£48 million Cambridge grants, 48 million in tourism saturation, 48 million litres in wine fraud, and 48 million blog hits

Trinity College and the University of Cambridge are providing £48 million in the Trinity Cambridge Research Studentships programme, supporting up to 300 PhD students (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

I continue to be overwhelmed by the viewing and reading figures for this blog. These figures reached a total of 48 million early this morning (24 August 2026), having reached 47 million a week ago (17 August 2026) and 46 million eight days previously (9 August 2026), the third time this month these figures passed the million mark. Last month, the readership figures also passed the million mark three times: 45 million on 29 July, 44 million less than a fortnight earlier (16 July 2026), and 43 million 12 days before that (4 July 2026).

These viewing and reading figures are overpowering at times, 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 27 million hits or visitors in 2026 alone, and almost 2.7 million hits already this month.

Half of all hits or reader figures have been in the past six months or so, with 24 million hits since 20 February 2026. I first began blogging back in 2010, and it took almost two years until July 2012 to reach half a million readers. Throughout this year and last, the daily figures are overwhelming on many occasions. Of the ten days of busiest traffic on this blog, three were in May (1, 6 and 14 May 2026), three were the previous month (26, 29 and 30 April 2026), three in March, and one in February:

• 1,124,925 (1 May 2026)
• 525,719 (14 May 2026)
• 509,644 (29 April 2026)
• 344,003 (30 April 2026)
• 323,156 (27 March 2026)

• 322,038 (26 April 2026)
• 318,835 (6 May 2026)
• 318,307 (1 March 2026)
• 314,018 (28 February 2026)
• 301,449 (2 March 2026)

The daily average was over 187,000 throughout May, but that figure was distorted by the exceptionally high number of hits on three days. There was an average of almost 88,000 hits a day last month, and an average of about 110,000-120,000 a day so far this month. Yet, I remember that ten years ago, back in 2016, the daily average was around 1,000, or 30,000 a month.

Anti-fraud authorities in France uncovered a massive wine scam involving over 48 million litres or 64 million bottles of wine (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

To put this latest figure of 48 million into perspective:

Sudan, Uganda, Iraq and Algeria have populations of about 48 million people – although that depends on who is counting and how they are counting.

Save the Children reports that 48 million children a year are affected by climate disasters.

The US Centre for Disease Control estimates that roughly 1-in-6 Americans – or 48 million people – fall ill from contaminated food each year, leading to 128,000 hospital cases and 3,000 deaths.

Greece continues to experience an unprecedented surge in tourism, with predictions that it could be heading for record-shattering visitor numbers by the end of the year, near to or exceeding 48 million over the annual cycle. These figures are driven by major increases in arrivals from the EU, the UK, and the US, and Greece’s South Aegean and Ionian island regions have recorded the highest tourism saturation of any region in the EU.

The islands of Santorini, Rhodes and Kos are proving to be particularly popular, and the Ionian islands, which include Corfu and Zakynthos, are in second place when it comes to tourism saturation.

Trinity College Cambridge and the University of Cambridge are providing £48 million in the Trinity Cambridge Research Studentships (TCRS) programme, funding up to 300 fully supported PhD students over a decade.

About 48 million tons of plastic waste is generated in the US each year – and less than 10% of it is recycled.

About 48 million kangaroos live in Australia, outnumbering human residents by nearly two to one.

The Еuropeana online archive collection contains digitised versions of more than 48 million works of art that include thousands of photographs, paintings, books and other artefacts, collected from more than 100 museums and archives all over Europe.

48 million litres is equal to 13 Olympic-sized swimming pools or 64 million bottles of wine. French anti-fraud authorities uncovered a massive wine scam involving over 48 million litres of table wine falsely sold under prestigious regional labels like Côtes du Rhône and Châteauneuf-du-Pape between 2013 and 2016.

The Pan-American Highway is the world’s longest motorable road network. It spans roughly 48,000 km (48 million metres) from Prudhoe Bay in Alaska to the southern tip of Argentina. It crosses 14 countries, including Canada, the US and Mexico, and several in Central and South America, but the route is interrupted by the Darién Gap, a 160 km swampy jungle between Panama and Colombia with no paved road. 48 million minutes is equal to 91 years, 3 months, 28 days and 8 hours. In other words, if this blog was getting only one hit a minute, I would need to have been blogging since April or May 1935, more than four year before World War II began.

I retired from active parish ministry over four years ago, on 31 March 2022. These days, though, about 130-140 people on average are reading my daily prayer diary posted on this blog each morning, or up to 1,000 people each week.

This evening, once again, I am truly grateful to the real readers among those 48 million hits on this blog to date, and in particular I am thankful for the faithful core group of 150 or so people who join me in prayer, reading and reflections each day.

The blue-domed churches of Santorini in a poster in Milton Keynes … with predictions of 48 million or more tourists visiting Greece, islands like Santorini are suffering from tourism saturation (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 108, Monday 24 August 2026, Saint Bartholomew the Apostle

Damien Hirst’s sculpture of Saint Bartholomew, ‘Exquisite Pain’, in Saint Bartholomew the Great Church, Smithfield, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and this week began with the Twelfth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XII). The Church Calendar today celebrates the feast of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle (24 August).

Later today, I hope to take part in the choir rehearsals preparing for a funeral tomorrow in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford. 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.

Saint Bartholomew the Apostle … a statue on the west front of Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 22: 24-30 (NRSVA):

24 A dispute also arose among them as to which one of them was to be regarded as the greatest. 25 But he said to them, ‘The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. 26 But not so with you; rather the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves. 27 For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.

28 ‘You are those who have stood by me in my trials; 29 and I confer on you, just as my Father has conferred on me, a kingdom, 30 so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and you will sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.’

A statue of Saint Bartholomew above the south porch of Saint Bartholomew’s Church, Wednesbury (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflections:

The Church Calendar today celebrates Saint Bartholomew the Apostle (24 August). Exciting Holiness recalls that it has long been assumed that Bartholomew is the same as Nathanael, ‘though it is not a certainty’.

The gospels speak of Philip bringing Nathanael to Jesus, who calls him an Israelite worthy of the name. He is also present beside the Sea of Galilee at the resurrection. Although he seems initially a somewhat cynical man, he recognises Jesus for who he is and proclaims him as Son of God and King of Israel.

Bartholomew is listed among the Twelve in the three Synoptic Gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke, and in Acts of the Apostles. But, apart from the narrative about Nathanael, we are left with silence when it comes to the story of Saint Bartholomew.

One of my favourite walks in silence in the English countryside is along Cross in Hand Lane, which starts at the back of the Hedgehog Vintage Inn in Lichfield and leads to Farewell and Saint Bartholomew’s Church, on the northern fringes of Lichfield.

This walk along Cross in Hand Lane marks the beginning – or the end – of the pilgrim route between the shrine of Saint Chad in Lichfield and the shrine of Saint Werburgh in Chester Cathedral.

Today, this pilgrim route is marked out as the Two Saints’ Way. And little has changed in the landscape along this route since mediaeval times. The road twists and turns, rises and falls, with countryside that has changed little over the centuries.

At this time of the year, the fields are usually green and golden under the clear blue skies of summer. There are horses in paddocks here, or cows there, and most of the land is arable or being used for grazing.

Although farming patterns have changed in the last 30 or 40 years, these fields may not have changed in shape or altered in their use for centuries, and even the names on new-built houses can reflect names that date back to a period in the 12th to 14th century.

Apart from the occasional passing car or van, one other walker and one or two cyclists, the only hints of modernity are the overhead pylons, and until their demolition in recent years the smoking towers of the power station in Rugeley could be glimpsed in the distance.

This walk often offers me opportunities to clear out the cobwebs in the corners of my brain and (hopefully) my soul, and allows me time to enjoy this walk as this walk and as nothing more.

I have stopped to admire the shapes and patterns of the fields and the trees. I have stopped in silence at the babbling brook. I have stopped to look at Farewell Mill. The local historian Kate Gomez suggests the name has nothing to do with saying goodbye and points out that the alternative spelling of ‘Fairwell’ refers to a nearby ‘fair or clear spring.’

Often as priests, we think we should be filling the silent spaces in time with intense prayers and thoughts about sermons and services that need preparation. But sometimes we need to just let go and empty our minds, our thoughts – even our prayers. We take everything else to be recycled as we clear out spaces in our houses, our offices, our studies and our garden sheds. But we seldom give time to clearing out the clutter in our inner spiritual spaces, allowing them to benefit from recycling.

Silence is prayer in itself, on its own, alone.

A gate in the churchyard at Saint Bartholomew’s Church in Farewell, at the end of Cross in Hand Lane, on the northern fringes of Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 24 August 2026, Saint Bartholomew the Apostle):

In Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), the theme this week, from 23 to 29 August 2026 (pp 32-33), is ‘Legacies of History’. This theme was introduced yesterday with a reflection by the Revd Dr Rachele Evie Vernon O’Brien, a Jamaican-born theologian and advocate.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Monday 24 August 2026, Saint Bartholomew the Apostle) invites us to pray:

Lord of compassion, remember young people who feel let down by the Church. Draw them into communities where your love is shown in actions as well as words.

The Collect:

Almighty and everlasting God,
who gave to your apostle Bartholomew grace
truly to believe and to preach your word:
grant that your Church
may love that word which he believed
and may faithfully preach and receive the same;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

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

Saint Bartholomew’s Church, Farewell … at the end of a walk along Cross in Hand Lane from the Hedgehog Vintage Inn in Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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