Peering through the keyhole, but is the Order of Malta Europe’s smallest microstate or an anomalous leftover?

The Aventine Keyhole is said to allow the curious to peer through three sovereign territories at once: the Order of Malta’s property, Italy, and Vatican City (Photograph: Order of Malta)

Patrick Comerford

I have been to some of the smallest states in Europe over the years. Both the Vatican and San Marino are completely landlocked within Italian territory, yet are sovereign entities themselves, with all the international rights and obligations that entails.

Malta is off the coast of Italy, but it too is a sovereign, independent, internationally recognised state and, unlike San Marino and the Vatican, it is a full member of the European Union.

I have missed out on visiting Monaco, Lichtenstein and Andorra, which are also counted as European microstates, although on one occasion I came close to standing on former Andorran sovereign territory when I stood on the steps of the court building in Perpignan, once the supreme court of Andorra although it is in French territory.

Cyprus, where I have worked and been on holiday, and Luxembourg, are too large, both in land territory and population numbers, to be bring the six European microstates up to eight in number. The Isle of Man, which I visited in my teens, and the many Channel Islands, such as Guernsey, Jersey, Alderney and Sark, are not fully sovereign as they are crown dependencies of the United Kingdom and they do not represent themselves in international bodies such as the UN.

The former Supreme Court of Andorra was once in the French city of Perpignan (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

While the microstates have sovereignty over their own territory, there are small autonomous territories in Europe that, despite having more or less own independent government, executive branch, legislature, judiciary, police, and other trappings of independence, are nonetheless under the sovereignty of another state. Some of those anomalous places I have visited include Gibraltar, which is a British overseas territory surrounded by Spain, but not a separate independent state.

And I have been to places that are unusual, such as Mount Athos, the autonomous monastic community in Greece, often described as a monastic state and under the direct jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.

In Cyprus, I have passed though Akrotiri and Dhekelia, which is a British overseas territory, and I have crossed the ‘Green Line’ in Nicosia into the so-called ‘Turkish Republic of Norther Cyprus’, hardly a microstate as it remains essentially the Turkish-occupied part of the divided island and its statehood is not recognised by the UN, the EU, any EU member state or in international law.

The border crossing between San Marino and Italy … the mountain republic is totally surrounded by Italian territory (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

At times, counting these places is like counting sheep in restless or sleepless moments in the night, and reminiscent of the 99 Ealing comedy Passport to Pimlico, which I was writing about the week before last (7 August 2026). But over the weekend, I found myself asking whether I had missed out on listing one European microstate that I may also have visited in the past.

The Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta, to give the order its formal and legal name, is a sovereign entity in its title and in international law and it has diplomatic relations with many sovereign states and nations. It no longer has territory, and certainly not in Jerusalem, Rhodes, or Malta, all of which I have visited in the past. On the other hand, some of the order’s buildings in Rome, including its headquarters at the Magistral Palace, have special autonomous privileges in Italian law.

Although not a state, the Order of Malta or the Knights of Malta is a sovereign entity under international law. It has permanent non-state observer status at the UN, it has full diplomatic relations, including embassies, with 115 states, it issues its own stamps, coins, passports and license plates, and it has its own army medical corps.

The Grand Master, who is elected for ten years, is known as the Prince and Grand Master, and is both the religious superior and the Sovereign of the Order of Malta, and also holds the title of Most Eminent Highness.

The biometric passports issued by the Order of Malta are diplomatic and service passports and are said to be among the rarest in the world, with only about 500 in total. They are reserved strictly for members of the government (Sovereign Council), diplomatic corps, and select humanitarian officials, and they are recognised in over 100 countries.

The Battle of Lepanto (1571) by Karel Škréta above the altar in the Church of Our Lady Beneath the Chain, a church linked to the Knights of Malta in Prague (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Two friends on Facebook were having a discussion the weekend before last about the international status of the Order of Malta. One suggested that the Order of Malta, rather than the Vatican, is technically the pedantic correct answer to the question, ‘What is the world’s smallest state?’

Unlike the Holy See, which is sovereign over the Vatican City, the Order of Malta has no territory. However, its headquarters in the Palazzo Malta on Via dei Condotti and the Villa Malta on the Aventine Hill are granted extraterritoriality by Italy, and Malta extends the same status to the order’s historical headquarters in Fort St Angelo.

The Aventine Keyhole is a famous peephole in the green door of the Villa del Priorato di Malta in Rome. Looking through the keyhole gives sight of a perfectly manicured garden hedge framing the dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica. This unique spot is said to allow the curious to peer through three sovereign territories at once: the order’s property, Italy, and Vatican City.

The Aventine Hill is one of the Seven Hills on which ancient Rome was built. I stayed once in Sant’Anselmo, the Benedictine Abbey on the Aventine Hill, as a guest during a conference on the Church in China. The campus includes Sant’Anselmo Abbey, the offices of the Benedictine Confederation, the residence of the Abbot Primate, the College of Sant’Anselmo, as well as the Church of Sant’Anselmo.

The campus faces onto the Piazza dei Cavalieri di Malta, the square on the Aventine Hill created in 1764 by the architect Giovanni Battista Piranesi. Outside, on the square, tourists queue up in long lines to peer through the keyhole of the ‘Buco della Serratura’ as they are told that are standing in one state (Italy), looking through another one (Order of Malta), and seeing a third (Vatican).

The former Palace of the Grand Masters in Valletta is now the office of the President of Malta (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

I have visited the former Palace of the Grand Masters in Rhodes. The Knights of Rhodes were expelled from the island by the Ottoman Turks in 1522, and the surviving knights sailed first to Crete, then under Venetian rule, as a staging and regrouping point before moving on to Sicily and eventually Malta, becoming the Knights of Malta. They lost their last footholds in Crete in 1669. The knights were expelled from Malta by Napoleon in 1798, and the former Palace of the Grand Masters in Valletta is now the office of the President of Malta.

Ever since, the Magistral Villa has been at the heart of the Order of Malta’s institutional life, welcoming heads of state, ambassadors and visitors from around the world. It is home to Piranesi’s Church of Santa Maria in Aventino and to the keyhole framing the dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica.

No passport checks are needed for this experience – but then I’ve never been asked for a passport going in or out of the Vatican or San Marino either. Unlike Monaco, San Marino or Andorra, neither the Vatican nor the Order of Malta has an international football team or football league. Monaco has own international team, but AS Monaco plays in Ligue 1, the top tier of French football, and very successfully too. San Marino is currently the lowest-ranked FIFA-affiliated national football team, having won only three matches since their inception. Its chances might improve dramatically if either the Vatican or San Marino decided to sign up, and perhaps signing up the Order of Malta might even increase the moral tone of the pressure on Gianno Infantino to stand down.

As for the knights’ former territories, Rhodes is a part of Greece and Malta is a sovereign, independent EU-member state. And Air Malta is not the air force of the Knights of Malta – its a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ryanair, and it operates scheduled flights on behalf of Ryanair. It’s more like the ‘Nights of Malta’ and the nearest you get to an order, I suppose, is the orderly queueing for ‘Priority’ and ‘Non-Priority’ boarding.

Malta Air … more like the ‘Nights of Malta’ than the ‘Knights of Malta’, flies the flag for Ryanair (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Saint Margaret of Antioch: exploring the legends and looking at some churches that remember her name

Saint Margaret of Antioch Church overlooking the harbour of Vernazza in Cinque Terre on the Italian Riviera … she is remembered on 20 July (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The Church Calendar today (20 July) remembers Saint Margaret of Antioch, a martyr in the fourth century, and Saint Bartolomé de las Casas (1566), Apostle to the Indies.

I have written about Saint Bartolomé de las Casas and in his role as a founding figure of our modern concepts of human rights, an important figure to remember as international law and agreed principles of human rights come under growing threats, particularly from the US, which once saw itself as a defender of international law and human rights.

But as I was searching for images of Saint Margaret of Antioch to illustrate my prayer diary on my blog this morning, I came across memories of a visit back in 2012 to Vernazza in Cinque Terre on the Italian Riviera and the church that is said to hold a relic of her finger.

Saint Margaret of Antioch Church at the harbour of Vernazza in Cinque Terre on the Italian Riviera is said to hold a relic of the saint’s finger (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Margaret of Antioch, also called Marina, was martyred during the Diocletian persecutions at the beginning of the fourth century. Her preaching before her death is said to have converted many to the Christian faith.

According to the legend, she was the daughter of a third or fourth century pagan priest in Antioch. She was either thrown out of the house by her father when she converted to Christianity or was converted by her nursemaid. She was noticed by the local prefect who wanted to marry her, but she spurned him and vowed to keep her virginity for Christ.

He handed her over to the Roman authorities. In prison she was swallowed by Satan in the form of a dragon. But the cross she was carrying irritated his throat, and he spat her out unharmed.

Her persecutors tried to kill her by fire and by drowning, but each time she survived, converting the growing crowd of onlookers. Finally, she was beheaded, along with her many converts, by Emperor Diocletian (245-313 AD). She was buried at Antioch, but her remains were taken later to Italy where they were divided between shrines in Montefiascone and Venice.

Vernazza is one of the five towns that make up the Cinque Terre region in north-west Italy (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Vernazza, in the province of La Spezia in Liguria, in north-west Italy, is one of the five towns that make up the Cinque Terre region. Vernazza is the fourth town heading north, has no car traffic, and remains one of the truest ‘fishing villages’ on the Italian Riviera. It is the only natural port of Cinque Terre and is famous for its elegant houses.

Legend has it that in ancient times, a small wooden box was found along the coast of Vernazza, containing the bones of a finger of Santa Margaret’s hand. After finding the relic, the residents decided to build a church in her honour in the area of the town known as Isolotto.

However, the relic was lost sight of during a strong storm and it appeared only some time later, precisely where it was first found. The people of Vernazza then built a church there, overlooking the sea, where it stands to this day.

Inside the church of Santa Margherita d’Antiochia in Vernazza (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The church of Santa Margherita d’Antiochia was built in the 13th century in the Gothic-Ligurian style by the Antelami masters on a pre-existing Romanesque building. The church is mentioned for the first time in 1318. It stands next to the main square of Vernazza on a rock overlooking the sea. The octagonal tower, 40 meters high, is crowned by small arches and ends with a dome.

The church was enlarged and extended in 1500-1600, when the original mediaeval façade which was destroyed. During new works in 1750, the Romanesque interior was covered with Baroque-style decoration, the wooden roof was replaced with vaults, and the bell tower was raised.

The church was partially restored in 1964-1970, when the original internal structure was recovered, including the wooden roof. The church has two entrances: the main one is more hidden and less easy to reach, and a more comfortable one, in one of the apses overlooking the tree-lined square in front of the marina, opened in the 19th century. The interior with three naves is raised above the level of the square. The church has two 17th century canvases, the Baroque high altar dates from 1750, and there is an 18th century processional chest and a wooden crucifix attributed to Anton Maria Maragliano.

The people of Vernazza celebrate Saint Margaret of Antioch as their patron every year on 20 July.

Saint Margaret’s, Westminster Abbey … the parish church of the House of Commons (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Council of Oxford added her to the list of feast days in 1222, and so her cult grew in popularity in England. More than 250 churches in England are dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch, including Saint Margaret’s, Westminster, the parish church of the House of Commons.

Saint Margaret’s was built in the late 11th century, and a grant from Pope Clement III to the Abbot and Convent of Westminster in 1189 confirmed that Saint Margaret’s was outside the jurisdiction of the Bishop of London. In 1222, the abbey and its properties, including Saint Margaret’s, were declared to be outside the Diocese of London and also exempt from the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Robert Stowell began to rebuild the church in 1482, and it was consecrated on 9 April 1523. Until the dissolution of the monasteries in 1540, the church was served by the monks of the abbey, and the close relationship between Saint Margaret’s and Westminster Abbey has continued ever since.

When Queen Elizabeth I re-founded Westminster Abbey as a collegiate church in 1560, she maintained its exemption from episcopal authority and made the new foundation a royal peculiar, subject only to the authority of the monarch as Visitor.

Saint Margaret’s became the parish church of the Palace of Westminster in 1614. The north-west tower of the church was rebuilt by John James in 1734-1738 and the interior was restored in 1877 by Sir George Gilbert Scott, who retained many of its Tudor features.

In 1972, the church and its churchyard were placed once more under the governance of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster Abbey, with one of the canons of Westminster Abbey serving as Rector of Saint Margaret’s. MPs and staff members of the House of Lords and House of Commons are permitted to marry in the church, and those who were married there include the diarist Samuel Pepys, and prime ministers Sir Winston Churchill and Harold Macmillan.

Saint Margaret Pattens, a guild church on Eastcheap, seen from Saint Mary-at-Hill (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Margaret Pattens, a guild church on Eastcheap, is dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch. The first church on the site dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch was recorded in 1067, when the church was probably built from wood.

The church was rebuilt in stone at a later date but fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1530 and rebuilt in 1538. The church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. The present church was built by Sir Christopher Wren between 1684 and 1687.

The church exterior is notable for its 200-ft high spire, Wren’s third highest and the only one that he designed in a mediaeval style. It is sometimes referred to as Wren’s only ‘true spire.’

Saint Margaret Pattens is one of only a few City churches to have escaped significant damage in World War II. It ceased to be a parish church in 1953 and became one of the City’s guild churches. The church is the Guild Church of the Worshipful Company of Pattenmakers and the Worshipful Company of Basketmakers, two of the City livery companies.

Saint Margaret Lothbury, known as the Bankers’ Church, is one of the 51 Wren churches in the City of London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Margaret Lothbury is also dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch. It is known as the Bankers’ Church, because of its proximity to the back door of the Bank of England. Lothbury is a short street that runs east-west with traffic flow in both directions, from the junction of Gresham Street with Moorgate to the west, and the junction of Bartholomew Lane with Throgmorton Street to the east.

There has been a church on the site since the 12th century, and the earliest mention of Saint Margaret Lothbury is in 1185. It was rebuilt over the Walbrook in 1440, when a stone arch was erected over the brook in 1440 so that the church could be extended. The work was completed mostly at the expense of Robert Large, then the Lord Mayor of London. He is remembered as the Master to whom William Caxton, the printer, served his apprenticeship.

Like so many London churches, the church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666 and was rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren between 1686 and 1690. It is one of the 51 churches in London rebuilt by Wren after the fire. However, the tower may be the work of Robert Hooke.

The church has exceptionally fine 17th-century woodwork from other now-demolished Wren churches. This woodwork includes the reredos, the Communion rails and the baptismal font, which are thought to be by Wren’s carver, Grinling Gibbons. The pulpit is the original pulpit of the Wren church and the Baptismal Font is thought to come from the workshop of Grinling Gibbons.

Saint Margaret Lothbury still serves as a parish church in the Square Mile. It is also the official church of five Livery Companies, two Ward Clubs and two professional institutes. It also has connections with many local finance houses, all of which hold special services there each year.

The west end of Saint Margaret of Antioch Church, with Durham Castle (left) and Durham Cathedral (right) in the background (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

In Durham, Saint Margaret of Antioch Church at the bottom of Crossgate is a parish church in the Liberal Catholic tradition, with a diversity inherited from recent history – charismatic, catholic, contemplative – that is reflected in the congregations.

Crossgate is the ancient route west from the city, on a bluff overlooking Framwellgate Bridge. It connects the city centre with Neville’s Cross, where the remains of a stone cross are a reminder that Crossgate was once a pilgrim route for those travelling to Durham and the relics of Saint Cuthbert.

Saint Margaret’s was established in the 12th century as a chapel of ease in the Parish of Saint Oswald to serve the people of the Borough of Crossgate or the ‘Old Borough’. Saint Margaret’s was under the jurisdiction of the Priors of Durham, and their successors, the Dean and Chapter of Durham, remain the patrons of the living to this day.

The earliest surviving parts of the church date from ca 1150. After their own chapel was built, the people of Crossgate resented still having to attend the parish church at certain times and to pay certain dues. During one dispute, the prior removed the font from Saint Margaret’s in 1343. It was returned by the bishop, but he insisted, however, that the parishioners had no right to use it.

Eventually, the residents of Crossgate won the right to be baptised and married in Saint Margaret’s, and burials were allowed there from 1431. The church was restored in the second half of the 19th century, when the north aisle was largely rebuilt, and a full set of stained glass windows was added. The organ dates from 1917 and is by Harrison & Harrison. Their factory until recently was within the parish, and Arthur Harrison was the churchwarden of Saint Margaret’s at the time.

Saint Margaret of Antioch depicted in a statue above the north porch of Saint Margaret of Antioch Church, Crossgate, Durham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 74, Monday 20 July 2026

‘The people of Nineveh … repented at the proclamation of Jonah’ (Matthew 12: 41) … a whale depicted in the Saint Brendan window in Saint Michael’s Church, Sneem, Co Kerry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and yesterday was the Seventh Sunday after Trinity (Trinity VII, 19 July 2026). Today, the calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship remembers Saint Margaret of Antioch, martyr in the fourth century, and Saint Bartolomé de las Casas (1566), Apostle to the Indies.

I stayed up last night watching the World Cup final between Spain and Argentina. I watched the first 90 minutes in the Old George in Stony Stratford, and then watched the rest of the game at home to see Spain 1-0 in extra time. Now I am on my way to Cambridge this morning. But, as the day begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘The people of Nineveh … repented at the proclamation of Jonah’ (Matthew 12: 41) … a reconstruction of the gates of an Assyrian palace in the Pergamon Museum, Berlin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 12: 38-42 (NRSVA):

38 Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to him, ‘Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.’ 39 But he answered them, ‘An evil and adulterous generation asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40 For just as Jonah was for three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so for three days and three nights the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth. 41 The people of Nineveh will rise up at the judgement with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the proclamation of Jonah, and see, something greater than Jonah is here! 42 The queen of the South will rise up at the judgement with this generation and condemn it, because she came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon, and see, something greater than Solomon is here!’

‘Hold up the sandal, as he has commanded us!’ (Monty Python, ‘The Life of Brian’) … two over-size sandals outside the Antika Irish bar on Arabatzoglou street in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s reflection:

Signs are part of the humour throughout Monty Python’s Life of Brian, also known as Life of Brian, a controversial 1979 film by the Monty Python team, including Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin.

Scene 18, ‘The Holy Gourd of Jerusalem’, includes this dialogue:

FOLLOWERS: … Look! Ah! Oh! Oh!

ARTHUR: He has given us a sign!

FOLLOWER: Oh!

SHOE FOLLOWER: He has given us … His shoe!

ARTHUR: The shoe is the sign. Let us follow His example.

SPIKE: What?

ARTHUR: Let us, like Him, hold up one shoe and let the other be upon our foot, for this is His sign, that all who follow Him shall do likewise.

EDDIE: Yes.

SHOE FOLLOWER: No, no, no. The shoe is …

YOUTH: No.

SHOE FOLLOWER: … a sign that we must gather shoes together in abundance.

GIRL: Cast off …

SPIKE: Aye. What?

GIRL: … the shoes! Follow the Gourd!

SHOE FOLLOWER: No! Let us gather shoes together!

FRANK: Yes.

SHOE FOLLOWER: Let me!

ELSIE: Oh, get off!

YOUTH: No, no! It is a sign that, like Him, we must think not of the things of the body, but of the face and head!

SHOE FOLLOWER: Give me your shoe!

YOUTH: Get off!

GIRL: Follow the Gourd! The Holy Gourd of Jerusalem!

FOLLOWER: The Gourd!

HARRY: Hold up the sandal, as He has commanded us!

ARTHUR: It is a shoe! It is a shoe!

HARRY: It's a sandal!

ARTHUR: No, it isn't!

GIRL: Cast it away!

ARTHUR: Put it on!

YOUTH: And clear off!

How often do we pray for unusual signs as indications of God’s blessing, favour, approval or intervention, or even God’s judgment?

In this morning’s Gospel reading (Matthew 12: 38-42), Jesus faces this sort of request too in his own day. People wanted some spectacular sign from him to establish beyond doubt that he was who he said he was.

In today’s reading, Jesus addresses the crowds who gather around him as ‘an evil and adulterous generation’ (verse 39) because they are asking for a sign. Today people can be very impressed by visionaries who claim to have visions that are denied to the rest of believers.

The church has traditionally been very wary of all such claims. In the Gospel reading, Jesus accuses his contemporaries of failing to see what is there before them. They want signs and yet all they need already stands in front of them in the person of Jesus, someone greater than Solomon, greater than Jonah, greater than all the prophets and kings.

If the people of Nineveh responded to Jonah, and if the Queen of the South responded to Solomon, how much more should Jesus’ contemporaries respond to him?

God has already given us all we need in and through the church, in Word, in Sacrament and in the community of believers. There we find the living word of God. There we find the Eucharist and the other sacraments. There we find Jesus present among us and within his followers.

In the Eucharist, Christ is present to us in the bread and the wine, saying, ‘This is my body … This is my blood’.

In coming to Christ in the Eucharist, we are coming to one who is greater than Jonah or Solomon. He is present to us in other ways also. We take his presence seriously by responding to his call and following in his way, as the people of Nineveh responded to Jonah’s call. And, in response to Christ’s presence, we are called to respond to his presence by living in as a sign of his presence in the world.

A collection of cluttered signs and over-size sandals outside the Antika Irish Bar in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 20 July 2026):

In Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), the theme this week, from 19 to 25 July 2026 (pp 20-21), is ‘Flood Relief in Mozambique’. This theme was introduced yesterday with a programme update from the Revd Mauricio S Mugunhe, Executive Director Anglican Social Action, Igreja Anglicana de Moçambique e Angola (the Anglican Church of Mozambique and Angola).

The USPG prayer diary today (Monday 20 July 2026) invites us to pray:

Lord of all comfort, we pray for those who mourn loved ones lost in the floods. Hold them in your mercy and bring them your peace.

The Collect of the Day:

Lord of all power and might,
the author and giver of all good things:
graft in our hearts the love of your name,
increase in us true religion,
nourish us with all goodness,
and of your great mercy keep us in the same;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

Lord God, whose Son is the true vine and the source of life,
ever giving himself that the world may live:
may we so receive within ourselves
the power of his death and passion
that, in his saving cup,
we may share his glory and be made perfect in his love;
for he is alive and reigns, now and for ever.

Additional Collect

Generous God,
you give us gifts and make them grow:
though our faith is small as mustard seed,
make it grow to your glory
and the flourishing of your kingdom;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

Saint Margaret of Antioch is commemorated on 20 July … the church in Vernazza in Cinque Terre on the Italian Riviera is said to hold a relic of her finger (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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

Saint Peter’s Church on Saffron Hill is at the heart of ‘Little Italy’ and the oldest Italian church in London

Looking out on Clerkenwell Road and Hatton Garden from the loggia and portico of Saint Peter’s Italian Church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Patrick Comerford

When I was in Holborn and the Hatton Garden area recently for an event in Saint Alban’s Church, Holborn, organised by USPG and SPCK, I visited a number of churches in the area, including Saint Alban’s, Saint Etheldreda’s Church on Ely Place, the City Temple, and Saint Peter’s Church on Saffron Hill on Clerkenwell Road, facing the top end of Hatton Garden.

Saint Peter’s Italian Church has been described as one of the most beautiful churches in London and is the oldest church for Italians in London. It just within the boundaries of the London Borough of Camden, but it is the spiritual home of the Italian community in Clerkenwell (‘Little Italy’), with its hub in the Borough of Islington.

The church has a modest outer appearance and seems to be hemmed in between the neighbouring tall buildings, including an Italian restaurant to the left, and the Bryson Hotel to the right, so that only the later, narrow entrance front and loggia can be seen from the street. But inside the church has a large and splendid interior.

Saint Peter’s Italian Church has been described is the oldest church for Italians in London and is the spiritual heart of ‘Little Italy’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

In the early 19th century, Saffron Hill was a poor neighbourhood with crowded and decadent streets, known for pickpockets and fences. By 1850, about 2,000 Italian immigrants were living there, many working as street musicians, artisans, framers, and makers of mirrors, barometers and scientific instruments. These Italians did not have their own church and so used in the Capella Reale Sarda in Lincoln’s Inn Fields.

Saint Vincent Pallotti (1795-1850), an Italian priest and founder of the Union of the Catholic Apostolate or Pallotine Fathers, decided in 1845 to build a church for Italian emigrants in London. After the restoration of the Catholic hierarchy in England, sensitivities about the ‘papal aggression’ were still high. Saint Vincent Pallotti was supported by the prominent Italian politician and activist Giuseppe Mazzini (1805-1872), who was living in exile in London at the time.

Inside Saint Peter’s Church, designed by the Dublin-born Irish architect Sir John Miller-Bryson and consecrated on 16 April 1863 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The church was designed by the Dublin-born Irish architect Sir John Miller-Bryson (1822-1864), whose name is recalled in the Bryson Hotel to the right of the church. Bryson worked from plans drawn up by Francesco Gualandi of Bologna and modelled on the Basilica of San Crisogono in Trastevere in Rome. At first, the new church was to hold 3,400 people, but the original grand designs were never fully realised due to a shortage of funds.

In the course of work, as the church was built in 1862-1863, its size was greatly reduced. Yet, it was the largest Catholic church in Britain for the next 40 years and the only church the built in Britain in the style of a Roman basilica style.

The church was consecrated on 16 April 1863 as the Church of Saint Peter for All Nations, and was the first Italian church outside Italy. The architect Bryson died the following year (3 October 1864) and was buried in Brompton Cemetery.

The statues of Christ, Saint Bede and Saint George and the mosaics depicting scenes in the life of Saint Peter (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Saint Peter’s Church is 19 metre high church with a capacity for 2,000 people. The front section has a loggia and portico with twin arches. Above them are three niches: the central alcove has a statue of Christ, while the side alcoves have statues of Saint Bede and Saint George. Between the alcoves, two large mosaics depict two scenes in the life and ministry of Saint Peter: the first miraculous draught of fish (see Luke 5: 1-11), which results in Peter, James and John following Jesus; and Christ giving the keys of the Kingdom to Saint Peter (see Matthew 16: 19).

Above the façade, a 33-metre-high bell tower built in 1891 houses a bell known as the ‘Steel Monster’. The great bell was cast in 1862 by Naylor Vickers of Sheffield and was one of several bells exhibited at the International Exhibition that year. At the time, the only other large bell in London, apart from Big Ben in Westminster, was Great Tom in Saint Paul’s Cathedral.

The ‘Steel Monster’ remains one of the largest bells in England, though there are larger Roman Catholic bells at Downside, Ampleforth and in Liverpool Roman Catholic Cathedral.

The organ is part of the original organ built by the Belgian company Annaesens in 1886 and at the time it was considered one of the best in the country.

The organ is part of the original organ built by the Belgian company Annaesens in 1886 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

There are two wall memorials in the loggia: one, installed in 1927, remembers veterans, mostly Italian Britons of World War I; the other, installed in 1960, commemorates the 446 Italians who died on the SS Arandora Star in 1940.

Mussolini declared war on Britain on 10 June 1940, and after Churchill’s famous outburst, ‘Collar the lot!’, many Italians were interned. The SS Arandora Star sailed from Liverpool for Canada on 1 July 1940 with 712 Italian internees on board. The remaining passengers included 479 interned German men, among them a number of Jewish refugees, and 86 German prisoners of war – 1,216 detainees in total – and there was a crew of almost 400 British military guards and merchant sailors.

The SS Arandora Star was without escort and had no Red Cross insignia. On 2 July 1940, it was sunk by a German U-boat about 75 miles west of Bloody Foreland, Co Donegal, with great loss of life. One of the internees on board, the German Captain Otto Burfeind, went down with the ship having organised the lifeboat evacuation of British, German and Italian men alike. Over 800 people – British, Italian and German – were lost. It was the worst mass loss of life of any foreign-based Italian community.

During World War II, when many Italian immigrants were interned, the Irish Pallottine fathers took care of the church. During the war, Polish Catholics were permitted to worship and hold services in Polish in the church, as they had no other church. The church returned to the Italian Pallottines in 1953, and since then it has been substantially remodelled. Today it is a Grade II listed building.

Two memorials in the loggia recall the tragedies of World War I and World War II (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Little Italy’s core historical borders are usually placed at Clerkenwell Road, Farringdon Road and Rosebery Avenue, comprising the Saffron Hill part of Clerkenwell. The Clerkenwell area spans the London boroughs of Camden and Islington. Today, the Italian community in London is more dispersed, but the church remains a major venue for the community of Little Italy.

A highlight in the community calendar is the annual processione in mid-July. The annual procession began in the 1880s, and is believed to be the first of its kind in England since the Reformation. It remains a focal point of the calendar in Little Italy.

Sunday Masses in Saint Peter’s are at 7 pm on Saturdays, and 9:30 am, 11 am (Sung), 12: 30 and 7 pm. Masses on Holy Days are at 10 am, 12:15 pm and 7:30 pm. Weekday Masses are at 12:15 pm, Monday to Friday.

Saint Peter’s remains a major venue for the community of Little Italy (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Cormac Comerford makes his Olympic debut on the opening day of the Winter Olympics

Team Ireland alpine skiier Cormac Comerford from Glenageary, Co Dublin, in Piazza Walther (Photograph: David Fitzgerald/ Sportsfile/ Irish Examiner)

Patrick Comerford

Cormac Comerford from Glenageary, Co Dublin, finished 34th in the men’s downhill today on the opening day of the Alpine skiing at the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics, where Franjo von Allmen from Switzerland delivered a sensational performance to win the first gold medal of the Games.

Cormac Comerford made his Olympic debut this afternoon in skiing’s queen event at the Stelvio Ski Centre in Bormio, finishing the 3,442-metre course in a time of 2:04.40. He started out last among the field and came 34th among the 36 starters, well pleased with his effort on a highly technical, and in parts treacherous, course.

‘It’s an incredible feeling to make my Olympic debut today in this weather, on this slope,’ he told The Irish Times. ‘To bring it down Stelvio is a huge achievement, coming from the artificial slope back home. There’s a huge sense of pride. I made a few mistakes in the run, it felt smoother in training, but that’s racing and I’m really proud to have brought it down.’

‘I’m excited to be here,’ he said. ‘If I’m proud, I hope I can make Ireland proud as well.’ He was the first member of Team Ireland to compete in this year’s Winter Olympics in Milan and Cortina when he hit the slopes on the opening day of the games.

Ireland has been sending teams to the Winter Olympics for many years, but it is 24 years since Dublin-born Clifton Wrottesley (Lord Wrottesley) came up one place shy of a medal for Ireland in the skeleton at the Salt Lake City Games in 2002.

Cormac Comerford’s Olympic scholarship meant fewer pressures in a sport that costs him €40,000 a year to compete in. This is important for him, as he remembers how hard it was when first started out professionally after starting to study engineering at TU Dublin (Technological University Dublin). His summer work included ‘a lot of sailing instruction and labour on construction sites.’

He says he spent too many of his early years on the circuit sleeping in bus stations and carting a ski bag the weight of his own body to different events and different countries in order to shave pennies off his budget.

It took him six years to qualify for his engineering degree because of the time spent away from home. He could, as he joked himself, be a doctor by now. But scholarships from Trinity, FBD and from the Olympic Federation of Ireland were critical in allowing him to stay on track and in pursuit of his dream.

He competed in the World Championships in 2017 for first time. He is now at his peak, among the top five per cent in the world, 23rd in the World Championships, ‘and hopefully going a lot higher.’

Cormac Comerford found that breaking into a sport where Ireland have no tradition was hard, and his achievements were often belittled. ‘I remember watching Shane O’Connor on the TV at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver and thinking, ‘Imagine if I could do that, how cool would that be?’ So going into Milan-Cortina would be massive for me. To achieve that childhood dream would be the cherry on the cake.’

When Cormac Comerford was eight and growing up in Glenageary, his aunt first took him up the dry ski slopes in Kilternan in south Co Dublin. Now, 21 years later, after his fourth qualification attempt, Comerford is among the four Irish athletes taking part in Milano Cortina 2026.

Cormac Comerford … ‘It’s been a childhood dream of mine’ (Photograph: RTÉ)

The 25th Winter Olympics are spread across six locations in north Italy this year. They opened last night (6 February 2026) and continue for the next two weeks until Sunday 22 February. Cormac Comerford’s journey there has been has been a difficult one and his childhood dream of reaching the Olympics has been tested repeatedly over the years.

‘It’s been a childhood dream of mine, since I first put on a pair of skis, up at the Ski Club of Ireland. I fell in love with the sport, and when I got to watch Shane O’Connor at the Olympics in 2010, that’s when the seed was really sown’, he says.

Cormac is competing in all four events in Milano Cortina: the downhill, super-G, giant slalom and slalom. He has also competed in five World Championships, when he finished inside top-30 in the European Cup. The three other Irish athletes are Anabelle Zurbay (17), who was born in Minnesota; Thomas Maloney Westgård born on the island of Leka in Norway to a Galway mother and Norwegian father, and Ben Lynch, who has lived in Vancouver since he was three.

Cormac Comerford previously reached the minimal qualifying criteria in alpine skiing for Sochi 2014, Pyeongchang 2018, and Beijing 2022, but each time he missed out on the strict quota for Irish representatives. Yet he never let go of that dream. ‘Being an Irish ski racer can also be incredibly lonely, there aren’t many of us, it’s a really hard path to forge.’

‘There were a few turning points,’ he recalls, ‘like when I started in Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT), my whole career was hanging on me getting a scholarship there. Thankfully they believed in me, I got some extra support, and it was enough to help me keep the dream alive.’

None of his family are skiers. He grew up playing GAA underage with Cuala, alongside Con O’Callaghan, and was also involved in rugby, hockey, sailing, and surfing. But, ultimately, skiing came out on top.

His specialist event is the slalom, the mix of technical and physical demands, dodging between 50 or 60 gates, 8 to 11 metres apart, while flat-out downhill at 60 kph for between 40 seconds to a minute.

His first event was on Saturday, the day after the opening ceremony in the San Siro Stadium in Milan.

It is 34 years since Team Ireland first competed at the Winter Olympics, at Albertville 1992, and the four athletes selected for Milano Cortina bringing to 37 the number of Irish Winter Olympians. For Cormac, the lifelong dream is finally being realised.

Cormac Comerford works as a mechanical engineer in the off-season, and spends most of the winter travelling Europe, training and competing. He recalls how he spent too many of his early years on the circuit sleeping in bus stations and carting a ski bag the weight of his own body to different events and different countries in order to shave pennies off his budget.

Cormac Comerford grew up in Glenageary in south Dublin. He was a sporty child, lining out for Cuala in both GAA codes, and playing rugby at Newpark Comprehensive in Blackrock. His mother’s passion for sailing also meant he spent a lot of time on the water. But trips with his aunt to Ireland’s only artificial ski slope in Kilternan caught his imagination from the age of eight.

He loved the individuality of downhill skiing, its niche status in Ireland appealing because it meant Comerford could hone his craft under the radar. ‘There was no noise around the sport, especially in Ireland,’ he says. ‘It was just me in my own world with the racing. That's what really pulled me in and kept me hooked.’

He is competing in four different events at the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics and faces three more Alpine skiing events: on Wednesday (11 February) in the Super-G (Alpine Skiing) in Bormio; next Saturday (14 February), in the Giant Slalom Run 1 and 2 (Alpine Skiing) in Bormio; and on Monday 16 February in the Slalom Run 1 and 2 (Alpine Skiing), also in Bormio.

The closing ceremony is in Verona on Sunday 22 February.

Alpine skier Cormac Comerford from Glenageary … representing Ireland in skiing at the Winter Olympics in Milan (Photograph: Harry Murphy/Sportsfile)

Greece celebrates Oxi Day, but did Metaxas say ‘No’ 85 years ago, and was he truly opposed to fascism?

The Greek flag flying in the Ionian Sea off the coast of Paxos (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Today is Oxi Day in Greece, the 85th anniversary of the day Greece said No, Όχι, to fascism in 1940 and a day of national pride. In Greek, this day is known as Επέτειος του οχι, or ‘the anniversary of No’.

Oxi Day (sometimes spelt Ohi Day) is a national public holiday in both Greece and Cyprus and is celebrate by Greeks around the world.
On this day 85 years ago (28 October 1940), the Prime Minister of Greece, Ioannis Metaxas, said ‘No’ to Mussolini’s demand to allow Italian troops to cross the border into Greece.

In the days that followed, as news of this rejection by Metaxas spread around Athens and throughout Greece, Greeks took to the streets shouting ‘Oxi! Όχι!’ That refusal on 28 October 1940 is commemorated each year as a day that represents bravery, solidarity and heroism for millions of Greeks all around the world.

Although Greece had tried to remain neutral in the early days of World War II, increasing threats from Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy pushed the Greek dictatorship into turning to Great Britain and the allies. The Greek army emerged as a formidable force, holding back the Axis forces from entering Greece for almost six months. Churchill commented at the time: ‘Hence we will not say that Greeks fight like heroes, but that heroes fight like Greeks.’

The Greek Parliament facing onto Syntagma Square in Athens (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Oxi Day parade in Athens today included marching bands, clubs, societies and school children in their thousands marching through the city centre, along Leoforos Vassilissis Amalias Avenue, moving past the Parliament in Syntagma Square and then along Panepistimiou Street. This display of colour and national pride was repeated in every city and town in Greece.

Oxi Day was also celebrated with free entry into archaeological sites in Athens, including the Acropolis, the Acropolis Museum, the Byzantine Christian Museum and the National Archaeological Museum. Most shops were closed, but most restaurants and bars stayed open, particularly in the main tourist areas.

In Rethymnon in Crete, today also marks the Feast of the Four Martyrs of Rethymnon, commemorating four local men— Angelis, Manuel, George and Nicholas — who were martyred in 1824 for refusing to renounce their Christian faith under Ottoman rule.

Sunday last was the Feast of Saint Demetrios of Thessaloniki (26 October), and both his feast day and Oxi Day were marked with special celebrations in the Greek Orthodox Church in Stony Stratford last weekend, beginning with Vespers on Saturday, and concluding with themed performances by the children, parents and teachers in the Church Hall at lunchtime on Sunday.

Celebrating Oxi Day in the Greek Orthodox Church in Stony Stratford on Sunday morning (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Mussolini had been planning his war against Greece for several months. He never informed Hitler of his plans though, and notoriously said that Hitler was going to read about it in the papers.

On 15 August 1940, an Italian submarine fired three torpedoes against Elli, a Greek protected cruiser on the island of Tinos island, and nine people were killed. In an effort to avoid the conflict with Italy, the Greek government never officially acknowledged the nationality of the submarine.

Events escalated week-by-week, and on 28 October 1940 Mussolini gave an ultimatum to the Greek government through the Italian ambassador in Greece, Emanuele Grazzi.

Grazzi asked Metaxas, to allow the Italian troops to pass through Pindos mountains, in the region of Epirus. If the forces were not allowed through the Greek border and Greek territory, then there would be war, Mussolini warned. br />
Tradition says Metaxas replied to this ultimatum with a single word: OXI. This refusal marked the beginning of the Greco-Italian War. On the next day, Italian troops deployed in Albania forced their way into Greece. As the news spread, the whole nation joined forces to combat the foreign invader. People took to the streets, shouting ‘OXI’.

The high morale of the Greek troops and their extreme heroism were praised worldwide, and the Greek Resistance fought with determination against Axis occupation. World leader including the American president Franklin D Roosevelt, the British statesman Winston Churchill, the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin and the exiled leader of the French resistance Charles de Gaul all praised the Greek army.

But it is for historians to disentangle myth and history, and popular tellings of stories from the events of the past.

So, did Ioannis Metaxas (1871-1941) actually deliver that one-word rebuttal, Oxi?

And was he taking a principled stand against Fascism?

The Greek flag flying above the Fortezza in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

When Mussolini demanded that Greece would consent to Italian troops crossing the border into Greece, the story goes, Metaxas responded brusquely and bluntly: ‘OXI!’

In reality, Grazzi and Metaxas had a longer dialogue in French, which is documented in Grazzi’s memoirs. Metaxas responded to the Italian ultimatum in French, the diplomatic language at the time: Alors, c’est la gueree!, ‘Well, then it is War!’

According to Metaxa’s daughter, the dialogue escalated as follows:

Grazzi: Pas nécessaire, mon excellence (Not necessarily, your excellency).

Metaxas: Non, c’est necessaire (No, it is necessary).

But, a long quotation in French does not really work as a slogan in Greek. On 30 October, a creative journalist published an article with the headline ‘ΟΧΙ,’ referring to Metaxas’ refusal. This, in turn, became a catchphrase of the Greek resistance, and it remained a remembered word among generations of Greeks ever after.

The Greek flag outside the church in the village of Tsesmes, east of Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

But was Metaxas a principled political opponent of Fascism and the threatened fascist invasion of Greece?

General Ioannis Metaxas (Ιωάννης Μεταξάς) was born on the island of Ithaka in 1871 into an aristocratic family. He entered the Greek army as a career office at an early age. He took part in the Greco-Turkish War (1897) and the Balkan Wars (1912-1913), and quickly rose through the ranks of the Greek army. He studied at the Berlin War Academy in 1899-1903 on the personal nomination of Crown Prince Constantine and became an admirer of Prussian militarism and an opponent of what he regarded as ‘intemperate parliamentarism’ in Greece.

When Eleftherios Venizelos became Prime Minister, he appointed Metaxas as his adjutant in 1910 as part of an effort at rapprochement with the monarchy. At the outbreak of World War I, Venizelos and King Constantine rejected a German request to join the Central Powers, and instead Venizelos approached the Entente Powers, Britain, France and Russia. Venizelos was shaken when Metaxas resigned in February 1915, and when King Constantine decided to keep Greece neutral Venizelos resigned.

Venizelos won the May 1915 elections, formed a new government and recalled Metaxas as deputy chief of staff. Venizelos received support in Parliament for Greek entry into the war and the presence of allied troops in Thessaloniki with a 152-102 vote on 22 September. However, the king dismissed Venizelos the next day, solidifying the rift between monarchists and Venizelists and creating the ‘National Schism’.

When Constantine and the army leadership allowed German and Bulgarian troops to occupy parts of east Macedonia in 1916, there was widespread popular anger throughout Greece. Venizelist officers launched a revolt in Thessaloniki in August 1916 and Venizelos formed a ‘Government of National Defence’. The new government entered the war on the Allies’ side, while the official Greek state and the royal government remained neutral, and King Constantine and Metaxas were accused of being pro-German.

Metaxas formed a monarchist paramilitary Epistratoi force during the events in Athens known as Noemvriana (November) or ‘Greek Vespers’. But King Constantine was deposed in June 1917 and was replaced by his son, King Alexander. Venizelos returned to office, and Greece officially joined the war.

Metaxas and other leading opponents of Venizelos were exiled to Corsica, but he escaped to Sardinia and later to Siena. He was sentenced to death in absentia in January 1920 for his role in the Noemvriana events. But after the electoral defeat of Venizelos in November 1920, Metaxas retuned to Greece and was reinstated in the army with the rank of major-general.

Following the defeat of Greek forces in Asia Minor, King Constantine was again forced into exile after a coup led by Colonel Nikolaos Plastiras. Metaxas entered politics and founded the Freethinkers’ Party in 1922. However, his role in a failed monarchist coup in October 1923 forced him into exile again. King George II was forced into exile too, the monarchy was abolished, and the Second Hellenic Republic was proclaimed in March 1924.

Metaxas soon returned to Greece, publicly declaring his acceptance of the new republic. But in elections in 1926, his party won 15.8% of the vote and 52 seats in Parliament, and Metaxas became Communications Minister in a coalition formed by Alexandros Zaimis.

His party became entangled in infighting and dropped to 1.6% of the vote and three seats in 1933, but he became Interior Minister in the cabinet of Panagis Tsaldaris. He soon became the most intransigent and extreme of all the Monarchist politicians with his call for an absolute monarchy. When there was a failed assassination attempt against Venizelos in 1933, Metaxas praised it in his newspaper Hellenki, expressing regret only that the attempt failed.

Greek flags at the church in the coastal village of Panormos, east of Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Venizelist officers attempted a coup in Thessaloniki on 1 March 1935. The city was known as a ‘hotbed of republicanism’ and had taken in the bulk of the 1.3 million Greeks expelled from Turkey in 1923, and the majority of the refugees there lived in extreme poverty.

After the failed coup, Metaxas called for a ‘new order’ in Greece. Tsaldaris called early elections and for a referendum on restoring the monarchy. Metaxas and his party took 20% of the vote in Athens, and the War Minister, General Georgios Kondylis, declared he was an admirer of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. The army was purged of Venizelist officers, Metaxas spoke openly of a civil war and there was a wave of strikes and protests across the country.

Kondylis staged a coup, Tsaldaris was deposed, and George II returned from exile in London after a heavily rigged plebiscite and took the throne in 1935. On 11 December 1935, the king met Ernst Eisenlohr, the German envoy in Athens, who reminded him that Germany was Greece’s largest trading partner and that ‘Greece could not live without her German customers.’

Venizelists and anti-Venizelists failed to form a government after elections on 26 January 1936, in which the Liberals or Venizelists won 141 seats, while the followers of Kondylis won 12 seats and the followers of Metaxas only seven seats. The big breakthrough was by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) which took 15 seats. The army chief of staff, General Alexandros Papagos, threatened an immediate coup d’état if the Liberals formed an alliance with the KKE.

On 5 March 1936, George II appointed Metaxas the Minister of Defence, a post he held until he died in 1941. A government under Konstantinos Demertzis government was sworn in on 14 March, with Metaxas as vice-president of the government and Minister of Defence. When Demertzis died suddenly on 13 April, the king immediately appointed Metaxas as Prime Minister.

Even Plato’s ‘Republic’ was on the list of banned books under the Metaxas regime (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Parliament voted on 30 April to suspend its sittings. Stikes were called across Greece, and a general strike began in Thessaloniki on 9 May. Metaxas used the unrest to declare a state of emergency. He adjourned parliament indefinitely, suspended many articles of the constitution guaranteeing civil liberties, and declared he would hold ‘all the power I need for saving Greece’.

The regime became known as the ‘4 August Regime’ and Greece became a totalitarian state, in which Metaxas was presented as ‘the First Peasant’, ‘the First Worker’ and ‘the National Father’ of the Greeks. He adopted the title of Arkhigos, Greek for ‘leader’ or ‘chieftain’ and claimed he was initiating a ‘Third Hellenic Civilisation’, inspired by ancient Greece and the Byzantine Empire.

State propaganda portrayed Metaxas as a ‘Saviour of the Nation’, all political parties and strikes were banned, there was widespread censorship, the Communist leader Nikos Zachariadis was arrested, and many political activists were arrested and tortured.

Metaxas made himself Minister of Education in 1938 and had all school texts rewritten to fit the regime’s ideology. Book burnings targeted authors such as Goethe, Shaw, Freud and several Greek writers. Even Plato’s Republic was on the list of banned books. The Fascist salute was introduced, the Minoan double-axe was used in the way Mussolini used the Roman fasces in Italy, and regime propaganda constantly praised Hitler, Mussolini and Franco.

But Metaxas had no mass political party and his power depended on the army and the support of the king. Although most Greeks regarded Italy as their principal enemy, Metaxas saw Germany as a counterweight to Italy.

The crux came when the Italian Ambassador Emanuele Grazzi visited Metaxas at 3 in the morning and in the darkness of the night presented his demands on 28 October 1940, the night of Oxi Day. By morning, Greeks were taking to the streets in cities, towns and villages, chanting ‘Oxi! Όχι!’ A nation refused to bend the knee to fascism or to bow to military threats.

If Greeks had said Yes, Italian troops would have marched in unopposed, independence would have disappeared overnight, the Axis powers would have dominated the Mediterranean, the world would have lost a symbol of resistance, Greek pride and unity would have been silenced and would have dissolved. Greece would have been subugated. Later that morning, Italy invaded Greece from Albania. But Greece fought back, winning the first Allied victory in World War II, and Greeks became an inspiration for anti-fascist resistance throughout Europe.

Metaxas died in Athens on 29 January 1941, before the German invasion and the subsequent fall of Greece. Metaxism was undoubtedly a form of Fascism. During the colonels’ junta in 1967-1974, he was honoured as a patriot.

Many of his decisions and policies have uncanny reflections in the actions of the Trump regime in the US today, from banning books in schools, to overriding the elected members of parliament, ignoring the constitution, arresting political opponents, promising to make Greece great again, pretending to be a voice of the people, and proclaiming himself the ‘leader’, the ‘chieftain’ and the ‘Saviour of the Nation’.

Metaxas never said No, his reply was, in fact, a polite diplomatic démarche in French. It was ordinary Greeks who took to the streets shouting ‘Oxi! Όχι!’ and the word Όχι echoed throughout Greece. The word belongs to them, and the heroism was theirs. So, it is paradoxical but understandable that Metaxas has also become a symbol for Greeks across the political spectrum of resistance to Fascism, and for Cypriots this resistance to an Italian invasion has parallels to resistance to the Turkish invasion over half a century ago in 1974.

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

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

Patrick Comerford

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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