each morning, or more than 1,000 people each week. As this blog moves beyond 55 million hits, I am truly grateful to the real readers among that 55 million. In particular, I am thankful for the faithful core group of people who join me in prayer, scripture reading and reflections each day.

Livraria Lello is said have inspired JK Rowling while she was living in Porto … Harry Potter books have each sold about 55 million copies (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

A series of 11 heraldic paintings in Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching, tells the stories of four dioceses

Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching ... painted heraldic decorations represent the Diocese of Kuching, the dioceses in the Church of the Province of South East Asia and dioceses that are part of the story of Anglican missions in the region (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Patrick Comerford

Above the choir and chapter stalls in Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching, a series of nine painted heraldic decorations represent the Diocese of Kuching, its partner dioceses in the Church of the Province of South East Asia, and four other dioceses that are part of the story of Anglican missions in the region.

In addition, the cathedral also displays the coats of arms of both the State of Sarawak and the Federation of Malaysia.

It is difficult to find technically correct heraldic descriptions for some of these coats-of-arms, and in some cases they have been adopted without any heraldic authority. But I am grateful to Mark Scott, Somerset Herald at the College of Arms in London, who has kindly helped me to identify and describe many of these heraldic displays.

The coats of arms of Church of the Province of South East Asia and its four provinces, in a poster the Kuching diocesan offices beside Saint Thomas’s Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

These coats of arms are of interest to specialists in ecclesiastical heraldry and church history. But they also tell part of the story of the relationship of the Anglican Church in Sarawak with the Brooke Rajahs of Sarawak and the short-live British Crown Colony and of the subsequent incorporation of Sarawak into the modern state of Malaysia.

They also tell the story of the relationship between Diocese of Kuching with the neighbouring Anglican dioceses in Malaysia, Singapore and throughout South-East Asia.

The coat of arms of Church of the Province of South East Asia above the chapter and choir stalls in Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Church of the Province of South East Asia, made up of four dioceses – Sabah, Sarawak, Singapore and West Malaysia – was formed 30 years ago in 1996 as the 37th Province in the Anglican Communion. It is self-governing, self-supporting, self-propagating and truly indigenous.

At first, the See of Calcutta provided episcopal supervision for Anglican work throughout much of south and east Asia, and beyond, as far as Australia and New Zealand. The first Anglican church in what is now Malaysia was on Penang island, where the Church of Saint George the Martyr, was built in 1819 and consecrated by Thomas Fanshaw Middleton, first Bishop of Calcutta.

In time, because it was so widespread, the Diocese of Calcutta became impractical, and new dioceses were formed. As a result, for example, the Diocese of Australia was formed in 1836 and the Diocese of Singapore, Labuan and Sarawak was formed in 1855 as a missionary diocese under the oversight of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Today the Church of the Province of South East Asia covers a geographical area of 329,800 sq km with a population: 23.8 million. The coat of arms of the province, which appears to be without a full, technical heraldic description, has a white cross on a blue background, that echoes both the Saint Andrew’s cross used by the Diocese of Singapore, which its four quarters or segments may acknowledge the four dioceses that form the province.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Kuching in the chancel in Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of Kuching:

Francis Thomas McDougall (1817-1886) was the first Bishop of Labuan and Sarawak (1855-1868). He was consecrated bishop in Calcutta on Saint Luke’s Day, 18 October 1855, by Bishop Daniel Wilson of Calcutta, under a commission from Archbishop John Bird Sumner of Canterbury.

His consecration was the first of an English bishop to take place outside Britain and Ireland. He was styled Bishop of Labuan and Sarawak because Labuan was a British territory and Sarawak was not. The Church in the Straits Settlements, including Singapore, Penang and Malacca, was separated from the Diocese of Calcutta in 1869, and placed under the episcopal care of the Bishop of Labuan. This arrangement lasted until 1909, when the Diocese of Singapore was founded.

After the Japanese occupation and World War II, the Diocese of Labuan and the Bishopric of Sarawak were joined into the Diocese of Borneo. The Diocese of Borneo was divided in 1962, forming a new Diocese of Jesselton (Sabah), including Labua, while the rest of the diocese, including Brunei, was reconstituted as the Diocese of Kuching.

The arms of the Diocese of Kuching have inherited elements from the arms granted to the Bishopric of Borneo in 1949 and that were transferred to Kuching in 1964.

They are described in heraldic language or blazoned as: Per pale gules and sable, a cross crosslet fitchy or. This describes a shield that is divided vertically down the middle, red and black, with a gold cross that has three smaller crosses at the top and to the side, and a pointed tip at the end.

At the time of the grant, Sir George Bellew (1899-1993), the Dublin-born Somerset Herald (1926-1950) and later Garter Principal King of Arms (1950-1961), pointed to these arms as an example of how with grants of arms ‘it is still possible to design simple arms without infringing those already in use.’

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Kuching echoes the colours and imagery of the coat of arms of the Brooke family, Rajahs of Sarawak (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The shield incorporates the red and black split design associated with the Brooke family, Rajahs of Sarawak, combined with a gold cross. The dominant colours mirror the historic colours of the Sarawak state flag and the heraldic arms of the Brooke dynasty, founded by James Brooke, the first Rajah of Sarawak.

The coat of arms used by the Brooke dynasty for over a century, from 1841 to 1946, were: Or (gold or yellow), a cross engrailed parted per pale gules (red) and sable (black), charged in fess point with an eastern crown or (gold or yellow); crest: a brock or badger proper (natural colours); motto: Dum Spiro Spero (‘While I Breathe, I hope’).

This blazon describes a gold or yellow shield, with a red and black cross that has wavy edges, surmounted by a crown that was added in 1848. The badger or brock in the crest is a pun alluding to the dynastic surname, and its symbolism is remembered, for example, in the name of the Badger Bar in the Sarawak Club.

The coat of arms of Sir James Brooke, first Rajah of Sarawak, granted by the College of Arms, London, in 1848 (Image: PMostEpic/Wikipedia/CC BY-SA 4.0)

The arms of Sir James Brooke were: or (gold), a cross engrailed per cross indented azure (blue) and sable (black), in the first quarter an estoile of the second (blue); crest: on an eastern crown a brock proper ducally gorged or. Motto: Dum Spiro Spero.

The azure and sable or blue and black colours were abandoned for red and black two years after the succession of his son Sir Charles Johnson Brooke (1868-1917). His achievement was: arms: or (yellow or gold), a cross engrailed parted per pale sable (black) and gules (red); crest: on a wreath of the colours a brock proper; motto: Dum Spiro Spero.

His son, Sir Charles Vyner Brooke (1917-1946), altered the arms by introducing a five-pointed crown, symbolising the five divisions of the kingdom, centred around Kuching, Sri Aman and Simanggang, Sibu, Miri, and Limbang. Shortly before World War II, the engrailed edging of the cross was abandoned and replaced by a simple cross parted per pale.

The simplified coat of arms of the Brooke family as Rajahs of Sarawak (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Sir Charles Brooke abdicated in 1946 after the Japanese occupation (1941-1945), and Sarawak became a British Crown Colony. A new coat of arms was adopted on 10 March 1947: or, on a cross parted per pale sable and gules, charged with a five-pointed eastern crown or.

The arms of the British Crown Colony of Sarawak continued to be used as the state coat of arms when Sarawak formed Malaysia with Malaya, Sabah and Singapore in 1963, and were used until 1973.

The design of the shield also provided the basis for the Sarawak flag used until 1973, and the state flag reverted to these original colours in 1988. At the same time a new state coat of arms was adopted, in which the state flag became the shield, displayed on a hornbill.

The arms of the Diocese of Sabah, first granted to the Diocese of Jesselton, seen in Kuching Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of Sabah:

The British Colony of North Borneo changed its name to Sabah on 31 August 1963, and joined the Federation of Malaysia as an independent state. The Diocese of Sabah, covering Sabah and Labuan, was formed in 1962 as the Diocese of Jesselton. Originally, it was part of the much larger Diocese of Labuan and its Dependencies, established in 1855. When the Diocese of Singapore was formed out of that earlier diocese in 1909, the area of the present-day Diocese of Sabah fell under the jurisdiction of the Diocese of Labuan and Sarawak, which was reorganised as the Diocese of Borneo in 1949.

The Diocese of Borneo was divided in two in 1962, forming the Diocese of Kuching and the Diocese of Jesselton, which was renamed the Diocese of Sabah when Jesselton, the capital city, was renamed Kota Kinabalu in 1967.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Sabah are the arms of the former Diocese of Jesselton: argent (silver or white), issuant from a base vert (green) thereon three barrulets wavy argent (silver or white) a mountain sable (black), in chief five crosses three and two couped gules (red).

A variation in the colours in the official grant of arms of the Diocese of Sabah, seen in a poster marking the 20th anniversary of the Church of the Province of South-East Asia (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

These arms have some echoes of the arms adopted in 1948 by the former Crown Colony of British North Borneo. The diocesan arms incorporate representations of the South China Sea, with historical connotations of the early Christian missionaries travelling by sea, or of the fields of Sabah, beneath Mount Kinabalu.

However, there are variations in the colours in the official grant of arms, as seen in the chancel in Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching, and those used by Diocese of Sabah today.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Singapore seen in Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of Singapore:

The Diocese of Singapore dates back to 1826, shortly after Singapore was founded by Stanford Raffles and at first the Anglican presence there was under the jurisdiction of the Diocese of Calcutta.

Saint Andrew’s Cathedral, Simgapre, was named after the patron saint of Scotland in honour of the Scottish community who first donated to the building fund. Singapore was transferred from the Diocese of Calcutta to the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Labuan and Sarawak in 1869, and Saint Andrew’s Cathedral became the cathedral church of the diocese in 1870. It officially became the Diocese of Singapore, Labuan and Sarawak in 1881, and in 1909 Singapore was made a separate diocese covering the Straits Settlements, Peninsular Malaya, Siam (Thailand), Java, Sumatra and the adjacent islands.

It was renamed the Diocese of Singapore and Malaya on 6 February 1960. The diocese was dissolved on 8 April 1970 when it was divided into two new dioceses, the Diocese of Singapore and the Diocese of West Malaysia.

The official grant of arms to the Bishopric of Singapore are blazoned or described in heraldic language as: azure (blue) a saltire argent (white or silver) between four garbs or (gold or yellow), on a chief of the last (gold or yellow) a pastoral staff and a key in saltire purpure (purple).

The principal element in the arms of the Diocese of Singapore is the shield of Saint Andrew, similar to the symbol seen on the flag of Scotland. The four bunches of wheat symbolise the harvest of the mission fields, the crozier is a symbol of episcopal office, the key represents episcopal authority, and the crozier and key are crossed in the shape of Saint Andrew’s saltire.

The emblem the Diocese of West Malaysia displayed in Kuching Cathedral in the style of a diocesan coat of arms (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of West Malaysia:

A new and independent diocese, the Diocese of West Malaysia, was formed from the Diocese of Singapore and Malaya in 1970, and it was incorporated by an Act of the Malaysian Parliament in 1971. Saint Mary’s Cathedral is beside Independence Square or Dataran Merdeka in Kuala Lumpur.

An official formal heraldic blazon for the arms used by the Anglican Diocese of West Malaysia is not found in standard armorial databases, it does not follow traditional heraldic designs and heraldry remains largely unregulated in Malaysia.

However, the arms used by the diocese draws heavily on local symbols and Malaysian cultural motifs seen in the shape and design of the cross and the depiction of a hornbill.

The coat of arms of the Archbishops of Canterbury above the bishop’s throne in Kuching Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of Canterbury:

The blazon for the coat of arms of the Diocese of Canterbury is: Azure (blue), an archiepiscopal staff or (gold) ensigned with a cross formy or (gold), surmounted of a pallium argent (silver or white) edged and fringed gold, charged with four crosses formy fitchy sable (black).

These are similar to the arms used by the Archbishops of York, Armagh and Dublin. The pallium on all these is a white lamb’s wool band shaped like a ‘Y’ and is an ancient symbol of metropolitan authority.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of London seen in the chancel in Kuching Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of London:

The Bishop of London historically had responsibility for the administration, oversight, and provision of the Church of England in all British overseas colonies. From the 17th century on, Anglican congregations and chaplaincies in British territories outside England – including North America and the West Indies – were within the remit of the Diocese of London.

After the American Revolution in 1776, the North American mainland colonies left this oversight, leaving only the British West Indies under the London bishop's direct care. To manage expanding global territories, the Church of England began forming separate colonial dioceses starting in 1787 with Nova Scotia, eventually forming 41 distinct overseas dioceses before they gained autonomy by 1863.

The technical heraldic description (blazon) for the coat of arms of the Diocese of London is: gules (red), two swords in saltire proper hilts and pommels or (gold).

This is a red shield, with two swords crossed in an ‘X’ shape or saltire. They represent Saint Paul, who is often depicted in iconography with an up-turned sword. He is the patron saint of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, the seat of the Diocese of London.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Calcutta seen in Kuching Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of Calcutta:

The Diocese of Calcutta was formed as an Anglican diocese in 1814. The Bishop of Calcutta was the Metropolitan of India, with a vast geographical province that initially included the entire British empire in India, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), British territories across south and south-east Asia and Australia.


From 1863 on, former colonial dioceses were separate from and independent of the Church of England, although, exceptionally, the Archbishop of Canterbury has retained some metropolitan jurisdictions outside England.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Calcutta is recorded as: Gules (red), a pastoral staff or crozier in bend or (gold), headed argent (silver), surmounted by an open book argent bound or; on a chief indented ermine, two palm fronds in saltire vert (green), debruised with a mitre with infulae or (gold.

This is a red shield, representing holy zeal and martyrdom, with a bishop’s gold crosier placed diagonally across the shield, surmounted by an open Bible.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Sydney displayed in Kuching Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The Diocese of Sydney:

The Diocese of Australia was formed in 1836 and William Grace Broughton became the first Bishop of Australia. The Diocese of New Zealand became a separate diocese in 1841 and the Diocese of Tasmania in 1842. When the Diocese of Australia was divided in 1847 into four separate dioceses – Sydney, Adelaide, Newcastle and Melbourne – Broughton remained as Bishop of Sydney.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Sydney granted to William Broughton, first Bishop of Sydney, is: azure (blue), four mullets of eight points in cross argent (silver or white). This is a blue shield with four eight-pointed silver stars arranged in the shape of a cross, representing the Southern Cross constellation, with four of its primary stars.

The present coat of arms of Sarawak seen in Kuching Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The arms of Sarawak and Malaysia:

The traditional arms of Sarawak are: Or (gold or yellow), a cross engrailed parted per pale gules (red) and sable (black), charged with an eastern crown or (gold or yellow). Motto: Dum Spiro Spero (‘While I breathe, I hope’).

The arms of the British Crown Colony of Sarawak were based on the arms of the Rajah and were the state coat of arms when Sarawak formed Malaysia with Malaya, Sabah and Singapore in 1963. These arms were used from 1947 to 1973: or (gold or yellow), on a cross parted per pale sable (black) and gules (red), an Eastern crown of the field.

The current coat of arms of Sarawak dates from 31 August 1988. The shield features a symbolic wing-spread kenyalang or rhinoceros hornbill with a shield bearing the state flag. The hornbill’s wings have 13 feathers, which represent the states in Malaysia. The hibiscus represent the Malaysia’s national flower which appears on the right and left sides of the bird’s legs and the hornbill perches on a banner with the words Bersatu, Berusaha, Berbakti (‘Unity, Effort, Service’).

The coat of arms of Malaysia displayed in Kuching Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The coat of arms of Malaysia (Jata Negara Malaysia) retains many of the design elements used in the arms of the Federated Malay States during British colonial rule, and it resembles European heraldic designs. The shield is supported by two tigers for supporters, and the crest is a yellow crescent and a yellow 14-point star representing Islam and the states of Malaysia.

The shield consists of a chief or upper portion and a lower section that is divided in three per pale (longitudinally). The chief is gules (red) charged with five krises (Malay daggers), representing the five former Unfederated Malay States: Johor, Kedah, Kelantan, Terengganu and Perlis.

The dexter section (the viewer’s left) shows the former coat of arms of Penang; the upper middle section below the chief shows the colours of the Federated Malay States (red, black, white and yellow); while in the lower middle section are three sections representing the new states of Sabah, Singapore and Sarawak which joined the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. In the sinister section (the right side from the viewer’s point of view) is a Malacca tree (Phyllanthus emblica), after which the state was named.

The two tigers supporting the shield are traditional Malay symbols, and were inherited from the earlier armorial ensigns of the Federated Malay States and Federation of Malaya.

The motto, Bersekutu Bertambah Mutu (‘Unity is Strength’), is in both Latin and Jawi script.

The arms of the Diocese of Lichfield, seen on the railway bridge at Upper John Street, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

A missing coat of arms:

The inclusion of the arms of Canterbury, London, Calcutta and Sydney affirms the historic links between the Diocese of Kuching and those four other dioceses. But if a fifth diocese was to be represented, I would suggest the Diocese of Lichfield.

The Diocese of Lichfield and the Diocese of Kuching have been linked together since the Lambeth Conference in 1988. But the two were linked before that when the second bishop, Walter Chambers (1870-1881), who was ordained a priest in Lichfield Cathedral by Bishop John Lonsdale of Lichfield in 1849, moved to Borneo to assist Bishop Thomas McDougal, the first Bishop of Borneo. Chambers became Archdeacon of Sarawak in 1868 and became Bishop of Sarawak and the Straits Settlements when McDougal resigned in 1870.

The coat of arms of the iocese of Lichfield are described in heraldic terms in this way: Per pale gules (red) and argent (white) , a cross potent and quadrate (Cross of Saint Chad) between four crosses patée all counterchanged. I like to imagine the per pale or vertical division of the field and the shape of the central cross may have had some incluence on the design of the arms of the Diocese of Kuching.

The coat of arms of the Diocese of Kuching on the lectern in the chapel in the Bishop’s House in Kuching (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)