Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 150, Monday 5 October 2026

An Orthodox icon of the Parable of the Good Samaritan, interpreting the parable according to Patristic and Orthodox traditions (Click on image for full-screen viewing)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and this week began with the Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XVIII, 4 October).

Before today begins, however, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, and 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 Good Samaritan … a stained glass window by Charles Eamer Kempe in Saint Andrew’s Church, Great Linford, Buckinghamshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 10: 25-37 (NRSVA):

25 Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ 26 He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ 27 He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.’ 28 And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’

29 But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbour?’ 30 Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan while travelling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.” 36 Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?’ 37 He said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.’

The Good Samaritan … a modern icon

Today’s Reflection:

We are all very familiar with the parable of the Good Samaritan, so familiar and so used to it that we are probably comfortable with the explanations and sermons we have heard over the years about this episode in today’s Gospel reading (Luke 10: 25-37), leaving very little to our own imaginations.

But the Early Fathers offered another interpretation of this parable.

The man who goes down from Jerusalem to Jericho is Adam, or humanity, or each and every one of us.

What does it mean that he goes down from Jerusalem to Jericho?

Jerusalem is the holy city of God, the place where God is served in worship and in public prayer. It is an impregnable stronghold, but it is located in a hill country, where the soil is stony and barren.

On the other hand, Jericho lies below the sea level in the Jordan Valley, in an area that is very fertile and rich in vegetation.

Jerusalem signifies the Divine Commandments. These commandments, like the walls of a city, limit us and our desires, but also create a safe living space where we can live unharmed by sin.

A man being seduced by earthly pleasures, represented by Jericho, goes out from Jerusalem, the stronghold of Divine Commandments. Here, we might think of Adam and Eve, leaving the Garden and going out into the world.

But the robbers control this way. Who are the robbers?

When people abandon God and seek pleasures in other places, the way of bodily desires first appears to be full of joy. But as time passes, indulging in passions becomes a heavy burden on the soul; in place of pleasure it becomes endless slavery. A man realises that he has lost his freedom and has become a captive of his passions. A soul blinded by passions and wounded by sin becomes incapable of any spiritual activity.

Before God, such a man is half-dead. On the way, the man has been stripped of his raiment, deprived of the raiment of virtues and of the cover of God’s grace and protection.

In this patristic approach to reading the parable, the robbers are demons who act through our own passions. The man wounded by robbers represents fallen humanity before the coming of Christ.

Who then were the Priest and Levite who saw the wounded man and passed by without providing him any help?

The Priest and the Levite are ministers of God. They represent the saints and prophets sent by God from the beginning of time.

Why then is it said that they passed by without helping that man?

Did they not fulfil the ministry of preaching?

Yes, they did. They came to that place, they stopped, they saw the man and they passed by. But wounded humanity remained lying on the road. Moses came and passed away, Elijah came and passed away, other prophets came and passed away, but the illness of humanity remained without being healed.

Only God who has created us can recreate us.

This is how Isaiah speaks on the incurable disease of the humanity:

Why do you seek further beatings?
Why do you continue to rebel?
The whole head is sick,
and the whole heart faint.
From the sole of the foot even to the head,
there is no soundness in it,
but bruises and sores
and bleeding wounds;
they have not been drained, or bound up,
or softened with oil. (Isaiah 1: 5-6)

Who then is the Samaritan who goes down on the same road?

The Samaritans were the descendants of Israelites and the nations who migrated to Palestine under Assyrian rule after the destruction of Jerusalem. They lived to the south of Judea, between Judea and Galilee. Samaritans believed in the One God of Israel and kept the Law of Moses, but they developed their own traditions. For the Jews, they were heretics, and so Jews kept their distance from Samaritans.

Why then does Christ represent himself as a Samaritan?

The Pharisees mockingly labelled Christ a Samaritan, saying, ‘Are we not right in saying that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?’ (John 8: 48).

Christ humbly attributes to himself the name given to him by his detractors.

In addition, Greek Orthodox hymns note a similarity between the phrases ‘from Samaria’ and ‘from Mary,’ for in Greek these phrases sound similar. (For example, the Samarian Gorge in Crete takes its name not from Samaria but from the abandoned village and church of Óssia María or Saint Mary).

The Samaritan, moved with compassion, approaches the wounded man. He binds his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them. The oil symbolises mercy and the wine the true teaching of God. Then he brings the man to an inn where he can be taken care of.

This Gospel readings says that the Good Samaritan ‘put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him.’ However, in traditional icons, Christ carries the man on his back. Christ in the incarnation takes on our human nature, our soul and body. That is why in the parable he ‘set him on his own beast,’ interpreted by the Early Fathers that Christ makes us members of his own body.

There is a similar image in the parable of the Lost Sheep (see Luke 15). The Good Shepherd left 99 sheep in the desert and went after the lost sheep, representing humanity. When he found the lost sheep, he put it on his shoulders, rejoicing.

The inn in this parable represents the Church. The innkeeper represents bishops and priests. Christ establishes his Church which, like an inn, accepts and provides shelter for all. The wounded man should stay here to be taken care of. The Samaritan has to leave, however. He takes out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper, saying: ‘Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.’

Christ indicates his second coming when he will come not to heal our infirmities, but to judge the living and the dead, and to reward each one according to his works.

The silver the Samaritan gives to the innkeeper is the divine grace Christ gives to the Church; it heals and saves souls through the sacraments. Bishops and priests, the ministers of the sacraments of the Church, are the distributors of God’s gifts. They offer to others what they have received: the sacraments and the teaching of Christ. Are they able to spend more? What can they add from themselves to the gift of the Divine Grace? Their labour, their cares, their zeal, which Christ shall recompense them on the day of the Last Judgment.

In this interpretation of the parable of the Good Samaritan, Christ offers himself as the prime example of mercy and compassion. Through his compassion, he takes on our sufferings and becomes the true neighbour of all fallen humanity.

This is a reading of this parable that connects with the assertion in the New Testament reading that God through Christ ‘has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom.

The Good Samaritan window in Saint George’s Church, Belfast (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 5 October 2026):

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, 4-10 October 2026 (pp 44-45), is ‘The Gun, The Sword, and The Bible’. This theme was introduced yesterday with a reflection by the Revd Les Isaac OBE, founder and President of Ascension Trust and co-founder of Street Pastors.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Monday 5 October 2026) invites us to pray:

Lord, give us courage to face the complexities of your Church’s history with honesty and humility. Help us to seek truth without fear and to grow in understanding and grace.

The Collect of the Day:

Almighty and everlasting God,
increase in us your gift of faith
that, forsaking what lies behind
and reaching out to that which is before,
we may run the way of your commandments
and win the crown of everlasting joy;
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:

We praise and thank you, O Christ, for this sacred feast:
for here we receive you,
here the memory of your passion is renewed,
here our minds are filled with grace,
and here a pledge of future glory is given,
when we shall feast at that table where you reign
with all your saints for ever.

Additional Collect:

God, our judge and saviour,
teach us to be open to your truth
and to trust in your love,
that we may live each day
with confidence in the salvation which is given
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

The Good Samaritan … a stained glass window in Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick (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

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)

Daily prayer in Lent 2026: 15, Wednesday 4 March 2026

‘Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?’ (Matthew 20: 22) … the altar in Saint Mary’s Church, Askeaton, Co Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Lent began two weeks ago on Ash Wednesday (18 February 2026), and this week began with the Second Sunday in Lent (Lent II, 1 March 2026). The Chinese New Year celebrations here in Kuching came to a dramatic finale yesterday with Chap Goh Mei. I am due to leave here tomorrow with flights first to Kuala Lumpur and from there through Muscat to Lonndon tomorrow. But as the situation in the Gulf changes by the hour I have no idea what is going to happen to my travel plans in the days to come.

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

1, reading today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘While Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside by themselves’ (Matthew 20: 17) … an icon of the Communion of the Apostles

Matthew 20: 17-28 (NRSVA):

17 While Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside by themselves, and said to them on the way, 18 ‘See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death; 19 then they will hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified; and on the third day he will be raised.’

20 Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came to him with her sons, and kneeling before him, she asked a favour of him. 21 And he said to her, ‘What do you want?’ She said to him, ‘Declare that these two sons of mine will sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom.’ 22 But Jesus answered, ‘You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?’ They said to him, ‘We are able.’ 23 He said to them, ‘You will indeed drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left, this is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.’

24 When the ten heard it, they were angry with the two brothers. 25 But Jesus called them to him and said, ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 26 It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave; 28 just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.’

The calling of James and John … a window in Saint George’s Church, Belfast (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflections:

Did James and John think initially that opting to follow Jesus, becoming disciples, was a good career move? Whenever I read today’s Gospel story (Matthew 20: 17-28), I think back to my childhood days. I remember all those preparations for football matches or beach cricket, as we lined up to pick sides. And how we all wanted to be among the first to be picked for a team.

Everyone wanted to be picked first, everyone wanted to line up there beside one of the two captains, no-one wanted to be picked last, even when there were enough places for everyone to get a game.

I can still see them: nine- or ten-year-old boys, jumping up and down on the grass, waving our hands or pointing at our chests, and pleading: ‘Me, me, please pick me, I’m your friend.’

Me, me, please pick me. And then when we were picked how we wanted the glory. Slow at passing the ball, in case I might not score the goal. Better to lose that ball in a tackle than to pass it to someone else and risk someone else scoring the winning goal. Or wanting to bat first, to in stay and refusing to accept that we had run out or caught.

And that’s who James and John remind me of: wanting to be picked first, wanting to be the first to line up beside the team captain, being glory seekers rather than team players.

No wonder the other ten were upset when they heard this. But they were upset, not because they wanted to take on the servant model of priesthood and ministry. They were upset not because James and John hadn’t yet grasped the point of it all. They were upset because they might have been counted out, because they might have missed out being on the first team, on the first XI.

And their upset actually turns to anger. Not the sort of candidates you’d like to meet at a selection conference.

And what did James and John want in reality? They wanted that one would sit on Christ’s right hand and the other on his left.

Now, even that might not have been too bad an ambition. The man who stood at the right hand of the Emperor in the Byzantine court was the Emperor’s voice. What he said was the emperor’s word. And so, in the creed, when we declare our belief that Christ sits at the right hand of the Father, we mean not that there is some heavenly couch on which all three are seated, comfy and cosy, as if waiting to watch their favourite television sit-com.

When we say that Christ ‘is seated at the right hand of the Father,’ we mean that Christ is the Word of God. In some way, I suppose, this is what Andrei Rublev was trying to convey in his icon of the Visitation of Abraham, his icon of the Holy Trinity in the Old Testament.

In that icon, the Father and the Spirit are seated to the right and left of the Son. Indeed, in that icon, Christ is wearing not the elaborate high-priestly stole of a bishop, but the simple stole of a deacon at the table.

For James and John to want to be seated at the right and left of Christ in his glory – not when they were sitting down to a snack, or travelling on the bus, or even at the Last Supper, but in the kingdom (verse 21) – they were was expressing an ambition to take the place of, to replace God.

But to be like God means to take on Christ’s humility. We are made in the image and likeness of God, and then God asks us, invites us to return to that image and likeness when Christ comes in our image and likeness – not as a Byzantine emperor or Roman tyrant, but just as one of us.

Are we willing to be like him in our discipleship? Christ asks us that this morning. Are we willing to drink the cup that he drinks (see verses 22-23)?

Of course James and John were. See how this hot-headed pair, the sons of Zebedee, went on to serve the community that shared in the one bread and the one cup, the community that is the Church, the community that in the shared meal is the Body of Christ.

James – not James the Brother of the Lord, but James the Great – was executed by the sword and became one of the first Christian martyrs (see Acts 12: 1-12). John too lived a life of service to the Church: he was exiled on Patmos, and although he died in old age in Ephesus, there were numerous attempts to make him a martyr. And, of course, he gave his name to in the Johannine writings in the New Testament.

Martyrdom comes in many forms. In essence the word means witness. But the first step in martyrdom is dying to self, to self-ambition, to self-seeking, to self-serving. Your life must be a life that is testimony to your most cherished beliefs, testimony to Christ himself.

We love our titles as Anglicans – canon, archdeacon, prebendary, dean – and stand firmly on our dignity, and even on our dignitaries if they get in our way. But ministry is not about career with good prospects. There is nothing wrong with anyone wanting to be a bishop. There is something wrong if that becomes a career goal.

For ‘the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many’ (Matthew 20: 28).

In Andrei Rublev’s icon of the Holy Trinity, the Christ-figure is wearing a simple deacon’s stole, and is seated with the Father and the Holy Spirit to his left and to his right

Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 4 March 2026):

The theme this week (1-7 March 2026) in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is: ‘Saint David’s Day’ (pp 34-35). This theme was introduced on Sunday with Reflections by the Revd Sarah Rosser, Team Vicar in the Netherwent Ministry Area, Diocese of Monmouth, Church in Wales.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Wednesday 4 March 2026) invites us to pray:

We pray for the world: for peace where there is war, hope where there is poverty, healing where there is illness. Guide leaders with wisdom and reconcile divisions within our own communities.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
you show to those who are in error the light of your truth,
that they may return to the way of righteousness:
grant to all those who are admitted
into the fellowship of Christ’s religion,
that they may reject those things
that are contrary to their profession,
and follow all such things as are agreeable to the same;
through our Lord Jesus Christ,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

Almighty God,
you see that we have no power of ourselves to help ourselves:
keep us both outwardly in our bodies,
and inwardly in our souls;
that we may be defended from all adversities
which may happen to the body,
and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Almighty God,
by the prayer and discipline of Lent
may we enter into the mystery of Christ’s sufferings,
and by following in his Way
come to share in his glory;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many’ (Matthew 20: 28) … a crucifixion icon by Hanna-Leena Ward in her exhibition in Lichfield Cathedral last month (Photograph: 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

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 147, Monday 6 October 2025

An Orthodox icon of the Parable of the Good Samaritan, interpreting the parable according to Patristic and Orthodox traditions (Click on image for full-screen viewing)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and this week began with the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XVI, 5 October). The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers William Tyndale (1494-1536), Translator of the Scriptures and Reformation Martyr.

In the Jewish calendar, Sukkot begins at sunset this evening (6 October) and conrtinues until nightfall next Monday (13 October). Sukkot is also known as the ‘Festival of Tabernacles’ or the ‘Feast of Booths,’ and it is one of the three central pilgrimage festivals in Judaism, alongside Passover and Shavuot. It is traditional in Jewish families and homes to mark this festival by building a sukkah or a temporary hut to stay over in during the holiday.

I hope to join other clergy in the Milton Keynes area for breakfast later this morning. Before today begins, however, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, and 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 Good Samaritan … a stained glass window by Charles Eamer Kempe in Saint Andrew’s Church, Great Linford, Buckinghamshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 10: 25-37 (NRSVA):

25 Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ 26 He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ 27 He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.’ 28 And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’

29 But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbour?’ 30 Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan while travelling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.” 36 Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?’ 37 He said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.’

The Good Samaritan … a modern icon

Today’s Reflection:

We are all very familiar with the parable of the Good Samaritan, so familiar and so used to it that we are probably comfortable with the explanations and sermons we have heard over the years about this episode in today’s Gospel reading (Luke 10: 25-37), leaving very little to our own imaginations.

But the Early Fathers offered another interpretation of this parable.

The man who goes down from Jerusalem to Jericho is Adam, or humanity, or each and every one of us.

What does it mean that he goes down from Jerusalem to Jericho?

Jerusalem is the holy city of God, the place where God is served in worship and in public prayer. It is an impregnable stronghold, but it is located in a hill country, where the soil is stony and barren.

On the other hand, Jericho lies below the sea level in the Jordan Valley, in an area that is very fertile and rich in vegetation.

Jerusalem signifies the Divine Commandments. These commandments, like the walls of a city, limit us and our desires, but also create a safe living space where we can live unharmed by sin.

A man being seduced by earthly pleasures, represented by Jericho, goes out from Jerusalem, the stronghold of Divine Commandments. Here, we might think of Adam and Eve, leaving the Garden and going out into the world.

But the robbers control this way. Who are the robbers?

When people abandon God and seek pleasures in other places, the way of bodily desires first appears to be full of joy. But as time passes, indulging in passions becomes a heavy burden on the soul; in place of pleasure it becomes endless slavery. A man realises that he has lost his freedom and has become a captive of his passions. A soul blinded by passions and wounded by sin becomes incapable of any spiritual activity.

Before God, such a man is half-dead. On the way, the man has been stripped of his raiment, deprived of the raiment of virtues and of the cover of God’s grace and protection.

In this patristic approach to reading the parable, the robbers are demons who act through our own passions. The man wounded by robbers represents fallen humanity before the coming of Christ.

Who then were the Priest and Levite who saw the wounded man and passed by without providing him any help?

The Priest and the Levite are ministers of God. They represent the saints and prophets sent by God from the beginning of time.

Why then is it said that they passed by without helping that man?

Did they not fulfil the ministry of preaching?

Yes, they did. They came to that place, they stopped, they saw the man and they passed by. But wounded humanity remained lying on the road. Moses came and passed away, Elijah came and passed away, other prophets came and passed away, but the illness of humanity remained without being healed.

Only God who has created us can recreate us.

This is how Isaiah speaks on the incurable disease of the humanity:

Why do you seek further beatings?
Why do you continue to rebel?
The whole head is sick,
and the whole heart faint.
From the sole of the foot even to the head,
there is no soundness in it,
but bruises and sores
and bleeding wounds;
they have not been drained, or bound up,
or softened with oil. (Isaiah 1: 5-6)

Who then is the Samaritan who goes down on the same road?

The Samaritans were the descendants of Israelites and the nations who migrated to Palestine under Assyrian rule after the destruction of Jerusalem. They lived to the south of Judea, between Judea and Galilee. Samaritans believed in the One God of Israel and kept the Law of Moses, but they developed their own traditions. For the Jews, they were heretics, and so Jews kept their distance from Samaritans.

Why then does Christ represent himself as a Samaritan?

The Pharisees mockingly labelled Christ a Samaritan, saying, ‘Are we not right in saying that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?’ (John 8: 48).

Christ humbly attributes to himself the name given to him by his detractors.

In addition, Greek Orthodox hymns note a similarity between the phrases ‘from Samaria’ and ‘from Mary,’ for in Greek these phrases sound similar. (For example, the Samarian Gorge in Crete takes its name not from Samaria but from the abandoned village and church of Óssia María or Saint Mary).

The Samaritan, moved with compassion, approaches the wounded man. He binds his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them. The oil symbolises mercy and the wine the true teaching of God. Then he brings the man to an inn where he can be taken care of.

This Gospel readings says that the Good Samaritan ‘put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him.’ However, in traditional icons, Christ carries the man on his back. Christ in the incarnation takes on our human nature, our soul and body. That is why in the parable he ‘set him on his own beast,’ interpreted by the Early Fathers that Christ makes us members of his own body.

There is a similar image in the parable of the Lost Sheep (see Luke 15). The Good Shepherd left 99 sheep in the desert and went after the lost sheep, representing humanity. When he found the lost sheep, he put it on his shoulders, rejoicing.

The inn in this parable represents the Church. The innkeeper represents bishops and priests. Christ establishes his Church which, like an inn, accepts and provides shelter for all. The wounded man should stay here to be taken care of. The Samaritan has to leave, however. He takes out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper, saying: ‘Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.’

Christ indicates his second coming when he will come not to heal our infirmities, but to judge the living and the dead, and to reward each one according to his works.

The silver the Samaritan gives to the innkeeper is the divine grace Christ gives to the Church; it heals and saves souls through the sacraments. Bishops and priests, the ministers of the sacraments of the Church, are the distributors of God’s gifts. They offer to others what they have received: the sacraments and the teaching of Christ. Are they able to spend more? What can they add from themselves to the gift of the Divine Grace? Their labour, their cares, their zeal, which Christ shall recompense them on the day of the Last Judgment.

In this interpretation of the parable of the Good Samaritan, Christ offers himself as the prime example of mercy and compassion. Through his compassion, he takes on our sufferings and becomes the true neighbour of all fallen humanity.

This is a reading of this parable that connects with the assertion in the New Testament reading that God through Christ ‘has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom.

The Good Samaritan window in Saint George’s Church, Belfast (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 6 October 2025):

The theme this week (5 to 11 October) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Disability inclusion in Zimbabwe’ (pp 44-45). This theme was introduced yesterday with Reflections from Makomborero Bowa, Lecturer in the Department of Philosophy Religion and Ethics in the University of Zimbabwe.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Monday 6 October 2025) invites us to pray:

Lord, forgive us for when we have mistreated others. Help us to rejoice that you have made all people in your image.

The Collect:

Lord, give to your people grace to hear and keep your word
that, after the example of your servant William Tyndale,
we may not only profess your gospel
but also be ready to suffer and die for it,
to the honour of your name;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

God our redeemer,
whose Church was strengthened by the blood of your martyr William Tyndale:
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 reflection

Continued tomorrow

The Good Samaritan … a stained glass window in Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick (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

$16.5 million in bribes, 16.5 million refugees, 16.5 million tourists and 16.5 million readers

There are 16.5 million people of Italian ancestry living in the US (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This blog continues to reach more and more readers, and for the second time this month it has passed a half-million marker, reaching the staggering total earlier yesterday of 16.5 million hits since I first began blogging back in 2010.

I almost missed the significance of the 16 million figure which was passed two weeks ago (6 September) while I was on a weekend visit to York and Durham. Since then, there has been another half a million hits in the space of a fortnight.

After I began blogging in 2010, it took almost two years until July 2012 to reach half a million readers. It was over a year before this figure rose to 1 million by September 2013. It climbed steadily to 2 million, June 2015; 3 million, October 2016; 4 million, November 2019; 5 million, March 2021; 6 million, July 2022; 7 million, 13 August 2023; 8 million, April 2024; and 9 million, October 2024.

But the rise in the number of readers has been phenomenal this year, reaching 9.5 million on 4 January 2025, 10 million over a week later (12 January 2025), 10.5 million two days after that (14 January 2025), 11 million a month later (12 February 2025), 11.5 million a month after that (10 March 2025), and 12 million early in May (3 May 2025).

The figures claimed steadily throughout June, July and August, from 12.5 million early in June (6 June 2025), 13 million less than two weeks later (17 June 2025), 13.5 million a week after that (24 June 2025), 14 million a week later (1 July 2025), 14.5 million ten days later (11 July), 15 million two weeks after that (25 July 2025), 15.5 million less than a month later (23 August 2025), then 16 million earlier this month (6 September 2025), and 16.5 million in the early hours of Friday (19 September 2025), hours before I had awoken.

So far this month, this blog has had almost 830,000 hits by noon today, and it looks like having over 1 million hits by the end of the month for the fourth time.

In July, for a third time, this blog had more than a million hits in a single month, with 1,195,456 hits in July; June 2025 was the second month that this blog had more than 1 million hits in one month, with 1,618,488 hits by the end of that month. These figures follow January’s record of 1 million hits by the early hours of 14 January, and a total of 1,420,383 by the end of that month (31 January 2025).

So far this year, the daily figures have been overwhelming on occasions. Seven of the 12 days of busiest traffic on this blog were in June, four were in January, and one was in July:

• 289,076 (11 January 2025)
• 285,366 (12 January 2025)
• 261,422 (13 January 2025)
• 100,291 (10 January 2025)
• 82,043 (23 June 2025)
• 81,037 (21 June 2025)

• 80,625 (22 June 2025)
• 79,981 (19 June 2025)
• 79,165 (20 June 2025)
• 69,722 (18 June 2025)
• 69,714 (30 June 2025)
• 69,657 (1 July 2025)

This blog has already had over 7.1 million hits this year, over 44 per cent of all hits ever.

Queen’s University Belfast … tourism visits to Northern Ireland have doubled and are now put at 16.5 million a year (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

With this latest landmark figure of 16.5 million hits this week, I once again found myself asking questions such as:

• What do 16.5 million people look like?
• Where do we find 16.5 million people?
• What does £16.5 million, €16.5 million or $16.5 million mean?
• What would it buy?

The UN Resident Coordinator and Humanitarian Coordinator in Syria, Dr Adam Abdelmoula, said earlier this month that about 16.5 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance in Syria. He added that more than 6 million Syrians remain internally displaced, while more than 6 million others live as refugees around the world. He noted that about 24% of the country’s housing stock has been damaged or destroyed in recent years. The number who ever get to the UK is tiny within the overall, overwhelming enormity of this dire situation.

The overall population of the city of Lagos in Nigeria was estimated at 16.5 million last year (2024).

There are 16.5 million people of Italian ancestry living in the US.

An oft-quoted statistic says 16.5 million tourists visit Greece each year, more than the country’s entire population. But the actual figure for tourists in Greece each year is now almost double that, with over 30 million visitors a year.

Tourism visits to Northern Ireland have doubled since the Good Friday Agreement from 7.5 million in 1998 to 16.5 million.

China Eastern Airlines and its subsidiaries Shanghai Airlines and China United Airlines carried almost 16.5 million passengers during the annual Spring Festival travel rush last year.

The Irish tech founder Niall Crosby left a will valued at €16.5 million after he died in a helicopter accident last year (July 2024).

Oxfam GB put 265 jobs at risk of redundancy earlier this year after it faced a forecast £16.5 million deficit in unrestricted funds.

When Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort went on trial on tax and bank fraud charges, it was revealed he had $16.5 million in unreported taxable business income between 2010 and 2014. The US Internal Revenue Service revealed in court how Manafort’s unreported income included foreign wire transfers to US vendors like landscapers and clothiers, wire transfers to buy property, and income improperly reclassified as loans.

Manafort was jailed twice on multiple charges – and he was then promptly pardoned by Donald Trump.

Stephen Calk, former chair and CEO of the Federal Savings Bank, was an economic adviser to Trump during the 2016 presidential election campaign. He was jailed in 2022 for bribing Paul Manafort with $16.5 million in high-risk loans ‘to try and buy himself prestige and power.’ Calk was convicted of financial institution bribery and conspiracy to commit financial institution bribery.

A Reuters report last year revealed that Timothy Mellon, heir of the Pittsburgh-based Mellon banking family, had given the pro-Trump MAGA Inc at least $16.5 million since 2022. He also gave at least $20 million to the pro-Trump America First Action Inc during the 2020 presidential election.

So, 16.5 million buys a lot of votes and a lot of influence, and seems to even buy a way out of jail for some people.

Once again, this blog has reached another humbling statistic and a sobering figure, and once more I am left with a feeling of gratitude to all who read and support this blog and my writing.

A continuing and warming figure in the midst of all these statistics continues to be the one that shows my morning prayer diary reaches up to 80-85 people each day. It is 3½ years now since I retired from active parish ministry. But I think many of my priest-colleagues would be prayerfully thankful if the congregations in their churches averaged or totalled 560 to 580 people a week.

Today, I am very grateful to all 16.5 million readers of this blog to date, and in particular I am grateful for the small and faithful core group among you who join me in prayer, reading and reflection each morning.

It is often said Greece has 16.5 million tourists, but the numbers are now almost double that (Photograph Patrick Comerford)

Finding Irish links and links with CS Lewis in a plaque in the cloisters in Durham Cathedral

The monument to Archdeacon George Hans Hamilton in the cloisters in Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

As I was walking through the cloisters in Durham Cathedral during my recent visit, I noticed a plaque commemorating George Hans Hamilton (1823-1903), who was Archdeacon of Lindisfarne (1865-1882), Archdeacon of Northumberland (1882-1905), and a Canon of Durham Cathedral.

The plaque caught my attention because his name indicated and the fading coat-of-arms on the memorial indicated, to me at least, not only that Archdeacon Hamilton was Irish but that he was part of the Hamilton family who are closely identified with both Balbriggan and Skerries in north Co Dublin.

I have been familiar with both towns since my schooldays, until recently I regularly went for walks on the beach in Skerries, and I often did Sunday duty in Holmpatrick Church, Skerries, and Saint George’s Church, Balbriggan.

There is a large monument to one branch of the Hamilton family in the centre of Skerries, and some memorial tablets from an older church that have survived in the new church when it was being built in the 1860s.

One curious monument to the memory of James Hamilton of Sheepshill and Holmpatrick reads in part: ‘A gentleman who during a long and most active life displayed that zealous energy and ingenious integrity that forms a useful and virtuous man … He died the 20th of October 1800, in the 73rd year of his age … Of the uncommonly numerous offspring of thirty six children he was survived by eight sons and eight daughters.’

James Hamilton’s descendants include Richard Branson. However, with 36 children born over 200 years ago, Hamilton must be the ancestor of thousands upon thousands of people today. But … 36 children? A most active life that displayed zealous energy indeed! Useful and virtuous? What about his poor wife or wives?

Archdeacon Hamilton, on the other hand, is directly related to the Balrothery and Balbriggan branch of the Hamilton family, and my search for his family background led to the discovery that he was also related to interesting Irish literary figures too.

The future archdeacon was born on 21 January 1823, the third son of Henry Hamilton (1780-1854) of Tullylish, Co Down, and a grandson of Hugh Hamilton (1729-1805), Bishop of Clonfert and Kilmacduagh (1795-1799) and then Bishop of Ossory (1799-1805).

Bishop Hugh Hamilton was born in Balrothery, near Balbriggan, Co Dublin, in 1725. He was an older brother of Judge George Hamilton (1732-1793) of Hampton, Balrothery, who was MP for Belfast and a Baron of the Exchequer. Judge Hamilton is remembered mainly for developing the town of Balbriggan. As part of the development of Balbriggan, he sold the Lower Mill to the business of Comerford and O’Brien in Balbriggan in the early 1780s. His son, the Revd George Hamilton built Saint George’s Church, Balbriggan, in 1813.

The most elaborate memorial in Saint George’s Church recalls George Alexander Hamilton, who died on 17 September 1871. His wife Amelia Fancourt Hamilton is remembered on a similar memorial that says: ‘Her clothing and coal clubs were for many years a great benefit to the poor of this neighbourhood.’ It also mentions that she set up an infant school in 1836 at Hampton Gates.

The elaborate memorial to George Alexander Hamilton, who died in 1871 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Hamiltons were a clerical family with seemingly innumerable priests in the Church of Ireland. Bishop Hamilton was a Professor of Philosophy in Trinity College Dublin, Vicar of Saint Ann’s, Dublin, and Dean of Armagh before he became a bishop. Three of his sons were priests: Hans Hamilton of Knocktopher, Co Kilkenny, who fled Co Kilkenny during the ‘Tithe War’ in the 1830s; George Hamilton (1783-1830), of Killemogh, Co Laois, a Biblical scholar; and the Revd Hugh Hamilton (1790-1865) of Innishmacsaint, Co Fermanagh.

Another son of Bishop Hamilton, Henry Hamilton (1780-1854), grew up in Dublin, but lived much of his life in Tullylish, Co Down. As well as the archdeacon who is commemorated in Durham Cathedral, Henry Hamilton was the father of two other priests: the Revd Hugh Hamilton (1811-1884) of Dublin, and Canon William Alfred Hamilton (1824-1897), Rector of Taney, Dundrum, Co Dublin. His daughter Sarah was a doctor’s wife who lived in the family home, Hampton Hall, Balbriggan; her son, the Revd Rowland Scriven (1859-1944), was a curate in Balbriggan from 1898 until 1920, when he moved to England.

The Hamilton family was intermarried with many of the great literary figures in Ireland, and both John Millington Synge and CS Lewis are direct descendants of Bishop Hamilton.

Archdeacon George Hans Hamilton was a first cousin of the Revd Thomas Robert Hamilton, the first Rector of Saint Mark’s, Dundela, in Belfast, and the grandfather of CS Lewis.

In the cloisters in Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The future archdeacon, George Hans Hamilton, was born on 21 January 1823, He was educated at Shrewsbury School and Trinity College, Dublin and was ordained in 1847.

After a time as a curate in Sunderland he became chaplain of Durham Prison and then Vicar of Berwick. He was chaplain to the High Sheriff of Durham in 1884.

Hamilton first married Arabella Sarah (Bella) Best on 9 May 1848. Her father John Best (1791-1825) was an accountant with the East India Company in Bombay; her mother Arabella née Robinson (1795-1855) was from Sunderland. Best seems to have spent much of his time travelling between Bombay and Sunderland. When he died in Bombay at the age of 33, he left a pregnant widow in India with four other children under the age of 10.

Bella Hamilton died in January 1868. She was the mother of two sons and a daughter: Hans Alfred Hamilton (born 1849), who seems to have been the ‘black sheep’ of the family; and Henry (Harry) Best Hans Hamilton (1850-1935); and Eliza Arabella Sarah (1858-1919), known as Ella.

Soon after Bella’s death, Hamilton married his second wife Lady Louisa Frances Clements (1843-1939) in 1869. She was a sister of Robert Bermingham Clements (1847-1892), 4th Earl of Leitrim. The couple were the parents of another daughter and three more sons: George Francis Clements Hamilton (1870-1900); Robert Charles Clements Hamilton (1871-1901), a refrigeration engineer, who was killed in an explosion on the first refrigerated ship bringing bananas to Britain from the West Indies; Sir Collingwood George Clements Hamilton (1877-1947), an electrical engineer and Conservative politician; and Louisa Lindisfarne Clements (Hamilton) Maitland (1878-1952).

Hamilton was a great advocate of prison reform. His character was drawn upon by Charles Reade in It Is Never Too Late to Mend (1856). He was Archdeacon of Lindisfarne (1865-1882), Archdeacon of Northumberland (1882-1905), and a canon of Durham Cathedral. He died on 23 September 1905 – he was 80 and still in office; his widow, Lady Louisa Hamilton, died on 31 August 1939.

As for Archdeacon Hamilton’s first cousin, the Revd Thomas Hamilton, he baptised his grandson, Clive Staples Lewis, in Saint Mark’s Church, Dundela, on 29 January 1899.

A portrait in Saint Mark’s Church, Dundela, of the Revd Thomas Hamilton, grandfather of CS Lewis (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The former Belfast Bank in Rathmines has moved from a ‘Quid’ in the Psalms to making the best dough

The former Belfast Bank, now Reggie’s Pizzeria on Rathmines Road Lower, was designed by Vincent Craig (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

The former Belfast Bank at 221-223 Rathmines Road Lower is now Reggie’s Pizzeria and is one of the interesting buildings in Rathmines that I looked at last week, along with the former YMCA building on Lower Rathmines Road, close to Portobello Road, nearby Kensington Lodge on Grove Park, and the former Kodak building.

The former Belfast Bank in Rathmines is a small building in a Scottish Baronial style, with a sharp corner and a corner turret. Despite its size, it is very noticeable for the narrow façade that creates an optical illusion, for its individual features, and because of its prominent location on a busy corner where Rathmines Road Lower meets Rathgar Road and Rathmines Road Upper.

The side street is Wynnefield Road, and many people also know the building because of its location beside Slattery’s public house.

The narrow façade at the junction of Rathmines Road, Wynnefield Road and Rathgar Road creates an optical illusion (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Belfast Bank was formed in 1827 by a merger of two private banks, Batt’s, also known as the Belfast Bank, and Tennant’s, also known as the Commercial Bank. The bank moved in 1846 to the former Assembly Buildings at the corner of North Street, Bridge Street, Waring Street and Donegall Street. Within decades, the bank was trading in branches throughout the northern half of Ireland.

The Belfast Bank had a New York branch by the 1860s, but it did not establish a branch in Dublin until 1892, when temporary premises were acquired in Dame Street. A purpose-built branch at 21-22 College Green was designed by William Henry Lynn and was built in 1893-1894.

The Belfast Bank in Rathmines was the second branch in Dublin, and a third branch in Dublin at 86 Talbot Street was designed by Frederick George Hicks and built in 1900. The branch building in Rathmines was designed by the Belfast architect Vincent Craig (1869-1925), whose work included clubhouses for yacht and golf clubs, Presbyterian churches, hospitals, banks for the Belfast Bank and the Ulster Bank, and masonic halls.

Craig was born at Craigavon, Strandtown, Belfast, in 1869, one of seven sons of James Craig, a wealthy whiskey distiller, and a younger brother of James Craig (1871-1940), later Lord Craigavon and first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland.

Vincent Criag was educated at Bath College and received his architectural training in the office of William Henry Lynn from 1885 to 1889. He then spent a year travelling in Europe before setting up in practice in Belfast in 1891.

He was a member of the Royal Institute of the Architects in Ireland, and was elected a fellow (FRIAI) in 29 May 1906. He was also a fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (FRIBA, 1900). His pupils and assistants included John Charles Lepper, Arthur Norman McClinton and Jackson Graham Smyth. He exhibited drawings of three of his designs in the Irish International Exhibition in Dublin in 1907.

Craig was a keen yachtsman and motorist, and also a generous benefactor of hospitals. He represented Court Ward on Belfast City Council in 1903-1906, and he was president of the Belfast Art Society in 1903.

He worked from 5 Lombard Street, Belfast, and 22 Donegall Place, and lived at Eldon Green, Helen’s Bay, Co Down, which he designed for himself. He moved to England in 1910, retired from his architectural practice soon after, and lived in retirement at High Close, Wokingham, Berkshire.

The former bank is in a Scottish baronial style, with a sharp corner and a corner turret (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Craig’s bank in Rathmines was built between 1899 and 1900 for the Belfast Bank. Tenders were invited in September 1899 and the building was ‘nearly complete’ by mid-July 1900.

The site was once part of the Chains. A fading photograph in Slattery’s beside the former bank tells how the Chains were one of the worst slums in late Victorian Rathmines. According to Weston St John Joyce in The Neighbourhood of Dublin (1912), the Chains were a number of dilapidated shanties enclosed by chains hung from stone pillars. They had become ‘an unsightly and insanitary slum’ until they were cleared to make the site for a new bank.

The corner is marked by a tower, topped by a finial and cut into at the base to make the entrance. The curve to the castellation is picked up on the apex of the gable, and the little peaks on the slope look even more like cake decoration when you follow the line down into the fussy scrolled base.

The terracotta plaque with the coat of arms of Belfast and the motto ‘Pro tanto quid retribuamus’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

On the Wynnefield Road elevation, a terracotta plaque set into the wall displays the coat of arms of Belfast with the motto Pro tanto quid retribuamus (‘What return shall we make for so much?’). It is a paraphrase of Psalm 116: 12 in the Vulgate translation, which reads ‘Quid retribuam Domino pro omnibus quae retribuit mihi?’

My childish sense of humour could not resist being amused by a Latin motto on a bank building that includes the word Quid.

On this façade, the chimney’s descent stops nearly in line with the top of the door, and it is an additional tension, a feat of brinksmanship with the visual weight as well as a clear marker of the asymmetry of the two façades. The break happens within the entrance, too, with the columns holding nothing and the pointed brackets above hanging like stalactites.

Sitting on the string course are two stone figures that look like lions bearing shields with the initials BB for Belfast Bank. The doors have panels and panes of stained glass.

Two stone figures that look like lions bear holdshields with the initials BB for Belfast Bank (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

In the aftermath of the 1916 Rising, the Belfast Bank merged with the London City & Midland Bank in 1917, the first entry into the Irish market by an English bank. After partition, the Belfast Bank decided to operate only in what became Northern Ireland. Following secret negotiations, the business in what had become the Irish Free State was transferred to the Royal Bank of Ireland in 1923, along with 20 branches and their staff.

The bank in Rathmines was more recently the premises of the Trustee Savings Bank/TSB Bank, and then the offices of a recruitment agency. It is now Reggie’s Pizzeria, which was opened in December 2024 by Reggie White, his wife Amy and their daughter Florence, who live nearby.

He has been described by the The Irish Times as ‘Ireland’s pizzaiolo-in-chief.’ He has trained Ballymaloe, and had stints at Del Popolo and Flour+Water in San Francisco. He returned to Dublin, co-founded Pi on George’s Street, and then made his name consulting for some of Ireland’s best-known pizza spots, including Little Forest, Bambino and Otto. With ten of his friends, including James Lowe, quietly backing 20 per cent, he opened Reggie’s in Rathmines shortly before last Christmas.

Once again, my childish sense of humour could not resist being amused by the thought that a former bank that exalted the word Quid is now making some of the best dough in Dublin.

As for the Belfast Bank, its businesses in Northern Ireland eventually merged with the Northern Bank, which began trading in 1824. Both were acquired by the Midland Bank, the integration was completed in 1970, and Northern Bank continued to trade throughout the whole of Ireland. The Midland Bank eventually sold the Northern Bank to the National Australia Bank, which later transferred ownership to Danske Bank.

Many of the former Belfast Bank buildings in Northern Ireland have been sold on to other businesses. But the name of ‘Belfast Bank’ continues to adorn a few of the old buildings, including those in Portrush, Rathfriland and Warrenpoint, as well as the former bank building on that narrow corner on Lower Rathmines Road.

For the former National Bank and Bank of Ireland branch at Lower Rathmines Road, see here

Inside Reggie's Pizzeria in the former Belfast Bank on Rathmines Road Lower (Photograph © Bryan O’Brien, The Irish Times, 2025)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 65, Sunday 13 July 2025, Fourth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity IV)

‘You shall love … your neighbour as yourself’ (Luke 10: 26). But who is my neighbour? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and today is the Fourth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity IV, 13 July 2025). In the Calendar of the Orthodox Church today is also the Sunday of the Holy Fathers of the Fourth Ecumenical Council. The Council of Chalcedon in 451 CE defined the doctrine of the hypostatic union, clarifying the relationship between the divine and human natures of Christ.

I am still feeling sore and very sorry for myself after Friday’s surgical procedure in Oxford, but I am hoping to attend the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford, later this morning. But, before I make any decisions about what to do, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

The Good Samaritan … a stained glass window in Saint Michael’s Church, Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 10: 25-37 (NRSVA):

25 Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ 26 He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ 27 He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.’

28 And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’

29 But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbour?’ 30 Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan while travelling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.” 36 Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?’ 37 He said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.’

An Orthodox icon of the Parable of the Good Samaritan, interpreting the parable according to the Patristic and Orthodox tradition (click on image for full-screen viewing)

Today’s Reflection:

The Lectionary readings this year [2025 Year C] are inviting us to work our way through Saint Luke’s Gospel, which is full of healing stories and parables.

Most of us are familiar – or think we are familiar with – these great parables:

• the rich man with his barns who wants to ‘eat, drink and be merry’ (Luke 12: 13-21, 3 August 2025)
• the thief in the night (Luke 12: 32-40, 10 August 2025)
• the guests at the wedding banquet (Luke 14: 1, 7-14, 31 August 2025)
• the lost sheep and the lost coin (Luke 15: 1-10, 14 September 2025)
• the Prodigal Son (Luke 15: 11-32, 30 March 2025)
• the unjust steward (Luke 16: 1-13, 21 September 2025)
• Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16: 19-31, 28 September 2025)
• the widow who nags and nags at the judge (Luke 18: 1-8, 19 October 2025)
• the Pharisee and the tax-collector (Luke 18: 9-14, 26 October 2019).

Regular churchgoers are so familiar with these parables, we know who to identify with, who is being chided, what the lesson is, and what to expect in the sermon.

Or do we?

The story of the Parable of the Good Samaritan, which we read this morning, is so familiar to all of us that we all know how to use the term Samaritan … well, don’t we?

A Good Samaritan is someone who comes to our aid in time of need, who goes over and beyond the demands of duty, a good listener, a good neighbour, a giver, a helping hand …

In conversations, I sometimes identify my own Good Samaritans in the world today. I think of Francesca Albanese, the UN Rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza, who is vocal about the plight of people in Gaza. The Trump regime has imposed sanctions on her for investigating abuses of human rights in the Palestinian Territories, but nominations for her to receive the Nobel Peace Prize are gaining momentum. There is Carola Rackete, the German sea captain who defied Italy’s ban on migrant rescue ships some years ago by forcing her way into the port of Lampedusa with 42 migrants rescued at sea. Or the ordinary, everday people everyday people throughout the US every day who try to masked and unnamed ICE and Homeland Security agents from breaking up families in their homes, in the courtrooms and on the streets.

There are countless Good Samaritans across the US today, trying to stop ICE and Homeland Security from breaking up families and taking away migrants, immigrants, students, tourists … neighbours.

In an extraordinary move, the Bishop of San Bernardino has dispensed or freed a person from the obligation to attend Masses on Sunday and Holy Days of Obligation if the person fears ICE. Bishop Alberto Rojas says that he is guided by the desire to extend pastoral care to all in his diocese, particularly those who ‘face fear and hardship’. It is a vivid reminder that even churches are no longer considered safe places.

The one who shows mercy is the good neighbour.

But there are other characters, other dramatis personæ, in this parable too … who would identify with the man who has been beaten up and left by the road?

We all pretend we have not but probably have met characters who might easily be in that band of robbers.

I should worry that people might compare me less with the Good Samaritan and more with the priest and the Levite hurrying and scurrying to the Temple, two men who might well have made very good and upright deans and canons today.

How many of us would identify with the innkeeper, worried about somebody who is going to make a mess of one of the last rooms left available at a busy time of holidays and pilgrimages?

How many of us, instead, would identify with the man who has been beaten up and left half dead on the side of the road?

How often have I been beaten up on the pathway through life?

Beaten up by family rows and divisions?

Beaten up by depression, anxiety and low self-esteem?

Beaten up by job loss or finding it difficult to find meaning in life?

Beaten up by rejection in love, in friendship, by bullies, in employment?

Beaten up by ill-health, physical and psychological, when people pass by and think I ought to pull myself up by own bootstraps?

Beaten up by addictions that other people think are my own fault, so they pass me by on the other side of the road?

Well that man brought it all on himself, didn’t he, straying off the straight and narrow, instead of keeping focussed on the holy city, the Jerusalem of this parable, turning his face towards Jericho, the oldest city in the world, representing every city with its fleshpots and decadence?

There is another way of reading this parable, however. It is the way it was read by the early Fathers of the Church, a way of reading it for almost 1,500 years, a way that it is still read in the Orthodox Church.

The man who goes down from Jerusalem to Jericho is Adam, or humanity, each and every one of us.

Jerusalem is the holy city of God, but also symbolises God’s future plans for us.

Jericho, the oldest city the world, symbolises the oldest earthly pleasures.

On the way, the man loses his freedom, becomes captive to his passions, wounded by sin, so incapable of prayer and worship that on the road of life he has become spiritually half-dead, stripped of his virtues, left without the cover of God’s grace and protection.

The man wounded by robbers represents fallen humanity before the coming of Christ.

The Priest and the Levite, ministers of God, represent the saints and prophets sent by God from the beginning of time, before Christ’s coming.

They saw the plight of humanity, lying on the road. Moses came by, Elijah came by, other prophets came by, but the illness of humanity remained without being healed.

Only God who has created us can recreate us. God humbles himself and becomes human, takes on our human flesh, in the incarnation. It sounds so unlikely, so impossible, it is like imagining a Jew becoming a Samaritan, one of those in the territory between Judea and Galilee, between Jericho and Jerusalem.

Indeed, the Pharisees mockingly labelled Christ a Samaritan, saying, ‘Are we not right in saying that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?’ (John 8: 48).

Christ humbly attributes to himself the name given to him by his detractors.

The Samaritan binds up the wounds of wounded humanity, pours oil and wine on them: oil symbolises mercy and wine the true teaching of God. He then brings us to an inn where we can be taken care of.

The Gospel says that the Good Samaritan ‘put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him.’ However, in traditional icons, Christ carries the man on his own back. Christ in the incarnation takes on our human nature, our soul and body. That is why in the parable he ‘set him on his own beast,’ interpreted by the Early Fathers that Christ makes us members of his own body.

There is a similar image in the parable of the Lost Sheep (see Luke 15). When the Good Shepherd finds the lost sheep, he puts him on his shoulders, rejoicing.

The inn represents the Church, the innkeeper the bishops and priests. Christ establishes his Church which, like an inn, accepts and provides shelter for all. The wounded man should stay here to be taken care of. The Samaritan has to leave, however. He takes out two silver coins and gives them to the innkeeper, saying: ‘Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.’

Christ indicates his second coming, he will return.

The silver given to the innkeeper is the divine grace Christ gives to the Church; it heals and saves souls through the sacraments. Bishops and priests, the ministers of the sacraments of the Church, are the distributors of God’s gifts and freely-given grace for the lost and the outcast and those of us who have fallen by the way.

In this reading of the parable of the Good Samaritan, Christ offers himself as the prime example of mercy and compassion. Through his compassion, he takes on our sufferings and becomes the true neighbour of all fallen humanity.

We are not being challenged in this morning’s reading to be Good Samaritans. We don’t all have that opportunity, that encounter, that wealth to spend.

We are not even being challenged to be a good neighbour.

We are being challenged to ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself’ (Luke 10: 27).

The Jewish theologian, Professor Michael Fishbane, says this great exhortation is at the heart of the Hebrew Bible, and adds: ‘These words are also at the heart of Judaism and constitute its religious idea.’

Christ then echoes a verse in the Law: ‘You have given the right answer; do this and you will live’ (verse 28). ‘You shall keep my statutes and my ordinances; by doing this one shall live: I am the Lord’ (Leviticus 18: 5).

The one who shows mercy is the good neighbour.

The Good Samaritan window in Saint Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Today’s Prayers (Sunday 13 July 2025, Trinity IV):

The theme this week (13 to 19 July) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Shaping the Future: Africa Six.’ This theme is introduced today with a programme update from Fran Mate, Senior Regional Manager: Africa, USPG:

Earlier this year I arranged a meeting with the Advisory Council of the Africa 6 – the Centre for Anglican Women’s Leadership and Research in Africa (CAWLRA). We gathered at the Thaba Bosiu Cultural Village in Lesotho for an inspiring week of strategic thinking and reflection. The retreat, which brought together some of the most influential Anglican women leaders in Africa, focused on empowering senior women bishops to lead with strength and vision in the years to come. It was a pleasure to be alongside the Right Revd Dr Dalcy Dlamini (Bishop of Eswatini), the Right Revd Filomena Teta das Neves Estevão (Bishop of Bom Pastor, Angola), the Right Revd Dr Vicentia Kgabe (Bishop of Lesotho) and the Right Revd Dr Emily Onyango (Assistant Bishop of the Diocese of Bondo, Kenya).

Although unable to attend, the Africa 6 also includes the Right Revd Elizabeth Awut (Diocese of Rumbek, South Sudan) and the Right Revd Rose Okeno (Diocese of Butere, Kenya).

The Africa 6’s inspirational mission is clear: to ensure that Anglican women leaders across the continent are equipped and empowered to make a lasting impact, not just for today, but for future generations.

USPG are proud to walk alongside the Africa 6 Women Anglican Bishops as they lead the way in establishing and shaping the future of the Centre for Anglican Women’s Leadership and Research in Africa. Together, we continue to support the growth of women’s leadership within the Anglican Church, ensuring that these remarkable leaders are ready to guide the Church into the future.

The USPG prayer diary today (Sunday 13 July 2025, Trinity IV) invites us to pray by reading and meditating on Luke 10: 25-27.

The Collect:

O God, the protector of all who trust in you,
without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy:
increase and multiply upon us your mercy;
that with you as our ruler and guide
we may so pass through things temporal
that we lose not our hold on things eternal;
grant this, heavenly Father,
for our Lord Jesus Christ’s 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:

Eternal God,
comfort of the afflicted and healer of the broken,
you have fed us at the table of life and hope:
teach us the ways of gentleness and peace,
that all the world may acknowledge
the kingdom of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Gracious Father,
by the obedience of Jesus
you brought salvation to our wayward world:
draw us into harmony with your will,
that we may find all things restored in him,
our Saviour Jesus Christ.

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

The Good Samaritan … a stained glass window in Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick (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