‘The Thucydides Trap’ could trap Trump, with classical lessons on war and democracy

The Monument of the Unknown Soldier outside Parliament in Athens … the quotations are from the Funeral Oration by Pericles, recounted by Thucydides in ‘The History of the Peloponnesian War’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

When Xi Jinping and Donald Trump met in Beijing last week, the Chinese leader recalled another conflict between superpowers of the past, when he referred to the Peloponnesian War in ancient Greece, a decades long conflict that between Athens and Sparta that began in 431 BCE.

In a reference to classical rivalry, Xi asked: ‘Can China and the United States transcend the so-called “Thucydides Trap” and forge a new paradigm for major-power relations?’

I doubt that Trump had much of a classical education, and the reference must have gone over his head, presuming he was awake and listening at the time. If he was listening, I cannot imagine that he connected with the Peloponnesian War, still less that he ever heard of Thucydides or Pericles, just as I imagine that throughout the illegal war that has been waged continuously against Iran for weeks now, he has been incapable of knowing about the Persian Wars, still less that Persia was once one of the great classical civilisations.

Trump took a pack of ambitious business deal-makers with him on the jolly to Beijing, but few actual members of his administration, and probably no-one who was educated enough to understand the reference to the Thucydides Trap or anyone who was wise enough to grasp the significance of the citation.

The Thucydides Trap refers to the idea that when a rising power threatens to displace an established one, the result is often war. ‘It was the rise of Athens and the fear that this instilled in Sparta that made war inevitable,’ Thucydides wrote in The History of the Peloponnesian War. Just as Athens was once at war with Sparta, the implication is that China’s rise provokes anxiety and potential conflict with the US.

But the term the ‘Thucydides Trap’ was not devised by Thucydides. Instead, the label was first used by the US political scientist Graham Allison of Harvard in a feature in the Financial Times in 2012 to describe an apparent tendency towards war when an emerging power, such as Athens, threatens to displace an existing great power, such as Sparta, as a regional or international dominant power. The term has been widely used since 2015, and it primarily applies to analyses of China-US relations.

Graham Allison led a study at Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs which found that, among a sample of 16 historical instances of an emerging power rivalling a ruling power, 12 ended in war. Allison expanded his theory in 2017 in his book Destined for War, where he argues that ‘China and the US are currently on a collision course for war’.

However, Allison’s theory has come under considerable criticism, and scholars remain divided on the value of the ‘Thucydides Trap’, particularly as it relates to a potential military conflict between the US and China.

If anybody is brave enough to explain to Trump the meaning of the ‘Thucydides Trap’, they might also be well-advised to explain how the concept and values of democracy – so under threat in Trump’s America today – emerged and were consolidated around the same time as Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War.

The term democracy first appeared in Greek political and philosophical thought in the city-state of Athens (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Greek word δημοκρατία (dēmokratía), a compound of δῆμος (demos, people) and κρατία (kratía, power or rule). The term first appeared in Greek political and philosophical thought in the city-state of Athens. The first attested use of the word democracy is found in prose works in the 430s BCE, such as Herodotus’ Histories. But its usage was older by several decades, and Aeschylus strongly alludes to the word in his play The Suppliants (ca 463 BCE), in which he mentions ‘the demos’s ruling hand.’

Athenian democracy took the form of a direct democracy, and it had two distinguishing features: the random selection of ordinary citizens to fill the few existing government administrative and judicial offices, and a legislative assembly consisting of all Athenian citizens.

All eligible citizens could speak and vote in the assembly, which set the laws of the city state. However, Athenian citizenship excluded women, slaves, foreigners, and youths below the age of military service. Effectively, only 1 in 4 residents in Athens qualified as citizens.

During the run-up to this week’s election, I have been re-reading one of the greatest Greek speeches about democracy and democratic values. For many years I had a T-shirt, bought in Athens, with quotes from that funeral oration by Pericles in the cemetery in Kerameikos in Athens at the height of the Peloponnesian War.

The funeral oration by Pericles has been handed down in history by Thucydides in his History of the Peloponnesian War. He tells us Pericles delivered his oration in the cemetery in Kerameikos – not only to bury the dead, but to praise democracy.

There are excerpts from the speech on the Monument of the Unknown Soldier on Parliament Square (Plateia Voulis) on Vasilissis Amalias avenue, facing onto Syntagma Square. The monument, designed by the architect Emmanuel Lazaridis in 1929-1930, includes a large bas-relief of a dying Greek soldier by Kostas Demetriadis (1881-1943) and the Greek text of the funeral oration delivered by Pericles in 431 or 430 BCE.

Part of the Parthenon frieze in the Acropolis Museum in Athens (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Pericles was a Greek leader and statesman and a supporter of democracy during the Peloponnesian War. He was so important for Athens that his name defines the age – the Periclean Age – during which Athens rebuilt what had been destroyed during the recent war with Persia.

The people of Athens, including those from the countryside whose land was being pillaged by their enemies, were kept in crowded conditions within the walls of Athens. Near the start of the Peloponnesian War, a plague swept through the city. Pericles succumbed to this plague and died.

Before he died, though, Pericles delivered his rousing speech about the virtues of democracy. Thucydides puts in Pericles’ mouth key democratic values that are worth remembering today when democracy is under threat:

• Democracy allows humanity to advance because of merit instead of wealth or inherited class.
• In a democracy, citizens behave lawfully while doing what they like without fear of prying eyes.
• In a democracy, there is equal justice for all in private disputes.

Pericles, in his ‘Funeral Oration’ in Athens, uses ‘the many,’ οἱ πολλοί (hoi polloi), in a positive way when praising the Athenian democracy. He contrasts them with ‘the few’ (οἱ ὀλίγοι, hoi oligoi), who abuse power and create an oligarchy, rule by the few. He advocates equal justice for ‘the many’, ‘the all’, before the law, against the selfish interests of the few.

And that’s what democracy should have at its heart despite all the threats it faces from the Trump autocracy in the US and from the far-right in Britain and across Europe: equal justice for ‘the many’ and ‘the all’, before the law, against the selfish interests of the few.

A grave in Kerameikós, Athens, where Pericles delivered his funeral oration (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

When you vote, consider the people who feel the need to ‘always keep a packed suitcase by the front door’

Tomorrow is polling day in local elections in many parts of England and in assembly elections in Wales and Scotland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

There is an old adage among football fans that ‘you don’t choose the club, the club chooses you.’

So, on Sunday night, as I stood in the bar in the Old George, I really wanted – hope against hope – as five minutes of added time stretched into an agonising six, that Aston Villa would clinch an equaliser, and rise back into the top four in the Premier League.

I have been a Villa fan since my teens for no other reasons than that Villa Park is a few stations south of Lichfield on the trainline from Lichfield into Birmingham. I seldom go to football games these days, but I still watch Villa matches in my local pub, and I have benign, avuncular feelings when I see Villa fans at Lichfield Trent Valley and Lichfield City heading off to games.

In the present political climate, I recall that Aston Villa has a proud tradition of standing up against antisemitism and racism. When Aston Villa was invited on a three-match tour of Germany in 1938, the players refused to give the Nazi salute. Later, during World War II, local lore says, the Villa reserve team were all captured at Dunkirk, and in captivity they thrashed their SS guards.

But on Sunday night I had something of an internal conflict – I didn’t want to see Tottenham Hotspur relegated either. Spurs have been my second team since my teens too, but for very different reasons.

Part of Spurs’ traditional support base was for long in the Jewish community in London, so that to fans of Chelsea and other clubs, Tottenham Hotspur is a Jewish club. In response to racist and antisemitic taunts, Spurs fans long ago adopted as their own chant: ‘We are the Yids’, embracing the label to render the abuse impotent.

Since 1982, Spurs have had three chairs who were Jewish businessmen with pre-existing degrees of allegiance to the club. It is said about 5 per cent of the Spurs fans at games may be Jewish.

The Jewish community in Tottenham began to grow early in the last century. East European Jews fleeing pogroms in Russia arrived in London from the 1880s on, and a fresh wave in 1905-1906 as the persecution intensified. Many Jews settled in the East End, and other families then moved further north to the Tottenham area. In time, Tottenham Hotspur became part of the lives of working-class Jewish men in the Tottenham area.

Jewish numbers at home matches rose after World War I, when improved public transport made it possible to be in synagogue in the morning and to catch a tram from Aldgate in time for a 2:30 kick-off at White Hart Lane. In the 1920s, the Jewish Chronicle claimed, almost all Jews who followed soccer were Spurs supporters, and the Jewish fanbase continued to grow in the 1930s. Several reports in 1935 estimated as many as 10,000 Jews in a Spurs crowd, or about one-third of the total.

When White Hart Lane was the venue for an international between England and Germany, the choice seen as an affront to the Jewish community. The swastika flew over White Hart Lane on 4 December 1935 and the German team gave a sinister Nazi salute to the crowd before kick-off. But a fan climbed onto the roof of the West Stand and tore down the Nazi flag. Perhaps it was irony, certainly it was justice, that Germany was defeated 3-0 that day.

After the war, Jewish fans still felt they belonged at White Hart Lane, although the local community was shrinking from the 1960s on. In the late 1960s, fans from opposing clubs began chanting abuse at Spurs fan using the ‘Yid’ word. When Spurs beat Chelsea in the 1967 FA Cup Final, the antisemitic abuse from Chelsea fans was so undiluted that many were deeply disgusted.

Throughout the 1970s, opposition fans openly labelled Spurs fans as Jews, and the chants descended into extreme racism. These chants raged from ‘does your rabbi know you’re here?’ to ‘I’ve never felt more like gassing the Jews,’ and ‘Spurs are on their way to Auschwitz.’ Nazi salutes were common, and hissing sound that resounded was intended as a reminder of the gas chambers.

In response, Spurs fans embraced the label and on the terraces, they took to chanting, ‘We are the Yids.’ They do not use the word in a derogatory way, nor is it an example of cultural appropriation. They use the label imposed on them by others to celebrate their history, continuity and identity in a form of defence mechanism against virulent and often uncontrolled antisemitism.

At a game between Spurs and West Ham some years ago, songs about Hitler and gas chambers could be heard from the away crowd, and Nazi salutes were also seen. In recent years, Chelsea supporters have chanted anti-Jewish songs on the London Underground, a group of Chelsea fans forced an Orthodox Jewish passenger to move carriages after targeting him for abuse, and a Chelsea season ticket-holder was banned for three years after making 13 Nazi salutes at Spurs fans.

This reminds me of behaviour by Nigel Farage that he refuses to acknowledge, to accept responsibility for, or to accept how offensive his refusal and responses to continue to be. The leader of Reform UK has faced significant allegations regarding antisemitism and racism, largely stemming from his time as a student at Dulwich College in the late 1970s and early 1980s, alongside criticism of his political rhetoric in later years.

Over 20 former classmates and teachers report having witnessed Farage engage in racist and antisemitic behaviour, including singing ‘gas ’em all’ songs, mimicking gas hissing sounds, and telling Jewish pupils that ‘Hitler was right’. Jewish contemporaries have recalled him as a school bully who targeted them and other ethnic minority students with abusive language.

Farage has either denied these claims, calling them ‘complete made-up fantasies’, or, in an apparent admission of their truth, has claimed he never intended to be hurtful or racist, dismissing his past comments as nothing more than ‘banter’.

A 1981 letter from a teacher previously described him as a ‘publicly professed racist’ with ‘neo-fascist views’, according to reports. In recent months, 11 Holocaust survivors have joined calls for Farage to apologise for the alleged school-era antisemitic remarks, but Farage’s response has not been to deny or to apologise, but to claim his critics are ‘politically motivated’.

Jewish groups and MPs have also criticised Farage for using the term ‘globalist’ to describe public figures, describing it as an antisemitic ‘dog whistle’. Farage has been accused of adopting antisemitic tropes by labelling financier George Soros ‘the biggest danger to the entire western world’ and alleging a ‘globalist’ plot, themes often linked to far-right conspiracy theories. Farage has gladly been guest on far-right US shows, with hosts such as Alex Jones and Rick Wiles, who has made overtly antisemitic claims, such as calling a political event a ‘Jew coup’.

And so, it is nothing less than galling to see Farage visit Golder’s Green after last week’s attack, trying to make political capital in advance of tomorrow’s local elections out of the mounting fears of antisemitism in the Jewish community, and accusing the government of failing to respond adequately to rising antisemitism, arguing that political considerations are preventing stronger action, particularly fear of offending a key voting bloc of Muslim South Asians.

My worst experience of racism was at a bus stop late one evening, when two burly men stood by me, one on either side, and started a conversation across me with each other with one saying: ‘’itler was right about ’em.’ I have no doubt it was my beard, black hat and black coat.

The coward’s response would have been to tell them that I’m not Jewish. It may have implied it was not OK to victimise me but was OK to victimise people who are Jews. And once one group of racists identify or perceive you as a Jew, you are always going to be a Jew in the eyes of racists and antisemites everywhere, no matter what ruling is made by a beth din, no matter what definitions are built into the Law of Return, no matter how narrow interpretations and applications of Halakha may be. On the other hand, even Chabad activits approach me on the streets, from London to Paris or Krakow, and ask me very direct questions about my identity.

In a recent discussion on a social media platform on how people are perceived as being Jews, one contributor wrote: ‘You will always be a Jew no matter what. When I was a kid I told my father I hated being a Jew and did not want to be one anymore, he told me you will always be a Jew. When the nazis come, you will be a Jew. When the PLO hijacks a plane and takes the Jews, you will be a Jew.’

My father grew up playing on the streets of ‘Little Jerusalem’ in Portobello in Dublin, where many of his uncles and cousins lived and where his schoolboy friends included Chaim Herzog and the Levitas brothers. I was born a few doors a way from the synagogue on Rathfarnham Road and I too played on those same streets in my younger schooldays, familiar with the small shuls on Walworth Road, Lennox Street, Lombard Street, Saint Kevin’s Parade and Oakfield Place, and the larger synagogues then on the South Circular Road and Adelaide Road. The late Kevin Martin, ‘a cousin of cousins’, was an expert in Sephardic genealogy, and constantly encouraged me to explore our shared stories of the Comerford, Mendoza, Martinez and Nunez families and his descent from the family of the Irish-Jewish prize fighter Daniel Mendoza.

But in today’s climate of induced fear, many Jews are increasingly afraid of openly discussing or displaying their identity, of having that long beard and black hat and coat. For my part, I have suspended my once regular blog postings, often on a Friday evening, discussing the history, architecture and heritage of synagogues, for fear of adding to the feelings of vulnerability among the people and congregations using those synagogues. This fear was confirmed yesterday with news of a fire at the former East London Central Synagogue on Nelson Street in east London. I have written about this synagogue many times in the past, including its recent sale to a Muslim group. Police are concerned that the attack on Tuesday morning may be part of an arson campaign linked to Iran, and now I am concerned about writing about other synagogues and their locations in the weeks, possibly months, ahead.

None of these fears and concerns takes away in any way from the reality of the disgusting misogyny that makes women feel afraid on our streets, the open Islamophobia that sees verbal and physical attacks on Muslims on the streets and on mosques, and the unfettered racism that is expressed against refugees, asylum seekers and immigrants but, is in fact, targeting all minorities of Africa and Asian heritage or descent, and even many with European origins. All this combines in a lethal cocktail that is being stirred by the far-right and that is being served up by their candidates in these elections.

The Labour politician Margaret Hodge, who was born in Alexandria in 1944 to Jewish parents who had fled Germany and Austria, has spoken of how her father advised her always to keep a packed suitcase by the front door. That fear has returned to many Jewish people in recent years, in an atmosphere that must not be linked only with the current crisis in the Middle East, but also with the actions and statements from far-right parties, their candidates and their leaders.

We have nation-wide local elections tomorrow. I shall be up early in the morning to vote: democracy has come at a very heavy price in too many countries, and once it is eroded it is very difficult to recover, as people in Hungary have learned, and as voters in the US are going to realise later this year.

How we vote tomorrow may determine whether the racist atmosphere on our streets is given permission to become even more vocal and more extreme, whether Farage becomes more smug about the past he agressievly sidesteps away from whenever he is challenged about it, hectoring and berating the interviewers while smiling smugly, and whether many people feel the need now to pay greater heed to the advice from previous generations to ‘always keep a packed suitcase by the front door’.

I shall be hoping for a better result tomorrow evening in the second leg of the Europa League semi-final between Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest. But I fear for the results from tomorrow’s elections.

Democracy has come at a very heavy price in many places, and once it is eroded it is very difficult to recover (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The US must never forget Martin Luther King and his values despite Trump devaluing MLK Day today

Today is Martin Luther King Jr Day in the US … a feature in ‘The Irish Times’ 45 years ago

Patrick Comerford

Until Trump intervened and abolished the federal holiday, the third Monday in January was marked each year in the US as Martin Luther King Jr Day, a federal holiday celebrating the life and achievements of the civil rights leader, the Revd Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King’s actual birthday was on 15 January 1929, and he was murdered on 4 June 1968. But on Martin Luther King Day today, it is worth considering the choices the US faces this week.

Forty-five years ago, on 3 January 1981, in a series in The Irish Times on ‘The Spell of the Sixties,’ I wrote a full-page feature for the front page of the Saturday supplement ‘Martin Luther King and the End of a Dream.’

Three years later, when it came to writing my first book, Do You Want to Die for NATO?, I headed chapters with quotations from Martin Luther King on nonviolence and the arms race.

King’s march on Washington on 28 August 1963 is in sharp contrast with Trump’s march on the Capitol on 6 January 2021 as he refused to accept that he had lost the presential election.

On that August day almost 63 years ago, Martin Luther King led more than 200,000 people in a march on Washington, not to overturn democracy, but to extend democratic rights to all Americans, including jobs and freedom.

On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, King called on Americans ‘to sit down together at the table of brotherhood’ and meet our promise of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all.

In contrast, Trump spoke in front of the White House, calling on Mike Pence to overturn the democratic will of the people, and calling on his own followers to fight. He told them ‘you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong.’

And he told them, ‘We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.’

In yet another display of his pathological, if not congenital, compulsion to exaggerate and lie, Trump claimed his crowd was larger in numbers than those who marched on Washington with Martin Lutger King.

He spoke of the US today in degrading language, comparing it with a ‘third world country’ and ‘a communist country.’ He mocked people’s weight, skin colour and background, mocked the members of the supreme court and mocked state governors and legislatures.

As he addressed the mob in an incoherent and rambling address, they included neo-nazis and members of far-right and white supremacist militias as he spoke of them as ‘amazing patriots’ and promised them, ‘The best is yet to come.’

And so, it is egregious hypocrisy that Trump could later say Martin Luther King ‘exemplified the quintessential American belief that we will leave a brighter, more prosperous future for our children.’ He spoke of King as ‘a giant of the civil rights movement whose nonviolent resistance to the injustices of his era – racial segregation, employment discrimination, and the denial of the right to vote – enlightened our Nation and the world.’

Has any American president been so crass, so vulgar, so bigoted, so smug and so self-righteous?

He recalled how, ‘In the face of tumult and upheaval, Dr King reminded us to always meet anger with compassion in order to truly “heal the hurts, right the wrongs and change society”.’

He spoke of the ‘spirit of forgiveness’ and the need ‘to bind the wounds of past injustice by lifting up one another regardless of race, gender, creed, or religion, and rising to the first principles enshrined in our founding documents.’

He claimed he was committed to ‘upholding’ King’s ‘legacy and meeting our sacred obligation to protect the unalienable rights of all Americans.’

Needless to say, these proved to be hollow words. Despite being a federal holiday, Trump signed an executive order last month removing two days from the National Park Service’s list of free days: Martin Luther King Jr Day and Juneteenth (19 June), commemorating the day the last group of enslaved people learned they were free after the Union won the Civil War.

It is interesting that it was a Republican President, Ronald Reagan, who signed the holiday into law in 1983, and it was first observed three years later. At first, some states resisted observing the holiday as such, giving it alternative names or combining it with other holidays. It was officially observed in all 50 states of the US for the first time 26 years ago in 2000.

The idea of Martin Luther King Jr Day as a holiday was promoted by trade unions in negotiations. After King’s death, Representative John Conyers (Democrat, Michigan) and Senator Edward Brooke (Republican, Massachusetts) introduced a bill in Congress to make King’s birthday a national holiday. The bill first came to a vote in the House of Representatives in 1979. However, it fell five votes short of the number needed. Only two other figures have national holidays in the US honouring them: George Washington and Christopher Columbus.

Soon after, the King Center turned to support from the corporate community and the general public. The success of this strategy was cemented when Stevie Wonder released his single ‘Happy Birthday’ to popularise the campaign in 1980 and hosted the Rally for Peace Press Conference in 1981. Six million signatures were collected for a petition to Congress to pass the law, termed by a 2006 article in The Nation as ‘the largest petition in favour of an issue in US history.’

Senator Jesse Helms and Senator John Porter East (both Republican, North Carolina) led the opposition to the holiday and questioned whether King was important enough to receive such an honour. Helms criticised King’s opposition to the Vietnam War and accused him of espousing ‘action-oriented Marxism.’ Helms led a filibuster against the bill and alleged King had associations with communists. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (Democrat, New York) declared the document a ‘packet of filth,’ threw it on the Senate floor and stomped on it.

President Reagan originally opposed the holiday. When asked about Helms’s accusations that King was a communist, he said ‘We’ll know in 35 years, won’t we?’ But on 2 November 1983, Reagan signed a bill into law to create a federal holiday honouring King. The final vote in the House of Representatives was 338-90 and the final vote in the Senate was 78-22. The holiday was observed for the first time 40 years ago on 20 January 1986, and since then was observed on the third Monday of January.

Although the federal holiday was signed into law in 1983 and took effect three years later, not every US state chose to observe the January holiday at the state level until 1991. New Hampshire became the last state to name a holiday after King, which they first celebrated in January 2000.

South Carolina was the last state to recognise the day as a paid holiday for all state employees.

Technically, Trump alone does not have the power to cancel MLK Day or any established federal holiday – that would require an act of Congress. But legalities and constitutional checks and balances no longer seem to command respect in the White House.

As I re-read Trump’s hollow words from five years, I wonder what the US faces today, with the rise in racism, the fast erosion of democratic and human rights, and unprecedented war-mongering and sabre-rattling.

I concluded my feature in The Irish Times 45 years ago in January 1980:

‘For King, nonviolence was no mere tactic, it was a necessary form of action, of sacrificial love, in a world of increasing hatred and violence. The question is not so much was he a failure of the ’60s, but whether he can be a success in the ’80s before it is too late.

“In our day, the choice is either nonviolence or non-existence”.’

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 166, Saturday 25 October 2025

‘A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard …’ (Luke 13: 6) … a surviving fig tree beside a former small vineyard that has been cleared near the beach in Platanias east of Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and tomorrow is the Last Sunday after Trinity. Today, the calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship remembers Saint Crispin and Saint Crispinian, Martyrs at Rome, ca 287.

I hope to spend much of today waiting for a declaration after the Presidential election in Ireland. In my prayers this morning I am giving thanks for the benefits of democracy, and for the strong social witness of President Michael D Higgins during his 14 years in office. I am also praying for family members who are attending a family funeral in Kuching today.

This is the last weekend of October, and the storms over the last few days have been a reminder, if we ever needed it, that summer is truly over. The clocks go back an hour later tonight, early tomorrow morning, at 2 am, oand time in the UK and Ireland switches back from Daylight Saving Time (DST) or British Summer Time (BST) to Standard Time or Greenwich Mean Time. Before today begins, meanwhile, before having breakfast, I am taking some quiet time early this morning to give thanks, and for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

The Friary Clock Tower in Lichfield … why were the workers killed accidentally in the Tower of Siloam? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Luke 13: 1-9 (NRSVA):

1 At that very time there were some present who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. 2 He asked them, ‘Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? 3 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. 4 Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them – do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? 5 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.’

6 Then he told this parable: ‘A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. 7 So he said to the gardener, “See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?” 8 He replied, “Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig round it and put manure on it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down”.’

A lost vineyard in Platanias near Rethymnon in Crete … fig trees at either end helped to protect the vines against winds from the sea and mountain and to hold the soil and water (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

Some years ago, in an address at the Pontifical University in Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth, Bishop John Kirby spoke of the way many people ask why we are relatively prosperous while so many people live in poverty. But, he said, we need to realise instead that we are relatively prosperous in rich countries in the northern hemisphere precisely because so many people live in poverty and hunger and thirst in the two-thirds world.

In the middle of the economic crisis in Greece some years ago, the Greek Prime Minister accused other European leaders of failing to put compassion into action, and warned of the danger of Greece becoming ‘a warehouse of souls.’

Emphasising the spiritual without understanding the world we live in leads to us being irrelevant. On the other hand, actively doing good, without any deep and truly spiritual foundations, leads to burn-out and disillusion. Of course, we are called to hunger and thirst for righteousness (Matthew 5: 6). But wishing is not enough. Christ reminds us in today’s Gospel reading that we are called to bear fruit too … and he is patient in waiting for faith to produce fruit.

These thoughts are interesting preludes to today’s Gospel reading (Luke 13: 1-9), when we hear of the chilling and horrific deaths of two groups of people that made headline news at the time.

We all know that people often ask why God allows bad things to happen to good people. In this reading there are two examples. In the first case, it was Galileans at prayer in the Temple who were slaughtered in their innocence, and who then, sacrilegiously, had their blood mixed with the Temple sacrifices. In the second case, innocent building workers, working on the Tower of Siloam near the Temple, died when the work collapsed on top of them.

In those days, it was a common belief that pain and premature death were signs of God’s adverse judgment. We think like that today: how often do people think those who are sick, suffer infirmities, have injuries, die because they cannot afford health care? They do not die because they cannot afford healthcare – they die because governments prefer to spend money on weapons and wars or in giving tax breaks to the rich, rather than spending money on health care for those who need it.

The first group in this Gospel reading, a group of Galileans, from Christ’s own home province, believed they were doing God’s will as they worshipped in the Temple. But they were killed intentionally as they sacrificed to God in the Temple. Even in death, they were degraded further when, on Pilate’s orders, their blood was mixed with the blood of the Temple sacrifices.

Think of the horror we feel when people are murdered at worship in attacks on churches, synagogues or mosques, or Oscar Romero saying Mass 45 years ago in San Salvador (24 March 1980).

The second group in the Gospel reading, numbering 18 in all, were building workers who were killed accidentally as they were building the Tower of Siloam.

Think of our horror today at people who die randomly or accidentally, not because of their own mistakes or sinfulness: people who die sleeping in their own homes at night during Russian attacks on Ukrainian cities; children who die in attacks on hospitals or schools in Gaza; people who die daily of hunger and poverty; children born to die because they are HIV +, because their parents live in poverty, or other circumstances not of their choosing such as Trump’s capricious cancellation of US financial support; the children who die in treacherous sea crossings in the English Channel or in the Mediterranean …

How easy it is to talk about ‘innocent victims’ – of wars, of AIDS, of gangland killings – as though some people are ‘guilty victims’ who deserve to die like that anyway.

But in both cases in our Gospel reading – in all these cases – Christ says no, there is no link between an early and an unjust death and the sins of the past or the sins of past generations.

In both stories, we could explain away what we might otherwise see as the inexplicable way God allows other people to suffer and die by saying they brought it on themselves by their sins, or the sins of their ancestors … or, in today’s language, by saying they cannot afford to pay for health care, or they bring it upon themselves by their lifestyle, or they need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, or they ought to stay in their own countries.

My compassion is the victim of my hidden values, and so others become the victims.

Many may have expected Christ to say that their deaths were in punishment for their rebellious behaviour, in the case of the Galilean rebels, or collaborative behaviour, in the case of the workers who were building a water supply system for the Roman occupiers.

Is Christ indifferent to political and environmental disasters?

Instead of meeting those expectations, Christ teaches that death comes to everyone, regardless of how sinful I am, regardless of my birth, politics or social background, or – even more certainly – my smug sense of religious pride and righteousness. And he goes on to teach how we each need to repent – even when, in the eyes of others, we do not appear to need repentance.

Seek the Lord while he may be found,
call upon him while he is near …

It is so tempting to excuse or dismiss the sufferings of others. To say they brought it on themselves offers us an opt-out: we can claim to have compassion, but need not respond to it, nor need to do anything to challenge the injustices that are the underlying causes of this suffering.

Yet, in the parable of the fig tree, we are called on to wait, we are urged not to be too hasty in our judgment on those who seem in our eyes to do nothing to improve their lot.

It makes logical, economic and financial sense for the owner to want to chop down the fig tree – after all, not only is it taking up space, but it also costs in terms of time, tending, feeding, caring and nurturing. The owner knows what it is to make a quick profit, and if the quick profit is not coming soon enough he wants to cut his losses.

It takes much tender care and many years – at least three years – for a fig tree to bear fruit. And even then, in a vineyard, the figs are not a profit – they are a bonus.

Even if a fig tree bears early fruit, the Mosaic Law said it could not be harvested for three years, and the fruit gathered in the fourth year was going to offered as the first fruits. Only in the fifth year, then, could the fruit be eaten.

So, if this tree was chopped down, and another put its place, it would take longer still to get fruit that could be eaten or sold. In his quest for a quick profit, the owner of the vineyard shows little knowledge about the reality of economics.

The gardener, who has nothing at stake, turns out to be the one who not only has compassion, but has deep-seated wisdom too. The gardener, who is never going to benefit from the owner’s profits, can see the tree’s potential, is willing to let be and wait, knowing what the fig tree is today and what it can do in the future.

But we can decide where we place our trust – in the values that I think serve me but serve the rich, the powerful and the oppressor, or in the God who sees our plight, who hears our cry, and who comes in Christ to deliver us.

Seek the Lord while he may be found,
call upon him while he is near …

Figs ripening on a fig tree near the beach at Platanias, east of Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Saturday 25 October 2025):

The theme this week (19 to 25 October) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), has been ‘Advancing Theological Education for Young Women in Africa’ (pp 48-49). This theme was introduced last Sunday with reflections from Esmeralda (Essie) Pato, Chair of the Communion-Wide Advisory Group for USPG; she is based in Johannesburg, South Africa.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Friday 24 October 2025, United Nations Day) invites us to pray:

Lord, bless Essie in her leadership of the Communion-Wide Advisory Group for USPG. Grant her wisdom and strength as she guides the mission, inspiring others to serve faithfully.

The Collect:

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.

Collect on the Eve of Last Sunday after Trinity:

Blessed Lord,
who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:
help us so to hear them,
to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest them
that, through patience, and the comfort of your holy word,
we may embrace and for ever hold fast
the hope of everlasting life,
which you have given us in 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

Vines in a small abandoned vineyard near the bus top in Platanias, east of Rethymnon (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

The bell tower beside the Cathedral in Rethymnon, with a clock dating from 1899 … the clocks go back an hour tonight (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 165, Friday 24 October 2025

‘When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, “It is going to rain”; and so it happens’ (Luke 12: 54) … clouds above Saint Paul’s Cathedral and the River Thames in London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and the week began with the Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XVIII). Today is United Nations Day and the Irish Presidential election takes place today. In my prayers this morning I am giving thanks for the benefits of democracy, for the strong social witness of President Michael D Higgins during his 14 years in office, and for UN agencies that bring hope for peace and an end to conflicts and sufferings throughout the world.

But, before the day begins, before having breakfast, I am taking some quiet time early this morning to give thanks, and for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

Which way to Maroulas? Confusing street signs in Tsesmes near Rethymnon … but do we know how to read the signs of the end of the times? (see Luke 12: 54-56) (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 12: 54-59 (NRSVA):

54 He also said to the crowds, ‘When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, “It is going to rain”; and so it happens. 55 And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, “There will be scorching heat”; and it happens. 56 You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?

57 ‘And why do you not judge for yourselves what is right? 58 Thus, when you go with your accuser before a magistrate, on the way make an effort to settle the case, or you may be dragged before the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer throw you in prison. 59 I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny.’

‘I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny’ (Luke 12: 59) … old pennies on a table in a bar in Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflections:

This morning’s Gospel reading continues on from the difficult images we had yesterday of division and strife, shattering all our expectations of Gospel values that emphasise domestic bliss and harmony.

We heard warnings of fire on earth (verse 49), and of families and households divided and fighting each other to the death (verses 52-53). The verses that follow today include images of people being blown about by the storms and tempests of the day (verses 54-56).

Christ chides those who are listening for not recognising the signs he bears. They know how to forecast the weather, but they cannot forecast, watch for the signs of, the coming Kingdom of God.

There is a fashion in the Church today for ‘fresh expressions of Church’ that blow where the wind blows. They seek to be fashionable and claim that they are relevant.

Sometimes, you may not know whether you are in a coffee shop or in a church, whether you are in the guiding hands of a barista or of a priest. The old forms of church have been abandoned, and with it we may ask whether they have thrown out the core content too.

I visited one of these churches a few years ago. Yes, there was a rambling sermon of 35 or more minutes. Yes, there was a time of ‘fellowship’ where people turned around their chairs and were chummy with one another, in a clumsy sort of way.

There was one reading, but no Gospel reading. There was no confession and absolution, no Credal statement, no Trinitarian formula in the prayers. The prayers prayed for those present and those like them, but there were no prayers for those outside, no prayers for a world that is divided and suffering, no challenge or judgment for those who have created the plight and sufferings of wars, refugees, racism, homelessness, economic injustice and climate change.

In this smug self-assurance, without any reference to the world outside, there was no challenge to discipleship, to live up to the promises and challenges of Baptism.

And, needless to say, there was no Sacrament, and no hint of there ever being a sacramental ministry.

Content had been abandoned for the sake of form. But the form had become a charade. For the sake of relevance, the church had become irrelevant.

The challenge of our Baptism is a challenge for the Church to be a sign of, a sacrament of, the Kingdom of God.

We can be distracted by the demands and fashions of what pass as ‘fresh expressions of Church’ and never meet the needs of a divided and suffering world.

Or we can be nourished by Word and Sacrament and respond to the demands of our Baptism in a discipleship that seeks to challenge and confront a suffering and divided world with the values and promises of the Kingdom of God.

But it is costly. And in that struggle, like Simeon warns Mary when she brings the Christ Child to the Temple, we may find ‘a sword will pierce your own soul too.’

Fresh espresso in street art in Coffee Hall, Milton Keynes … some experiences of church today seem to be in the guiding hands of a barista rather than a priest (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Friday 24 October 2024):

The theme this week (19 to 25 October) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Advancing Theological Education for Young Women in Africa’ (pp 48-49). This theme was introduced on Sunday with reflections from Esmeralda (Essie) Pato, Chair of the Communion-Wide Advisory Group for USPG; she is based in Johannesburg, South Africa.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Friday 24 October 2025, United Nations Day) invites us to pray:

Lord God, today we thank you for the United Nations and its essential role in advancing peace, sustainable development and human rights. Guide the leaders and nations towards cooperation, compassion, and understanding.

The Collect:

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

‘When you go with your accuser before a magistrate, on the way make an effort to settle the case’ (Luke 12: 58) … judges and barristers at the Judges’ Service in Liverpool Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

14 million readers, 14 million residents, 14 million refugees and 14 million passports

A wall painting in a shelter in Budapest housing Ukrainian refugees … more than 14 million Ukrainians are in need of humanitarian assistance (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This blog reached yet another new peak last night (1 July 2025), totalling up 14 million hits since I first began blogging about 15 years ago, back in 2010.

Yet again, this is yet another humbling statistic and a sobering figure, and once again I am left not with a sense of achievement but with a feeling of gratitude to all who read and support this blog and my writing.

After I began blogging, 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 over the past few months, 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), 12 million early last month (3 May 2025), 12.5 million a month later (6 June 2025), 13 million less than two weeks later (17 June 2025), 13.5 million a week later (24 June 2025) and 14 million last night (1 July 2025).

Last month (June 2025) was the second month that this blog ever had more than 1 million hits in one single month, with 1,618,488 hits by the end of the month (30 June). This followed 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).

In recent months, the daily figures have been overwhelming on occasions. Seven of the 12 days of busiest traffic on this blog were in June alone, four were in January 2025, and one was in this month (1 July 2025):

• 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 4,466,445 hits in the first half of this year, over 31 per cent of all hits ever.

Joseph Heller wrote in Catch-22, ‘Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.’ It may only be a hunch, but it’s an educated hunch or a journalist’s experienced instinct when I say I have not failed to notice some patterns.

Some of these days were in the week before and after Trump’s inauguration, the others were in the days around his damp-squib military parade in Washington DC on 14 June and his hair-brained decision to attack Iran. Indeed, the overwhelming number of hits are not from Ireland, the UK and Greece, as I might expect, but from the US.

It’s not paranoid either to imagine how the bots at work in some ugly, dim basement in Washington are trawling far and wide for anyone critical of the Trump regime. The costs may be minimal, but it’s still money that could be better spent on healthcare, education, rehiring air traffic controllers or reinstating DEI programmes.

I doubt that my criticisms of Trump, Rubio, Vance, Hegseth and Musk are going to make it easy to get a visa to visit the US over the next four years, should I ever want to visit the place under the present dystopian regime. I’d prefer to boost my ego and convince myself that my popularity is growing and that I have become a ‘must-read’ writer for so many people every day. But, sadly, I don’t think that’s so.

On the other hand – and in this lies my greatest fear – if a minor critic of the Trump regime outside the US such as me is feeling watched and intimidated at this level, try to imagine how many critics inside of the Trump regime and ICE inside the US feel they really are being monitored, intimidated and bullied into silence.

More than 14 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes since 2011 … collecting shoes for refugee children from Syria (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Putting all this aside, with this latest landmark figure of 14 million hits by today, 1,618,488 hits in June alone, and over 1.4 million hits in January, I once again find myself asking questions such as:

• What do 14 million people look like?
• Where do we find 14 million people?
• What does £14 million, €14 million or $14 million mean.
• What would it buy?

The film 14 Million Screams is so-called because 14 million young girls are forced to be married every year, and 700 million women have been married before the age of 15.

Several cities have populations of around 14 million people, including Istanbul, Karachi, Tokyo, Mumbai, Delhi, Shanghai and Cairo … although this figure depends on how specific metropolitan areas are defined, and who is doing the counting.

A sculpture of a kouros, an athletic youth, and valued at $14 million was among the antiquities recently returned to Greece after being stolen and illegally sent to the US. Dozens of stolen antiquities were repatriated to Greece including 47 antiquities seized from the collection of billionaire investor Michael Steinhardt in 2021 after a search that lasted many years across many countries.

Greece’s efforts to manage the challenges posed by the tourism industry, with extensive taxes and regulations targeting holiday homes, seem to have fallen short. Despite hefty fines and additional charges imposed by the government, the number of residential properties surged by nearly 10 per cent last year.

Figures show there were 14 million overnight stays by foreign tourists using short-term rentals like Airbnb for their holiday accommodation last year (2024), an increase of 2 million on the previous year (2023, prior to Greece implementing policies to address issues caused by over-tourism, such as sky-rocketing rents and deteriorating public services.

The Syrian crisis is one of the largest displacement crises globally. Since 2011, more than 14 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes in search of safety. This includes both internally displaced people and refugees who have crossed borders.

The director-general of the International Organisation for Migration, Amy Pope, said last October that over 14 million people had also fled their homes in Sudan, either inside the country or over its borders. They include the 11 million people who have been internally displaced within the country, and the 3.1 million who have crossed borders.

As the frontline shifts and hostilities increase, more than 14 million Ukrainians are estimated to be in need of humanitarian assistance in the largest refugee crisis in Europe since World War I. Over 6.3 million refugees have fled to neighbouring countries and 3.7 million people are internally displaced. This means nearly one-third of the population of Ukraine has been forced to flee their homes, including more than half of all Ukrainian children.

Up to 14 million UK tourists risk being turned away at airport gates, according to a recent report. Only half of recent British visitors to Europe knew that a passport must be issued less than 10 years before departure ,and only one in three British passport holders knew that a passport must be valid for at least three months after the return date.

This means around 13.9 million travellers could have made one of these mistakes on their trip. The report also found that only two in five UK adults do not knew they are not be covered by their insurance policy if they make one of these passport errors.

The way statistics like this are mangled in the red-top tabloids never ceases to irritate me. When any of those 14 million tourists are turned back from the their planned package holiday in Benidorm, the Balearics or Benitses, it becomes the fault not of Brexit but of some faceless European bureaucrats in Brussels.

Those forgetful tourists are never bemoaned as illegal migrants without legal papers. But when any miniscule proportion of those 14 million displaced people or refugees – from, say, Sudan, Syria or Ukraine – try to cross the channel, they become illegal migrants without papers, and the victims of tabloid bile and racist caricature.

When any of those 14 million passport holders go island hopping in Greece, it’s fun and pleasure – it ought to be; when any of those 14 people use boats between France and the English coast, they became the target of vitriol from the likes of Daily Mail columnists and Reform voters.

The world has a population of 8.2 billion people, and 14 million people represent only 0.17% of all those people. So 14 million hits on this blog is quite a modest number, I have to concede.

One of the most warming figures personally in the midst of all these statistics is the one that shows my morning prayer diary reaches an average of 80-85 people each day in the past month. It is over three 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 14 million readers of this blog to date, and for the small and faithful core group among you who join me in prayer, reading and reflection each morning.

Up to 14 million UK tourists could be travelling abroad on invalid passports (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Daisy Stuart Shaw, pioneering woman in Lichfield life and politics, is celebrated with a plaque at her former home

The new plaque at 8 Bore Street, celebrating Daisy Stuart Shaw, Lichfield’s first woman mayor (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

It is always good to see new plaques or ways of commemorating pioneering people who have made an impact on public and social life in Lichfield. When I was in Lichfield a few months ago, I had noticed the name of Daisy Stuart Shaw on the Friary Clock Tower. A few days later, a plaque honouring her was unveiled at the house on Bore Street where she lived 100 years ago.

So, it was interesting last week the see the plaque that was unveiled recently at No 8 Bore Street, to honour this pioneering and forward-thinking woman.

Daisy Stuart Shaw (1861-1955) was the wife of Dr Thomas David Stuart Shaw, a Lichfield GP. She was the first woman councillor to sit on Lichfield City Council (1919), the first woman to become Mayor of Lichfield (1927-1928) and the first woman to become an Alderman of the city.

Daisy Stuart Shaw was born Daisy Ramsay in Edinburgh in 1861. She had been a nurse before she married Dr Thomas David Stuart Shaw, a general practitioner. The couple moved from Gloucester to Lichfield 120 years ago in 1905 when her husband took over the practice of Dr Welchman, a medical practice in Bore Street that dated back to the 1850s.

No 8 Bore Street … Daisy and Thomas Stuart Shaw moved to Lichfield in 1905 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

In Lichfield, Daisy became involved in working with the Victoria Cottage Hospital, which had opened on Sandford Street in 1889. At the outbreak of World War I in 1914, Freeford Manor, the home of the Dyott family near Lichfield, became a military hospital for soldiers wounded in action. Daisy worked there as a VAD (Voluntary Aid Detachment) Red Cross nurse, looking after wounded soldiers.

In the last year of World War I, an act was passed in 1918 giving women the vote for the first time. The Act came after almost 30 years of campaigning, but was also a response to the women who had worked throughout the war in factories, farms and businesses. Thousands of men who had previously been disenfranchised, mainly because they were not house owners, were also given the vote.

Daisy Stuart Shaw became the first woman member of Lichfield City Council the following year when she was elected a councillor for the South Ward in November 1919. She was re-elected in 1923 and was a councillor for over 20 years. She took a particular interest in the rights of women, particularly women who were widows or on low incomes, in the welfare of children, and in housing reform.

Both Daisy and Thomas Stuart Shaw continued to be actively involved in the Victoria Cottage Hospital in the inter-war years. By the 1920s, the hospital on Sandford Street had become too small to meet the needs of an growing number of patients and the couple were involved in fundraising efforts to build a new, purpose-built, hospital on land off The Friary, on the other side of the Bowling Green public house.

Thomas provided his medical services to the new hospital voluntarily and they both dedicated many hours of their own time and funds, ensuring the success the new hospital in the days long before the National Health Service.

Meanwhile, Daisy was the first woman to become the Mayor of Lichfield, holding office in 1927-1928. As Mayor, she took part in the official reopening of the Clock Tower on The Friary in 1928, after it had been relocated, brick by brick, from its original location on the junction of Bore Street, Saint John Street and Bird Street. While Daisy was Mayor of Lichfield, the Sheriff of Lichfield in 1927-1928 was Joseph Henry Bridgeman, the son of Robert Bridgeman, the noted stonemason and wood carver, whose premises were on Quonians Lane, off Dam Street.

Daisy Stuart Shaw was Mayor of Lichfield when the Clock Tower was moved a new location in 1928 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Ten years later, Daisy was honoured when she became the first woman to be made an alderman of Lichfield by Lichfield City Council in 1938 in recognition of her long service and dedication, and for her tireless voluntary work in and around the city.

After almost 40 years in Lichfield, the Stuart Shaws retired in 1945 and moved away from their adopted city. The general committee of the Victoria Hospital made a presentation to them, recognising their ‘outstanding services of a public and charitable nature’.

Daisy died in 1955 in Castle Douglas in her native Scotland. Her widowed husband died in 1960.

After more than half a century, Daisy Stuart Shaw’s commemoration was championed by the city council chair, Councillor Ann Hughes, who said she ‘learned about Daisy through the Wayward Women history group which set up plaques temporarily across the city in 2021.’ Her story has also been told by local historian and tour guide Jonathan Oates in the local magazine CityLife in Lichfield and on social media platforms.

A blue plaque celebrating Daisy’s life and contribution was installed at 8 Bore Street, her former home, earlier this year. It was unveiled on 7 March at a ceremony that also marked International Women’s Day and that included the Deputy Mayor, Councillor Claire Pinder-Smith, and the town crier, Adrian Holmes.

Daisy Stuart Shaw was the first woman councillor, first woman mayor and first woman alderman in Lichfield (Photograph courtesy of the Saint Mary’s Lichfield Photographic Collection, via Jonathan Oates)

Sources/Further Reading:

Jono Oates, ‘Daisy Stuart Shaw’, Lichfield’s First Lady,’ CityLife in Lichfield, March 2025, p 47

(Professor) Janet Hunt, Staffordshire’s War: Voices of the First World War (Amberley, 2017)

‘It’s coming from the sorrow in the street The holy places where the races meet … Democracy is coming to the USA’

Leonard Cohen at the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham … when can we hope that ‘Democracy is coming to the USA’? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

I watch in despair as democracy in the US is trampled under foot, the rule of law is ignored, judges are arrested, constitutional protection and guarantees are over-ridden, elected politicians are barred from public buildings, handcuffed pushed to the floor and forcibly ejected from government buildings, are shot on their doorsteps and murdered on their doorsteps.

Families – mothers, fathers, infants – are incarcerated in cruel and degrading conditions, journalists are pushed around and beaten to ground, even sacked for asking questions. Troops sworn to protect the constitution and the people are deployed on the streets against the people, and are drummed into parades to satisfy the ego of a megalomaniac as his own personal stormtroopers.

Friends in the US – writers, composers, creative aritists – are finding their social media accounts on XTwitter and Facebook are being suspended or cancelled. Books are being withdrawn from libraries, institutions of culture have become captive to the most crass and unlettered of politicians, academic independence is under threat, racism is on the rise, Islamophobia and antisemitism are rampant, and from here it looks as though the United States today is in a place similar to one Germany was in 1937 or 1938, when book-burning had become widespread and just before Kristallnacht and the burning of the Reichstag.

As I watch the news, I weep every night. The ‘No King’ protests last weekend offered some comfort and consolation, but not enough to assure me that we are on the brink of the collapse of democracy in the US, that we are staring into the abyss and that the Trump regime is drawing the US rapidly into political implosion and drawing the world towards inevitable global conflagration.

Not once, but twice, this abject and petulant man without one single enduring quality and totally devoid of basic good manners, has been able to take power, not by stealth or cunning, but through the will of the people. Many coups are staged from outside the political systeml this coup against democracy is taking place from inside, engineered by the felon elected as president has chosen to surround himself with.

I was in a shop in Mayfair earlier this week that has a select or even exclusive clientele. It’s the sort of shop where you’re invited to sit down and offered a refreshing drink before they even start to ask you what you would like.

A well-dressed customer walked in, glanced around, and when he was asked what he would like, he answered, painfully rather than with expectation, ‘Peace in the Middle East.’

Everyone was silent.

I wonder, this Friday evening, how I can possibly say, pray, even hope Shabbath Shalom .

Leonard Cohen had died on 7 November 2016, the day before I found myself watching the election of Donald Trump the first time round. I remember the night sharply. I had recently visited Auschwitz, and as I sat up all night in disbelief in a hotel room in Kraków, I was reminded of the wisdom in the lyrics of his song ‘Democracy’:

It’s coming to America first,
the cradle of the best and of the worst.
It’s here they got the range
and the machinery for change
and it’s here they got the spiritual thirst.
It’s here the family’s broken
and it’s here the lonely say
that the heart has got to open
in a fundamental way:

Democracy is coming to the USA.

Once again, I find myself hearing his words about how in the US

… … the feel
that this ain’t exactly real
or it’s real, but it ain’t exactly there

But so the protests last weekend indicate there truly is and a rising tide of

… the wars against disorder
… the sirens night and day
… the fires of the homeless
… the ashes of the gay …

I wonder tonight whether there is any comfort to be drawn from Leonard Cohen’s hope, that ‘Democracy is coming to the USA’?

Leonard Cohen cared about America but was horrified and revolted by what was happening to it. At a time when the US is in more danger of foundering than ever before, Cohen’s words are the perfect anthem for these times:

Sail on, sail on
oh mighty ship of State,
to the shores of need
past the reefs of greed
through the squalls of hate.

As the world watches while the dominant superpower tetters under the whims and with ever twist and turn of a bigoted bully with fascist tendencies for president, I think too of the many lines that Leonard Cohen cut out of this song, and how relevant this evening – lines that refer to a ‘Concentration camp behind a smile’, or,

Who really gets to profit
and who really gets to pay?
Who really rides the slavery ship
right into Charleston Bay?

More than three decades after he completed this song in 1992, Leonard Cohen continues to speak to these times as though he were still alive and writing today.

‘Democracy’ is the sixth of nine tracks on The Future, the ninth studio album by Leonard Cohen, released on 24 November 1992. Almost an hour in length, it was Cohen’s longest album at the time.

Both the fall of the Berlin Wall and the riots in Los Angeles that year took place while Cohen was writing and recording the album, expressing his sense of the world’s turbulence. The album was recorded with a large cast of musicians and engineers in several studios.

The album built on the success of his previous album, I’m Your Man, and sold a quarter of a million copies in the US, which until then had not been enthusiastic about Leonard Cohen’s albums.

In an interview with Paul Zollo in Songwriters on Songwriting, Leonard Cohen spoke at length about ‘Democracy.’ He admitted that he wrote 60 verses for the song. As he watched the fall of the Berlin Wall, he recalled, ‘everyone was saying democracy is coming to the east.’ But he thought to himself, ‘I think a lot of suffering will be the consequence of this wall coming down.’

‘But then I asked myself, “Where is democracy really coming?” And it was the USA … So while everyone was rejoicing, I thought it wasn’t going to be like that, euphoric, the honeymoon. So it was these world events that occasioned the song. And also the love of America. Because I think the irony of America is transcendent in the song.

‘It’s not an ironic song. It’s a song of deep intimacy and affirmation of the experiment of democracy in this country. That this is really where the experiment is unfolding. This is really where the races confront one another, where the classes, where the genders, where even the sexual orientations confront one another. This is the real laboratory of democracy.’

According to Ira Nadel’s book Various Positions (1996), the title track, ‘The Future,’ was originally called ‘If You Could See What’s Coming Next.’ I cannot predict the future, I cannot see what is coming next. But on this evening I wonder whether the US is ‘the real laboratory of democracy’ or whether we are watching the end of democracy in the USA, perhaps even the beginning of the end of the USA.

Leonard Cohen celebrated on recent postage stamps issued in Canada (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

In ‘Democracy’, Leonard Cohen sings:

It’s coming through a hole in the air
From those nights in Tiananmen Square
It’s coming from the feel
That this ain’t exactly real
Or it’s real, but it ain’t exactly there
From the wars against disorder
From the sirens night and day
From the fires of the homeless
From the ashes of the gay
Democracy is coming to the USA

It’s coming through a crack in the wall
On a visionary flood of alcohol
From the staggering account
Of the Sermon on the Mount
Which I don’t pretend to understand at all
It's coming from the silence
On the dock of the bay,
From the brave, the bold, the battered
Heart of Chevrolet
Democracy is coming to the USA

It’s coming from the sorrow in the street
The holy places where the races meet
From the homicidal bitchin’
That goes down in every kitchen
To determine who will serve and who will eat
From the wells of disappointment
Where the women kneel to pray
For the grace of God in the desert here
And the desert far away:
Democracy is coming to the USA

Sail on, sail on
O mighty Ship of State
To the Shores of Need
Past the Reefs of Greed
Through the Squalls of Hate
Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on

It’s coming to America first
The cradle of the best and of the worst
It’s here they got the range
And the machinery for change
And it’s here they got the spiritual thirst
It’s here the family’s broken
And it’s here the lonely say
That the heart has got to open
In a fundamental way
Democracy is coming to the USA

It’s coming from the women and the men
O baby, we’ll be making love again
We’ll be going down so deep
The river’s going to weep,
And the mountain’s going to shout Amen
It’s coming like the tidal flood
Beneath the lunar sway
Imperial, mysterious
In amorous array
Democracy is coming to the USA

Sail on, sail on …

I’m sentimental, if you know what I mean
I love the country but I can’t stand the scene
And I’m neither left or right
I’m just staying home tonight
Getting lost in that hopeless little screen
But I’m stubborn as those garbage bags
That Time cannot decay
I’m junk but I’m still holding up
This little wild bouquet
Democracy is coming to the USA

Shabbat Shalom, שבת שלום


Democracy lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC