Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 118, Friday 5 September 2025

The banquet with Levi included the questions and answers – and the drinking – associated with a Greek symposium … pottery in a shop in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and the week began with the Eleventh Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XI, 31 August 2025). The Season of Creation began on Monday (1 September 2025), and continues until 4 October.

Later today, we are travelling to York. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

After the symposium … an end-of-term dinner with the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 5: 33-39 (NRSVA):

33 Then they said to him [Jesus], ‘John’s disciples, like the disciples of the Pharisees, frequently fast and pray, but your disciples eat and drink.’ 34 Jesus said to them, ‘You cannot make wedding-guests fast while the bridegroom is with them, can you? 35 The days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.’ 36 He also told them a parable: ‘No one tears a piece from a new garment and sews it on an old garment; otherwise the new will be torn, and the piece from the new will not match the old. 37 And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the new wine will burst the skins and will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. 38 But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. 39 And no one after drinking old wine desires new wine, but says, “The old is good”.’

‘You cannot make wedding-guests fast while the bridegroom is with them, can you?’ (Luke 5: 34) … preparing for a wedding in Southwark (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

Jesus has called the tax-collector Levi, and then dines with him in his house that evening (Luke 5: 27-31). Levi celebrates not just with dinner, or even a lavish dinner, but a ‘great banquet’ in his house that is attended by a large crowd.

Banquets were not merely lavish meals but also a setting for teaching and instruction, and the word for banquet here δοχή (dochē) suggests a formal Greek banquet known as a symposium (συμπόσιον, sympósion, from συμπίνειν, sympínein, ‘to drink together’).

In classical Greece, the symposium was the part of a banquet that took place after the meal, when drinking for pleasure was accompanied by music, dancing, recitals, or conversation. Literary works that describe or take place at a symposium include two Socratic dialogues, Plato’s Symposium and Xenophon’s Symposium, as well as a number of Greek poems.

If we read Levi’s banquet as a symposium, then, of course, it is going to be associated, culturally, in those days with drinking, and with questions and answers.

Some people ask why Jesus eats and drinks with tax collectors and sinners. Now, in this morning’s Gospel reading (Luke 5: 33-39), the same people ask why, unlike John’s disciples or the disciples of the Pharisees, who frequently fast and pray, the disciples of Jesus eat and drink.

Similar complaints were made about Socrates. In Plato’s Symposium, Alcibiades claims that Socrates, despite allegedly drinking heavily just like the others, never got drunk and that alcohol never has any effect on Socrates: ‘Observe, my friends, said Alcibiades, that this ingenious trick of mine will have no effect on Socrates, for he can drink any quantity of wine and not be at all nearer being drunk.’

Christ responds to his detractors by comparing the invitation into the Kingdom with an invitation to a wedding, and speaks of his followers as guests at a wedding banquet. The feast is in progress, so this is a time for joy, while after his death it will be a time for fasting.

He insists that the old way of being and the new way he brings are separate, even if both are to be valued. New material stretches more than old. When wine ferments, it expands. Soft new wineskins expand with the wine, but old ones do not.

And so, in a way, I find myself thinking this morning of two other banquets where the wine must have been flowing freely.

The first of these is the Wedding at Cana, the banquet before Christ’s ministry begins. There the wine runs out, and then the wine runs freely.

The second banquet is at the end of Christ’s ministry, the meal at the Last Supper. Not only must the wine have been flowing freely at that meal, it is the meal of the New Covenant, in which bread and wine are freely given, just as Christ gives himself freely, body and blood.

In this in-between time, this Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, ordinary meals offer a promise of what the heavenly banquet is like. And constantly, as in this morning’s Gospel reading, Jesus uses the image of the wedding banquet to convey how sacred, how loving, how caring, how beautiful, how full of promise, is the heavenly banquet.

Just as the wedding banquet is not the wedding itself, but a celebration of the wedding and the promise of the wedding, the meals in the Gospel in the in-between times are foretastes of, promises of, the great heavenly banquet.

And, at those banquets, Christ dines with tax-collectors like tax-collectors like Levi, Pharisees like Simon, those who are rejected by polite society like Zacchaeus, just as he is going to dine at the Last Supper with those who are going to betray him like Judas, those who are going to deny him like Peter, just as he is going to insist on dining with those who fail to recognise him after the Resurrection, like the disciples at Emmaus.

No matter how wayward others may think we are, no matter how wayward we may think we have been, Christ calls us back to dine with him, to have a new and intimate relationship with, wants to dine with us, so that, as we say in the Prayer of Humble Access, so that ‘that we may evermore dwell in him and he in us.’

Levi’s banquet has parallels with the symposia associated with Socrates, including the drinking and the questions … Socrates bar in Piskopianó in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Friday 5 September 2025):

The theme this week (31 August to 6 September) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘A Faith that Listens and Grows’ (pp 34-35). This theme was introduced on Sunday with reflections from Soshi Kawashima, Seminarian, Diocese of Chubu, Nippon Sei Ko Kai (Anglican Church in Japan). Soshi took part in the Emerging Leaders Academy (ELA), a cross-cultural learning opportunity for young people across the Anglican Communion.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Friday 5 September 2025) invites us to pray:

Heavenly Father, thank you for the mentors who faithfully support the ELA cohort through online 1-1 meetings. May they be strengthened and equipped to encourage others.

The Collect:

O God, you declare your almighty power
most chiefly in showing mercy and pity:
mercifully grant to us such a measure of your grace,
that we, running the way of your commandments,
may receive your gracious promises,
and be made partakers of your heavenly treasure; 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:

Lord of all mercy,
we your faithful people have celebrated that one true sacrifice
which takes away our sins and brings pardon and peace:
by our communion
keep us firm on the foundation of the gospel
and preserve us from all sin;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

God of glory,
the end of our searching,
help us to lay aside
all that prevents us from seeking your kingdom,
and to give all that we have
to gain the pearl beyond all price,
through our Saviour Jesus Christ.

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

‘No one tears a piece from a new garment and sews it on an old garment’ … colourful new fabrics in a shop in Seville (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

Socrates is regarded as the founder of western philosophy … a street name in Koutouloufári in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 113, Sunday 31 August 2025, Eleventh Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XI)

‘But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place’ (Luke 14: 10) … empty tables outside a restaurant in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and today is the Eleventh Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XI, 31 August 2025). We have come to the end of August, and the Season of Creation begins tomorrow (1 September).

Later this morning, I hope to take part in the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford, leading the intercessions. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘When you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place’ (Luke 14: 10) … tables upstairs in Akri restaurant in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Luke 14: 1, 7-14 (NRSVA):

1 On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the sabbath, they were watching him closely.

7 When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honour, he told them a parable. 8 ‘When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honour, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited by your host; 9 and the host who invited both of you may come and say to you, “Give this person your place”, and then in disgrace you would start to take the lowest place. 10 But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, “Friend, move up higher”; then you will be honoured in the presence of all who sit at the table with you. 11 For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.’

12 He said also to the one who had invited him, ‘When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbours, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. 13 But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. 14 And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.’

‘When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind’ (Luke 14: 13) … eating out in Rethymnon (Photographs: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today’s Reflections:

In today’s Gospel reading (Luke 14: 1, 7-14), Saint Luke continues his series of Christ’s sayings about entering the Kingdom of God. He has healed a person on the sabbath (verses 2-6), and he is invited to a Sabbath meal with a prominent Pharisee.

The gathering of God’s elect at the end of time is commonly depicted as a wedding banquet, at which the host is God. The translation of the word κεκλημένος (keklemenos) in verses 7 and 8 referring to ‘guests’ in the NRSV and other versions of the New Testament fails to quite capture how the Greek word, with one occurrence only in Matthew (see Matthew 22: 3, κεκλημένους) and in Luke, says these people have not just been invited but called specifically by their names, chosen individually.

But when we are invited to the heavenly banquet, be that the Eucharist or the Kingdom of God, we are to realise that this is an open invitation. The very people the author of the Letter of the Hebrews reminds us about, the ones we see as humble and humbled, have been invited to the banquet too.

Remembering this should be a cautionary reminder of how we behave in our homes and in our churches, at our own tables, too.

‘For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted’ (Luke 14: 11) … tables upstairs in a restaurant in Panormos near Rethymnon, looking out to the sea (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today’s Prayers (Sunday 31 August 2025, Trinity XI):

The theme this week (31 August to 6 September) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘A Faith that Listens and Grows’ (pp 34-35). This theme is introduced today with reflections from Soshi Kawashima, Seminarian, Diocese of Chubu, Nippon Sei Ko Kai (Anglican Church in Japan).

Soshi took part in the Emerging Leaders Academy (ELA), a cross-cultural learning opportunity for young people across the Anglican Communion. Here he shares some reflections:

It was at graduate school that I came across Anglicanism for the first time. What struck me most was the description of the Anglican Communion as "a communion continuing interpretation". It made me think about how the diversity of the Anglican Communion can enhance, or challenge, our core beliefs.

In my day-to-day life, I interact with many people who we might consider oppressed, such as my LGBTQ+ friends and female ministers. This encounter changed me, making me realise they cannot be disregarded. Unless our theology is dynamic and linked to individual experiences and lives, we will end up with a very ‘dry’ definition of what it means to be a Christian. In short, Anglicanism should oppose a static theology and should instead empower and sustain individuals.

In that sense, the ELA was meaningful to me because it taught me about the importance of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5: 19). Matters are bound to complex, but the recent discussions over same-sex marriage, for example, seem to me to be a significant opportunity to come together and hear new and diverse voices from all over the world. What are considered weak points can be strong points.

Anglicans have always valued diversity and will continue to do so. Our future does not lie in absolute truth but in a thoughtful, evolving understanding. We must remain fully respectful of our Anglican identity as a communion that continually reflects on and reinterprets who we are.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Sunday 31 August 2025, Trinity XI) invites us to read and meditate on Luke 14: 1, 7-14.

The Collect:

O God, you declare your almighty power
most chiefly in showing mercy and pity:
mercifully grant to us such a measure of your grace,
that we, running the way of your commandments,
may receive your gracious promises,
and be made partakers of your heavenly treasure; 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:

Lord of all mercy,
we your faithful people have celebrated that one true sacrifice
which takes away our sins and brings pardon and peace:
by our communion
keep us firm on the foundation of the gospel
and preserve us from all sin;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

God of glory,
the end of our searching,
help us to lay aside
all that prevents us from seeking your kingdom,
and to give all that we have
to gain the pearl beyond all price,
through our Saviour Jesus Christ.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

‘O God, you declare your almighty power … mercifully grant to us … a measure of your grace’ (the Collect) … Christ the Pantocrator in the dome of the parish church in Panormos, near Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

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: 110, Thursday 28 August 2025

‘You have one teacher, and you are all students’ (Matthew 23: 8) … ‘Teacher and Student’ (1904), J Gerberhole, burnished clay, the Old Synagogue Museum, Kraków (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and this week began the Tenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity X) and then the Summer bank holiday on Monday. The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers Saint Augustine (430), Bishop of Hippo, Teacher of the Faith, whose mother, Saint Monica (387), was commemorated yesterday (27 August).

Later today, we are planning to visit London. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

’The greatest among you will be your servant’ (Matthew 23: 11) … service at a table for two in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 23: 8-12 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples:] 8 ‘But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all students. 9 And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father – the one in heaven. 10 Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Messiah. 11 The greatest among you will be your servant. 12 All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.’

Do I need a manual, a discourse or a lecture on how to use a fork … or to love? … at a table in Piskopiano in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

This morning’s Gospel reading (Matthew 23: 8-12) is part of the Gospel reading we looked at last Saturday (Matthew 23: 1-12, 23 August 2025). This morning, we hear a more general rebuke of those among the Scribes and the Pharisees who ‘do not practise what they teach’ (verse 4), who ‘do all their deeds to be seen by others’ (verse 5) and who ‘love to have the place of honour at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, and to be greeted with respect in the market-places, and to have people call them rabbi’ (verses 6-7).

We are warned about the dangers built into loving honorific titles, such as ‘teacher,’ ‘father’ and instructor (see verses 8-10) – perhaps for me that may mean ‘Father’, ‘Canon’ and ‘Professor’ – because, of course, we are all students, we are all brothers and sisters, we are all disciples and children of God.

Yet I too am a father and have been a teacher and a tutor. Is Christ warning against the position; or is he warning against seeking honours that have not been earned?

It is a truism that parents must earn the respect of their children, not seek or demand it. Most parents have, at one time or another, said to their children: ‘Do what I tell you, not what I do.’ Needless to say, children never listen to parents when we say something so silly. All parents know, on the other hand, that actions speak louder than words.

This morning’s reading must not be understood as a general rebuke of all scribes and Pharisees, for Jesus prefaces all he says here by reminding those present that they ‘sit on Moses’ seat; therefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it’ (verses 2-3).

Perhaps this morning’s reading reflects later tensions between the Jewish synagogue and the new Christian community. But, in Christ’s own days, people expected a Pharisee to be a careful observer of the Law. Unlike the Temple priests and village elders, the Pharisees did not have a high social status.

Before the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in the year 70 CE, the Pharisees were a relatively modest group of people without political power and they tried to live out Jewish tradition and the Torah seriously and conscientiously in their daily lives. The Pharisees saw the Law as applying not only to every aspect of public life, but to every aspect of private, domestic, daily life too.

There is a well-worn saying that advises: ‘It’s not where you start out but where you end up.’ The Pharisees started out with good intentions, but some of them ended by seeking to be great, seeking to be exalted (verses 11-12). They started out being concerned for holiness, but some ended at exclusion. They started out seeking to recognise God in all aspects of life, but some of them ended by seeking recognition at banquets and in the synagogue (verses 6-7).

Christ calls us to live in such a way that we can say to the world: ‘Do as we say and do as we do.’

As I was suggesting in my reflections last Saturday, the problem here may not so much be a conflict between words and actions, but the need to make the connection between words and actions. Words must mean what they point to, and the actions must be capable of being described in words.

Most of us, as children, learned by watching how adults behave, we learn as members of the human community. As a child, when I needed to learn how to use a fork, I did not need a lecture on the hygienic and sanitary contributions that forks have made to the benefit European lifestyles since the introduction of the fork through Byzantium and Venice to mediaeval Europe.

I did not need an engineering lecture on the practicalities and difficulties of balancing the prongs and the handle.

I would have been too young to read a delightful discussion by Judith Herrin of how the fork-using Byzantines were much more sophisticated than their western allies or rivals who ate with their hands (Judith Herrin, Byzantium – the Surprising Life of a Mediaeval Empire, London: Allen Lane, 2007).

The same principle applies to everything else. I recalled on Saturday how Andrew Davison, Regius Professor of Divinity, Oxford, points out in his contribution to Imaginative Apologetics (London: SCM Press, 2011), that the same principle applies to how we learn about everything else in life – cups, books, bicycles and so on.

He might have added love – the love of God and the love of one another.

Thinking requires language, language is a communal experience, and, as Andrew Davison points out, we learn language as members of a human community and through induction into common human practices.

We can talk about prayer, forgiveness, and most of all about love itself, to others. But if it only remains talk and has no application, then the words have no meaning.

We may say we believe in the two great commandments, but we only show we believe in them with credibility when we live them out in our lives. There must be no gap that separates what we teach and how we live out what we teach in our lives.

Saint Augustine depicted in a stained glass window by George W Walsh in Saint Augustine’s Church, Galway (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 28 August 2025):

The theme this week (24 to 30 August) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is been ‘From Strangers to Neighbours’ (pp 32-33) This theme was introduced on Sunday with a programme update from the Right Revd Antonio Ablon, Chaplain of Saint Catherine’s Anglican Church, Stuttgart, Germany.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 28 August 2025) invites us to pray:

God of the journey, sustain those facing hardships in foreign lands. When they feel unseen or unheard, may they be reminded that you are near. May their faith be their refuge, and may they find kindness in those they meet.

The Collect:

Merciful Lord,
who turned Augustine from his sins
to be a faithful bishop and teacher:
grant that we may follow him in penitence and discipline
till our restless hearts find their rest in you;
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 of truth,
whose Wisdom set her table
and invited us to eat the bread and drink the wine
of the kingdom:
help us to lay aside all foolishness
and to live and walk in the way of insight,
that we may come with Augustine to the eternal feast of heaven;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

Saint Augustine and Saint Monica, in a window by J Clarke and Sons in Holy Cross Church, Charleville, Co Cork … they are commemorated on 27 and 28 August (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

The Oranges and Lemons are back in fashion in the St Clements area near the heart of Oxford

The Oranges and Lemons in St Clement’s … returning to a name from the 1970s and 1980s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

When I was visiting hospitals and clinics in Oxford recent weeks, I mused on the name of Port Mahon on St Clement’s Street, but also on the name of some of the neighbouring pubs with curious names that I noticed on those return journeys, including the Cape of Good Hope, at the corner of the Plain, where Cowley Road meets St Clement;s Street and Headington Road, and the Oranges and Lemons – which seems such an appropriate name for St Clement’s.

I promised myself that once I was back on my feet fully again I would continue my explorations and find out about those curious pub names.

So, at lunchtime yesterday, I was back in Oxford, and decided to have another look at the Oranges & Lemons at 30 St Clement’s Street.

It describes itself as a ‘quintessential traditional pub in Oxford’ that prides itself ‘on offering great food and excellent service’ and that ‘promises a delightful experience’ with ‘an array of pub classics and seasonal daily specials’.

But the Oranges & Lemons is anything but an ordinary pub on the fringes of the city centre. Apart from having an apt name for an area known as St Clements, it has a three-storey façade that has been painted brightly to full-height with an eye-catching and colourful collection of lemons and oranges, and the theme is carried into the name sign on the street frontage.

A large old photograph of punks and other drinkers outside the old Oranges & Lemons is still on the wall of the main bar. The photograph was taken in 1979, when it was a lively music venue frequented by punks and attracting acts such as Billy Idol of Generation X. According to the Oxford Handbook in 1980, ‘the atmosphere is wonderful. Have a chat with the tramp warming himself by the coal fire. Gaze at the punks with hair all colours of the spectrum.’

The Morgan Pub Collective also runs the Grapes in George Street and took over the Angel and Greyhound in St Clement’s last year. It reopened the pub six month ago [12 February] after a refurbishment that saw it revert to a previous name, the Oranges & Lemons. During those works over a six-week period, the contractors stayed across the street at another traditional pub, the Old Black Horse Inn.

The change of ownership, the refurbishment and the restoration of the former name all came as a surprise to people in the St Clement’s area. The pub was known as the Burton Ale Stores from 1920 on, and then was known as the Oranges & Lemons from 1970 until the mid-1980s. After that, it became a cocktail bar called Parker’s in the 1980s.

When Young’s acquired it in 1991, it was renamed the Angel & Greyhound, a name that came from a former coaching inn, the Angel and the Greyhound on Oxford’s High Street, that once stabled horses in a field behind the old pub in St Clement’s.

Young’s was once a brewery but is now only a pub chain with over 270 pubs, including three in Oxford: the King’s Arms, close to Hertford College, St Aldates Tavern, opposite the town hall and museum, and the Plough Inn on the corner of Cornmarket Street and Saint Michael’s Street.

The Oranges & Lemons in St Clement’s … known as the Angel & Greyhound until a recent change of management (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

When the Angel & Greyhound became the Oranges & Lemons once again, it was the second pub in St Clement’s to change management in a short span of time, following Port Mahon a few months earlier.

Dick Morgan, the founder of the Morgan Pub Collective, had already made a success of the Grapes, which reopened in George Street in August 2023, and of the Gardeners Arms in North Parade Avenue. However, the Gardeners Arms closed earlier this year, and the lease was returned to Greene King.

Morgan pubs are also known for their food, décor and vinyl music from record players. But the name Oranges & Lemons comes from a traditional nursery rhyme and singing game that includes the lines,

Oranges and Lemons, say the bells of St Clement’s
You owe me five farthings, say the bells of St Martin’s.

The lines refer not to Oxford but to the bells of Saint Clement Danes Church in London among several other churches, and the tune is listed as No 13190 in the Roud Folk Song Index, a database of around 250,000 references to almost 25,000 songs. The earliest known version appeared in print ca 1744. The bells of Saint Clement Danes ring out the tune four times a day, at 9 am, noon, 3 pm and 6 pm.

St Clement’s Street in Oxford is often known simply as St Clement’s, and it was originally the main road between Oxford and London. The street links the Plain near Magdalen Bridge beside Magdalen College with London Place at the foot of Headington Hill at the junction with Marston Road to the north.

The street is known for its small shops and restaurants and the street and church give their name to St Clement’s district on the east bank of the River Cherwell. This is a small triangular area from the roundabout known as the Plain, bounded by the River Cherwell to the north, Cowley Road to the south, and the foot of Headington Hill to the east.

The population of the area is a multicultural and socially diverse, from owner occupiers, student accommodation and homes in multiple occupation to social housing. A number of buildings belong to the Charity of Thomas Dawson or the Dawson Trust, founded in 1521 to provide income for the benefit of the people of St Clement’s and the parish church.

The Plain received its name after the parish church of Saint Clement’s, which stood there, was demolished around 1829 to allow a busy street junction to be reconfigured. The roundabout is the site of the former churchyard.

But more about Saint Clement’s Church, old and new, and that roundabout at the Plain on another day, hopefully.

The Oranges and Lemons is at the heart of the St Clement’s area in Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 105, Saturday 23 August 2025

‘They love to have the place of honour at banquets’ (Matthew 23: 6) … dinner by the beach in Platanias near Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and tomorrow is the Tenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity X, 24 August 2025) and the feast of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle.

Today begins the August summer bank holiday weekend in England. Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘They love to have the place of honour at banquets’ (Matthew 23: 6) … a restaurant in Bettystown, Co Meath (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 23: 1-12 (NRSVA):

23 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 2 ‘The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat; 3 therefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practise what they teach. 4 They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them. 5 They do all their deeds to be seen by others; for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long. 6 They love to have the place of honour at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, 7 and to be greeted with respect in the market-places, and to have people call them rabbi. 8 But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all students. 9 And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father – the one in heaven. 10 Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Messiah. 11 The greatest among you will be your servant. 12 All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.’

Rabbi Zalman Lent in the synagogue on Rathfarnham Road, Dublin, with tallit and teffilin, signs of keeping God’s word before us (Photograph: Orla Ryan)

Today’s Reflection:

In the Gospel reading at the Eucharist yesterday (Matthew 22: 34-06), we learned how all the Law and the Prophets – everything taught by Moses and Prophets – depends on, hangs on, the two great commandments, to love God and to love our neighbour.

His summary of those guidelines for living came in a conversation Jesus had with a lawyer in the Temple, in front of the Pharisees and the Sadducees, the two groups most concerned with teaching what is meant by the Law and the Prophets.

In this morning’s Gospel reading (Matthew 23: 1-12), we are still in the Temple with Christ in Holy Week, the week leading up to his Passion, Death and Resurrection. There in the Temple, Christ has silenced his critics among the Sadducees and the Pharisees, showing their lack of understanding of the core messages of the Prophets and the Law in the Bible.

In this morning’s Gospel reading, he turns to speak ‘to the crowds and to his disciples’ about the scribes and the Pharisees, and their attitude to and teaching of the Law and the Bible.

Christ tells the people in the Temple that the Pharisees have authority to teach the Law, and he concedes that they are in an unbroken chain that goes back to Moses, for they ‘sit on Moses’ seat’ (verse 2).

But while honouring their teachings, the people should be wary of their practices. In their interpretation of the Law, they impose heavy burdens on others, yet do not follow the Law themselves.

Externally, they appear pious. They wear teffelin or phylacteries, small, black, leather boxes, on their left arms and foreheads with four Biblical passages as a ‘sign’ and ‘remembrance’ that God liberated their ancestors from slavery in Egypt (see Exodus 13: 1-10; Exodus 13: 11-16; Deuteronomy 6: 4-9; and Deuteronomy 11: 13-21). They also have lengthy fringes or tassels on their prayer shawls (tallitot, singular talit), as visible reminders of the 613 commandments in the Law (see Numbers 15: 38, Deuteronomy 22: 12).

Christ gives four examples of vanity (verse 6-7): they love places of honour at banquets, the best seats in the synagogues, being greeted with respect publicly, and being called ‘Rabbi,’ which means master and later becomes a title for the leader in a synagogue.

We are warned about the dangers built into loving honorific titles, such as ‘teacher,’ ‘father’ and instructor (see verses 8-10) – perhaps for me that means Canon and Professor – because, of course, we are all students, we are all brothers and sisters, we are all disciples, and we are all children of God.

Yet I too am a father and have been a teacher and a tutor. Is Christ warning against the position; or against seeking honours that have not been earned?

It is a truism that parents must earn the respect of their children, not seek or demand it. Most parents have, at one time or another, said to their children: ‘Do what I tell you, not what I do.’ Needless to say, children never listen to parents when we say something so silly.

All parents know, on the other hand, that actions speak louder than words.

Perhaps this morning’s reading reflects later tensions between the Jewish synagogue and the new Christian community. But, in Christ’s own days, people expected a Pharisee to be a careful observer of the Law. Unlike the Temple priests and village elders, the Pharisees did not have a high social status.

Before the destruction of the Temple in the year 70 CE, the Pharisees were a relatively modest group of people without political power and they tried to live out Jewish tradition and the Torah seriously and conscientiously in their daily lives. The Pharisees saw the Law as applying not only to every aspect of public life, but to every aspect of private, domestic, daily life too.

There is another well-worn statement: ‘It’s not where you start out but where you end up.’ The Pharisees started out with good intentions, but some of them ended by seeking to be great, seeking to be exalted (verses 11-12). They started out being concerned for holiness, but some ended at exclusion. They started out seeking to recognise God in all aspects of life, but some of them ended by seeking recognition at banquets and in the synagogue (verses 6-7).

Christ calls us to live in such a way that we can say to the world: ‘Do as we say and do as we do.’

The problem here may not so much be a conflict between words and actions, but the need to make the connection between words and actions. Words must mean what they point to, and the actions must be capable of being described in words.

Most of us, as children, learned by watching how adults behave, we learn as members of the human community. As a child, when I needed to learn how to use a fork, I did not need a lecture on the hygienic and sanitary contributions that forks have made to the benefit European lifestyles since the introduction of the fork through Byzantium and Venice to mediaeval Europe; I did not need an engineering lecture on the practicalities and difficulties of balancing the prongs and the handle; I would have been too young to read a delightful chapter by Judith Herrin in one of her books on how the fork-using Byzantines were much more sophisticated than their western allies or rivals who ate with their hands (Judith Herrin, Byzantium – the Surprising Life of a Mediaeval Empire, London: Allen Lane, 2007).

The same principle applies to everything else, as Andrew Davison, Regius Professor of Divinity, Oxford, points out in his contribution to Imaginative Apologetics (London: SCM Press, 2011), the same principle applies to how we learn about everything else in life – cups, books, bicycles and so on. He might have added love – the love of God and the love of one another.

On a number of occasions, I have visited the National Botanic Gardens in Glasnevin, Dublin. There, in the Great Palm House, are the steps on which the great 20th century German philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein regularly sat in contemplation and thought while he was living in Dublin in the late 1940s.

Even for those who find Wittgenstein difficult to read, he offers useful insights in his writings.

Wittgenstein teaches us that thinking and language must be inter-connected. ‘Words have meaning only in the stream of life,’ he says. Thinking requires language, language is a communal experience, and, as Davison points out, we learn language as members of a human community and through induction into common human practices.

We can talk about prayer, forgiveness, and most of all about love itself, to others. But if it only remains talk and has no application, then the words have no meaning.

Saint Paul reminds the members of the Church in Thessaloniki (I Thessalonians 2: 9-13) that they are witnesses to Christ not only in their beliefs but in the way they live their lives and in their conduct towards the new Church members.

Like a father teaching his children, he urges and encourages them, and pleads with them to walk in God’s ways, so that God’s word becomes made active in those who believe. In All Saints-tide, this is good advice on how to live as saints, as part of the Communion of Saints.

We might remind ourselves that when Christ tells the lawyer sent by the Pharisees and the Sadducees that the greatest commandments are to ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind’ and to ‘love your neighbour as yourself.’ And, he adds: ‘On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets’ (see Matthew 22: 34-46),

If the Pharisees, the Sadducees and the young lawyer were teaching and acting in conformity with these laws, if their words and actions were inter-connected, then there would have been an unassailable ring of authenticity to their teaching.

We may say we believe in the two great commandments, but we only show we believe in them with credibility when we live them out in our lives. There must be no gap that separates what we teach and how we live out what we teach in our lives.

Ludwig Wittgenstein’s steps in the Great Palm House in the National Botanic Gardens, Glasnevin, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Saturday 23 August 2025):

The theme this week (17 to 23 August) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), has been ‘Tell the Full Story’ (pp 28-29). This theme was introduced last Sunday with reflections from Dr Jo Sadgrove, Research and Learning Advisor, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Saturday 23 August 2025, International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and Its Abolition) invites us to pray:

Father, today we honour the lives lost to the slave trade and the struggles of all who fought for its abolition. May we never forget the past, and may we be inspired to work towards a future of justice, equality, and freedom for all.

The Collect of the Day:

Almighty God,
who sent your Holy Spirit
to be the life and light of your Church:
open our hearts to the riches of your grace,
that we may bring forth the fruit of the Spirit
in love and joy and peace;
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:

Holy Father,
who gathered us here around the table of your Son
to share this meal with the whole household of God:
in that new world where you reveal the fullness of your peace,
gather people of every race and language
to share in the eternal banquet of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Gracious Father,
revive your Church in our day,
and make her holy, strong and faithful,
for your glory’s sake
in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Collect on the Eve of Trinity X:

Let your merciful ears, O Lord,
be open to the prayers of your humble servants;
and that they may obtain their petitions
make them to ask such things as shall please you;
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.

Collect on the Eve of Saint Bartholomew:

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

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

The table remains bare if our words and our actions are not inter-connected … tables at a restaurant in Baker Street, London, this week (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

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 103, Thursday 21 August 2025

Waiting for a wedding reception at the Boot and Flogger in Southwark … we are all invited to the heavenly banquet, but are we ready to accept the invitation? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and this week began with the Ninth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity IX, 17 August 2025).

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

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Go therefore into the … streets, and invite everyone you find to the … banquet’ (Matthew 22: 9) … empty tables at restaurants in the side streets in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Matthew 22: 1-14 (NRSVA):

1 Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: 2 ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. 3 He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. 4 Again he sent other slaves, saying, “Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.” 5 But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his slaves, maltreated them, and killed them. 7 The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. 8 Then he said to his slaves, “The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.” 10 Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so the wedding hall was filled with guests.

11 ‘But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, 12 and he said to him, “Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?” And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, “Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 14 For many are called, but few are chosen.’

‘A Peasant Wedding’ (1620), Peter Brueghel the Younger, the National Gallery of Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

‘For many are called, but few are chosen.’

Sometimes, the ways I can behave as a snob can catch me off-guard and unexpectedly, and I shame myself.

When I was growing up, the snobberies and class distinctions of previous generations were challenged over 60 years ago in an old-fashioned way in the film My Fair Lady (1964), based on George Bernard Shaw’s earlier play, Pygmalion (1913).

But Pygmalion also inspired what I think is a much funnier film, Hoi Polloi (1935), with the Three Stooges, Larry, Curly and Moe.

Two professors are arguing about whether our social behaviour is caused by environment or heredity. It is a very funny take on the old Nature v Nurture argument.

To settle a bet, the two professors take three binmen – Larry, Curly and Moe – train and coach them for three months, dress them up, and send them off to a posh society dinner.

Their behaviour descends into farce, and it looks as if one professor has won his bet: our social behaviour is dictated by inherited class.

But then the tables are turned – literally. Everyone else at the party descends to the same riotous behaviour. At a base level, we are all the same, even if some refuse to accept it.

Nature or nurture? It was an important statement that we all share the same humanity, coming as racism and the Nazis were on the rise in the 1930s.

The title of the film, Hoi Polloi, is a way of expressing class-based social prejudice. It is a Greek phrase, meaning ‘the many’ and it was used in Victorian England by people who had the benefit of a classical education in English public schools and the universities, to describe the masses, who they presumed did not understand the phrase.

Gilbert and Sullivan use the phrase to mock those who used it in their comic opera Iolanthe. Later, it was used by English public schoolboys in the 1950s and the 1960s, when they referred to ‘oips’ and ‘oiks’.

The term hoi polloi also appears in a scene in the film Dead Poets Society (1989). Professor John Keating, played by Robin Williams, speaks negatively about the use of the definite article ‘the’ in front of the phrase.

Steven Meeks (Allelon Ruggiero) raises his hands and speaks: ‘The hoi polloi. Doesn’t it mean the herd?’

Keating replies: ‘Precisely, Meeks. Greek for the herd. However, be warned that, when you say “the hoi polloi” you are actually saying “the the herd.” Indicating that you too are “hoi polloi”.’

This morning’s Gospel reading (Matthew 22: 1-14) begins with a very joyful occasion – a posh nosh, a planned wedding, and generous invitations to a lavish banquet. But, instead of the farce in that film with the Three Stooges, it quickly descends into very difficult images: slaves who are kidnapped, mistreated and killed; cities that are burned down; a man who is bound hand and feet and thrown into outer darkness.

The images of the wedding banquet and the wedding covenant are important ways of describing our relationship with God.

But the parable in this morning’s Gospel reading is particularly difficult.

The king has invited a long list of guests, but even after being repeatedly sought out, none of these guests comes to the banquet.

To refuse to come, to refuse a king’s command, is treason; to kill his slaves amounts to insurrection. So the king sends out troops to put down the rebellion.

The king then sends his slaves into the streets to find enough people to sit at the tables at the wedding banquet. The phrase translated as ‘the main streets’ (διεξόδους τῶν ὁδῶν, verse 9), means not the main fashionable, shopping streets in a chic part of a city centre. It refers to dirty, gritty, street corners and junctions, perhaps the main junctions outside the city gates.

This is the place where those who want to be hired as labour gather, where those who are refused entry wait without hope, this is where those who are on margins are found. Other translations catch these images when they talk about the highways and the byways.

And the king’s invitation, in verse 10, goes out to all people, ‘both good and bad.’

Yet, when the king sees that a man is not dressed appropriately for the event, the king throws him into the outer darkness. In this case, the robe probably symbolises the white robe worn for baptism.

Do we wear that robe all the time? In other words, do we live up to our promises of discipleship made at Baptism – summarised in the call to love God and to love others?

If you were to imagine yourself as one of the characters in this parable, who would you be?

And would you behave that way?

Are you the king, throwing a lavish wedding banquet?

Are you a wedding guest who has denied the generosity of the king?

Are you the bride or groom, sidelined and marginalised at our own wedding, incidental to all the power playing and role playing?

Are you one of the people brought in from the streets, but not prepared for the celebration about to take place?

Where do you find Good News in this parable?

What is meant by the many and the few here?

In our western way of thinking, the word many is a quantity much more than the majority, while few is many less than the majority. But in eastern thought, one less than 100% would be considered few.

We could put the Greek use of ‘few’ and ‘many’ by Christ in this parable in its cultural context. Pericles, in his ‘Funeral Oration’ in Athens, according to Thucydides in his History of the Peloponnesian War, uses ‘the many,’ οἱ πολλοί (hoi polloi), in a positive way when he extols democracy in Athens.

He contrasts ‘the many’ with ‘the few’ (οἱ ὀλίγοι, hoi oligoi), the few who abuse power and create an oligarchy, rule by the few. Pericles demands equal justice for ‘the many’, ‘the all’, before the law, against the selfish interests of the few.

When we celebrate the Eucharist, we remember that Christ is the victim, and that he said his blood is shed ‘for you and for many.’ The word ‘you’ here means us, the Church, the few in this parable. But the phrase ‘the many’ here, οἱ πολλοί (hoi polloi), refers to the masses, the multitude, the great unwashed, who are called to the banquet too.

Christ’s invitation is not just to you and me, who know we are invited to the banquet. It is also for the many, the lumpen masses, all people, the ones who are not usually invited to the posh nosh, the Larry, Curly and Moe in our midst.

The invitation to come in, to celebrate at the banquet, symbolised in the Eucharist this morning, is not just for the few, the oligarchs. The many are invited to this banquet this morning.

Who are we to behave like a tyrannical despot and exclude them? For if we exclude them, we are in danger of excluding Christ himself.

‘Look, I have prepared my dinner … and everything is ready’ (Matthew 22: 3) … waiting for diners at the Black Horse in Great Linford, Buckinghamshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 21 August 2025):

The theme this week (17 to 23 August) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Tell the Full Story’ (pp 28-29). This theme was introduced on Sunday with reflections from Dr Jo Sadgrove, Research and Learning Advisor, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 21 August 2025) invites us to pray:

Heavenly Father, we pray for all trapped in modern-day slavery and exploited labour. Bring freedom, dignity, and hope to those who suffer, and help us be a voice for the voiceless.

The Collect of the Day:

Almighty God,
who sent your Holy Spirit
to be the life and light of your Church:
open our hearts to the riches of your grace,
that we may bring forth the fruit of the Spirit
in love and joy and peace;
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:

Holy Father,
who gathered us here around the table of your Son
to share this meal with the whole household of God:
in that new world where you reveal the fullness of your peace,
gather people of every race and language
to share in the eternal banquet of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Gracious Father,
revive your Church in our day,
and make her holy, strong and faithful,
for your glory’s sake
in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

‘Those who had been invited to the wedding banquet … would not come’ (Matthew 22: 3) … empty tables at the Moat House on Lichfield Street, Tamworth (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

A grave in Kerameikós, Athens, where Pericles delivered his funeral oration (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)