Peter Walker’s sculpture of Izaak Walton in Stafford and the missing rod of the ‘Compleat Angler’

Peter Walker’s statue of Izaak Walton on the banks of the River Sow in Victoria Park, Stafford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Patrick Comerford

The sculptor and artist Peter Walker’s work can be seen in towns, cities and cathedrals throughout England and around the world. His art includes large-scale sculptures, commissioned and bespoke sculptural works, as well as paintings, drawings, film, and sound and light installations.

He has had a major impact in recent decades on Lichfield and Lichfield Cathedral, and is singularly responsible for transforming Lichfield into the City of Sculpture. I often take the opportunity to appreciate another aspect of his sculpture and work in Lichfield, where he has undertaken, developed and commissioned artistic projects since 2006.

When I was in Stafford earlier this week, I saw his one of Peter Walker’s earlier works. His statue of Izaak Walton (1593-1683) stands on the banks of the River Sow in Victoria Park, close to Stafford Station, and was made as part of a millennium project in 2000.

Izaak Walton, best-known for The Compleat Angler (1653), was born in Stafford in 1593 and baptised in Saint Mary’s Church, Stafford, on 21 September 1593. He left Stafford in his teens to serve an apprenticeship in London, and by 1624 he was running a linen and drapery shop in the city. He lived in Chancery Lane, which gave him access to the River Thames and River Lea to go fishing.

Walton was related by marriage to both Archbishop Thomas Cranmer and the nonjuror Bishop Thomas Ken. He got to know the poet-priest John Donne while the future Dean of Saint Paul’s was the vicar of Saint Dunstan-in-the-West Church, Fleet Street, and Walton was a churchwarden and vestry member there in 1632-1644.

As a strong supporter of both the Anglican church and the Royalist cause during the Civil War, Walton was forced to sell his business following the Royalist defeat at Marston Moor in 1644 and move from the Parliamentarian-controlled City of London to Clerkenwell.

Walton also returned to his home county of Staffordshire, and bought Halfhead Farm in Shallowford, five miles outside Stafford, in 1655. He regularly visited his friends in Staffordshire, including Charles Cotton of Beresford Dale on the banks of the River Dove, and I first got know of him and his works in my late teens when I visited Dovedale and stayed at Ilam Hall.

The restoration of the monarchy in 1660 brought new roles for Walton. Bishop George Morley appointed him as his steward first in Worcester and later in Winchester. He died in Winchester on 15 December 1683 at the age of 90.

Walton wrote a biography of the priest-poet John Donne in 1640, and later published biographies of Richard Hooker (1665) and George Herbert (1670). These books earned him a place in Anglican theology and church history, although he is best known for The Compleat Angler, first published in 1653. It was not just a guide to fishing but also offered a window into life in 17th century England, particularly during the English Civil War. It secured Walton’s place in literary history, and became one of the most reprinted books in the world. His friend Cotton wrote a supplement on fly fishing for the final edition of The Compleat Angler.

In The Compleat Angler, Walton points out that fishing can teach us patience and discipline. Fishing takes practice, preparation, discipline; like discipleship, it has to be learned, and learning requires practice before there are any results. And sometimes, the best results can come from going against the current.

Izaak Walton, best-known for The Compleat Angler (1653), was born in Stafford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Peter Walker was a student at Stafford College and his sculpture of Izaak Walton in Victoria Park was cast in 2000 by Morris Singer Art Foundry, founded in 1927. The statue was presented to the town by the Staffordshire Newsletter to mark the Secon Millennium, and was funded by staff and readers of the Staffordshire Newsletter, with support from Staffordshire County Council’s Public Art Fund. It was unveiled by the newspaper proprietor Lord Illife on 5 September 2000.

Victoria Park in the centre of Stafford is close to Saint Mary’s Church, the High House on Greengate and the train station, with the River Sow, a tributary of the Trent, running through the park.

Izaak Walton Walk was developed in the 1880s as part of Stafford Corporation’s river improvement scheme. Seats and railings were put in place, and trees were added around 1900 to improve the appearance of what was a marshy area prone to flooding.

The corporation bought the land In 1903 and raised its level by 3 ft. The area was laid out as Victoria Park, the bandstand was moved to the park from Market Square. The park was created by T Fobbs & Co of Wolverhampton and opened on 15 June 1908.

Peter Walker’s bronze sculpture of Izaak Walton was unveiled on 5 September 2000. A quarter of a century later it is one of only a handful of survivors from Statues in the Park, planned then as a millennial sculpture walk. The life-size figure originally originally held a sculpted fishing rod but this has since been removed. The missing rod is replaced on occasion by a real fly rod – appropriate, I suppose for a writer best remembered for The Compleat Angler.

The half-timbered cottage where Walton lived in Shallowford is now maintained by Stafford Borough Council as a museum. There is a wall tablet to Walton in Saint Mary’s Church, Stafford, where he was baptised, with a marble bust in the north aisle. The bust was created by RC Bett in 1878 after a public fundraising drive.

I was back in Stafford this week hoping to see inside Saint Mary’s, thinking there was a mid-day celebration of the Eucharist there on Tuesdays. However, I had not counted on the town centre parish church being closed after all the busy-ness of Holy Week and Easter.

I never got to see the monument to Izaak Walton in the church. But more about Saint Mary’s Church tomorrow, hopefully, and more in the days to come about some of the other places I visited in Stafford, Wolseley and Rugeley this week.

The River Sow and Victoria Park, Stafford, with Peter Walker’s sculpture of Izaak Walton to the right, on the river bank (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Daily prayer in Lent 2026: 9, Thursday 26 February 2026

‘Knock, and the door will be opened for you’ (Matthew 7: 8) … door knockers in the streets of Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Lent began last week on Ash Wednesday, and this week began with the First Sunday in Lent (Lent I, 22 February 2026).

This morning, before the day begins, I am taking some quiet time in Kuching to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone?’ (Matthew 7: 9) … stones and rocks on Damai Beach, 35 km north of Kuching (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 7: 7-12 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 7 ‘Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? 10 Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!’

‘Is there anyone among you who … if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake?’ (Matthew 7: 9-10) … fish in a taverna at the harbour in Rethymnon, Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflections:

The image in the Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Matthew 7: 9) of the guest knocking on the door reminds me too of the image of Christ knocking at the door in the Book of Revelation: ‘Behold I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door I will come in to him and will sup with him and he with me’ (Revelation 3: 20).

It is an image that has inspired The Light of the World, a painting in the chapel in Keble College, Oxford, by the Pre-Raphaelite artist William Holman Hunt (1827-1910), depicting Christ about to knock at an overgrown and long-unopened door. It is an image that has echoes too in the poetry of some of the great mystical writers in Anglican history, as in the words of John Donne (Holy Sonnets XIV):

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an usurp’d town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

It is the passionate language of love, of passionate love. But then, of course, Christ demands our passion, our commitment, our love.

Christ’s demands are made not just to some inner circle, for some elite group within the Church, for those who are seen as pious and holy. He calls on us to open our hearts, our doors, the doors of the church and the doors of society, to those on the margins, for the sake of those on the margins.

We are to be ever vigilant that we do not keep those on the margins on the outside for too long. When we welcome in those on the outside, we may find we are welcoming Christ himself.

Allow the stranger among you, and the stranger within you, to open that door and discover that it is Christ who is trying to batter our hearts and tear down our old barriers so that we can all feast together at the new banquet:

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
…
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

‘Knock, and the door will be opened for you’ (Matthew 7: 7) … ‘The Light of the World’ by William Holman Hunt (1827-1910) in a side chapel in Keble College, Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 26 February 2026):

The theme this week (22-28 February 2026) in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is: ‘Behold, I make all things new!’ (pp 30-31). This theme was introduced on Sunday with Reflections by the Right Revd Jorge Pina Cabral Jorge, Diocesan Bishop of the Lusitanian Church (Portugal).

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 26 February 2026) invites us to pray:

Generous Lord, bless the sharing of resources and gifts between the Lusitanian and Spanish Reformed Churches. Through partnership with USPG, may generosity bring strength and joy to all.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
whose Son Jesus Christ fasted forty days in the wilderness,
and was tempted as we are, yet without sin:
give us grace to discipline ourselves in obedience to your Spirit;
and, as you know our weakness,
so may we know your power to save;
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,
you have renewed us with the living bread from heaven;
by it you nourish our faith,
increase our hope,
and strengthen our love:
teach us always to hunger for him who is the true and living bread,
and enable us to live by every word
that proceeds from out of your mouth;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Heavenly Father,
your Son battled with the powers of darkness,
and grew closer to you in the desert:
help us to use these days to grow in wisdom and prayer
that we may witness to your saving love
in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘Knock, and the door will be opened for you’ (Matthew 7: 8) … a front door in Bore Street, Lichfield (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

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 162, Tuesday 21 October 2025

‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit’ (Luke 12: 35) … in Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese on Wine Office Court off Fleet Street, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and the week began with the Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XVIII, 19 October 2025).

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

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit … so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ (Luke 12: 35-36) … an open door in the church in Piskopianó in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Luke 12: 35-38 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 35 ‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; 36 be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. 37 Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them. 38 If he comes during the middle of the night, or near dawn, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves.’

‘They may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ … Holman Hunt’s ‘The Light of the World’ in a side chapel in Keble College, Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2014)

Today’s Reflection:

Have you ever been burgled?

It is a frightening and a traumatic experience for anyone who has suffered it.

It is one thing to come home from a day’s work, or from a holiday, to find your house has been broken into. It is another to wake up and realise that as you were sleeping a thief has broken into your home, and is downstairs or in the next room.

It happened to me once, in a house where I was living in south Dublin.

It was in the days long before mobile ’phones and cordless ’phones. I had been working late the night before and came downstairs to answer a mid-morning call.

Unknown to me, the thieves were in the next room, having already gone through the kitchen. They were in there, having made themselves something to drink, had cut the lead to the video recorder, and were squatting on the floor in the front room, armed with the ‘kitchen devil,’ straight from the cutlery drawer, sorting through my other possessions.

They must have remained very quiet. Instead of stealing anything, they stole out the back door before I had ever put down the ’phone or realised what had happened.

It is a frightening experience, and it made me extra vigilant: extra bolts and locks, rethinking the alarm system, and so on. The police knew who the ‘likely suspects’ were, but they could offer no guarantees that the house was never going to be broken into again … and again.

It is an experience that was also a reminder of my own vulnerability, and a reminder that what I own and possess is not really mine, and not mine for very long. Finding the ‘kitchen devil’ on the floor was also a sharp reminder, literally, that even my life is not mine for very long.

And so, the image of Christ we come across at the end of this Gospel reading, of a thief coming unexpectedly to break into my house, may not be a very comforting one for those of us brought up with the image of ‘Gentle Jesus, Meek and Mild.’

And yet it is an image that has echoes in the poetry of some of the great mystical writers in Anglican history. It reminds me, for example, of the words of John Donne (Holy Sonnets XIV):

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an usurp’d town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

It is the passionate language of love, of passionate love. But then, of course, Christ demands our passion, our commitment, our love.

Christ’s call to us in this reading, the demands Christ is making on us in this reading, are not just addressed to the Disciples.

Christ is speaking to the disciples in particular, and teaching them about the kingdom (Luke 12: 1). But as he is speaking to them, someone in the crowd – like a heckler – interrupts and asks a question (see Luke 12: 13).

The inner circle of the Disciples must have felt they were being broken into by those on the rims, those in the crowd of outsiders, the crowd or multitude following Christ but who were not among the Disciples.

So Christ’s demands are made not just of some inner circle, for some elite group within the Church, for those who are seen as pious and holy.

This is a demand he makes also to those on the margins, for the sake of those on the margins, that he makes on the whole Church for the sake of those on the margins.

We are to be ever vigilant that we do not keep those on the margins on the outside for too long. They may appear like thieves trying to break in. But when we welcome in those on the outside who we see as thieves, we may find we are welcoming Christ himself.

And in welcoming Christ himself, into our inner sanctum, we are making it a sign of the Kingdom. The Church needs to be a place not where we feel secure, but where the outsider feels welcome, where they can feast and taste what the Kingdom of God is like.

What is this Kingdom like?

Where is it?

When shall we find it?

In this Gospel reading, Christ tells the multitude – the multitude who are gathered just like the 5,000 who were gathered earlier on the hillside and fed with the multiplication of five loaves and two fish (Luke 9: 10-17) – that the kingdom is already given.

In the preceding verses, he says ‘it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom’ (Luke 12: 32), present tense. But the original Greek says ‘your Father was well pleased with you (or, took pleasure) to freely give the Kingdom to you’ (… ὅτι εὐδόκησεν ὁ πατὴρ ὑμῶν δοῦναι ὑμῖντὴν βασιλείαν).

God wanted to do something good for the ‘little flock’ (verse 32), and so freely gave them the kingdom – the reign of God – in which tables are open, status is upended, and all people are treated with dignity. In God’s Kingdom – on earth as it is in heaven – there is no scarcity, there are no class or gender barriers, there are no ‘insiders’ and no ‘outsiders.’

Christ compares that Kingdom of God with a wedding banquet.

When we go to a wedding, we have no control over what happens. In the first case, we have no control over who is getting married to whom. But, secondly, weddings break down all our petty snobberies and all our status-seeking.

Whatever we think of the choice of bride or groom, we have no say at all in who is going to be a new brother-in-law, a new mother-in-law, and even into the future, who is going to be a new cousin to our children’s children.

It’s enough to make you laugh.

Sarah laughed when she was told about her future family (see Genesis 18: 12). There is a hint of this story in the Letter to the Hebrews, where the writer reminds us of the faith of Abraham and Sarah (see Hebrews 11: 11, 13-16).

Despite our failings, the failings of society, the failings of politics, God’s promises of the Kingdom multiply beyond all our expectations, even beyond the expectations of modern Bible translators.

We cannot control this. Those who come into the banquet may appear to us like thieves and burglars, brazenly breaking into our own family home, into our own family.

But we may find that the thief is actually Christ trying to break into our hearts to let us know that the kingdom is already here.

The word for master here is actually κύριος (kyrios), Lord, the word used in the Greek Old Testament for the Lord God by Jews who found the use of the name of God offensive and blasphemous. But using the word master for κύριος hides away God’s work, confusing the Lord, the ‘Son of Man’ (ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, ho yios tou anthropou), with the ‘master of the house,’ the householder (οἰκοδεσπότης, oikodespótēs).

Think of how the word κύριος (kyrios), Lord, was used by Abraham as he addresses the three visitors to Abraham and Sarah at the Oak of Mamre. The strangers become angels, and the angels come to represent the Triune God.

Had Abraham treated his visitors as thieves, where would we be today? Instead he sets a banquet before the Three, and finds not once but three times that he has an encounter with the living Lord (Genesis 18: 3, 13, 14), the Triune God, an encounter that leads Abraham and Sarah to a faith that ushers in the promises of the Kingdom.

The Lord who arrives for the banquet and stands knocking at the door (Luke 12: 36) in this Gospel reading is the same Christ who says: ‘Behold, I am standing at the door knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come into you and eat with you, and you with me’ (Revelation 3: 20).

He comes in ways we do not expect, and at ‘the unexpected hour,’ the time we ‘think nothing of’ (ἧ ὥρᾳ οὐ δοκεῖτε, he hora ou dokeite, Luke 12: 40) – ‘an hour that seems like nothing.’ He does not bother trying to tear down our puny defences. He sneaks around them instead.

Welcome to the banquet.

Welcome to the kingdom.

Allow the stranger among you, and the stranger within you, to open that door and discover that Christ is not a thief trying to steal what you have, but is the Lord who is trying to batter our hearts and tear down our old barriers so that we can all feast together at the new banquet:

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
…
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

‘For you as yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend’ … a bust of John Donne at Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 21 October 2025):

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

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Tuesday 21 October 2025) invites us to pray:

Gracious God, we lift up the College of the Transfiguration, the Rector Dr Percy and all staff and students. May the college continue to be a place of learning, growth, and spiritual formation, where future leaders are nurtured in faith and service.

The Collect:

Almighty and everlasting God,
increase in us your gift of faith
that, forsaking what lies behind
and reaching out to that which is before,
we may run the way of your commandments
and win the crown of everlasting joy;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

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

Additional Collect:

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

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘Be like those who are waiting for their master to return … so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ (Luke 12: 35-36) … the open West Door of Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 93, Sunday 10 August 2025, Eighth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity VIII)

‘Be like those who are waiting for their master to return … so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ (Luke 12: 35-36) … door knockers seen on the streets of Stony Stratford (Photographs: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and today is the Eighth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity VIII, 10 August 2025). Later this morning, I plan to be at the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church in Stony Stratford. But, before the day 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 may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ … ‘The Light of the World’ by William Holman Hunt (1827-1910) in a side chapel in Keble College, Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Luke 12: 32-40 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 32 ‘Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

35 ‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; 36 be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. 37 Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them. 38 If he comes during the middle of the night, or near dawn, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves.

39 ‘But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. 40 You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.’

‘For you as yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend’ … a bust of John Donne at Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s reflection

Have you ever been burgled?

It is a frightening and a traumatic experience for anyone who has suffered it.

It is one thing to come home from a day’s work, or from a holiday, to find your house has been broken into. It is another to wake up and realise that as you were sleeping a thief has broken into your home, and is downstairs or in the next room.

It happened to me once, in a house in Dublin I was living in.

It was in the days before mobile ’phones, and even before cordless ’phones had become readily available. I had been working late the night before and came downstairs to answer a mid-morning call.

Unknown to me, the thieves were in the next room, having already gone through the kitchen. They were in there, having made themselves something to drink, had cut the lead to the video recorder, and were squatting on the floor, armed with the ‘kitchen devil,’ straight from the cutlery drawer, sifting through the other family possessions.

They must have remained very quiet. Instead of stealing these items, they stole out the back door before I ever put the ’phone down or realised what had happened.

It is a frightening experience, and it made me extra vigilant: extra bolts and locks, rethinking the alarm system, and so on. The police knew who the ‘likely suspects’ were, but they could offer no guarantees that the house was never going to be broken into again … and again.

It is an experience that was also a reminder of my own vulnerability, and a reminder that what I own and possess is not really mine, and not mine for very long. Finding the ‘kitchen devil’ on the floor was also a sharp, very sharp, reminder that even my life is not mine for very long.

And so, the image of Christ at the end of the Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Luke 12: 32-40), of a thief coming unexpectedly to break into my house, may not be a very comforting one for those of us brought up with the image of ‘Gentle Jesus, Meek and Mild.’

And yet it is an image that has echoes in the poetry of some of the great mystical writers in Anglican history. It reminds me, for example, of the words of John Donne (Holy Sonnets XIV):

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an usurp’d town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

It is the passionate language of love, of passionate love. But then, of course, Christ demands our passion, our commitment, our love.

Christ’s call to us in this reading, the demands Christ is making on us in this reading, are not just addressed to the Disciples.

Christ is speaking to the disciples in particular, and teaching them about the kingdom (Luke 12: 1). But as he is speaking to them, someone in the crowd – like a heckler – interrupts and asks a question (see Luke 12: 13).

The inner circle of the Disciples must have felt they were being broken into by those on the rims, those in the crowd of outsiders, the crowd or multitude following Christ but who were not among the Disciples.

So Christ’s demands are made not just of some inner circle, for some elite group within the Church, for those who are seen as pious and holy.

This is a demand he makes also of those on the margins, for the sake of those on the margins, that he makes on the whole Church for the sake of those on the margins.

We are to be ever vigilant that we do not keep those on the margins on the outside for too long. They may appear like thieves trying to break in. But when we welcome in those on the outside who we see as thieves, we may find we are welcoming Christ himself.

And in welcoming Christ himself, into our inner sanctum, we are making it a sign of the Kingdom. The Church needs to be a place not where we feel secure, but where the outsider feels welcome, where they can feast and taste what the Kingdom of God is like.

What is this Kingdom like?

Where is it?

When shall we find it?

In this Gospel reading, Christ tells the multitude – the multitude who are gathered just like the 5,000 who were gathered earlier on the hillside and fed with the multiplication of five loaves and two fish (Luke 9: 10-17) – that the kingdom is already given.

The translation in the NRSV (New Revised Standard Version) translations, says ‘it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom’ (Luke 12: 32), present tense. But the original Greek says ‘your Father was well pleased with you (or, took pleasure) to freely give the Kingdom to you’ (… ὅτι εὐδόκησεν ὁ πατὴρ ὑμῶν δοῦναι ὑμῖντὴν βασιλείαν).

God wanted to do something good for the ‘little flock’ (verse 32), and so freely gave them the kingdom – the reign of God – in which tables are open, status is upended, and all people are treated with dignity. In God’s Kingdom – on earth as it is in heaven – there is no scarcity, there are no class separation or gender barriers, there are no ‘insiders’ and no ‘outsiders.’

Christ compares that Kingdom of God with a wedding banquet.

When we go to a wedding, we have no control over what happens. In the first case, we have no control over who is getting married to whom. But, secondly, weddings break down all our petty snobberies and all our status-seeking.

Whatever we think of the choice of bride or groom, we have no say at all in who is going to be a new brother-in-law, a new mother-in-law, and even into the future, who is going to be a new cousin to our children’s children.

It’s enough to make you laugh.

Sarah laughed when she was told about her future family (see Genesis 18: 12). There is a hint of this story in the Epistle reading this morning, when the writer reminds us of the faith of Abraham and Sarah (see Hebrews 11: 1-3, 8-16).

The first reading (Isaiah 1: 1, 10-20) reminds us that despite our failings, the failings of society, the failings of politics, God’s promises of the Kingdom multiply beyond all our expectations, even beyond the expectations of modern Bible translators.

We cannot control this. Those who come into the banquet may appear to us like thieves and burglars, brazenly breaking into our own family home, into our own family.

But we may find that the thief is actually Christ trying to break into our hearts to let us know that the kingdom is already here.

The word for master here is actually κύριος (kyrios), Lord, the word used in the Greek Old Testament for the Lord God by Jews who found the use of the name of God offensive and blasphemous. But using the word master for κύριος hides away God’s work, confusing the Lord, the ‘Son of Man’ (ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, ho yios tou anthropou), with the ‘master of the house,’ the householder (οἰκοδεσπότης, oikodespótēs).

Think of how the word κύριος (kyrios), Lord, was used by Abraham as he addresses the three visitors to Abraham and Sarah at the Oak of Mamre. The strangers become angels, and the angels come to represent the Triune God.

Had Abraham treated his visitors as thieves, where would we be today? Instead, he sets a banquet before the Three, and finds not once but three times that he has an encounter with the living Lord (Genesis 18: 3, 13, 14), the Triune God, an encounter that leads Abraham and Sarah to a faith that ushers in the promises of the Kingdom.

The Lord who arrives for the banquet and stands knocking at the door (Luke 12: 36) in this Gospel reading is the same Christ who says: ‘Behold, I am standing at the door knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come into you and eat with you, and you with me’ (Revelation 3: 20).

He comes in ways we do not expect, and at ‘the unexpected hour,’ the time we ‘think nothing of’ (ἧ ὥρᾳ οὐ δοκεῖτε, he hora ou dokeite, Luke 12: 40) – ‘an hour that seems like nothing’. He does not bother trying to tear down our puny defences. He sneaks around them instead.

Welcome to the banquet.

Welcome to the kingdom.

Allow the stranger among you, and the stranger within you, to open that door and discover that Christ is not a thief trying to steal what you have, but is the Lord who is trying to batter our hearts and tear down our old barriers so that we can all feast together at the new banquet:

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
…
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit … so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ (Luke 12: 35-36) … prints of tradirional Cretan doors in a shop in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Sunday 10 August 2025, Trinity VIII):

The theme this week (10 to 16 August) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Serving God in the Gulf’ (pp 26-27). This theme is introduced today with reflections from Joyaline Rajamani, Administrator at the Church of the Epiphany, Doha, Anglican Church in Qatar:

In the heart of Doha, I have the privilege of serving as Administrator and Secretary to the Senior Priest at the Church of the Epiphany, The Anglican Church in Qatar. My role extends beyond managing schedules and logistics – it is a sacred calling to cultivate a space where faith flourishes, where a global community of believers stands as one family in Christ. Being a Christian here is a quiet yet profound pilgrimage, requiring patience, wisdom, and trust. Though a minority, we worship with dignity and respect, thanks to Qatar’s gracious provision of a safe space for religious practice.

The Religious Complex, fondly called ‘Church City,’ includes around 90 churches of various denominations from Greek Orthodox to Roman Catholic. It is a great symbol of coexistence. So too is the congregation at the Anglican Church of the Epiphany which represents around 57 different nationalities and has over 300 voting members who all worship and serve alongside one another in faith and peace.

‘Whom Shall I Send?’ is a course run by the Episcopal Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East with USPG’s support for youth across the Middle East. This time together stirred something deep within my spirit, calling me to pause and truly listen to God. When we sat under the tent of Abraham and Sarah (Genesis 17-21), I truly learned the grace of waiting. Theirs is a story of trust, hospitality, and unwavering faith in God’s promises. Hospitality is not merely an act but a spiritual discipline, one that has shaped my own faith journey and my administrative work at church.

The USPG prayer diary today (Sunday 10 August 2025, Trinity VIII) invites us to pray by reading and meditating on Luke 12: 32-40.

The Collect of the Day:

Almighty Lord and everlasting God,
we beseech you to direct, sanctify and govern
both our hearts and bodies
in the ways of your laws
and the works of your commandments;
that through your most mighty protection, both here and ever,
we may be preserved in body and soul;
through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

Strengthen for service, Lord,
the hands that have taken holy things;
may the ears which have heard your word
be deaf to clamour and dispute;
may the tongues which have sung your praise be free from deceit;
may the eyes which have seen the tokens of your love
shine with the light of hope;
and may the bodies which have been fed with your body
be refreshed with the fullness of your life;
glory to you for ever.

Additional Collect:

Lord God,
your Son left the riches of heaven
and became poor for our sake:
when we prosper save us from pride,
when we are needy save us from despair,
that we may trust in you alone;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit … so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ (Luke 12: 35-36) … an old and long-locked door near the Fortezza in Rethymnon in Crete (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

Daily prayer in Lent 2025: 27, Monday 31 March 2025

Capernaum … with the synagogue on the left and the domes of the Greek Orthodox church in the background

Patrick Comerford

This week began with the Fourth Sunday in Lent (Lent IV) and Mothering Sunday. Today (31 March), the Church Calendar in the Church of England in Common Worship remembers the poet-priest John Donne (1571-1631).

Before today 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 Greek Orthodox Church in Capernaum on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, with the Golan Heights in the distance

John 4: 43-54 (NRSVA):

43 When the two days were over, he went from that place to Galilee 44 (for Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no honour in the prophet’s own country). 45 When he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, since they had seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the festival; for they too had gone to the festival.

46 Then he came again to Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine. Now there was a royal official whose son lay ill in Capernaum. 47 When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. 48 Then Jesus said to him, ‘Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.’ 49 The official said to him, ‘Sir, come down before my little boy dies.’ 50 Jesus said to him, ‘Go; your son will live.’ The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and started on his way. 51 As he was going down, his slaves met him and told him that his child was alive. 52 So he asked them the hour when he began to recover, and they said to him, ‘Yesterday at one in the afternoon the fever left him.’ 53 The father realized that this was the hour when Jesus had said to him, ‘Your son will live.’ So he himself believed, along with his whole household. 54 Now this was the second sign that Jesus did after coming from Judea to Galilee.

‘Ecce Signum’, Sean Lynch’s work on a gable end in East Square, Askeaton, Co Limerick … the healing in John 4 is the second of the seven signs (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The Dominican author and theologian, Timothy Radcliffe, who was made a cardinal at the end of last year (December 2024), points out that that in the Bible, seven is the number of perfection. We know of the six days of creation and how God rested on the seventh. In Saint John’s Gospel, we have seven signs and seven ‘I AM’ sayings disclosing s who Jesus truly is.

In the Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (John 4: 43-54), we have two separate incidents that run together in Saint John’s Gospel: the return of Jesus to Galilee, and the second of the seven signs in the Fourth Gospel.

The first part of this reading (verses 43-45), recalling the return to Galilee, is a bridge passage, a link between two stories of encounters Jesus has with key non-Jewish figures – the Samaritan woman and the villagers of Sychar (see John 4: 1-42) and the royal official from Capernaum (verses 43-54). So with Nicodemus, the woman at the well, and the royal official, we have three key personalities, one Jewish, one Samaritan, and one Gentile.

In between the Samaritans and the Gentiles, Jesus continues on his journey from Jerusalem to Galilee, on the third day he arrives in Cana. So already, we are being prepared to hear about a story of life and death and new life.

We can find a link here between this story and the incident in Saint Luke’s Gospel (Luke 4: 14-21), when Jesus tells us that a prophet is without honour in his own country, and yet he appears at first to be received with honour in Galilee, as he was first received in the synagogues in Galilee when he returned from Jerusalem, according to Saint Luke (see Luke 4: 15).

Jesus says ‘a prophet has no honour in his own country’ (verse 44). But if Jesus believed that he would have no honour in ‘his own country’, why does John tell us that the Galileans ‘welcomed’ him? This same proverb is found in Matthew 13: 57, Mark 6: 4, and Luke 4: 24.

When Jesus comes to Nazareth and teaches in the synagogue, some local people who were there had probably been in Jerusalem when he had performed signs (see John 2: 23; 4: 45). If they had not been in Jerusalem, they would have heard about some of his miracles there. When Jesus arrives in his ‘hometown’, there must have been high expectations. Yet, some people start to ask questions. He may be a popular person and have a growing following. But Nazareth is his hometown, they all know all about him. And so, Jesus performs few miracles there.

He has returned to Galilee, to his ‘own country’ (verse 45), where a prophet is without honour. But when Jesus arrives in Galilee, the people there ‘welcome him’. From what we have seen in Matthew’s account of his arrival at Nazareth, we see virtually the same phenomena. Jesus returns to his ‘hometown’ and receives an initially warm welcome.

The people are aware of the miracles he performed in Jerusalem and now hope to see many more in their own town. But as they reflect on his origins and family background, they find they are not so sure. Has he come to bless the Gentiles as well as the Jews? What seems to start off well ends up in a very disappointing way, both for Christ and for those from his “hometown.”

A short-lived, superficial acceptance of Christ is not the same as an informed, long-term commitment. Although the Galileans initially welcomed Christ, this does not mean that they truly accept him as Messiah. His visit home is disappointing because, although he is initially welcomed, he is not truly honoured.

And yet this interlude also tells us that Christ came as the Saviour of Jews (these three verses), of Samaritans (the previous story), and of Gentiles (the next story) … in other words, of all people, and that he is the Saviour of the whole world.

On a first reading, the story about the healing of the royal official’s son in verses 46-54 seems similar to that of the healing of the centurion’s servant or slave (Matthew 8: 5-13; Luke 7: 2-10). But, despite the similarities, there are many differences. They can be summarised:

• The centurion was a Gentile; the royal official was probably a Gentile, although we are not told so – there is a possibility that he was Jewish.

• The centurion’s servant suffered from a paralysis; the royal official’s son was ill with a fever.

• The centurion lives in Capernaum; the royal official lives in Cana.

• The centurion’s faith is praised by Christ; the royal official and others are rebuked for a deficient faith.

• The centurion urges Jesus not to come, but only to speak the word; the royal official urges Jesus to come.

• The Centurion asks Jewish elders to plead his case; the royal official pleads personally with Jesus.

And so the story of Christ healing the royal official’s son is unique to the Fourth Gospel, as is most of the material in Saint John’s Gospel.

Jesus returns to Cana of Galilee (verse 46), where he turned water into wine at a wedding (John 2: 1-11). The NRSV translates βασιλικός (basilikós) as royal official, although other versions call him a ‘nobleman’. He was probably a servant of Herod, the Tetrarch of Galilee, who is referred to as king in the New Testament (see Matthew 14: 9; Mark 6: 14, 22).

Capernaum was a border town, and it was there that this royal official heard that Jesus is back in Cana once again. The official’s son is at the point of death and this father is desperate. Jesus is now his last and only hope to save his son. He makes the 30 km journey to Cana to find Jesus, and there he begs him to return with him to Capernaum immediately and to heal his dying son.

At first reading, Christ’s response to the royal official appears disturbing: Then Jesus said to him, ‘Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.’ The NRSV in a footnote, and other translations, point out that the ‘you’ in verse 48 is plural, and not singular. Therefore, Jesus is speaking to a larger audience and not to, or not just to the royal official.

At first reading, as with the story of the Syro-Phoenician woman in Saint Mark’s Gospel (Mark 7: 24-30), who asks for healing for her daughter, Jesus appears to be caught with his compassion down. But back in Galilee, where a prophet is without honour among his own people, Jesus is not going to rush into performing a miracle to entertain the crowd and to draw attention to himself.

His words of rebuke may be in the hope of dispersing the crowd. He chides them for being interested only in his miracles and not taking to heart what the signs point to.

Certainly the official does not interpret these words as a personal rebuke. For he asks – perhaps even tells – Jesus to come back with him (verse 49).

Perhaps the crowds have left by now. Jesus’ next words are to tell the man: ‘Go; your son will live’ (verse 50). If the crowd has stayed around, these words would have sounded as though they were only intended to get rid of this persistent father, not as words of assurance. He probably headed back home on his own to Capernaum. The crowd disperses, the sign-seekers go away disappointed.

From this story, it appears that the royal official believes – but only to a degree, and not fully. The royal official did not get what we wanted. Jesus did not go back to Capernaum with him. He probably headed home wondering what was happening to his son (verses 51-52).

The man’s belief only comes to full fruition in verse 53, later that evening or perhaps a day later, when he hears that his son was healed at the time Jesus spoke to him. The father now knows he has witnessed a miracle, and he believes, along with his entire household. But this new belief in verse 53 is more informed than the belief in verse 50. It is now a belief in Jesus as the Messiah, as the Saviour of the world.

This is the second sign in Saint John’s Gospel (verse 54). The first sign was at Cana, when Jesus turned the water into wine on the third day, but when most of the guests at the wedding never knew what had happened. It was a ‘sign’ seen only by a few, but it results in the faith of the disciples (see John 2: 1-12).

So too with the second sign, also on the third day. The royal official’s son is healed not in front of the gaping crowd, not even in front of the official’s household. Christ performs this miracle in such a way that only the royal official knows it is a miracle. But when he explained this miracle to his servants, they too become members of the household of faith.

‘He came again to Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine’ (John 4: 46) … an icon in the Lady Chapel in Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 31 March 2025):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Inspiration of the Holy Spirit.’ This theme was introduced yesterday with Reflections by the Revd Rock Higgins, Rector of Saint James the Less Episcopal Church, Ashland, Virginia, and the Triangle of Hope Youth Pilgrimage Lead for the Diocese of Virginia.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Monday 31 March 2025) invites us to pray:

Lord, bring us into a communion with you that grows richer and more splendid in time. Thank you for the Holy Spirit who lives inside us, comforting, teaching, correcting and leading us. Enable us to hear the Holy Spirit, and through him know you more deeply.

The Collect:

Merciful Lord,
absolve your people from their offences,
that through your bountiful goodness
we may all be delivered from the chains of those sins
which by our frailty we have committed;
grant this, heavenly Father,
for Jesus Christ’s sake, our blessed Lord and Saviour,
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 blessed Son our Saviour
gave his back to the smiters
and did not hide his face from shame:
give us grace to endure the sufferings of this present time
with sure confidence in the glory that shall be revealed;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Merciful Lord,
you know our struggle to serve you:
when sin spoils our lives
and overshadows our hearts,
come to our aid
and turn us back to you again;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

The poet priest John Donne is remembered in Common Worship on 31 March … a bust of John Donne at Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London (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

Daily prayer in Lent 2025: 9, Thursday 13 March 2025

‘Knock, and the door will be opened for you’ (Matthew 7: 8) … a front door in Bore Street, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Lent began last week on Ash Wednesday, and this week began with the First Sunday in Lent (Lent I).

The Jewish holiday of Purim begins this evening (13 March) and ends at nightfall tomorrow (14 March). But more about that this evening, hopefully. Meanwhile this morning, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone?’ (Matthew 7: 9) … stones and rocks on Damai Beach, 35 km north of Kuching (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Matthew 7: 7-12 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 7 ‘Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? 10 Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!’

‘Is there anyone among you who … if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake?’ (Matthew 7: 9-10) … fish in a shop in Ethnikis Antistaseos street in Rethymnon, Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Today’s Reflection:

The image in the Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Matthew 7: 9) of the guest knocking on the door reminds me too of the image of Christ knocking at the door in the Book of Revelation: ‘Behold I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door I will come in to him and will sup with him and he with me’ (Revelation 3: 20).

It is an image that has inspired The Light of the World, a painting in the chapel in Keble College, Oxford, by the Pre-Raphaelite artist William Holman Hunt (1827-1910), depicting Christ about to knock at an overgrown and long-unopened door. It is an image that has echoes too in the poetry of some of the great mystical writers in Anglican history, as in the words of John Donne (Holy Sonnets XIV):

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an usurp’d town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

It is the passionate language of love, of passionate love. But then, of course, Christ demands our passion, our commitment, our love.

Christ’s demands are made not just to some inner circle, for some elite group within the Church, for those who are seen as pious and holy. He calls on us to open our hearts, our doors, the doors of the church and the doors of society, to those on the margins, for the sake of those on the margins.

We are to be ever vigilant that we do not keep those on the margins on the outside for too long. When we welcome in those on the outside, we may find we are welcoming Christ himself.

Allow the stranger among you, and the stranger within you, to open that door and discover that it is Christ who is trying to batter our hearts and tear down our old barriers so that we can all feast together at the new banquet:

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
…
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

‘Knock, and the door will be opened for you’ (Matthew 7: 7) … ‘The Light of the World’ by William Holman Hunt (1827-1910) in a side chapel in Keble College, Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 13 March 2025):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘The Church and Unity.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday with reflections by the Right Revd Dr Royce M Victor, Bishop in the Diocese of Malabar, Church of South India.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 13 March 2025) invites us to pray:

We pray for our partner churches in South India – may their work and mission be blessed.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
whose Son Jesus Christ fasted forty days in the wilderness,
and was tempted as we are, yet without sin:
give us grace to discipline ourselves in obedience to your Spirit;
and, as you know our weakness,
so may we know your power to save;
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,
you have renewed us with the living bread from heaven;
by it you nourish our faith,
increase our hope,
and strengthen our love:
teach us always to hunger for him who is the true and living bread,
and enable us to live by every word
that proceeds from out of your mouth;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Heavenly Father,
your Son battled with the powers of darkness,
and grew closer to you in the desert:
help us to use these days to grow in wisdom and prayer
that we may witness to your saving love
in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

Megillat Ester or Scroll of Esther, silver with coloured stones and gilded, dated Vienna 1844, in the Jewish Museum, Vienna … Purim begins this evening and continues until nightfall tomorrow (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

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2024: 164, Tuesday 22 October 2024

‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit’ (Luke 12: 35) … in Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese on Wine Office Court off Fleet Street, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and the week began with the Twenty-First Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XXI).

We are hoping that our air conditioning has been repaired and that we can move later today from the Marian Boutique Lodging House in Kuching, where we have been staying for the past week, to our flat in Upper China Street. As the repairs to the air conditioning continued yesterday, we moved rooms in the Marian, to the chapel wing in the fomrer school chapel.

Before today day begins, before having breakfast, before having a swim, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, and for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit … so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ (Luke 12: 35-36) … opening the door out of the church in Piskopianó in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Luke 12: 35-38 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 35 ‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; 36 be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. 37 Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them. 38 If he comes during the middle of the night, or near dawn, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves.’

‘They may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ … Holman Hunt’s ‘The Light of the World’

Today’s Reflection:

Have you ever been burgled?

It is a frightening and a traumatic experience for anyone who has suffered it.

It is one thing to come home from a day’s work, or from a holiday, to find your house has been broken into. It is another to wake up and realise that as you were sleeping a thief has broken into your home, and is downstairs or in the next room.

It happened to md once, in a house where I was living in south Dublin.

It was in the days long before mobile ’phones and cordless ’phones. I had been working late the night before and came downstairs to answer a mid-morning call.

Unknown to me, the thieves were in the next room, having already gone through the kitchen. They were in there, having made themselves something to drink, had cut the lead to the video recorder, and were squatting on the floor in the front room, armed with the ‘kitchen devil,’ straight from the cutlery drawer, sorting through my other possessions.

They must have remained very quiet. Instead of stealing anything, they stole out the back door before I had ever put down the ’phone or realised what had happened.

It is a frightening experience, and it made me extra vigilant: extra bolts and locks, rethinking the alarm system, and so on. The police knew who the ‘likely suspects’ were, but they could offer no guarantees that the house was never going to be broken into again … and again.

It is an experience that was also a reminder of my own vulnerability, and a reminder that what I own and possess is not really mine, and not mine for very long. Finding the ‘kitchen devil’ on the floor was also a sharp reminder, literally, that even my life is not mine for very long.

And so, the image of Christ we come across at the end of this Gospel reading, of a thief coming unexpectedly to break into my house, may not be a very comforting one for those of us brought up with the image of ‘Gentle Jesus, Meek and Mild.’

And yet it is an image that has echoes in the poetry of some of the great mystical writers in Anglican history. It reminds me, for example, of the words of John Donne (Holy Sonnets XIV):

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an usurp’d town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

It is the passionate language of love, of passionate love. But then, of course, Christ demands our passion, our commitment, our love.

Christ’s call to us in this reading, the demands Christ is making on us in this reading, are not just addressed to the Disciples.

Christ is speaking to the disciples in particular, and teaching them about the kingdom (Luke 12: 1). But as he is speaking to them, someone in the crowd – like a heckler – interrupts and asks a question (see Luke 12: 13).

The inner circle of the Disciples must have felt they were being broken into by those on the rims, those in the crowd of outsiders, the crowd or multitude following Christ but who were not among the Disciples.

So Christ’s demands are made not just of some inner circle, for some elite group within the Church, for those who are seen as pious and holy.

This is a demand he makes also to those on the margins, for the sake of those on the margins, that he makes on the whole Church for the sake of those on the margins.

We are to be ever vigilant that we do not keep those on the margins on the outside for too long. They may appear like thieves trying to break in. But when we welcome in those on the outside who we see as thieves, we may find we are welcoming Christ himself.

And in welcoming Christ himself, into our inner sanctum, we are making it a sign of the Kingdom. The Church needs to be a place not where we feel secure, but where the outsider feels welcome, where they can feast and taste what the Kingdom of God is like.

What is this Kingdom like?

Where is it?

When shall we find it?

In this Gospel reading, Christ tells the multitude – the multitude who are gathered just like the 5,000 who were gathered earlier on the hillside and fed with the multiplication of five loaves and two fish (Luke 9: 10-17) – that the kingdom is already given.

In the preceding verses, he says ‘it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom’ (Luke 12: 32), present tense. But the original Greek says ‘your Father was well pleased with you (or, took pleasure) to freely give the Kingdom to you’ (… ὅτι εὐδόκησεν ὁ πατὴρ ὑμῶν δοῦναι ὑμῖντὴν βασιλείαν).

God wanted to do something good for the ‘little flock’ (verse 32), and so freely gave them the kingdom – the reign of God – in which tables are open, status is upended, and all people are treated with dignity. In God’s Kingdom – on earth as it is in heaven – there is no scarcity, there are no class or gender barriers, there are no ‘insiders’ and no ‘outsiders.’

Christ compares that Kingdom of God with a wedding banquet.

When we go to a wedding, we have no control over what happens. In the first case, we have no control over who is getting married to whom. But, secondly, weddings break down all our petty snobberies and all our status-seeking.

Whatever we think of the choice of bride or groom, we have no say at all in who is going to be a new brother-in-law, a new mother-in-law, and even into the future, who is going to be a new cousin to our children’s children.

It’s enough to make you laugh.

Sarah laughed when she was told about her future family (see Genesis 18: 12). There is a hint of this story in our Epistle reading, when the writer reminds us of the faith of Abraham and Sarah (see Hebrews 11: 11, 13-16).

Despite our failings, the failings of society, the failings of politics, God’s promises of the Kingdom multiply beyond all our expectations, even beyond the expectations of modern Bible translators.

We cannot control this. Those who come into the banquet may appear to us like thieves and burglars, brazenly breaking into our own family home, into our own family.

But we may find that the thief is actually Christ trying to break into our hearts to let us know that the kingdom is already here.

The word for master here is actually κύριος (kyrios), Lord, the word used in the Greek Old Testament for the Lord God by Jews who found the use of the name of God offensive and blasphemous. But using the word master for κύριος hides away God’s work, confusing the Lord, the ‘Son of Man’ (ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, ho yios tou anthropou), with the ‘master of the house,’ the householder (οἰκοδεσπότης, oikodespótēs).

Think of how the word κύριος (kyrios), Lord, was used by Abraham as he addresses the three visitors to Abraham and Sarah at the Oak of Mamre. The strangers become angels, and the angels come to represent the Triune God.

Had Abraham treated his visitors as thieves, where would we be today? Instead he sets a banquet before the Three, and finds not once but three times that he has an encounter with the living Lord (Genesis 18: 3, 13, 14), the Triune God, an encounter that leads Abraham and Sarah to a faith that ushers in the promises of the Kingdom.

The Lord who arrives for the banquet and stands knocking at the door (Luke 12: 36) in this Gospel reading is the same Christ who says: ‘Behold, I am standing at the door knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come into you and eat with you, and you with me’ (Revelation 3: 20).

He comes in ways we do not expect, and at ‘the unexpected hour,’ the time we ‘think nothing of’ (ἧ ὥρᾳ οὐ δοκεῖτε, he hora ou dokeite, Luke 12: 40) – ‘an hour that seems like nothing.’ He does not bother trying to tear down our puny defences. He sneaks around them instead.

Welcome to the banquet.

Welcome to the kingdom.

Allow the stranger among you, and the stranger within you, to open that door and discover that Christ is not a thief trying to steal what you have, but is the Lord who is trying to batter our hearts and tear down our old barriers so that we can all feast together at the new banquet:

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
…
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

‘For you as yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend’ … a bust of John Donne at Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 22 October 2024):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Persistence in Prayer’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a reflection by Ella Sibley, Regional Manager Europe & Oceania, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Tuesday 22 October 2024) invites us to pray:

Almighty God, we pray for your desires for the world. Teach us and show us your will for our lives today. Let us walk in your paths.

The Collect:

Grant, we beseech you, merciful Lord,
to your faithful people pardon and peace,
that they may be cleansed from all their sins
and serve you with a quiet mind;
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:

Father of light,
in whom is no change or shadow of turning,
you give us every good and perfect gift
and have brought us to birth by your word of truth:
may we be a living sign of that kingdom
where your whole creation will be made perfect in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Almighty God,
in whose service lies perfect freedom:
teach us to obey you
with loving hearts and steadfast wills;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘Be like those who are waiting for their master to return … so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks’ (Luke 12: 35-36) … the open West Door of Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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