58 million sq m of Irish Sea, 58 million German Christians, 58 million minutes from 1916, 58 million readers of this blog

Flying over Malahide, Donabate and Portrane and above the Irish Sea … the Irish Sea is one of the smaller regional seas, with a surface area of about 58,000 sq km or 58 million sq metres (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This month continues to be an exceptionally busy time on this blog, with a continuing, steady and overwhelming rise in figures for viewing and reading. These figures reached 58 million shortly before 4 pm this afternoon (23 September), having reached 57 million five days ago (18 September), and 56 million three days earlier (15 September).

This is the tenth time these figures have passed the million mark since the end of last month. In a steady climb, the figures reached 55 million on 12 September, 54 million two nights before that (10 September 2026), 53 million hits the day before that (9 September 2026), 52 million hits two days previously (7 September), 51 million on 5 September, 50 million on 4 September and 49 million on 31 August.

These viewing and readership figures are still overpowering, and this blog continues to reach volumes of readers I never expected when I first started blogging 16 years ago. At the end of last year, this blog had 21 million hits (31 December 2025). So far this year, there have been more than 37 million hits or visitors in 2026 alone.

This means half of all hits or reader figures have been within the past six months, with 29 million hits since 25 March 2026. I first began blogging in 2010, and it took almost two years until July 2012 to reach half a million readers. Throughout this year, the daily figures have often been overwhelming. September is already the busiest month for traffic on this blog, with 9 million hits so far.

Of the 10 days of busiest traffic on this blog, seven of them have been in this month alone (1, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11 and 12 September), two were in May (1 and 14 May) and one was in April (29 April):

• 1,124,925 (1 May 2026)
• 671,341 (10 September 2026)
• 647,187 (5 September 2026)
• 618,234 (8 September 2026)
• 583,320 (11 September 2026)

• 563,301 (9 September 2026)
• 557,448 (12 September 2026)
• 525,719 (14 May 2026)
• 513,725 (7 September 2026)
• 509,644 (29 April 2026)

Although traffic has slowed down in the past week or so, the daily average so far this month is still running at almost 400,000 hits a day. Yet, I recall how 10 years ago, back in 2016, the daily average was around 1,000, or 30,000 a month.

The Berliner Dom or Berlin Cathedral … the German population includes about 58 million Christians (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Some curious though random statistics help to put this new figure of 58 million into perspective:

The average distance from the Sun to the planet Mercury is roughly 58 million km.

The number of Americans aged 65 and older is projected to increase from 58 million in 2022 to 82 million by 2050, a 42% increase.

Walford, an Edwardian mansion on Shrewsbury Road in Ballsbridge, Dublin, sold for a record-breaking €58 million in 2005 at the height of the Celtic Tiger economic boom, making it Ireland’s most expensive house ever sold.

Spain, the world’s second-most visited country after France, had a record-breaking 58.1 million international tourists between January and July 2026, marking a 4.6% increase compared to the same period in 2025.

Germany is home to about 58 million Christians, the second-highest number of Christians in Europe, after Russia, and the tenth globally.

58 million metres is 58,000 km and 58 million sq metres is 58,000 sq km.

The Irish Sea is one of the smaller regional seas, with a surface area of about 58,000 sq km or 58 million sq metres. 58,000 sq km is the surface area of Lake Michigan, a lake between Canada and the US, and the fifth largest lake in the world measured by surface area, following the Caspian Sea, Lake Superior, Lake Victoria and Lake Huron.

Karl Bushby, an English walking adventurer and author from Hull, is currently attempting to be the first person known to completely walk an unbroken path around the world. His trek, known as the Goliath Expedition, started it in the southern tip of Chile in 1998 and he is expected to return to England this month or next (September or October 2026). He originally expected to finish the 58,000 km trek in 12 years, but with numerous unplanned and unexpected delays, his expedition is now expected to last approximately 27 years.

58 million minutes equals 110 years, 3 months, and 9 days. This means that if this blog was receiving just one hit a minute, I would need to have started blogging back in early June 1916, after the Easter Rising in Dublin, in the middle of World War I, at a time when my grandfather was being sent home from the war in Thessaloniki.

I retired from active parish ministry about 4½ years ago, on 31 March 2022. These days, though, about 150 people on average are reading my daily prayer diary posted on this blog each morning, or more than 1,000 people each week. As this blog moves beyond 58 million hits, I am truly grateful today to the real readers among that 58 million. In particular, I am thankful for the faithful core group of people who join me in prayer, scripture reading and reflections each day.

58 million minutes brings me back to mid-1916, when my grandfather was being invalided home from Thessaloniki during World War (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2026: 37, Saturday 13 June 2026

‘Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”’ (Matthew 5: 37) … contradictory road signs near Shanagolden, Co Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and tomorrow is the Second Sunday after Trinity (Trinity I1, 14 June 2026). 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.

‘Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”’ (Matthew 5: 37) … Yes and No answers about coffee at a café in Kazimierz, the old Jewish Quarter of Kraków (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 5: 33-37 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 33 ‘Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, “You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.” 34 But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. 36 And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”; anything more than this comes from the evil one.’

‘Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”’ (Matthew 5: 37) … Molly Bloom’s ‘Yes’ in a Bloomsday sign in Sweny’s Pharmacy on Lincoln Place, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Matthew 5: 33-37) continues our readings from the Sermon on the Mount. Christ has spoken about adultery, divorce and remarriage, and now he deals with truth, honesty and credibility.

Christ refers to the Biblical advice on oaths (see Exodus 20: 7, Leviticus 19: 12, Numbers 30: 2, Deuteronomy 5: 11, 6: 3, 22: 21-33) but then calls for even greater, total truth-telling. Our yes is yes and our no is no, and we are called to perfect and transparent, clearly visible honesty.

Of course, we can only aim for such honesty. Nevertheless, we must not swear falsely, break an oath, commit perjury, or call on God as our witness when all we want to do is to express an opinion.

The reference to ‘heaven’ – as with ‘earth’ and ‘Jerusalem’ in verse 35, and ‘your head’ in verse 36 – is an example of oath-taking verifications that allowed varying degrees of authenticity. A vow that was supported by the name of God is particularly binding, but as Christ points out, God is associated with all oath verifications.

Christ proposes standards that go beyond external ways of behaviour but challenge how we feel in our hearts. He suggests that if we do not keep an eye on our feelings and thoughts then we cannot control our actions.

Yes or No? Truth or Lies? … second-hand books on a stall at a charity sale in Portrane, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Saturday 13 June 2026):

In Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), the theme this week, from 7 to 13 June 2026 (pp 8-9), has been ‘Safe Churches in Zambia’. This theme was introduced last Sunday with a programme update from Fran Mate, Senior Regional Manager for Africa, USPG.

The USPG prayer diary today (Saturday 13 June 2026, World Day Against Child Labour) invites us to pray:

Lord God, guide Anglican provinces as they strengthen safeguarding through shared learning and accountability. Help your global Church to grow in wisdom, courage, and care for all people.

The Collect:

O God,
the strength of all those who put their trust in you,
mercifully accept our prayers
and, because through the weakness of our mortal nature
we can do no good thing without you,
grant us the help of your grace,
that in the keeping of your commandments
we may please you both in will and deed;
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:

Eternal Father,
we thank you for nourishing us
with these heavenly gifts:
may our communion strengthen us in faith,
build us up in hope,
and make us grow in love;
for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

God of truth,
help us to keep your law of love
and to walk in ways of wisdom,
that we may find true life
in Jesus Christ your Son.

Collect on the Eve of Trinity II:

Lord, you have taught us
that all our doings without love are nothing worth:
send your Holy Spirit
and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of love,
the true bond of peace and of all virtues,
without which whoever lives is counted dead before you.
Grant this for your only Son Jesus Christ’s sake,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Words from William Temple on worship, holiness, truth, beauty and love … seen in Saint Carthage’s Cathedral, Lismore, Co Waterford (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 2026: 37, Thursday 26 March 2026

‘Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am’ (John 8: 58) … ‘Abraham, our Father in Faith’ by Sean Rice (1931-1997), in the west apse of the Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the last two weeks of Lent, and this week began with the Fifth Sunday in Lent (Lent V), sometimes still known as Passion Sunday. The Church Calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers the life and witness of Harriet (O’Brien) Monsell (1811-1883), the Limerick-born founder of and first Superior of the Community of Saint John the Baptist or Clewer Sisters.

I have been on a 24-hour fast in preparation for an appointment this morning for blood tests as part of the continuing monitoring of my post-stroke condition, my sarcoidosis and my low levels of Vitamin B12. But, before the day begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

The Sacrifice of Abraham depicted in the East Window in Holy Trinity Church, Old Wolverton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

John 8: 51-58 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 51 ‘Very truly, I tell you, whoever keeps my word will never see death.’ 52 The Jews said to him, ‘Now we know that you have a demon. Abraham died, and so did the prophets; yet you say, “Whoever keeps my word will never taste death.” 53 Are you greater than our father Abraham, who died? The prophets also died. Who do you claim to be?’ 54 Jesus answered, ‘If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing. It is my Father who glorifies me, he of whom you say, “He is our God”, 55 though you do not know him. But I know him; if I were to say that I do not know him, I would be a liar like you. But I do know him and I keep his word. 56 Your ancestor Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day; he saw it and was glad.’ 57 Then the Jews said to him, ‘You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?’ 58 Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.’ 59 So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.

Abraham depicted in a stained glass window in Saint John’s Church, Wall, near Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders in Jerusalem continues in the Gospel reading at the Eucharist (John 8: 51-58) today. Today’s reading opens with Jesus promising that ‘whoever keeps my word will never see death’ (verse 51), but ends with him being threatened with death himself as his interlocutors picked up stones to throw at him (verse 59), threatening him with the very same form of execution that faced the woman who had been caught in adultery and was brought before Jesus by scribes and Pharisees at the beginning of this chapter (John 8: 1-11), which we read about on Monday (23 April 2026).

That woman escaped being stoned to death when Jesus challenged her accusers, ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’, and then wrote on the ground (verse 7-8).

Jesus escapes death this time, hiding himself and going out of the temple (verse 59). But we know his death is inevitable, and we shall focus on his passion and his death, not by stoning but on the Rock of Golgotha, next week throughout Holy Week.

Harriet Monsell (1811-1883), who is remembered today, is one of the few Irish-born women in the Calendar of Saints in Common Worship in the Church of England. She was the daughter of Sir Edward O’Brien (1773-1826) of Dromoland Castle, Co Clare, and a sister of the Irish patriot William Smith O’Brien (1803-1864).

Harriet and her Irish-born husband Canon Charles Henry Monsell (1815-1850) were closely identified with the Oxford Movement. After he died in 1850, she began working in the railroad and army village of Clewer among former prostitutes and unmarried mothers at a House of Mercy. The house had been founded some years earlier by Mrs Mariquita Tennant, who was a Spanish refugee, a convert to Anglicanism and a clergyman’s widow.

Harriet Monsell moved to Clewer with her sister Catherine and her husband, Canon Charles Harris, later Bishop of Gibraltar. Harriet Monsell professed religious vows with two other women, and became Mother Superior of one of the first Anglican religious orders since the Reformation 300 years earlier.

The women lived according to a rule attributed to Saint Augustine of Hippo. At first, they were called the Sisters of Mercy. They later changed their name to reflect their inspiration from Saint John the Baptist’s call to penitence. During the order’s first five years, it expanded from assisting about 30 marginalised women to dedicating a building to serve about 80 women.

The foundation of the sisterhood was viewed with alarm, but the Bishop of Oxford, Samuel Wilberforce, despite his misgivings, acted as Visitor to the Community until he moved to Winchester in 1869.

As the Community of Saint John Baptist, the nuns were guided by Mother Harriet, with her energy and humour. They extended their original mission to running about 40 institutions, including mission houses in parishes, as well as orphanages, schools and hospitals. Mother Harriet retired to Folkestone, Kent, in 1875 for health reasons, although she was occasionally able to visit the communities she founded.

She died in Folkestone on the morning of 25 March 1883, which that year was both the Feast of the Annunciation and Easter Day. Because of this coincidence, her commemoration in the Calendar of the Church of England has been moved to the following day, 26 March.

So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself (John 8: 59) … stones and pebbles on the beach in Portrane, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 26 March 2026):

The theme this week (22-28 March 2026) in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Myanmar Earthquake: One Year On’ (pp 40-41). This theme was introduced on Sunday with a programme update by the Revd Davidson Solanki, the USPG Senior Regional Manager for Asia and the Middle East.

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

Lord, we thank you for those who have provided support over the past year; church workers, volunteers, aid workers, and faithful supporters.

The Collect:

Most merciful God,
who by the death and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ
delivered and saved the world:
grant that by faith in him who suffered on the cross
we may triumph in the power of his victory;
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 Jesus Christ,
you have taught us
that what we do for the least of our brothers and sisters
we do also for you:
give us the will to be the servant of others
as you were the servant of all,
and gave up your life and died for us,
but are alive and reign, now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

Gracious Father,
you gave up your Son
out of love for the world:
lead us to ponder the mysteries of his passion,
that we may know eternal peace
through the shedding of our Saviour’s blood,
Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Mother Harriet Monsell (1811-1883), founder of the Community of Saint John Baptist, the ‘Clewer Sisters’

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

‘God, by His bow, vouchsafes to write This truth in Heaven above: As every lovely hue is Light, So every grace is Love’

‘What but the gentle rainbow’s gleam, / Soothing the wearied sight, / That cannot bear the solar beam, / With soft undazzling light?’ (John Keble) … a rainbow seen at the beach in Portrane, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Today is the Sunday before Lent, and many churches and parishes, including Saint Mary and Saint Giles,Stony Stratford, have marked today as Transfiguration Sunday. In the past, the Transfiguration was traditionally marked on 6 August and this Sunday, the Sunday before Lent, was known as Quinquagesima.

The three Sundays before Lent once had special Latin names in the Book of Common Prayer, names that were shared in most traditions in the Western Church. Although these Sundays are usually counted as ‘Ordinary Time’ in many traditions today, some Anglican parishes still use the original Latin names, and they are reminders that Lent and its disciplines are imminent.

These three Sundays were known as:

Septuagesima Sunday: the Third Sunday before Lent, which this year fell two weeks (Sunday 1 February 2026), although most parishes and churches celebrated it as the Feast of the Presentation, and some as the Fourth Sunday of Epiphany (Epiphany IV). In the early Church, no Gloria or Alleluia was sung on that Sunday because it was the first Sunday of the call to Lenten discipline. Although the word Septuagesima means ‘seventieth’, this Sunday falls only 63 days before Easter.

Early Christians began observing Lent the day after Septuagesima Sunday. This is because Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays were not days of fasting in the early Church. So, if the faithful wished to fast for 40 days before Easter, they would start the Monday after Septuagesima Sunday. Today, only Sunday is a non-fast day, and so Lent begins on Ash Wednesday (18 February 2026).

Sexagesima Sunday: the Second Sunday before Lent, which was last Sunday (8 February 2026). In the Early Church, Lent would have started on the previous Monday. In some parts of the Eastern Orthodox Church, that Sunday is known as ‘No Meat Sunday,’ and the dietary observances for Lent begin on this day.

Quinquagesima Sunday: the final Sunday before Lent, or the Sunday before Ash Wednesday (15 February 2026). It is 50 days before Easter, hence quinquagesima or ‘fiftieth.’

Today [15 February 2026] is the Sunday before Lent, is Quinquagesima Sunday, and as a reflection today, I have been re-reading John Keble’s poem, ‘Quinquagesima Sunday,’ recalling the traditional name once used for the Sunday before Lent.

John Keble (1792-1866) was an Anglican priest and poet, Professor of Poetry at Oxford, and one of the leading figures in the Oxford Movement. He was born on Saint Mark’s Day, 25 April 1792, in Fairford, Gloucestershire, where his father, the Revd John Keble, a former Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, was Vicar of Coln St Aldwyn’s. The choir sang his ‘Blest are the pure in heart’, written in 1819, as the anthem at the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford, this morning, and we sang another version as the Post-Communion hymn.

John Keble studied at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and in 1810, at the age of 18, he graduated with a double first in classics and mathematics. He became a Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford, in 1811 and he was ordained deacon by the Bishop of Oxford in 1815 and priest in 1816.

Keble published The Christian Year in 1827. He wrote the poems to restore a deep feeling for the Church Year among Anglicans, and it received such acclaim that it became the most popular volume of verse in the 19th century. One of the most popular poems in The Christian Year is the well-known hymn, ‘New every morning.’

The Christian Year went into 95 editions in Keble’s lifetime, and by the time the copyright expired in 1873, over 375,000 copies had been sold in Britain and 158 editions had been published.

The success of The Christian Year led to Keble being appointed Professor of Poetry in Oxford University (1831-1841).

His ‘Assize Sermon’ in Saint Mary’s University Church, Oxford, in 1833 was the spark that ignited the Oxford Movement. He was appointed Vicar of Hursley, Hampshire, in 1835, and he settled down to family life and remained there for the rest of his life as a parish priest at All Saints’ Church.

He edited an edition of Richard Hooker’s works in 1836. The most important of his prose writings, however, was his treatise on Eucharistic Adoration.

John Keble died 160 years ago, on 29 March 1866 at the age of 74. Within three years of his death, Keble College, Oxford, was established at Oxford ‘to give an education in strict fidelity to the Church of England.’

Keble College, Oxford, was established in 1870 as a tribute to John Keble, a founding figure in the Oxford Movement (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Quinquagesima Sunday by John Keble:

Sweet Dove! the softest, steadiest plume,
In all the sunbright sky,
Brightening in ever-changeful bloom
As breezes change on high; –

Sweet Leaf! the pledge of peace and mirth,
“Long sought, and lately won,”
Blessed increase of reviving Earth,
When first it felt the Sun; –

Sweet Rainbow! pride of summer days,
High set at Heaven’s command,
Though into drear and dusky haze
Thou melt on either hand; –

Dear tokens of a pardoning God,
We hail ye, one and all,
As when our fathers walked abroad,
Freed from their twelvemonth’s thrall.

How joyful from the imprisoning ark
On the green earth they spring!
Not blither, after showers, the lark
Mounts up with glistening wing.

So home-bound sailors spring to shore,
Two oceans safely past;
So happy souls, when life is o’er,
Plunge in this empyreal vast.

What wins their first and fondest gaze
In all the blissful field,
And keeps it through a thousand days?
Love face to face revealed:

Love imaged in that cordial look
Our Lord in Eden bends
On souls that sin and earth forsook
In time to die His friends.

And what most welcome and serene
Dawns on the Patriarch’s eye,
In all the emerging hills so green,
In all the brightening sky?

What but the gentle rainbow’s gleam,
Soothing the wearied sight,
That cannot bear the solar beam,
With soft undazzling light?

Lord, if our fathers turned to Thee
With such adoring gaze,
Wondering frail man Thy light should see
Without Thy scorching blaze;

Where is our love, and where our hearts,
We who have seen Thy Son,
Have tried Thy Spirit’s winning arts,
And yet we are not won?

The Son of God in radiance beamed
Too bright for us to scan,
But we may face the rays that streamed
From the mild Son of Man.

There, parted into rainbow hues,
In sweet harmonious strife
We see celestial love diffuse
Its light o’er Jesus’ life.

God, by His bow, vouchsafes to write
This truth in Heaven above:
As every lovely hue is Light,
So every grace is Love.

John Keble (1792-1866) … his poems in ‘The Christian Year’ include ‘Quinquagesima Sunday’

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time 2025: 36, Saturday 14 June 2025

‘Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”’ (Matthew 5: 37) … contradictory road signs near Shanagolden, Co Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The 50-day season of Easter, which began on Easter Day (20 April 2025), came to an end last Sunday with the Day of Pentecost or Whit Sunday (8 June 2025), and once again in the Church Calendar we are in Ordinary Time.

Tomorrow is Trinity Sunday (15 June 2025) and Father’s Day. The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers Richard Baxter (1691), the Puritan divine.

I spent much of the day in Oxford yesterday, with tests, scans and consultations in the Churchill Hospital, monitoring my pulmonary sarcoidosis and its impact on my heart. I got back to Stony Stratford last night, and sadly I have missed the opportunity to be in Dublin today for the funeral of my cousin and former Irish Times colleague Don Buckley, who died earlier this week. But, 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.

‘Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”’ (Matthew 5: 37) … Yes and No answers about coffee at a café in Kazimierz, the old Jewish Quarter of Kraków (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Matthew 5: 33-37 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 33 ‘Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, “You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.” 34 But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. 36 And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”; anything more than this comes from the evil one.’

‘Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”’ (Matthew 5: 37) … Molly Bloom’s ‘Yes’ in a Bloomsday sign in Sweny’s Pharmacy on Lincoln Place, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (Matthew 5: 33-37) continues our readings from the Sermon on the Mount. Christ has spoken about adultery, divorce and remarriage, and now he deals with truth, honesty and credibility.

Christ refers to the Biblical advice on oaths (see Exodus 20: 7, Leviticus 19: 12, Numbers 30: 2, Deuteronomy 5: 11, 6: 3, 22: 21-33) but then calls for even greater, total truth-telling. Our yes is yes and our no is no, and we are called to perfect and transparent, clearly visible honesty.

Of course, we can only aim for such honesty. Nevertheless, we must not swear falsely, break an oath, commit perjury, or call on God as our witness when all we want to do is to express an opinion.

The reference to ‘heaven’ – as with ‘earth’ and ‘Jerusalem’ in verse 35, and ‘your head’ in verse 36 – is an example of oath-taking verifications that allowed varying degrees of authenticity. A vow that was supported by the name of God is particularly binding, but as Christ points out, God is associated with all oath verifications.

Christ proposes standards that go beyond external ways of behaviour but challenge how we feel in our hearts. He suggests that if we do not keep an eye on our feelings and thoughts then we cannot control our actions.

Yes or No? Truth or Lies? … second-hand books on a stall at a charity sale in Portrane, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Saturday 14 June 2025):

‘Pentecost’ has been the theme this week (8-14 June) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel). This theme was introduced last Sunday with reflections by Dr Paulo Ueti, Theological Advisor and Regional Manager for the Americas and the Caribbean, USPG.

The USPG prayer diary today (Saturday 14 June 2025) invites us to pray:

Lord God, we thank you for the work of USPG and we pray that you may bless the staff in humility to honour and welcome diverse voices and cultures. Empower all at USPG to serve you in goodness and truth.

The Collect:

O Lord, from whom all good things come:
grant to us your humble servants,
that by your holy inspiration
we may think those things that are good,
and by your merciful guiding may perform the same;
through our Lord 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:

Gracious God, lover of all,
in this sacrament
we are one family in Christ your Son,
one in the sharing of his body and blood
and one in the communion of his Spirit:
help us to grow in love for one another
and come to the full maturity of the Body of Christ.
We make our prayer through your Son our Saviour.

Collect on the Eve of Trinity Sunday:

Almighty and everlasting God,
you have given us your servants grace,
by the confession of a true faith,
to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity
and in the power of the divine majesty to worship the Unity:
keep us steadfast in this faith,
that we may evermore be defended from all adversities;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

Words from William Temple on worship, holiness, truth, beauty and love … seen in Saint Carthage’s Cathedral, Lismore, Co Waterford (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: 37, Thursday 10 April 2025

‘Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am’ (John 8: 58) … ‘Abraham, our Father in Faith’ by Sean Rice (1931-1997), in the west apse of the Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the last two weeks of Lent, and this week began with the Fifth Sunday in Lent (Lent V), sometimes still known as Passion Sunday. The Church Calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers the life and witness of William Law (1686-1761), priest and spiritual writer; and William of Ockham (1347), friar, philosopher and teacher of the faith.

I have an appointment early this morning for my regular B12 injection. But, as the day begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

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

The Sacrifice of Abraham depicted in the East Window in Holy Trinity Church, Old Wolverton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

John 8: 51-58 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 51 ‘Very truly, I tell you, whoever keeps my word will never see death.’ 52 The Jews said to him, ‘Now we know that you have a demon. Abraham died, and so did the prophets; yet you say, “Whoever keeps my word will never taste death.” 53 Are you greater than our father Abraham, who died? The prophets also died. Who do you claim to be?’ 54 Jesus answered, ‘If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing. It is my Father who glorifies me, he of whom you say, “He is our God”, 55 though you do not know him. But I know him; if I were to say that I do not know him, I would be a liar like you. But I do know him and I keep his word. 56 Your ancestor Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day; he saw it and was glad.’ 57 Then the Jews said to him, ‘You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?’ 58 Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.’ 59 So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.

Abraham depicted in a stained glass window in Saint John’s Church, Wall, near Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Reflection:

The conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders in Jerusalem continues in the Gospel reading at the Eucharist (John 8: 51-58) today. Today’s reading opens with Jesus promising that ‘whoever keeps my word will never see death’ (verse 51), but ends with him being threatened with death himself as his interlocutors picked up stones to throw at him (verse 59), threatening him with the very same form of execution that faced the woman who had been caught in adultery and was brought before Jesus by scribes and Pharisees at the beginning of this chapter (John 8: 1-11), which we read about on Monday (7 April 2025).

That woman escaped being stoned to death when Jesus challenged her accusers, ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’, and then wrote on the ground (verse 7-8).

Jesus escapes death this time, hiding himself and going out of the temple (verse 59). But we know his death is inevitable, and we shall focus on his passion and his death, not by stoning but on the Rock of Golgotha, next week throughout Holy Week.

How we understand the life, death and resurrection of Christ, and live out the consequences of that understand, is one of the primary concerns of the writings of William Law (1686-1761), who is commemorated in the Church Calendar today (10 April).

Law was born in King’s Cliffe, Northamptonshire, and educated at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. After ordination as a deacon, he became a fellow of Emmanuel College in 1711. When George I came to the throne in 1714, Law declined to take the Oath of Allegiance. He became a non-juror and lost his fellowship, but was ordained priest in 1728.

Barred from the pulpit and the lecture hall, Law preached through his books. These include Christian Perfection, The Spirit of Love, The Spirit of Prayer, and best-known of all, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life (1728). His writings stress the moral virtues, a personal prayer life and asceticism, and strongly influenced people such as Samuel Johnson and John and Charles Wesley.

Law returned to King’s Cliffe in 1740, where he led a life of devotion and simplicity and caring for the poor. He remained there for the rest of his life and died on 10 April 1761.

According to Law’s theology, God is an ‘infinity of mere love.’ God is love and love is God. Therefore, nothing in God’s character can be contrary to love. Although as humans we cannot see God’s essence, that God exists is self-evident because we bear the stamp of divine nature. Any positive ability or quality we have in ourselves is a reflection of God’s essence. We form our idea of God by ‘adding Infinite to every perfection that we have any knowledge of.’

The love of God is the basic premise upon which Law’s theology is based. Because God is total love, e his completely good. God’s desire to communicate God’s love and goodness is the ultimate purpose behind creation. Consequently, it is the perfect will of God that humans experience his love and goodness.

We are all in the image of God, and, according to Law, Christ entered the human race, participating with us in our human nature in order that through his life, death and resurrection, he could restore the fallen faculties of human nature to the state God intended. In short, for Law the atonement is simply the reclaiming of human nature.

So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself (John 8: 59) … stones and pebbles on the beach in Portrane, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 10 April 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 ‘Healthcare in Bangladesh.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday with a Programme Update by Suvojit Mondal, Programme Director for the Church of Bangladesh Community Healthcare Programme in Dhaka.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 10 April 2025) invites us to pray:

Pray for the ongoing provision of resources, partnerships, and support that will enable the programme to expand its services to reach more villages and communities in need.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
who called your servant William Law
to a devout and holy life:
grant that by your spirit of love
and through faithfulness in prayer
we may find the way to divine knowledge
and so come to see the hidden things of God;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post Communion Prayer:

God of truth,
whose Wisdom set her table
and invited us to eat the bread and drink the wine
of the kingdom:
help us to lay aside all foolishness
and to live and walk in the way of insight,
that we may come with William Law to the eternal feast of heaven;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

William Law’s writings stress the moral virtues, a personal prayer life and asceticism

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 with early English saints: 42, 26 March 2024, Saint Robert of Lincoln

A 14th century portrait of Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln (British Library Harley MS 3860, f. 48)

Patrick Comerford

This the last week of Lent, and today is Tuesday in Holy Week (26 March 2024), known in many places as Holy Tuesday, and also as Temple Tuesday.

Throughout Lent this year, I am taking time each morning to reflect on the lives of early, pre-Reformation English saints commemorated in Common Worship.

We are in Norwich today, and stayed overnight in the Saint Giles House Hotel, close to the cathedral and the city centre. Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, A reflection on an early, pre-Reformation English saint;

2, today’s Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

Robert Grosseteste has been described as ‘the greatest product of Oxford University’ and the real founder of the tradition of scientific thought in mediaeval Oxford’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Early English pre-Reformation saints: 42, Saint Robert of Lincoln

Saint Robert Grosseteste (1253), Bishop of Lincoln, Philosopher and Scientist, is remembered in Common Worship on 9 October.

Robert Grosseteste has been described as ‘a mediaeval Dr Johnson in his powers of mind and personality.’ A leading Biblical scholar and commentator, he also wrote extensively on philosophy and science, and translated Aristotle. His biographer, Sir Richard Southern, said he was the greatest product of Oxford University but a man who ‘difficult to please and difficult to follow.’ AC Crombie, the Australian historian of science, describes him as ‘the real founder of the tradition of scientific thought in mediaeval Oxford.’

Robert Grosseteste (meaning ‘large-head’) was born at Stradbroke in Suffolk ca 1175. He studied at Oxford and Paris and held various posts until, after a grave illness, he returned to Oxford, where he taught at the Franciscan house of studies. He became the Chancellor of Oxford University in 1224, and at the same time he was Archdeacon of Leicester and a canon of Lincoln Cathedral.

He became Bishop of Lincoln in 1235, then the largest diocese in England, which received from him a thorough visitation soon after his arrival. He met opposition in his attempts at vigorous reforms in the shape of the dean and chapter in the cathedral in Lincoln, who saw themselves as beyond his jurisdiction. The dispute was settled in 1245 when the Pope issued a bull giving the bishop full power over the chapter. Robert attended the Council of Lyons that year.

At the papal court in Lyons in 1250, he denounced the Pope and the cardinals for ‘acting contrary to Christ’. The papal see, he told them, ‘the throne of God, the sun of the whole world … has been perverted and it has become a source of perdition and destruction.’

His wide-ranging interests covered mathematics, optics and many of the sciences; he translated large numbers of theological works from Greek and wrote his own theological commentaries and philosophical works.

It has been argued that Grosseteste played a key role in the development of the scientific method. His ideas about how the universe was created are close to the Big Bang Theory, he was the first scientist to identify the cause of the rainbow as refraction and he seems to have understood centuries before anyone else that the universe is expanding.

He introduced to the Latin West the notion of controlled experiment and related it to demonstrative science, as one among many ways of arriving at scientific knowledge. He was the first of the Scholastics to fully understand Aristotle’s vision of the dual path of scientific reasoning: generalising from particular observations into a universal law, and then back again from universal laws to prediction of particulars.

Grosseteste worked from Latin translations of Arabic versions of Aristotle’s texts. These had been translated from the original Greek by Islamic scholars. Jewish scholars based in southern Europe curated and distributed the texts to western scholars.

His commentary on Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics was one of the first and most influential of the mediaeval commentaries on this fundamental work. Other important writings belonging to the first period are his commentary on Aristotle’s Physics; independent treatises on astronomy and cosmology, the calendar (with proposals for the reform of the inaccurate calendar then in use), sound, comets, heat, optics, and other scientific subjects; and his scriptural commentaries, especially the Moralitates in evangelica, De cessatione legalium, Hexaëmeron and commentaries on the Pauline Epistles and the Psalms.

He began to study Greek in 1230-1231, and used this learning by translating into Latin translations of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics and De caelo, of the De fide orthodoxe of Saint John of Damascus, of Pseudo-Dionysius and of other theological writings. He brought assistants who knew Greek to Lincoln to work with him, and also arranged for a translation of the Psalms from the Hebrew.

His writings on the first chapter of Genesis anticipate of modern cosmological ideas. He read that the first thing created was light, and said that the universe began with pure energy exploding from a point source.

In a paper in the journal Nature Physics ten years ago [July 2014], a group of scientists discussed how they are re-examining Grosseteste’s work. They showed his contributions to the field of optics have yet to be assimilated into the canon of science. For example, his insight into the physics of rainbows enabled the researchers in the Ordered Universe Project at Durham and Oxford Universities to create a new co-ordinate system for colour.

Robert Grosseteste died at Buckden in Huntingdonshire on 9 October 1253. He is buried in a tomb in his memorial chapel in Lincoln Cathedral. The plaque on his tomb says: ‘He was a man of learning and an inspiration to scholars a wise administrator while a true shepherd of his flock, ever concerned to lead them to Christ in whose service he strove to temper justice with mercy, hating the sin while loving the sinner, not sparing the rod though cherishing the weak.’

Dr Jack Cunningham, a theology lecturer at Bishop Grosseteste University in Lincoln, recently launched a campaign for a statue to be erected in Lincoln to Bishop Robert Grosseteste. ‘Grosseteste was revolutionary in the history of science because he knew that everything was about mathematics and that good scientists should base their knowledge on what they observe and not what they think,’ he says.

Robert Grosseteste wrote important commentaries on Aristotle’s texts … the statue of Aristotle in Aristotelous Square in Thessaloniki (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

John 12: 20-36 (NRSVA):

20 Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. 21 They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’ 22 Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. 23 Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24 Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 25 Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honour.

27 ‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say – “Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. 28 Father, glorify your name.’ Then a voice came from heaven, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’ 29 The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, ‘An angel has spoken to him.’ 30 Jesus answered, ‘This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. 31 Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. 32 And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ 33 He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die. 34 The crowd answered him, ‘We have heard from the law that the Messiah remains for ever. How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?’ 35 Jesus said to them, ‘The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. 36 While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.’

Robert Grosseteste’s insight into the physics of rainbows enabled researchers at Durham and Oxford to create a new co-ordinate system for colour … a double rainbow over the Burrow Beach at Portrane, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 26 March 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 ‘Holy Week Reflection.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday by the Revd Canon Dr Peniel Rajkumar, Theologian and Director of Global Mission, USPG.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (26 March 2024) invites us to pray in these words:

O Lord, we pray for all those actively pursuing the vision of a different world marked by justice, peace and joy for all.

The Collect:

Almighty and everlasting God,
who in your tender love towards the human race
sent your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ
to take upon him our flesh
and to suffer death upon the cross:
grant that we may follow the example of his patience and humility,
and also be made partakers of his resurrection;
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 Jesus Christ,
you humbled yourself in taking the form of a servant,
and in obedience died on the cross for our salvation:
give us the mind to follow you
and to proclaim you as Lord and King,
to the glory of God the Father.

Additional Collect:

True and humble king,
hailed by the crowd as Messiah:
grant us the faith to know you and love you,
that we may be found beside you
on the way of the cross,
which is the path of glory.

Yesterday: Saint Richard of Chichester

Tomorrow: William of Ockham

Robert Grosseteste became Chancellor of Oxford University in 1224 and Bishop of Lincoln in 1235 … the arms of Lincoln College Oxford incorporate the arms of the Bishop of Lincoln (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

Praying with USPG and the music of Vaughan Williams: Thursday 15 September 2022

A wreath of poppies on the memorial to 19-year-old Private Robert Davies in Lichfield City station who was murdered in 1990 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The Calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today (15 September) recalls Saint Cyprian (258), Bishop of Carthage and Martyr, with a Lesser Festival.

Two of us are spending a few days in York as I take some rest following what is known as ‘gamma knife’ or stereotactic radiosurgery in Sheffield earlier this week. But, before today begins, I am taking some time this morning for reading, prayer and reflection.

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, whose music is celebrated throughout this year’s Proms season. In my prayer diary for these weeks I am reflecting in these ways:

1, One of the readings for the morning;

2, Reflecting on a hymn or another piece of music by Vaughan Williams, often drawing, admittedly, on previous postings on the composer;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary, ‘Pray with the World Church.’

Saint Cyprian of Carthage … argued that the sacraments are only valid within the Church

Saint Cyprian was born in Carthage ca 200, and was a teacher of rhetoric and a lawyer in the city before his conversion to Christianity. He gave away his pagan library and set his mind to study the sacred Scriptures and the commentaries that were beginning to proliferate. He became a priest and then, in the year 248, was elected Bishop of Carthage by the people of the city, together with the assembled priests and other bishops present.

Cyprian showed compassion to returning apostates, while always insisting on the need for unity in the Church. During the persecution of Valerian, the Christian clergy were required to take part in pagan worship. Cyprian refused and was first exiled and then condemned to death. He died on this day in the year 258.

Luke 9: 23-26 (NRSVA):

23 Then he [Jesus] said to them all, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. 24 For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it. 25 What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves? 26 Those who are ashamed of me and of my words, of them the Son of Man will be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.’


‘Dona nobis pacem’ with the Eastman-Rochester Chorus, the Eastman School Symphony Orchestra and Michaela Anthony, soprano

Today’s reflection: 4, ‘Dirge for Two Veterans’ (Whitman)

For my reflections and devotions each day these few weeks, I am reflecting on and invite you to listen to a piece of music or a hymn set to a tune by the great English composer, Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958).

For these six days this week, I am listening to Dona nobis pacem, a cantata for soprano and baritone soli, chorus and orchestra.

The oratorio falls into the six continuous sections or movements, and I am listening to these movements one-by-one in sequence each morning.

I am posting a full recording of the cantata each day, so each movement can be listened to in context, but each morning I am listening to the movements in sequence.

The six sections or movements are:

1, Agnus Dei

2, Beat! beat! drums! (Whitman)

3, Reconciliation (Whitman)

4, Dirge for Two Veterans (Whitman)

5, The Angel of Death (John Bright)

6, Dona nobis pacem (the Books of Jeremiah, Daniel, Haggai, Micah, and Leviticus, the Psalms, the Book of Isaiah, and Saint Luke’s Gospel)

This morning [15 September 2022], I am listening to the fourth movement, ‘Dirge for Two Veterans’ (Whitman).

4, Dirge for Two Veterans (Whitman)

Vaughan Williams based this movement on an earlier setting of the same words he had composed in 1914, before the outbreak of World War, and which he now incorporates into Dona nobis pacem.

This is a setting for a third poem by Walt Whitman (1819-1892), ‘Dirge for Two Veterans,’ from Drum-Taps (1865). The poem provides a second drum study for Vaughan Williams, but the drums this time are not the drums of war but the drums heard after war, the drums of death and burial, the drums of mourning and a funeral procession.

The drums and brass are transformed into instruments of noble commemoration; the strings and harp create a serene field filled by the choir fill with tender, loving words.

We are invited into a moonlit scene where we find a mother, highlighted by the moon, watching the funeral march for her son and husband, who have both been killed together in battle.

Her grief is symbolic of the grief shared by all families when lives are cut short one generation after another.

A compassionate world witnesses the scene with one heart, giving love as the moon gives light. The mourning turns to an outpouring of compassion and love as the wife and mother opens her heart and pours out her love for husband and son.

The moon gives you light,
And the bugles and the drums give you music;
And my heart, O my soldiers, my veterans,
My heart gives you love.

4, ‘Dirge for Two Veterans’

The last sunbeam
Lightly falls from the finished Sabbath,
On the pavement here, and there beyond it is looking,
Down a new-made double grave.

Lo, the moon ascending!
Up from the east the silvery round moon,
Beautiful over the house-tops, ghastly, phantom moon;
Immense and silent moon.

I see a sad procession,
And I hear the sound of coming full-keyed bugles;
All the channels of the city streets they’re flooding,
As with voices and with tears.

I hear the great drums pounding,
And the small drums steady whirring;
And every blow of the great convulsive drums,
Strikes me through and through.

For the son is brought with the father;
In the foremost ranks of the fierce assault they fell;
Two veterans, son and father, dropped together,
And the double grave awaits them.

Now nearer blow the bugles,
And the drums strike more convulsive;
And the daylight o’er the pavement quite has faded,
And the strong dead-march enwraps me.

In the eastern sky up-buoying,
The sorrowful vast phantom moves illumined;
(’Tis some mother’s large transparent face,
In heaven brighter growing.)

O strong dead-march you please me!
O moon immense with your silvery face you soothe me!
O my soldiers twain! O my veterans passing to burial!
What I have I also give you.

The moon gives you light,
And the bugles and the drums give you music;
And my heart, O my soldiers, my veterans,
My heart gives you love.

A wreath of poppies on my grandfather’s grave in Portrane, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayer (Thursday 15 September 2022, Saint Cyprian):

The Collect:

Holy God,
who brought Cyprian to faith in Christ,
made him a bishop in the Church
and crowned his witness with a martyr’s death:
grant that, after his example,
we may love the Church and her teachings,
find your forgiveness within her fellowship
and so come to share the heavenly banquet
you have prepared for us;
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 Redeemer,
whose Church was strengthened
by the blood of your martyr Cyprian:
so bind us, in life and death, to Christ’s sacrifice
that our lives, broken and offered with his,
may carry his death and proclaim his resurrection in the world;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The theme in the USPG prayer diary this week is ‘Holy Cross Day,’ and was introduced on Sunday with a prayer written by Naw Kyi Win, a final year undergraduate student at Holy Cross Theological College in the Church of Province of Myanmar.

The USPG Prayer Diary invites us to pray today (International Day of Democracy) in these words:

We give thanks for the ability to express ourselves and bring about democratic change. May we remember those who fought for our rights and pray for those who live in undemocratic countries.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

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

Celebrating the presence of the Lynders family in a house in Portrane for 300 years

The Lynders Farmhouse in Portane, has been in the possession of the Lynders family for 300 years since 14 March 1722 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

I was sorry that unexpected circumstances meant I missed the celebrations last Monday [14 March 2022] marking three centuries of the continuous presence of the Lynders family in Portrane, Co Dublin.

The Lynders Farmhouse was built in 1722 by my grandmother’s ancestor, John Lynders, and is the oldest house in Portane. My second cousin, Ger Lynders, now lives in the house, and is still proud of how he has lovingly restored and extended the family house.

John Lynders probably came to Portrane from Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries. An original family document still in the position of Ger Lynders shows that 300 years ago last Monday, on 14 March 1722, John Lynders entered an agreement with the principal inhabitants of Portrane Common, Nicholas Carberry and Thomas Bath, to maintain the watercourse leading from the Commons of Portrane to the sea.

In return for this, John Lynders received a grant of part of the Commons of Portrane for a garden, to hold freehold. This agreement, witnessed by Owen Ward and Henry Moran, is still in the possession of Ger Lynders.

In addition, John Lynders received assistance from William King (1650-1729), Archbishop of Dublin (1703-1729), in building the original Lynders house in Portrane. This means that – with Ger’s children and another generation there – ten successive generation of the Lynders family have lived in the same house for three centuries continuously, from 1722 to 2022.

Although the name Landers is found in Co Limerick, the name Linders is found across Europe, including the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and Denmark, while in Belgium there is a family named Lindeers.

A photograph of the Lynders Farmhouse in Portane in the mid-20th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

One theory says the family name is derived from Linden, the French for ‘lime trees.’ Another theory suggests the name is Lindars and of Swedish or Scandinavian origin. However, the surnames Linders and Lynders are found as variants of a family name more often found today as Lindars and that can be traced back to Oxfordshire as early as ca 1562. The earliest records of this family spell the name Lynders, but by 1700 members of the Oxfordshire family were spelling their name Linders and Lindars.

William Lynders (ca 1562-1624) may have been born ca 1562. He lived in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, about 25 miles north-west of Oxford, in the heart of the Cotswolds.

He was the father of four sons and a daughters, who were born in Chipping Norton between 1592 and 1602. His fourth child and third son, Ellis Lynders (1597-1684), was born in Chipping Norton on 11 March 1597. He married Elizabeth Hinks and they were the parents of four sons and three or four daughters. He died on 20 October 1684, aged 87, in Chipping Norton.

The descendants of this Oxfordshire family used the variants Linders and Lynders, and shared many of the first names of the Portrane family of the same name. From the 18th century, the spelling of their family name was standardised as Lindars.

It is believed the ancestor of the Portrane family may have first come to Ireland at the time of the Battle of the Boyne. The name is spelt, at different times, Linders, Lynders and Lunders, often in reference to one person.

John Lynders (ca 1675-post 1722), who built the family home in Portrane in 1722, seems to have been born ca 1675. He was probably a son of Ellis Lynders (ca 1633/1634-1682) of Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, and his second wife Susannah, although his baptism is not recorded in Chipping Norton Parish.

A carving on the boundary wall recalls the date 1722 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

On 14 March 1722, John Lynders entered an agreement with the principal inhabitants of Portrane Common, Nicholas Carberry and Thomas Bath, to maintain the watercourse leading from the Commons of Portrane to the sea, in return for which he received a grant of part of the Commons of Portrane, Co Dublin, for a garden, to hold freehold. The agreement was witnessed by Owen Ward and Henry Moran. The original agreement, which is still in the possession of his descendant, Ger Lynders, 300 years later, was transcribed by Nancy Dockrell-Dempsey in 1985.

This John Lynders was the father of John Lynders (ca 1705-ca 1764), who was the immediate of ancestor of the Lynders family of Portrane, including my paternal grandmother.

John Lynders (1798-post 1848), of The Burrow, Donabate, was born in 1798, and was baptised on 6 January 1798 (sponsors: Thomas Duff and Catherine Donaugh). In 1848, he was a tenant of Joshua Evans for two portions of tillage in The Burrow, Donabate, and he was one of only seven freeholders in the Parish of Portrane, along with Evans of Portrane, Cobbe of Newbridge, Barnewall (Lord Trimleston) of Turvey, Arthur of Ballymadrough, Matthew Bates and William Davis. Among these freeholders, John Lynders and Mrs Sophia Evans were the only freeholders in ‘Portraine Demesne.’

The agreement, dated 14 March, 1722 and made between the Archbishop of Dublin and John Lynders, the original of which is in the possession of John’s descendent, Ger Lynders, reads:

Memorandum of agreement made by and between the principal inhabitants of the Parish of Portrane in the County of Dublin, and John Lynders of Portrane aforesaid (that is to say) that the said Inhabitants granted unto the said Lynders a small part of the Commons of Portrane afores[aid]: for a garden and assisted him to build a house thereon to have and to hold the said house and garden free forever; he, the said John Lynders, his heirs.

Exec[uto]rs, Adm[inistrato]rs. and Assigns in consideration for the aforesaid house and garden were at all times to keep the watercourse leading from the aforesaid Commons of Portrane to the sea; clean and fit to receive and carry off the water of said Commons.

In witness whereof we have here unto set our hands this Fourteenth Day of March, one thousand, seven hundred and twenty two.

John Lynders do promise to perform the above.

His agreement, John Lynders, signed and delivered in presence of Owen Ward, Henry Moran. Nicholas Carbery Thomas Bath.

An old ‘grandfather’ clock … part of the Lynders family since my grandmother’s time or even earlier (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)