Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 167, Thursday 22 October 2026

The 15th-century font with images of the Seven Sacraments and the Crucifixion in Saint Mary and All Saints’ Church, Walsingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and the week began with the Twentieth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XX, 18 October 2026).

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

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth?’ (Luke 12: 51) … the Peace Globe in the nave in Norwich Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Luke 12: 49-53 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 49 ‘I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! 50 I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! 51 Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! 52 From now on, five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; 53 they will be divided:

father against son
and son against father,
mother against daughter
and daughter against mother,
mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law
and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.’

‘And you yourself a sword shall pierce’ … Station IV of Ken Thompson’s Stations of the Cross in Saint Mel’s Cathedral, Longford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

Once again we are confronted with a Gospel reading this morning that is difficult, with its images of division and strife, shattering all our expectations of Gospel values that emphasise domestic bliss and harmony.

I cannot resist finding irony in the coincidence just two days before we mark United Nations Day and the beginning of UN Disarmament Week, while the US continues to wage an undeclared against war against Iran and is now openly facilitating Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Gospel reading is a passage in which Jesus says: ‘Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!’ (verse 51).

In today’s Gospel reading (Luke 12: 49-53), we hear warnings of fire on earth (verse 49), and of families and households divided and fighting each other to the death (verses 52-53). The verses that follow include images of people being blown about by the storms and tempests of the day (verses 54-56).

They are images that might have inspired ‘hellfire and brimstone’ sermons. But they have inspired too great creative and literary minds in the English language, from William Shakespeare and William Blake to TS Eliot in the Four Quartets:

This is the death of earth.

Water and fire succeed
The town, the pasture and the weed.
Water and fire deride
The sacrifice that we denied.
Water and fire shall rot
The marred foundations we forgot,
Of sanctuary and choir.
This is the death of water and fire. ( – Little Gidding)

If we dismiss these apocalyptic images because they have been hijacked by fundamentalist extremists for their own religious and political ideals, then we miss an opportunity to allow our values to challenge those ways we may be allowing our lives to drift along without questioning or examination.

Fire and water were a challenge for me earlier this year when I visited Saint Mary and All Saints’ Church, the Church of England parish church in Walsingham. I was speaking at the Ecumenical Pilgrimage in March, and I had two separate opportunities to visit the Church of England parish church.

Saint Mary and All Saints’ Church dates from the 14th and 15th centuries, and is built from flint with stone dressings. In addition to nave and chancel, there are north and south aisles and north and south transepts. The west tower has a lead needle spire. The church was destroyed in a major fire in 1961; although the original tower and north porch survived. The rest of the church was rebuilt and it is a Grade I listed, building, while the churchyard walls and gates are separately listed Grade II. The original dedication of the church was to All Saints. When Father Alfred Hope Patten (1885-1958) was appointed the Vicar in 1921, he changed the dedication to the present double dedication of Saint Mary and All Saints.

The church has a 15th-century font that illustrate the Seven Sacraments and the Crucifixion. The font survived the fire in 1961, but the 17th-century font cover did not, and the 1964 font cover is a replica of the original. The beautiful baptismal font has now been placed at the west end of the church, close to entrance. The font is a challenge to all who enter the church and is placed exactly where it should be, for Baptism is entry to the Church.

Baptism is not a naming ceremony, it is not about my individual experience, it is never a private event. It is a public event, and it incorporates me into the unity, the community of the Body of Christ.

In the Gospel reading today (Luke 12: 49-53), Christ challenges us with three themes: Fire, Baptism and Division.

In the Bible, fire can represent the presence of God – think of the pillar of fire in the wilderness (Exodus 13: 17-22) or the tongues of flame at Pentecost (Acts 2: 1-4).

It can represent judgment (see Revelation 20: 7-10), and it can represent purification – the prophets Zachariah (13: 9) and Malachi (3: 2-3) speak of the refiner’s fire in which God purifies his people, as a refiner purifies silver by fire.

At the Presentation in the Temple (Luke 2: 22-38), old Simeon foresees how the Christ Child ‘is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inward thoughts of many will be revealed – and a sword will pierce your own soul too’ (verses 34-35).

The sword that pierces the soul of the Virgin Mary, the sword that has killed the prophets, the sword the divides families, is a reminder that Christ, who embodies the presence of God, simultaneously judges and purifies.

In the New Testament, Baptism represents both judgment and purification and Saint John the Baptist connects it with fire (Luke 3: 16-17).

In this Gospel reading, however, Christ is referring not to the baptism he brings but to the baptism he receives. He not only brings the fire of judgment and purification, but he bears it himself also.

The Kingdom of God he proclaims is governed:

• not by might but by forgiveness (think of forgiveness in the Lord’s Prayer, Luke 11: 4);
• not by fear but by courage (‘be not afraid’ in Luke 1: 13, 30, 2: 10, 5: 11, 8: 50, 12: 4, 7, 32);
• not by power but by humility (see Magnificat, Luke 1: 46-55).

But it is easy to be lured by the temptations of wealth, status, power and political promises rather than the promises that come with our Baptism.

‘Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!’ (Luke 12: 51) … Luke Perry’s sculpture of Æthelflæd in Tamworth points to Saint Editha’s Church and Tamworth Castle (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 22 October 2026):

The theme this week (18 to 24 October) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Inclusive Education in Handeni’ (pp 48-49). This theme was introduced on Sunday with a programme update from Father John George Sembuyagi, Programme Lead, Diocese of Tanga, Anglican Church of Tanzania.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 22 October 2026) invites us to pray:

God of unity, we pray for your church in Handeni that it may be known as a place of welcome, where hearts and minds are open to recognise and celebrate the gifts present in every person.

The Collect of the Day:

God, the giver of life,
whose Holy Spirit wells up within your Church:
by the Spirit’s gifts equip us to live the gospel of Christ
and make us eager to do your will,
that we may share with the whole creation
the joys of eternal life;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

God our Father,
whose Son, the light unfailing,
has come from heaven to deliver the world
from the darkness of ignorance:
let these holy mysteries open the eyes of our understanding
that we may know the way of life,
and walk in it without stumbling;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

God, our light and our salvation:
illuminate our lives,
that we may see your goodness in the land of the living,
and looking on your beauty
may be changed into the likeness of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘I have a baptism with which to be baptized’ (Luke 12: 50) … the baptismal font in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

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

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 166, Wednesday 21 October 2026

More comfortable than most seats in life … quiet seats by a beach in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and the week began with the Twentieth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XX, 18 October 2026).

I have a medical appointment early this morning as I continue to be monitored for my post-stroke care, pulmonary sarcoidosis and B12 deficiency. Later this evening, I hope to join the choir rehearsals in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford. But, 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.

‘From one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded’ (Luke 12: 48) … watching the sunset near the Bus Station in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 12: 39-48 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 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.’

41 Peter said, ‘Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for everyone?’ 42 And the Lord said, ‘Who then is the faithful and prudent manager whom his master will put in charge of his slaves, to give them their allowance of food at the proper time? 43 Blessed is that slave whom his master will find at work when he arrives. 44 Truly I tell you, he will put that one in charge of all his possessions. 45 But if that slave says to himself, “My master is delayed in coming”, and if he begins to beat the other slaves, men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk, 46 the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour that he does not know, and will cut him in pieces, and put him with the unfaithful. 47 That slave who knew what his master wanted, but did not prepare himself or do what was wanted, will receive a severe beating. 48 But one who did not know and did what deserved a beating will receive a light beating. From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded.’


Sunset on the Sarawak River in Kuching earlier this year (Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Today’s Reflections:

This Gospel reading at the Eucharist this morning (Luke 12: 39-48) is a difficult one, not just because this and similar passages were used in the past to defend slave-owning and claim it had a Biblical mandate, but because it has also been used to portray God as a harsh and punitive taskmaster who must be obeyed out of fear.

But it ends with words that are at the heart of the reading: ‘From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded’ (Luke 12: 48).

Later in Saint Luke’s Gospel, in the parable of the unjust steward (Luke 16: 1-13), we are told that whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?’

Being faithful with what is given to me is a familiar Gospel theme: it is found too in the parable of the talents. But being faithful with dishonest wealth and with wealth created by slaves treated cruelly are puzzling concepts, even if they remind us of the recent economic dilemmas in Ireland. Is it still possible to manage wealth in ways that are appropriate to, that witness to, that are signs of the Kingdom of God, and that seek the greater good of all?

On the other hand, do I think I am one of those people who has been given much in life, and how much is required of me in return, as a matter of social, communal responsibility?

When we were travelling to and from Kuching earlier this year, with the crisis in the Gulf creating delays and rerouting to flights through Kuala Lumpur and Muscat, I found yet again how there is little comfort on an overnight long-haul flight when you are trying to sleep in your small allocated space, especially should and the passenger in front insist on pushing back that seat as far it goes.

At times like that, comfort might seem like a first-class seat on a flight. But, when it comes to choices, I would much prefer true contentment over time-limited comfort, and an ordinary seat watching the sunset on the river or the waves on the beach always gives me the feeling of having received much in life.

A comfortable first-class seat on a flight is purely functional, and only lasts for so many hours. Sitting on a cheap chair by the sea watching the sunrise or the sunset brings me close to nature and reminds me of God’s eternal promises.

In Kuching and in England, we live in one-bedroom flats overlooking busy streets, and life below reminds me each day how I have been given much in my own life.

I can read, so I am better educated than over one billion people who cannot read at all.

I woke up this morning knowing I have more health than illness, unlike the million people who will not live through this week.

I have never lived through war in my home setting, I have never known the loneliness of a prison, never suffered the agony of torture, nor have I endured the pangs of starvation, unlike 500 million people in the world.

I can go to any meeting I want – political, religious or social – unlike more than 3 billion people in an increasingly oppressive world today.

I have food in the kitchen, clothes in the wardrobe, a roof over my head and a place to sleep, making me richer than 75 per cent of people in the world.

I have money in the bank and in my wallet, and spare change in my pocket, which puts me among the top eight per cent of the world’s wealthy.

I can write this and you are reading this, which means you and I are more educated than one billion people in the world today who cannot read.

‘From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded’ (Luke 12: 48).

Tombland Bookshop, facing Norwich Cathedral, is the largest bookshop of its type in East Anglia … one billion people in the world today cannot read or write (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 21 October 2026):

The theme this week (18 to 24 October) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Inclusive Education in Handeni’ (pp 48-49). This theme was introduced on Sunday with a programme update from Father John George Sembuyagi, Programme Lead, Diocese of Tanga, Anglican Church of Tanzania.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Wednesday 21 October 2026) invites us to pray:

Faithful God, we pray for your protection and guidance for all members of the Diocese of Tanga. May they trust in the presence of the Lord (Psalm 121) in every challenge faced.

The Collect of the Day:

God, the giver of life,
whose Holy Spirit wells up within your Church:
by the Spirit’s gifts equip us to live the gospel of Christ
and make us eager to do your will,
that we may share with the whole creation
the joys of eternal life;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

God our Father,
whose Son, the light unfailing,
has come from heaven to deliver the world
from the darkness of ignorance:
let these holy mysteries open the eyes of our understanding
that we may know the way of life,
and walk in it without stumbling;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

God, our light and our salvation:
illuminate our lives,
that we may see your goodness in the land of the living,
and looking on your beauty
may be changed into the likeness of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Old Greek coins on a stall in Rethymnon … the spare change in our pockets put you and me among the top eight per cent of the world’s wealthy (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 2026: 157, Monday 12 October 2026

Edith Cavell depicted in a bronze bust on her memorial by Henry Alfred Pegram (1862-1937) outside the Erpingham Gate at Norwich Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and the week began with the Nineteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XIX, 11 October 2026). The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers Wilfrid of Ripon, Bishop, Missionary, 709; Elizabeth Fry, Prison Reformer, 1845; and Edith Cavell, Nurse, 1915.

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

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Patriotism is not enough’ … the Edith Cavell Memorial in Saint Martin’s Place, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 11: 29-32 (NRSVA):

29 When the crowds were increasing, he began to say, ‘This generation is an evil generation; it asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. 30 For just as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so the Son of Man will be to this generation. 31 The queen of the South will rise at the judgement with the people of this generation and condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon, and see, something greater than Solomon is here! 32 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!’

The Edith Cavell Memorial near Trafalgar Square is the work of the sculptor Sir George Frampton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s reflections:

In this morning’s Gospel reading (Luke 11: 29-32), as the crowds seem to ask for a sign, Christ says there have been many signs in the past, including Jonah’s visit to Nineveh, and the queen of the South who ‘came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon’. The women who make dramatic appearances in Saint Luke’s Gospel are often outspoken, vocal and wise women who confound what have become traditional perceptions of women in those times. I think this morning of the way Donald Trump pwersitently and habitually seeks to demean women journalists or back to the year before last when Trump’s running mate, the now Vice-President JD Vance, referred to Kamala Harris and spoke dismissively of ‘childless cat ladies’ who are ‘mean and mean spirited.’

The Trump administration is infected in a systemic way with racism, misogyny, antisemitism and violence, and seems to be nourished by and to feed on all four. Yet, this morning, a woman who might have easily been a sort of ‘childless cat lady’ yet has political power, the Queen of the South, is acclaimed for travelling great lengths in her search for wisdom.

Two fearless women who showed wisdom and compassion rather than pursuing power are Elizabeth Fry (1845), the Prison Reformer, and Edith Cavell (1915), Nurse, who are commemorated in the Calendar of the Church of England today (12 October).

Edith Cavell (1865-1915) is a striking example of those childless women who provide moral leadership in the face of violence and hatred and who realised the inappropriate values inherent in what passes as patriotism. I have been to see monuments to her close to Norwich Cathedral, where she is buried, in Saint Martin’s Place, close to Trafalgar Square and Saint Martin-in-the-Fields Church, and in Peterborough Cathedral.

Edith Cavell was a matron at Berkendael Medical Institute in Brussels when World War I broke out in 1914. She nursed soldiers from both sides without distinction and helped 200 Allied soldiers escape from German-occupied Belgium. She was arrested in August 1915, court-martialled, found guilty of treason, and shot by a German firing squad 110 years ago on 12 October 1915.

A month before the end of World War I, her statue in Norwich by Henry Pegram (1862-1937) was unveiled by Queen Alexandra on 12 October 1918, the third anniversary of her execution. It stood originally in the middle of the road opposite the then Cavell Rest Home for Nurses, which was housed un part of the Maids Head Hotel. The depiction of the soldier offering a wreath represents the men she protected at the cost of her own life.

Her body was brought back from Belgium to Britain in May 1919 for a state funeral at Westminster Abbey and she was buried at Norwich Cathedral.

The sculptor Sir George James Frampton (1860-1928) accepted the commission for her monument in London, but declined any fee. He adopted a distinctively Modernist style for the memorial, which comprises a 3 metre high statue of Cavell in her nurse’s uniform, sculpted from white Carrara marble, standing on a grey Cornish granite pedestal. The statue stands in front of the south side of a larger 12-metre grey granite block. The top of the block is carved into a cross and a statue of a mother and child, sometimes interpreted as the Virgin and Child.

The inscription on the pedestal beneath her statue reads: ‘Edith Cavell / Brussels / Dawn / October 12th 1915 / Patriotism is not enough / I must have no hatred or / bitterness for anyone’. The last three lines quote her comment to the Revd Stirling Gahan (1870-1958), the Irish-born Anglican chaplain in Brussels, who shared Holy Communion with her on the night before her execution.

The face of the granite block behind the statue of Cavell bears the inscription ‘Humanity,’ and higher up, below the Virgin and Child, ‘For King and Country.’ Other faces of the block read ‘Devotion’, ‘Fortitude’ and ‘Sacrifice.’ On the rear face of the block is a carving of a lion crushing a serpent, and higher up is the inscription ‘Faithful until death.’

The memorial was unveiled by Queen Alexandra on 17 March 1920. The site was chosen because it was beside the first headquarters of the British Red Cross at 7 Saint Martin’s Place.

Edith Cavell was born on 4 December 1865 in Swardeston, near Norwich, where her father, the Revd Frederick Cavell (1824-1910), was the vicar for 45 years; her maternal grandmother was Irish. She was educated at Norwich High School for Girls, and at boarding schools at Clevedon, Somerset, and Laurel Court, Peterborough.

In 1888, when she was 23, Edith was governess in Keswick Hall, near Norwich, for the children in the Gurney family, the Quaker family of Elizabeth Fry, who is also commemorated in Common Worship today (12 October). She later spent five years with a family in Brussels, and began nursing training in London at the age of 30.

At the invitation of Dr Antoine Depage, she became the matron of a new nursing school in Brussels in 1907. She was visiting her widowed mother in Norfolk when World War I broke out. She returned to Brussels, where her clinic and nursing school were taken over by the Red Cross.

After the German occupation of Brussels in November 1914, Edith began sheltering British soldiers, helping them to escape to the neutral Netherlands, and hiding wounded British and French soldiers and Belgian and French civilians of military age.

She was arrested on 3 August 1915, charged with harbouring allied soldiers and war treason, despite not being a German national, and was sentenced to death. The First Geneva Convention guaranteed the protection of medical personnel, but this was forfeit if used as cover for belligerent action. At her trial, she made no attempt to defend herself.

The British government said it could do nothing to help her. But Hugh S Gibson of the US legation at Brussels made it clear to the German government that executing her would further harm Germany’s already damaged reputation. He reminded the Germans of the burning of Louvain and the sinking of the Lusitania.

The sentence of death by firing squad was confirmed at 4:30 pm on 11 October 1915, to be carried out before dawn the next day. Her final words to the German Lutheran prison chaplain, the Revd Paul Le Seur, were, ‘Ask Father Gahan to tell my loved ones later on that my soul, as I believe, is safe, and that I am glad to die for my country.’

Pastor Le Soeur realised that Edith could not receive spiritual help from someone in a German uniform. He hurriedly called for Horace Gahan who was not at home, but eventually the message reached him to meet the chaplain at his lodgings. Learning of Edith’s fate was a very shocking moment for him.

Gahan arrived with a pass at Saint Gilles Prison after 8:30 that evening 110 years ago, 11 October 1915, and went to Edith’s cell. There he found her calm and resigned. He recalled her words, ‘I have no fear or shrinking; I have seen death so often it is not strange, or fearful to me!’

They shared Holy Communion together and he stayed for an hour. She spoke kindly of her treatment in prison and said, ‘But this I would say, standing as I do in view of God and eternity, I realise that patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone.’

The meeting ended after they softly recited together the hymn Abide with Me. On leaving, he said ‘God Bless’; she smiled and replied tenderly, ‘We shall meet again.’

Sixteen men, forming two firing squads, carried out the death sentence on her and four Belgian men in Schaerbeek at 7 am on 12 October 1915. News reports after her execution were found to be only true in part. Even the American Journal of Nursing repeated the fictional account that she fainted and fell because of her refusal to wear a blindfold in front of the firing squad. Allegedly, while she lay unconscious, the German commanding officer shot her dead with a revolver. She was 49.

Pastor Le Seur, the German army chaplain, recalled at the time of her execution, ‘I do not believe that Miss Cavell wanted to be a martyr … but she was ready to die for her country … Miss Cavell was a very brave woman and a faithful Christian.’

Immediately after her execution, Horace Gahan wrote a moving account of their last meeting. It was sent through the US Legation to the Foreign Office in London, where it was released. Her story was used in war-time propaganda as an example of German barbarism and moral depravity.

Edith Cavell became the most prominent British female casualty of World War I, and many memorials were created around the world to remember her.

The reredos of the Last Supper behind the altar in Holy Trinity Church, Essex Street, Norwich, where Edith worshipped with her mother, was dedicated as a memorial to her. The Edith Cavell Health Care Campus is on the site of the former Edith Cavell Hospital in Peterborough, and there is a memorial to her in Peterborough Cathedral. She is also remembered in Peterborough in the name of the Cavell car park at the Queensgate shopping centre.

The Revd Horace Sterling Townsend Gahan (1870-1959), who shared Holy Communion with her on the evening before her execution, continued to live in Brussels until 1923, and there he was sometimes known affectionately as ‘Father Pat’ because of his Irish origins.

Gahan was born in Lurganboy, Co Donegal, on 11 November 1870, a son of Frederick Beresford Gahan, an engineer, and his wife, Katherine Jane (Townsend). He was ordained deacon (1894) and priest (1895), and worked in parishes in the Church of England until 1905, when he returned to Ireland. He moved to Brussels as the Anglican chaplain of Christ Church, just as World War I was about to break out. He returned to England and a parish in Leicester in 1923, and died in 1959.

Meanwhile, all those fears I had about the dangers of Trump returning to the White House, with his brutal interpretation of ‘patriotism’, have become a reality in the two years months since I first wrote about those fears while I reflected on Edith Cavell and Elizabeth Fry. The circumstances of Edith Cavell’s military-style execution came to mind again as Pete Hegseth, the US Defence Secretary, gloated and smirked in recent days at the plan he has concocted to livestream a military execution in the name of patriotism.

I am reminded too of two pithy sayings in the Pirkei Avot or Ethics of the Fathers: ‘Your house should be open wide, and you should treat the poor as members of your household’ (1: 5) … ‘On three things the world continues to exist: On justice, truth, and peace’ (1: 18). And I am reminded too of Edith Cavell’s words in prison before her death, ‘But this I would say, standing as I do in view of God and eternity, I realise that patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone.’

The monument to Edith Cavell near Norwich Cathedral, where she is buried (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Monday 12 October 2026):

In Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), the theme this week, 11-17 October 2026 (pp 46-47), is ‘The Lord Has Done Great Things’. This theme was introduced yesterday with a programme update by Guilherme Moura Bejo, candidate for Holy Orders in the Anglican Diocese of São Paulo, and co-ordinator of the Diocesan Youth Group.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Monday 12 October 2026) invites us to pray:

Lord, we give thanks for Guilherme and the ways that you have grown him through the Emerging Leaders Academy. Uphold him in his studies and responsibilities at church, to remember that you are his source of strength..

The Collect of the Day:

Almighty God,
who called our forebears to the light of the gospel
by the preaching of your servant Wilfrid:
help us, who keep his life and labour in remembrance,
to glorify your name by following the example
of his zeal and perseverance;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

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

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Edith Cavell was a student teacher in the 1880s at Laurel Court, beside Peterborough Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

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

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 92, Friday 7 August 2026

‘Whosever will come after me, let him take up their cross and follow me’ (Matthew 16: 24) … Station V in the Stations of the Cross by Irene Ogden in Saint Julian’s Church, Norwich (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and the week began with the Ninnth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity IX, 2 August 2026). Today, the calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship recalls John Mason Neale (1818-1866), Priest, Hymn Writer. Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

‘Let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me’ (Matthew 16: 24) … Simon of Cyrene takes up the Cross, Station 5 in the Stations of the Cross in the chapel of Saint John’s Hospital, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 16: 24-28 (NRSVA):

24 Then Jesus told his disciples, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 25 For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. 26 For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?

27 ‘For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done. 28 Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.’

‘For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life?’ (Matthew 16: 26) … torn and ragged banknotes in a tin box outside an antiques shop in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflections:

In the Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Matthew 16: 24-28), Christ and the disciples are near the villages of Caesarea Philippi, in today’s Golan Heights. Christ has both commended Peter for his faith and warned him of the danger of being a stumbling block.

To their dismay, Christ now speaks openly about his imminent death and resurrection. He then describes true discipleship: first, a disciple must follow him and renounce self-centeredness (verse 23). Those who are prepared to give even their lives for his sake and for the sake of spreading the good news will find true life verse 24). But those who opt for material well-being deny their true selves and lose out (verse 26).

There is a cost to discipleship, but the challenge to take up the Cross and to follow Christ is open to all.

God in Christ has come to enfold humanity. The cross will not stop the proclamation of the Good News, nor will it keep salvation history from breaking into the cosmos.

So often, in the face of criticism, the Christian response is either to shut down or to retreat to a different understanding of God and Jesus. But Christ tells the people that if they want to follow him on the journey, there is a cost to discipleship.

We are challenged to take up our cross and follow Christ on that journey.

Christianity cannot be reduced to an individual mental or philosophical decision. It is a journey with Christ and with not only the disciples but with the crowd, the many, who are also invited to join that journey.

If Saint Peter knew what was ahead of him, perhaps he might have been even more vocal in rebuking Christ in yesterday’s Gospel reading. But the triumph comes not in getting what we want, not in engineering things so that God gives us what we desire and wish for, so that we get a Jesus who does the things we want him to do. The triumph comes in the Resurrection.

True discipleship and true prayer mean making God’s priorities my priorities: the poor, the sick, the imprisoned, the isolated, the marginalised, the victims, the unloved. If that is difficult, nobody said that being a Christian was going to be easy, that being a Christian would not cost anything.

As the German martyr and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer might have put it, being a disciple means having to pay the cost of discipleship. There is no cheap Christianity and there is no cheap grace.

The late Pope Francis once put it another way. Referring to discipleship and the traditional Lenten fast, he asked, ‘Do you want to fast this Lent?’ And then, he answered:

Fast from hurting words and say kind words.

Fast from sadness and be filled with gratitude.

Fast from anger and be filled with patience.

Fast from pessimism and be filled with hope.

Fast from worries and have trust in God.

Fast from complaints; contemplate simplicity.

Fast from pressures and be prayerful.

Fast from bitterness; fill your hearts with joy.

Fast from selfishness and be compassionate.

Fast from grudges and be reconciled.

Fast from words; be silent and listen.

‘Let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me’ (Matthew 16: 24) … the Stations of the Cross in Saint Gregory’s Armenian Church, Singapore (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Friday 7 August 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 (2-8 August 2026, pp 24-25), is ‘Faith Under Pressure in Nicaragua’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a Reflection by the Most Revd Juan David Alvarado, Bishop of El Salvador and Primate of the Province of the Anglican Church in Central America.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Friday 7 August 2026) invites us to pray:

Lord Jesus, renew hope in your missions, parishes, and communities. Give your people a missionary heart - open to all, ready to accompany those who suffer, and to speak words of hope.

The Collect of the Day:

Almighty God,
who sent your Holy Spirit
to be the life and light of your Church:
open our hearts to the riches of your grace,
that we may bring forth the fruit of the Spirit
in love and joy and peace;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

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

Additional Collect:

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

Yesterday’s reflections

Continued tomorrow

A Cross in the north aisle in Saint Bene’t’s Church, Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

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

Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable, typifies the work of the church architect Desmond Williams and his liturgical priorities

Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable, completed in 1964, is typical of the work of the architect Desmond Williams (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Patrick Comerford

When I was in Dunstable in Bedfordshire last week, the two buildings I truly wanted to visit are Saint Peter’s Priory Church in the centre of the town, which I wrote about yesterday (31 May 2026), and the Roman Catholic Church, Saint Mary’s Church, on West Street.

Saint Mary’s was designed on a circular plan by the distinguished church architect Desmond Williams (1932-2026) when he was not yet 30. It was built in 1962-1964 and is one of four churches he designed that are listed Grade II. It has been listed for four principal reasons:

• an early example of the impact of the Liturgical Movement on church design and anticipated the reforms adopted at the Second Vatican Council;
• an important early work in the career of Desmond Williams, an architect notable for his innovative church buildings at a time of great change in ecclesiastical architecture;
• its innovative circular form and layout;
• its intact interior, including good quality bespoke furnishings and a highly unusual tetrahedral ceiling.

Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable, with its circular plan and tetrahedral ceiling of 600 aluminium pyramids, is one of Desmond Williams’s four listed Catholic churches (Photograph © Robert Proctor/The Guardian)

The Roman Catholic Church was growing in England in the late 19th and early 20th, and this growth created the need to build a large number of churches that would serve the religious and social needs of a growing community.

Until 1927, Catholics in Dunstable had to travel to nearby towns to attend Mass. In that year the Bishop of Northampton granted a petition for Mass to be said in Dunstable under the leadership of the Congregation of the Mission or the Vincentians based in Potters Bar.

The new parish was dedicated to Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal and the first church was built in 1935. The former building survives as the parish social centre in the grounds of the present church, but has been heavily altered. When the Spanish Vincentians left the parish, they were succeeded by and the Irish Vincentians.

As Dunstable expanded after World War II, plans were drawn up for a larger church in 1961 and the foundation stone of a new church was laid on 29 April 1962. Bishop Leo Parker of Northampton blessed and opened the building on 15 March 1964. The new church, dedicated to Our Lady Immaculate, was designed by Desmond Williams and was built by R Willis and Son at a cost of £72,000.

The church is circular in plan. The internal layout places the altar in front of the congregation, rather than at the centre as was the case at groundbreaking churches of the Liturgical Movement in church design. Nevertheless, Williams’s work was at the forefront of new design and draws the congregation together around the altar, anticipating the emphasis on a greater sense of communion and community in worship that is at the heart of the major reforms of the Second Vatican Council, expressed in Sacrosanctum Concilium, the 1963 Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy.

The liturgical arrangement in Dunstable is very similar to some highly significant later churches such as the Roman Catholic Cathedral at Clifton (1969-1973).

A contemporary presbytery and offices were built alongside the new church and a later hut was built to the north of the church beside a Garden of Remembrance (2000). The church has not been heavily altered since its completion, although the baptistery was later re-purposed as a shop.

Meanwhile, the association of the Irish Vincentians with Saint Mary’s Parish in Dunstable came to end when the parish was officially transferred to the Diocese of Northampton in September 2019.

Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable, is organised around a circular worship space (Photograph © Historic England Archive)

Desmond Williams and Associates designed a number of modern churches, including Saint Augustine’s Church, Manchester (1966-1968) with a notable reredos by Robert Brumby; Saint Dunstan’s Church, Birmingham (1966-1968), and Saint Michael’s Church, Penn, Wolverhampton (1967-1968). His other churches that I have visited include the Church of the Immaculate Conception, Bicester, Oxfordshire (1963).

Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable, is built of load-bearing brick and concrete, with walling in red-brown Fletton bricks and stained glass. The roof is of steel trusses covered in copper and asphalt. The interior features ironwork and joinery of pine and laminated tropical hardwoods.

The church is organised around a circular worship space with 12 projecting segments forming petal-like bays around its circumference. To the south-east, three full-height bays extend further outwards and are combined to form an entrance foyer with a baptistry and chapel at either side.

The stairs from the foyer lead to a gallery that cantilevers into the worship space. An ambulatory runs around the perimeter of the worship space cutting archways through brick piers to create a continuous path. Behind the altar, the ambulatory ramps upwards and connects with the sacristy and boiler room in a single-storey projection to the north of the church.

The principal entrance of Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable, is at the centre of three projecting bays (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

The exterior of the church is divided into 12 bays separated by full-height stained glass recesses with rectilinear multi-coloured panes. Set back above these bays is a plain-glazed clerestory beneath a copper roof that rises gently to a needle-like spirelet topped with a Celtic cross.

The principal entrance is at the centre of three projecting bays. Three modern replacement doors are accessed under three segmental concrete hoods to enter the foyer. Above the hoods is the coat of arms of Pope Paul VI, who was Pope when the church opened. On either side is a narrow window and five further windows are above. Most other bays have 10 slit windows arranged across four rows. The three bays at the north-west are not separated by glazing and connect to a single-storey projection with plain windows and a doorway at the top of a small cantilevered flight of concrete steps.

Inside the church, the worship space consists of four polygonal ranks of pews in good quality pine with open backs and upholstered kneelers on hinges. The bench ends follow the geometry of the benches and each has a cross in relief at the uppermost corner.

The nave floor, which has developed large cracks, is original and is laid in diamond patterns of grey and white tiles. Axially positioned opposite the entrance and in front of the pews, a wide polygonal sanctuary has a communion rail of cruciform brass stanchions and a dark marble top. The sanctuary steps are terrazzo and lead to a large white marble altar inlaid with gold mosaic tiles reading: Adoro Te Devote. Iron openwork behind the altar supports a large crucifix and allows views of the only bay to have stained glass in the narrow slit windows.

The whole worship space is unified by a sound-absorbing ceiling of 600 aluminium pyramids in 18 shades of blue and white radiating in concentric rings from a Greek cross in a boss at the centre. Williams’s design for the ceiling evokes mediaeval fan vaulting, especially that of the chapel at King’s College, Cambridge.

Within the ambulatory there are two confessionals clad in tropical hardwood with plain interiors. To the east of the narthex, Williams placed a baptistery entered through a screen of iron openwork of the same design as the reredos and lectern, on which hang two carved doves. The baptistry, now a shop, retains a round font in fine white marble carved with a pattern of squares that echo the stepped square recess in the floor that is now covered, and a suspended wooden square of the same proportions that hangs from the ceiling. The font is supported on a square shaft with a mosaic figure of Saint John the Baptist on the front and water on the back.

The architect Desmond Williams died earlier this year (31 January 2026) aged 93. He is best known for his design of modern Catholic churches, reflecting a rare ability to bring together liturgical function, architectural ambition and artistic collaboration. The quality and significance of his work were recognised during his lifetime with the listing of four of his churches, a distinction that placed him among the leading figures of post-war British architecture.

Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable, which was completed in 1964, is typical of his work. The building’s circular form cradled the congregation in an expansive embrace, bringing them nearer to the altar. Its real drama, however, lay in its complex tetrahedral ceiling, described as ‘resembling a giant and delicate piece of origami’. It is fashioned from 600 aluminium pyramids bolted together in alternating bands of blue and white – ‘a modern vault of heaven’, as the obituary writer said in The Gurdian.

Desmond Williams explained: ‘The ceiling was inspired by my earlier visits to King’s College Chapel in Cambridge’, with its exquisite stone lattice of mediaeval fan vaulting.

Williams designed churches that are bold yet disciplined, characterised by a confident use of materials, proportion and acoustics. His other listed churches were all completed in 1968.

Collaboration lay at the heart of his practice. At Saint Augustine’s Church, Manchester, he worked closely with the ceramic artist Robert Brumby, whose imposing sculptural reredos, along with Pierre Fourmaintraux’s abstract stained glass, elevate and enrich the architectural fabric. The unified and powerful liturgical space they created exemplifies the progressive, interdisciplinary spirit of 1960s British modernism.

The cot of arms of Pope Paul VI above the entrance to Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Desmond Williams was born in Whalley Range, Manchester, on 7 July 1932, the son of Sydney Williams, a draughtsman of electrical systems on submarines, and his wife, Eleanor, a staunch Catholic, He was educated at Saint Bede’s College, Manchester, where his early interest in architecture was encouraged.

A formative moment came during a teenage visit to Quarr Abbey on the Isle of Wight. There the abbey’s simple brick interior, its harmonious proportions and powerful combination of architecture, music and liturgy left a lasting impression and instilled a lifelong fascination with the relationship between space, sound and spiritual experience. His teenage interests in architecture were strengthened by a cycling trip through East Anglia, exploring Norwich Cathedral, along with local churches and historic houses.

Williams studied architecture at the University of Manchester School of Architecture, where his contemporaries included Donald Buttress, later the surveyor of the fabric of Westminster Abbey. After qualifying, he was briefly in partnership with Arthur Farebrother in Altrincham, securing early commissions for churches and schools. His first task as project architect was Saint Catherine of Siena Church, Didsbury (1957), designed in the style of a Romanesque basilica.

He was only 28 when he set up his own practice in Manchester, nurturing strong professional links with the Department of Education and Science that led to a steady stream of commissions. One of his first church commissions he received was for Saint Mary’s, Dunstable. The schools and colleges he designed included an extension to Ampleforth College, the Benedictine-run boarding school at Ampleforth Abbey.

Williams formed a partnership with the W & JB Ellis of Liverpool in 1968. This expanded into Ellis Williams Architects, with studios in London, Berlin and across the north of England. He was appointed OBE in 1988 in recognition of his work as a church architect and he continued working until he was in his mid 90s. He died on 31 January 2026.

• Sunday Masses in Saint Mary’s are: Saturday Vigil, 6 pm; Sunday mornings, 9:30 and 11:30; weekday Masses are generally on Monday to Friday at 9:30, or 10 am on bank holidays.

A statue of the Virgin Mary in the grounds of Saint Mary’s Church, Dunstable (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

A 27.5 million-year cycle, 27.5 million Nordic people, £27.5 million for Norwich and 27.5 million blog hits

The Earth experiences a major geological ‘pulse’ or cycle of activity roughly every 27.5 million years … a sculpture beneath the Fortezza in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The viewing and reading figures for this blog continues to surprise me, and those figures passed the 27.5 million mark late yesterday evening (16 March 2026). This is the fourth time this month alone that the half-million figure in readership numbers has been passed, with 27 million last Thursday (12 March 2026), 26.5 million hits the week before (3 March 2026) and 26 million at the beginning of the month (Sunday 1 March 2026), when the hits that day were also the highest daily figure I have ever recorded (318,307).

This year so far has seen a phenomenal amount of traffic on this blog, reaching a volume of readers that I never have expected when I first started blogging 16 years ago. Half the total hits (have been within the past eight or nine months, and the total of hits last month (February 2026) was the highest monthly total ever (3,386,504), with this blog passing the half-million mark seven times in all in February.

At the end of last year, this blog had 21 million hits (31 December 2025). So far this year, there have been more than 6.5 million hits or visitors for 2026.

I first began blogging in 2010, and it took almost two years until July 2012 to reach half a million readers – a number reached four times this month alone. Half of the 27.5 million hits have been within eight or nine months.

Throughout last year and this year, the daily figures have been overwhelming on many occasions. Eight of the 12 days of busiest traffic on this blog have been in February alone, two were this month (March) and two were in January last year:

• 318,307 (1 March 2026)
• 314,018 (28 February 2026)
• 301,449 (2 March 2026)
• 289,076 (11 January 2025)
• 285,366 (12 January 2025)
• 280,802 (26 February 2026)

• 273,022 (27 February 2026)
• 261,422 (13 January 2026)
• 195,391 (20 February 2026)
• 190,630 (23 February 2026)
• 190,467 (21 February 2026)
• 188,376 (19 February 2026)

The number of readers has been overpowering this year and last, with the daily averages currently running at over 100,000 hits a day so far this month. Ten years ago, the daily average was around 1,000.

Norwich Castle has reopened to the public after a five-year, £27.5 million transformation (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

To put this figure of 27.5 million in context:

The Earth experiences a major geological ‘pulse’ or cycle of activity roughly every 27.5 million years. This cycle influences plate tectonics, volcanism, and mass extinctions.

Norwich Castle has been redesigned as ‘The People’s Palace,’ making it the UK’s most accessible Norman castle. After a five-year, £27.5 million transformation, Norwich Castle Keep – one of Europe’s most important Norman palaces – reopened to the public last August.

The most common response to the religion question in the latest census in England and Wales was ‘Christian’– 46.2% of the overall population, or 27.5 million people.

The combined population of the Nordic countries (Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Iceland, along with Greenland, the Faroe Islands and Åland) is estimated at 27.5 million. The Nordic Council of Ministers has a vision to make the Nordic Region the world’s most sustainable and integrated region by 2030.

The population of the United Kingdom passed 27.5 million in 1843.

The Electoral Reform Society reports that 27.5 million people did not vote in the 2024 election in the UK, roughly equal to the number who did vote.

27.5 million metres is 27,500 km and 27 million square metres is 27,500 sq km, the approximate size of Haiti, the most populous country in the Caribbean.

And 27.5 million minutes is equal to 52 years, 3 months, and 12 days, or 458,333 hours. In other words, if this blog was getting only one hit a minute, it would take more than 52 years to reach this latest 27.5 million mark.

It is four years since I retired from active parish ministry in March 2022. These days, though, about 100 people on average are reading my daily prayer diary posted on this blog each morning. I imagine many of my priest-colleagues would be prayerfully thankful if the congregations in their churches totalled 700 or more people each week.

Today, I am very grateful to the real readers among those 27.5 million hits on this blog to date, and in particular I remain grateful to the faithful core group of about 100 people who join me in prayer, reading and reflections each day.

Helsinki City Hall in the Finnish capital … the combined population of the Nordic countries (Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Iceland, Greenland, the Faroe Islands and Åland) is 27.5 million (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

A missed opportunity to see the Despenser Reredos, but seeing other treasures in Norwich Cathedral

The Despenser Reredos in Saint Luke’s Chapel in Norwich Cathedral (Photograph: Wikipedia/CCL)

Patrick Comerford
When we were staying in Norwich last month, I visited Norwich Cathedral once again, and still managed to miss one of the great mediaeval treasures of the cathedral – the Despenser Reredos above the altar in Saint Luke’s Chapel.

When I visited Norwich Cathedral last year, the Despenser Reredos was covered in Lenten array, so that perhaps explains why I missed seeing it once again last month, not just once, but twice.

However, I managed to see a number of other mediaeval treasures this time round, including: the reredos in the Chapel of Saint Saviour, made with panels recovered from old mediaeval rood screens; the Adoration of the Magi by Martin Schwarz in the Jesus Chapel; and the old baptismal font and the statue of Saint Felix in Saint Luke’s Chapel; as well as another modern treasure in Saint Luke’s Chapel – the Hanging Chrismatory.

Norwich Cathedral is best known for its two-storey cloisters (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Norwich Cathedral is best known for its two-storey cloisters. But the Despenser Reredos, dating from ca 1380, is one of the cathedral’s greatest treasures, its most important work of art and the only surviving mediaeval English altarpiece with scenes of Christ’s Passion.

The Despenser Reredos, also known as the Despenser Retable, was saved from destruction over the centuries because it was hidden as the underside of a table until 1847. It depicts five scenes from the life of Christ: his scourging at the pillar, Christ carrying his cross, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection and the Ascension. The scenes are painted in vivid colours on wood, and are surrounded by a rectangular frame.

The original reredos may have been located at the High Altar originally. It was probably commissioned in 1382 by Henry le Despenser, the Bishop of Norwich, after the defeat of the Peasants’ Revolt at the Battle of North Walsham in 1381. Heraldic shields around the frame may represent the families involved in suppressing the Peasants’ Revolt in East Anglia, or who contributed to the cost of producing the piece.

An alternative theory suggests it was commissioned to mark the visit to Norwich by King Richard II and his queen Anne of Bohemia in 1383.

Albert Way, a local historian, and the art historian Matthew Digby Wyatt believed the altarpiece came from Italy. However, its origins remain uncertain. At first, experts thought it was of Italian or German origin, but later specialists believed it was influenced by French or Bohemian craftsmen. The English antiquarian William Henry St John Hope in 1898 described it as an example of ‘genuine English art’, and suggested it had been made in Norwich, was commissioned by Bishop Despenser at the time of the Peasants’ Revolt.

The panels are similar to those in another church in Norwich, Saint Michael-at-Plea, but experts have not been able to conclude from this that it was made locally. The historian David King concludes that the origin of the reredos cannot be ascertained by the style of the panels. On the other hand, the mediaeval art historian Pamela Tudor-Craig wrote that there is evidence that the reredos was ‘executed by local craftsmen’.

The mediaevalist Sarah Beckwith has argued that the commission was directly related to the insurrection in the manner of an object lesson, suggesting that ‘the peasants who had dared, albeit abortively, to contest their ordained position in the social hierarchy and whose revolutionary gestures were based on an identification with Christ, are once again shown a story, a story they already know very well.’

Early morning at Norwich Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

During the English Civil war, many religious works of art were kept secret to save them from the Puritan armies and the reredos was removed, turned upside down and used as a tabletop, with the paintings concealed underneath. The upper part, including part of the central figure of Jesus, was sawn off by carpenters who made the table top, and the four corners were cut out to allow table legs to be inserted.

The converted table was kept for years in an upper room, with the altarpiece paintings hidden underneath. The reredos remained lost until 1847, when it was accidentally rediscovered, supposedly when someone dropped something that rolled underneath the table. After its discovery, the reredos was displayed in a glass case in the south ambulatory.

The panels and frame and the vibrant colours were restored by Pauline Plummer in 1958, and since then the reredos has been used once again as an altarpiece in Saint Luke’s Chapel.

The reredos in Saint Saviour’s Chapel is made with panels recovered from mediaeval rood screens (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Another reredos in Norwich Cathedral is to be seen in Saint Saviour’s Chapel, the chapel of the Royal Norfolk Regiment and Royal Anglian Regiment. This memorial space at the east end of the cathedral is on the site of the 13th century Lady Chapel that was demolished in the late 16th century.

The architect Sir Charles Nicholson (1867-1949) designed Saint Saviour’s Chapel in 1930-1932. The reredos in the chapel is made with panels recovered from old mediaeval rood screens.

Nicholson’s other work on Anglican cathedrals includes the west front of Saint Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast, where he was the cathedral architect in 1924-1948), additions to Chelmsford Cathedral, and the reconstruction of Portsmouth Cathedral. His internal restorations were carried out at Brecon, Carlisle, Exeter, Leicester, Lichfield, Lincoln, Llandaff, Manchester, Salisbury, Wakefield, Wells and Winchester.

Martin Schwarz’s ‘Adoration of the Magi’ … a late mediaeval painting in the Jesus Chapel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Martin Schwarz’s ‘Adoration of the Magi’ is a late mediaeval painting in the Jesus Chapel. The painting may have been created in the late 15th or early 16th century as part of a triptych and shows the three Magi brining their gifts to the Christ Child. The figures may have been modelled on contemporary merchants and noblemen who commissioned the work, while the gifts of the Magi are depicted as intricate gold and silver pieces.

Modern wooden panels on either side of the painting quote Latin texts from the Epiphany service: Omnes de saba venient (‘They will all come from the East’, Isaiah 60: 6) … the passage continues: ‘They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord; and Omnis Terra Adoret Te (‘All the earth worships you’, Psalm 66: 4).

The Hanging Chrismatory in Saint Luke’s Chapel was designed by Henry Freeland and Rupert Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

Saint Luke’s Chapel, where the Despenser Reredos now stands behind the altar, was formerly dedicated to Saint John the Baptist, and has served as the parish church of Saint-Mary-in-the-Marsh since the 16th century.

The 15th century baptismal font in Saint Luke’s Chapel is a Seven Sacrament font, although the details and figures are difficult to make out due to the destructive and damage actions of iconoclasts and neglect over the centuries.

The Hanging Chrismatory in Saint Luke’s Chapel hangs directly above the baptismal font. It is a silver-gilt and glass vessel that holds the three holy oils and designed by Henry Freeland, the cathedral architect, and Rupert Harris, a conservator and restorer. Norwich Cathedral is believed to be unique in having the oils suspended in the manner of a ‘hanging pyx’ for the Blessed Sacrament.

Each vessel has its own distinctive marking that indicates the oil’s particular use:

IO, Oleum Infirmorum: the oil for anointing the sick and the dying. This oil is used to invoke God’s healing of body, mind and spirit.

OC, Oleum Catechumenorum: the oil for signing with the cross at Baptism. This oil is used immediately after Baptism to invoke God’s protection and to affirm our belonging to Christ.

SC, Sacrum Chrisma: the oil of chrism. This oil is used immediately after Baptism, at Confirmation, at the ordination of priests and at the consecration of bishops, to invoke God’s blessing on our life and work as faithful disciples in God’s kingdom.

The stone effigy outside Saint Luke’s Chapel is now said to represent Saint Felix, who brought Christianity to East Anglia (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)

A stone effigy on the wall just outside Saint Luke’s Chapel was originally thought to depict Bishop Herbert de Lonsinga, the founder of the cathedral. But experts now suggest although it was commissioned by Bishop Herbert de Lonsinga it represents Saint Felix, who is said to have brought Christianity to East Anglia.

Saint Felix was the first bishop of the Kingdom of the East Angles when England was divided into several kingdoms. He is credited with introducing Christianity to the East Angles and so freeing ‘the whole kingdom from long-standing evil and unhappiness’, according to the Venerable Bede in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People.

Initially, the statue stood in a niche outside the bishop’s door in the north transept, and was brought to its present location in 1969.

Lent begins next week on Ash Wednesday, and the Despenser Reredos will be covered in Lenten array again until Easter. It may be some time before I have another opportunity to see the most important work of art in Norwich Cathedral and the only surviving mediaeval English altarpiece.

Saint Saviour’s Chapel was designed by the architect Sir Charles Nicholson in 1930-1932 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)