COMERFORD WAY: Patrick Comerford’s online journal on Anglicanism, theology, spirituality, history, architecture, travel, poetry, beach walks ... and more
A poster for this month’s production of ‘Dancing at Lughnasa’ by the Ballaghaderreen Players at the Hawk’s Well Theatre
Patrick Comerford
I have been a member of the Stony Stratford Playreaders’ group for almost two years now, and during that time we have met twice a month in the library on Church Street, alternating between well-known, established works and plays by group members. We were part of the Stony Words festival last year, and I’m looking forward to taking part in the programme being prepared for next January.
Last month, I was asked to read the part of Trygaeus in Peace by Aristophanes, a very appropriate choice in the present global climate.
This week, we were reading Dancing at Lughnasa, a play by the Irish writer Brian Friel (1929-2015), first produced in 1990 and set in in the fictional town of Ballybeg, based on Glenties in Co Donegal, in August 1936. The play is set at a time when the Spanish Civil War was breaking out and Italy was invading Ethiopia (then Abyssinia), while in domestic politics Eamon de Valera had been office since 1932, and was about to introduce a new constitution and become Taoiseach in 1937, all referred to by the characters in the play.
This is a memory play told from the point of view of the adult Michael Evans, the narrator, as he recalls the summer in 1936, when he was a seven-year-old living with his mother Christina and four aunts, the five Mundy sisters – Maggie, Chris, Agnes, Rose, and Kate – and their brother Father Jack, who has returned from a life as a missionary in Uganda.
Lughnasa is the month of August. But, as the summer draws to a close, the family realises sadly that it is facing economic privation and their hopes fade as the realise the dismal futures they face.
Kate is a school teacher, the only sister with a well-paid job. Agnes and Rose help Maggie to keep house and knit gloves, but know this small income is about to dry up when a new knitwear factory opens nearby. Maggie and Chris have no income at all.
Their brother Father Jack is in his late 50s and a former British army chaplain in East Africa during World War I. He has come back home after 25 years as a missionary priest in Ryanga, a leper colony in a remote part of Uganda. He has malaria, and has trouble remembering many things, including his sisters’ names and everyday, common conversational words.
He no longer says Mass, and perhaps the real reasons he has been sent home are that he has ‘gone native’, abandoned much of his Catholic practice – there are hints that perhaps he has either lost his faith or that he was too close to his former ‘house boy’ Okawa.
He admires or respects the beliefs and practices of the native people of Africa. His apparent loss of faith greatly worries or Kate, who is concerned about the family's reputation. Jack refers to Michael as a love child rather than an illegitimate child and says they are common and accepted among the people of Uganda.
In a scene near the close of the play, Jack ceremonially swaps his British colonial feathered tricorn hat, a departing gift from a British governor, for a cap worn by Chris’s lover Gerry Evans, Michael’s Welsh father who is charming but unreliable. Gerry becomes the new, secular missionary, heading off to Barcelona to join the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War.
The play takes its name from the occasions when Chris and Gerry go walking and dance and the sisters’ random, spontaneous dancing prompted by intermittent céilí music from a temperamental radio nicknamed Marconi. Their lives are marked by poverty and financial insecurity, lives that are unfulfilled and lead to disaster off-stage.
We learn from Michael’s narrative that Agnes and Rose later die in abject poverty in Southwark in the 1950s, while Michael’s father has a parallel family in Wales, including a half-brother with the same name. For all of this, Michael was surrounded by love in his childhood, and this love is underlined by the way Jack refers to him as a love child rather than an illegitimate child, even though the play is peppered with word ‘bastard’.
Father Jack seems to recover from his malaria or his forgetfulness, but Michael as narrator tells us that he died later of a heart attack soon after the events in the play and he tells us that Kate was inconsolable when Jack died.
The play was originally staged at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin in 1990. It moved to the National Theatre in London in 1991, and later to the Phoenix Theatre and the Garrick, before moving on to Broadway. It was revived in Dublin in 1999-2000, again at the Abbey Theatre, and Joe Dowling directed a new production of the play at the Gate Theatre, Dublin, in 2004. The Old Vic Theatre in London presented a well-received production in 2009 starring Sorcha Cusack, Niamh Cusack, Sinéad Cusack and Andrea Corr.
In various productions, Father Jack has been played by Barry McGovern, Alec McCowen, Donal Donnelly, Des Cave, Michael Countryman, Michael Fitzpatrick, Ardal O’Hanlon and by Michael Gambon in the 1998 film adaptation starring Meryl Streep as Kate Mundy.
Being asked to read the part of Father Jack came as a pleasant surprise. He reminded me of many missionary priests I knew who had worked in Africa, Asia and Latin America and had become incarnational and enculturated in their approach to mission. Perhaps I also identified a little, too, with his problems in finding acceptance of his ministry in retirement. But I also thought of grandfather who had fought in World War I and who had been sent home from Thessaloniki with malaria.
I have only stayed in Co Donegal a half dozen or so times in all my life. But there are few differences from and many parallels between the rural life of the 1930s and the life I remember on my grandmother’s farm near Cappoquin, Co Waterford, in the 1950s and 1960s: the food, the temperamental radio, the difficulties families had in eking out a level, a similar distance into the nearest village, the suspicions of people living in even more remote areas, the lakes and the mountains, families forced to find work in larger towns or cities or to leave and find a living in London, whispered conversations about politics, prejudice and bigotry, and families were sisters were strong and determined women whose hopes and aspirations were always going to be disappointed.
De Valera was still dominating the political landscape, there were memories of Republicans and Blueshirts who went away to join different side in the Spanish Civil War, there was a missionary uncle who never returned, an aunt who was a teacher and a nun, and the Keane family had tried to provide a local industry until the bacon factory closed in 1980.
The ‘Stage’ opposite the Cats provided the same céilí music the sisters listened to, there was a temperamental ‘Marconi’ that ran off a battery and that only picked up the BBC and not Radio Eireann. Prejudice and judgmentalism were still alive in the south-east of Ireland in the 1950s, and I remember overhearing whispered conversations about the Fethard-on-Sea Boycott in neighbouring Co Wexford.
Lughnasa has passed, we are a long way into September, and summer has turned to autumn. But summers and Augusts in rural Donegal in the 1930s and rural Waterford in the 1950s came alive for me in the library Stony Stratford on Thursday afternoon.
The Backs and King’s College are among many of the familiar locations that appear as scenes in the BBC crime drama series ‘Ludwig’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)
Patrick Comerford
I am delighted that the detective drama Ludwig has returned to the BBC with a second series that began last week (20 August 2026), having enthusiastically watched the first series in 2024.
In both series of Ludwig, David Mitchell stars as John Taylor, a reclusive crossword setter and puzzle maker who publishes his books under the pen name ‘Ludwig’, and his missing identical twin brother, James Taylor, a successful detective chief inspector in the Cambridge police force.
As an enthusiastic fan of the Guardian crossword each day, I was interested to see that the Guardian’s crossword editor Alan Connor was involved in designing the crosswords used in the opening titles of the series; indeed, he also created a series of Ludwig-themed puzzles in the Guardian.
Throughout each episode, I am watching for familiar locations in Cambridge, where much of the plots and storylines are set, including the Backs and the River Cam, King’s College, Queens’ College, Queens’ Lane, Saint John’s College, the Bridge of Sighs, the Old Schools and All Saints’ Passage.
Almost three million viewers watched Episode 1 in Series 2 on BBC 1 last Thursday night (20 August 2026), with Episode 2 going out at 9 pm tonight (27 August 2026). The first three episodes in Series 2 are now available on BBC iPlayer and the remaining three episodes are due to be released on BBC iPlayer on 10 September.
‘Stands the Church clock at ten to three?’ (Rupert Brooke) … the clock at Grantchester Church, which features in the crime series ‘Grantchester’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
In Series 1, John Taylor works his way into the Cambridgeshire Police posing as his missing identical twin brother James. As a fake cop, he uses his pedantic puzzle-solving skills to solve some complex murders in and around Cambridge that make normally sedate Cambridge look like a more dangerous place to live in than Albert Square in EastEnders.
Oxford has Inspector Morse, but Cambridge has had its share of television sleuths too, including the vicars in the ITV detective drama Grantchester (2014-2026), filmed mainly in the village of Grantchester and in central Cambridge, with locations that include King’s Parade, Saint John’s College and the River Cam.
In addition, the four episodes of Porterhouse Blue (1987), a Channel 4 comedy series adapted from Tom Sharpe’s 1974 novel, were filmed mainly in Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, where I was a student over the years on a number of courses in association with the Institute of Orthodox Christian Studies (IOCS).
Sidney Sussex College provided the location for the Channel 4 comedy series ‘Porterhouse Blue’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)
BBC’s Ludwig is primarily set in and filmed in Cambridge. The actor David Mitchell went to Peterhouse in Cambridge in 1993 to study history, and as an undergraduate he joined the Cambridge Footlights dramatic club.
Ludwig inevitably includes numerous positioning shots – usually aerial – of Cambridge. The locations, backdrops and shots include King’s College, the River Cam, Saint John’s College and the Bridge of Sighs, Queens’ College, Queens’ Lane and the Mathematical Bridge, Silver Street, Silver StreetBridge and the Anchor, and the Millpond.
Episode 3 next week in the new series has many street scenes in central Cambridge, including Portugal Place, Market Hill, Trinity Lane and Garrett Hostel Bridge. But there are many fictional locations too, including the ‘Scholar's Fountain’ and Turing Lane. The theatre where last week’s murder scene is located is certainly not in Cambridge … it is, in fact, the Theatre Royal in Windsor.
The fictional Cambridge Police Authority station was filmed at Stockley Park Business Centre, a glass-fronted modern business park building in outer London. The grim offices of the fictional East Anglia Advertiser have been filmed at Pentland site off Squires Lane in Finchley. Its sad decline as a newspaper reminds me of the decline of the Lichfield Mercury a few years ago.
Locations beyond Cambridge include Moor Park Golf Club in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, North Mymms Park near Hatfield in Hertfordshire and locations in and around London including Ham Yard Hotel.
Doppelganger or ‘missing link’? … Charles Darwin’s plaque in the Great Gate at Christ’s College(Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)
Back in Cambridge last month, introducing a friend from Ireland to the Cambridge I have known for 20 years, the question of a doppelganger or curious lookalike surfaced in a humorous moment at the Great Gate or porters’ lodge at Christ’s College.
This gate and tower, which have been restored and regilded in recent years, date back to the 16th century when Christ’s College was founded by Lady Margaret Beaufort. As we stood there looking into First Court and the chapel, an American couple commented, half joking and wholly in earnest, on the likeness of the plaque behind me of Charles Darwin.
I have been a guest in Christ’s College many times, and I have preached in the chapel and was a visiting lecturer back in 2009. So I have always been aware of Darwin’s place in the history of the college. But there have also been rumours in family lore and legend that Charles Darwin was related to the Comberford family of Comberford Hall.
The nearest thing I can find to an actual link, though. is through a web of marriages rather than any direct genealogical connection. Charles Darwin’s father, Robert Waring Darwin, grew up as the step-brother of Sacheverell Chandos-Pole. Sacheverell’s son, the Revd William Chandos-Pole, held a kinship equivalent to a first cousin of Charles Darwin through marriage, and his son later had family ties that had a brief connection with Comberford Hall.
First Court and the Chapel in Christ’s College, Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)
I have described this tenuous relationship as a true ‘missing link’, but any direct connection between Charles Darwin and Comberford Hall is extremely remote, and indirect, and I have only traced these through collateral marital relations in Staffordshire. Perhaps I need Ludwig’s puzzle-solving skills if I am ever going to find this ‘missing link’.
But there is another puzzle in Ludwig: is the plot about a missing identical twin brother, about a doppelganger, or about a personality disorder?
The BBC confirmed last month that it has commissioned a third series of Ludwig. We may have to wait until then to put other pieces in the puzzle back into place.
All Saints’ Passage … one of the familiar scenes in Cambridge that provide locations for ‘Ludwig’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
A statue of Eirene, the Greek goddess of Peace, with a laurel wreath and a cornucopia, at Vergina restaurant in Platanias, near Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
In Greek mythology, Eirene (Εἰρήνη) was the goddess of peace, and she was a symbol of spring, wealth and order. She is depicted in art her statues and in art as a beautiful young woman carrying a cornucopia, sceptre and a torch or rhyton. She is usually said to be the daughter of Zeus and Themis and the sister of Dike and Eunomia.
The Greek word εἰρήνη (eirēnē) means peace, quiet and rest. In ancient Greek, it meant a time without war but it also speaks of more than just a lack of war: it describes wholeness, harmony, quietness, and a state of general well-being or flourishing.
It comes from a word that means to join together. Peace brings things back into a whole. It comes from verb εἴρω (eiro), to join or bind together that which has been separated, binding or joining together again what had been separated or divided and thus setting at one again.
Older theories also link the word εἴρω (eírō), ‘to speak, say’. We might compare it with the word ῥήτρα (rhḗtra), a verbal agreement or treaty.
A poster for a Shadow Puppet Theatre production of ‘Eirene’ by Aristophenes in Thessaloniki
The idea of the Common Peace (Κοινὴ Εἰρήνη, Koinē Eirēnē) was one of the most influential concepts of 4th century BCE Greek political thought, along with the idea of Panhellenism. The term described both the concept of a desirable, permanent peace between the Greek city-states (πόλεις, poleis) and a sort of peace treaty that fulfilled the three fundamental criteria of this concept: it had to include all the Greek city-states, it had to recognise the autonomy and equality of all city states without regard for their military power, and it had to be intended to remain in force permanently.
The advocates of the Common Peace saw it as a way to end the endemic warfare which engulfed the Greek poleis after the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War in 431 BCE. From the King’s Peace of 387-386 BCE down to the foundation of the League of Corinth in 338 BCE, the idea of the Common Peace influenced all peace treaties between Greek poleis. In the end, however, it turned out that only a strong hegemonic power could maintain a comprehensive peace for long.
The concept has been revived in modern times, and in the 20th century it was a foundation stone of international organisations such as the League of Nations and the United Nations.
‘Eirene’ by Aristophenes continues to appeal to adults and children alike in Greece
The Septuagint or Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible regularly uses εἰρήνη to translate the Hebrew shalom (שלום), a word that embraces completeness, prosperity, and relational harmony with God, neighbour, and creation. Priestly benedictions, such as Numbers 6: 26, anticipated a day when the Lord would ‘give you peace’. First-century Jews greeted one another with ‘peace’, and Jesus’ disciples continued the practice (see Luke 10: 5-6).
In the Greek New Testament, the word εἰρήνη (eirēnē) or peace is much like the Hebrew word shalom (שלום). It occurs over 90 times, and means inner calm, well-being, and right relationships with others. Well-known and well-loved examples include:
• πορεύου εἰς εἰρήνην, Go in Peace (Luke 7: 50; 8: 48);
• ἰρήνη τῷ οἴκῳ τούτῳ, Peace to this house (Luke 10: 5);
• Εἰρήνη ἀφίημι ὑμῖν, εἰρήνην τὴν ἐμὴν δίδωμι ὑμῖν, My peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you (John 14: 27);
• Εἰρήνη ὑμῖν, Peace be with you (Luke 24: 36; John 20: 19, 20-21, 26).
Every Pauline letter opens with the twin blessing ‘grace and peace’ (for example, see Romans 1: 7; Ephesians 1: 2) and most conclude with a similar wish (see Romans 15: 33). Peter, John and Jude follow the same pattern (see I Peter 1: 2; II John 1: 3; Jude 1: 2). These formulas are more than courteous salutations – they declare and confer the benefits of God’s favour and covenant well-being on those who receive the greeting.
Saint Irene (left), Saint Catherine and Saint Barbara … three women saints in a fresco in the Church of Panagia Dexia in Thessaloniki (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
In the Greek Orthodox tradition and in popular Greek piety today, there are three popular saints with the name Irene.
Saint Irene, Saint Catherine and Saint Barbara are three saints who are often found together in icons and frescoes in Greek churches. They form a traditional grouping, such as the Apostles Peter and Paul, as an icon of Church Unity, Saint Paul and Sant Barnabas or Saint Paul and Saint Titus as missionary companions, the three Cappadocian Fathers (Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa and Gregory of Nazianzus), and the Three Holy Hierarchs (Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian and John Chrysostom).
Saint Irene is one of three saints and sisters – Irene, Agape and Chioni – who were born in Thessaloniki and who were martyred there for their faith in the year 304 CE. Their names mean Peace, Love and Purity, and their feast day is on 3 April.
The story of their martyrdom is the subject of Dulcitius, a 10th-century Latin drama by Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim, the first-known female playwright.
Irene, Agape and Chione were brought before Dulcitius, governor of Macedonia, on the charge of refusing to eat food that had been offered in sacrifice to the gods. When Agape and Chionia again refused to eat this food, they were burned alive.
Dulcitius found that Irene was keeping prohibited Christian books that she had taken with her when she fled to the mountains. Dulcitius ordered Irene to be stripped and exposed in a brothel. When no one mistreated her in the brothel, the governor gave Irene a second chance. When she refused this, Dulcitius sentenced her to death and her books found were burned with her.
Saint Irene (752-803), a Byzantine empress who was instrumental in restoring the use of icons in the Orthodox Church … a fresco in a church in Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
A second significant Saint Irene in the Orthodox Calendar is Saint Irene (752-803), a Byzantine empress who was instrumental in restoring the use of icons in the Orthodox Church. She was the wife of the Byzantine emperor Leo IV, and when her husband died in 780, she became guardian of their 10-year-old son, Constantine VI, and co-emperor with him. Later that year she crushed a plot by the iconoclasts or opponents of the use of icons to put Leo’s half-brother, Nicephorus, on the throne.
The use of icons had been prohibited since 730. When one of the Empress Irene’s supporters, Tarasius, was elected patriarch of Constantinople, he summoned the Council of Constantinople in 786 and then the Seventh Ecumenical Council in Nicaea in 787 and restored the reverence of images.
Constantine VI banished his mother from court, but she later had her son arrested and blinded. From 797, she reigned alone as emperor for five years until she was deposed in 802 and exiled to the island of Lesbos. She is remembered for her zeal in restoring icons and her feast day is celebrated on 9 August.
Saint Irene of Lesbos with Saint Raphael and Saint Nicholas … an icon in the Church of the Transfiguration in Piskopiano in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
There is a third Saint Irene in the Greek Orthodox tradition and popular piety: Saints Raphael, Nicholas, and Irene of Lesbos (Ραφαήλ, Νικόλαος και Ειρήνη) are venerated as saints and martyrs.
According to legend, they lived on the island of Lesbos in the 15th century and were killed by Turkish raiders on 9 April 1463. Raphael was the abbot of the monastery of Karyes, near the village of Thermi, Nicholas was a deacon in the monastery, and Irene was the 12-year-old daughter of the village mayor: she was brutally executed and burned inside a clay cask in front of her parents.
The site of their martyrdom was excavated in 1959 and the relics of the saints are kept in a monastery that was rebuilt on Karyes, about 12 km from Mytilene, the island capital. The three saints were canonised in 1970. The monastery has become a prominent centre of pilgrimage.
A quiet corner in the monastery of Agia Irini, near Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
One of my favourite places in Rethymnon for peace and quiet, with time to be calm and to pray is the Monastery of Aghia Irini, about 5 km south of Rethymnon in the mountains above the town, and one of the oldest monasteries in Crete. Various accounts say it was founded sometime between 961 and 1204, and it was certainly built before 1362, when it is escribed in a Venetian document.
The monastery was destroyed several times during the many revolutions in Crete against Ottoman rule. During the last Cretan revolution of 1897-1898, the Turks burnt the monastery, the ruined monastery was formally closed in 1900, and the ruins remained deserted throughout most of the 20th century.
Sister Akaterina, who once brought me on a tour of the monastery some years ago, told of how the Metropolitan of Rethymnon, the late Bishop Theodoros Tzedakis, had a vision in 1989 for its restoration and invited a group of nuns to form a new community at Aghia Irini.
The nuns moved into the buildings and restoration work began in 1990. At the time, Aghia Irini was a jumble of dilapidated buildings. Today, it must be one of the most beautiful monasteries in Crete, and the restoration work has received architectural and cultural awards. The church was officially opened in 2003, and was consecrated in 2011 by Patriarch Theodoros of Alexandria. The buildings include an older three-aisled church of Saint Irene, Saint Catherine and Saint Euphemia.
An icon of Aghia Irini (Αγία Ειρήνη) or Saint Irene by Alexandra Kaouki … a present from Rethymnon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
When I was in Rethymnon last year for a five-day ‘mini-retreat’ in Crete during Holy Week and Easter, my friend Alexandra Kaouki (Αλεξανδρα Καουκι), one of the foremost icon writers in Rethymnon today, gave me a gift of one of her early icons, depicting Aghia Irini (Αγία Ειρήνη) or Saint Irene, completed in 2012.
Saint Irene seemed such a special choice for me that weekend. Alexandra explained how she thought it was appropriate for me because of my campaigning past, as the saint’s name means ‘Peace’, and because I had written appreciatively in the past about Aghia Irini convent in the hills above Rethymnon.
A fresco depicting Saint Irene or Aghia Irini by Alexandra Kaouki in a church in Rethymnon
The Theatre of Dionysus … the site of the great drama competitions in Athens (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Patrick Comerford
After a few weeks break, the Stony Stratford playreaders resume our readings and rehearsals this evening, and we have gathered in the Library in Stony Stratford, where the play we are reading is Peace (Εἰρήνη Eirḗnē), an Athenian ‘Old Comedy’ written and produced by the Greek playwright Aristophanes.
The play won second prize at the City Dionysia when it was staged just a few days before the validation of the Peace of Nicias, which promised to end the 10-year-old Peloponnesian War in the year 421 BCE.
With the current wars the US is waging in the Gulf against Iran, including Trump’s latest threats this week against Oman, the current war Russia is waging against Ukraine, the continuing and relentless Israeli military actions in Gaza, on the West Bank and in southern Lebanon, Peace seems deeply appropriate as a choice for our reading this evening.
The play is written in joyous anticipation of peace and it is a celebration of a return to an idyllic life in the countryside. However, it also sounds a note of caution, there is a bitter acknowledgment of lost opportunities, and the ending is not happy for everyone.
As in all plays by Aristophanes, the jokes are many, the action is wild and absurd and the satire is savage. Cleon, the pro-war populist leader of Athens, is once again a target of the author's wit, even though he had died in the Battle of Amphipolis just a few months earlier.
The playwright Aristophanes (Ἀριστοφάνης) was known as ‘the Father of Comedy’ and ‘the Prince of Ancient Comedy’ and lived between ca 446 and ca 386 BCE. He wrote 40 plays, although only 11 survive virtually complete. His plays were performed at the religious festivals of Athens, mostly the City Dionysia and the Lenaia, and several of his plays won the first prize in their respective competitions. The majority of his surviving plays belong to the genre known as ‘Old Comedy’ and are among its most valuable examples.
The porch of the Erechtheion … the last of the buildings dating from the time of Pericles … building work finished around 410 BCE (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
In his plays, Aristophanes wrote about real-life figures, including Pericles, Euripides and Alcibiades, and contemporary events, such as the Peloponnesian War. He is said to have recreated life in ancient Athens more convincingly than any other author.
His plays are characterised by preposterous premises, explicit language, wordplays, and political satire. His powers of ridicule were feared and acknowledged by influential contemporaries. Plato singled out the play The Clouds as slander that contributed to the trial and subsequent condemning to death of Socrates.
His now lost second, now lost play, The Babylonians, was denounced by Cleon as a slander against the Athenian polis. Aristophanes caricatured Cleon mercilessly in his subsequent plays, especially The Knights.
In Peace, Trygaeus, whose part I have been asked to read, is a middle-aged Athenian who miraculously brings about a peaceful end to the Peloponnesian War. He earns the gratitude of farmers while bankrupting various tradesmen who had profited from the hostilities.
Trygaeus boldly summons Greeks everywhere to come and help him set Peace free while there is still time. A Chorus of excited Greeks from various city-states arrives as prompted but they are so excited they cannot stop dancing at first. Eventually they get to work, pulling boulders from the cave’s mouth under the supervision of Trygaeus.
Real progress is only made by the farmers and at last Peace and her companions, Festival and Harvest, are brought to light, appearing as visions of ineffable beauty. Hermes then tells the gathering why Peace had left them many years earlier – she had been driven away by politicians who were profiting from the war.
She had tried to come back several times, but each time the Athenians had voted against her in their Assembly. Trygaeus apologises to Peace on behalf of his fellow Athenians, then he leaves her to enjoy her freedom while he sets off again for Athens, taking Harvest and Festival back with him.
Trygaeus celebrates his triumph by marrying Harvest, a companion of Festival and Peace, all of whom he has liberated from a celestial prison.
All the early plays by Aristophanes were written and acted against a background of war. The war between Athens and Sparta began in 431 BCE. Under Archidamus II in Sparta and Pericles in Athens, it developed into a war of slow attrition in which Athens was unchallenged at sea and Sparta was undisputed master of the Greek mainland.
The Monument of the Unknown Soldier outside Parliament in Athens … the quotations are from the Funeral Oration by Pericles, recounted by Thucydides in ‘The History of the Peloponnesian War’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Every year, the Spartans and their allies invaded Attica and wreaked havoc on Athenian farms. As soon as they retreated, the Athenians marched out from their city walls to avenge themselves on the farms of their neighbours, the Megarians and Boeotians, allies of Sparta. Till then, most Athenians had lived in rural settlements but now they congregated within the safety of the city walls.
A plague in 430 BCE, decimated the over-crowded population of Athens and also claimed the life of Pericles, leaving Athens in the control of a more radical leadership, epitomised by Cleon.
Cleon was determined to gain absolute victory in the war with Sparta and his aggressive policies seemed to be vindicated in 425 at the Battle of Sphacteria, with the capture of Spartan hostages and the establishment of a permanent garrison at Pylos, from where the Athenians and their allies could harass Spartan territory.
The Spartans then made repeated appeals for peace but these were dismissed by the Athenian Assembly under guidance by Cleon, who wished instead to broaden the war with ambitious campaigns against Megara and Boeotia. The Athenians suffered a major defeat in Boeotia at the Battle of Delion and this was followed by an armistice in 423 BCE.
When the armistice ended, Cleon led a force of Athenians to Chalcidice to repress the revolts. But he and his men were surprised and defeated by a Spartan force. Both Cleon and Brasidas died in the battle and their removal opened the way for new peace talks in the winter of 422-421. The Peace of Nicias was ratified soon after in the City Dionysia, where Peace was performed, early in the spring of 421 BCE.
Cleon, the populist leader of the pro-war faction in Athens, is mentioned by name only once in this play, and he receives several indirect mentions. At one point, the Chorus describe Cleon as a disgusting gorgon-like phenomenon in language that matches sound and sense:
a hundred heads of doomed stooges circled and licked around his head
The sound of something revolting is captured in the original Greek by the repetition of the harsh k sound, including a repetition of the word for ‘head’.
Euripides is a tragic poet renowned for his innovative plays and pathetic heroes. He is ridiculed for his reliance on legalistic quibbling for dialogue and his plays are parodied and deliberately misquoted.
The tragic poet Sophocles is mentioned too because his verses are evocative of the good times that will come with peace.
Homer, the bard of all bards and the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, is mentioned by name twice in this play, there are frequent references to his poetry, and he is fancifully misquoted by Trygaeus.
Places that are named in the play include Mount Etna, the island of Naxos, the Erechtheion, the iconic building on the Acropolis, where work began in 420 BCE during the Peace of Nicias, not long after the performance of Peace at the City Dionysia, and the Pnyx, the hill where the citizens of Athens convened as a democratic assembly.
Masks inspired by classical drama in a shop in Athens … Thalia was the Muse of comedy, the laughing face, while Melpomene was the Muse of tragedy, the weeping face (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
In his plays, Aristophanes shows a tender love of rural life and a nostalgia for simpler times, and he develops a vision of peace involving a return to the countryside and its routines.
The association of peace with rural revival is expressed in this play in terms of religious imagery: Peace, imprisoned in a cave guarded by a Cerberus figure, resembles a chthonic fertility goddess in captivity in the underworld, a motif especially familiar to Athenians in the cult of Demeter and her daughter Kore in the Eleusinian Mysteries.
In spite of the play’s mythical and religious contexts, political action emerges as the decisive factor in human affairs. The gods are seen as distant figures, and so mortals must rely on their own initiative, as seen when the Chorus of Greeks work together to release Peace from captivity.
The god Hermes delivers a speech blaming the Peloponnesian War on Pericles and Cleon, an argument that Aristophanes had put forward in earlier plays.
The Chorus has a joyful celebration of peace but also shares bitter reflections on the mistakes of past leaders and Trygaeus expresses anxious fears for the future of the peace since events are remain subject to bad leadership. The bankrupted tradesmen at the end of the play are a reminder that there is still support for war.
The militaristic verses borrowed from Homer are a dramatic reminder that war is deeply rooted in culture and that it still commands the imagination of a new generation. Peace in such circumstances requires not only a miracle but also a combination of good luck and good will on the part of a significant group within the community.
Does any this find parallels with today’s cycle of war and how many world leaders have forgotten Peace, leaving Peace trapped in a dark cave?
Actors promoting a theatrical performance of classical drama in the square at Monastiraki in Athens (Photograph; Patrick Comerford)
Waiting for guests at the Tai Tai restaurant in Kuching … we are all invited to the heavenly banquet, but are we ready to accept the invitation? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2026)
Patrick Comerford
We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and this week began with the Eleventh Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XI, 16 August 2026). The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today remembers Saint Bernard (1112-1153), Abbot of Clairvaux, Teacher of the Faith; and William Booth (1829-1912) and Catherine Booth (1829-1890), founders of the Salvation Army.
I hope to be involved in a drama group meeting in the library in Stony Stratford this evening, when we are reading the appropriately topical Peace by Aristophanes. This play was first staged just a few days before the validation of Peace of Nicias, which promised to end the ten-year-old Peloponnesian War, in 421 BCE. Earlier in the day, I have a number of tests, including blood tests, heart monitoring and an ECG, as my Vitamin B12 deficiency and sarcoidosis continue to be monitored. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:
1, today’s Gospel reading;
2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
‘Go therefore into the … streets, and invite everyone you find to the … banquet’ (Matthew 22: 9) … empty tables at restaurants in the side streets in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
Matthew 22: 1-14 (NRSVA):
1 Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: 2 ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. 3 He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. 4 Again he sent other slaves, saying, “Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.” 5 But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his slaves, maltreated them, and killed them. 7 The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. 8 Then he said to his slaves, “The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.” 10 Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so the wedding hall was filled with guests.
11 ‘But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, 12 and he said to him, “Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?” And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, “Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 14 For many are called, but few are chosen.’
‘A Peasant Wedding’ (1620), Peter Brueghel the Younger, the National Gallery of Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Today’s Reflection:
‘For many are called, but few are chosen.’
Sometimes, the ways I can behave as a snob can catch me off-guard and unexpectedly, and I shame myself.
When I was growing up, the snobberies and class distinctions of previous generations were challenged over 60 years ago in an old-fashioned way in the film My Fair Lady (1964), based on George Bernard Shaw’s earlier play, Pygmalion (1913).
But Pygmalion also inspired what I think is a much funnier film, Hoi Polloi (1935), with the Three Stooges, Larry, Curly and Moe.
Two professors are arguing about whether our social behaviour is caused by environment or heredity. It is a very funny take on the old Nature v Nurture argument.
To settle a bet, the two professors take three binmen – Larry, Curly and Moe – train and coach them for three months, dress them up, and send them off to a posh society dinner.
Their behaviour descends into farce, and it looks as if one professor has won his bet: our social behaviour is dictated by inherited class.
But then the tables are turned – literally. Everyone else at the party descends to the same riotous behaviour. At a base level, we are all the same, even if some refuse to accept it.
Nature or nurture? It was an important statement that we all share the same humanity, coming as racism and the Nazis were on the rise in the 1930s.
The title of the film, Hoi Polloi, is a way of expressing class-based social prejudice. It is a Greek phrase, meaning ‘the many’ and it was used in Victorian England by people who had the benefit of a classical education in English public schools and the universities, to describe the masses, who they presumed did not understand the phrase.
Gilbert and Sullivan use the phrase to mock those who used it in their comic opera Iolanthe. Later, it was used by English public schoolboys in the 1950s and the 1960s, when they referred to ‘oips’ and ‘oiks’.
The term hoi polloi also appears in a scene in the film Dead Poets Society (1989). Professor John Keating, played by Robin Williams, speaks negatively about the use of the definite article ‘the’ in front of the phrase.
Steven Meeks (Allelon Ruggiero) raises his hands and speaks: ‘The hoi polloi. Doesn’t it mean the herd?’
Keating replies: ‘Precisely, Meeks. Greek for the herd. However, be warned that, when you say “the hoi polloi” you are actually saying “the the herd.” Indicating that you too are “hoi polloi”.’
This morning’s Gospel reading (Matthew 22: 1-14) begins with a very joyful occasion – a posh nosh, a planned wedding, and generous invitations to a lavish banquet. But, instead of the farce in that film with the Three Stooges, it quickly descends into very difficult images: slaves who are kidnapped, mistreated and killed; cities that are burned down; a man who is bound hand and feet and thrown into outer darkness.
The images of the wedding banquet and the wedding covenant are important ways of describing our relationship with God.
But the parable in this morning’s Gospel reading is particularly difficult.
The king has invited a long list of guests, but even after being repeatedly sought out, none of these guests comes to the banquet.
To refuse to come, to refuse a king’s command, is treason; to kill his slaves amounts to insurrection. So the king sends out troops to put down the rebellion.
The king then sends his slaves into the streets to find enough people to sit at the tables at the wedding banquet. The phrase translated as ‘the main streets’ (διεξόδους τῶν ὁδῶν, verse 9), means not the main fashionable, shopping streets in a chic part of a city centre. It refers to dirty, gritty, street corners and junctions, perhaps the main junctions outside the city gates.
This is the place where those who want to be hired as labour gather, where those who are refused entry wait without hope, this is where those who are on margins are found. Other translations catch these images when they talk about the highways and the byways.
And the king’s invitation, in verse 10, goes out to all people, ‘both good and bad.’
Yet, when the king sees that a man is not dressed appropriately for the event, the king throws him into the outer darkness. In this case, the robe probably symbolises the white robe worn for baptism.
Do we wear that robe all the time? In other words, do we live up to our promises of discipleship made at Baptism – summarised in the call to love God and to love others?
If you were to imagine yourself as one of the characters in this parable, who would you be?
And would you behave that way?
Are you the king, throwing a lavish wedding banquet?
Are you a wedding guest who has denied the generosity of the king?
Are you the bride or groom, sidelined and marginalised at our own wedding, incidental to all the power playing and role playing?
Are you one of the people brought in from the streets, but not prepared for the celebration about to take place?
Where do you find Good News in this parable?
What is meant by the many and the few here?
In our western way of thinking, the word many is a quantity much more than the majority, while few is many less than the majority. But in eastern thought, one less than 100% would be considered few.
We could put the Greek use of ‘few’ and ‘many’ by Christ in this parable in its cultural context. Pericles, in his ‘Funeral Oration’ in Athens, according to Thucydides in his History of the Peloponnesian War, uses ‘the many,’ οἱ πολλοί (hoi polloi), in a positive way when he extols democracy in Athens.
He contrasts ‘the many’ with ‘the few’ (οἱ ὀλίγοι, hoi oligoi), the few who abuse power and create an oligarchy, rule by the few. Pericles demands equal justice for ‘the many’, ‘the all’, before the law, against the selfish interests of the few.
When we celebrate the Eucharist, we remember that Christ is the victim, and that he said his blood is shed ‘for you and for many.’ The word ‘you’ here means us, the Church, the few in this parable. But the phrase ‘the many’ here, οἱ πολλοί (hoi polloi), refers to the masses, the multitude, the great unwashed, who are called to the banquet too.
Christ’s invitation is not just to you and me, who know we are invited to the banquet. It is also for the many, the lumpen masses, all people, the ones who are not usually invited to the posh nosh, the Larry, Curly and Moe in our midst.
The invitation to come in, to celebrate at the banquet, symbolised in the Eucharist this morning, is not just for the few, the oligarchs. The many are invited to this banquet this morning.
Who are we to behave like a tyrannical despot and exclude them? For if we exclude them, we are in danger of excluding Christ himself.
‘Look, I have prepared my dinner … and everything is ready’ (Matthew 22: 3) … waiting for diners at the Black Horse in Great Linford, Buckinghamshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Today’s Prayers (Thursday 20 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, from 16 to 22 August 2026 (pp 30-31), is ‘Hope in the Making’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a reflection by Grace Murray, a USPG volunteer. The prayers this week come courtesy of passersby at Greenbelt Festival 2025.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Thursday 20 August 2026) invites us to pray:
Dear God, please forgive us for we have been selfish and misused your creation. We are sorry that nature has been hurt by humans. Help us to do better, Lord!
The Collect of the Day:
Merciful redeemer,
who, by the life and preaching of your servant Bernard,
rekindled the radiant light of your Church:
grant us, in our generation,
to be inflamed with the same spirit of discipline and love
and ever to walk before you as children of light;
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 Bernard to the eternal feast of heaven;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
‘Those who had been invited to the wedding banquet … would not come’ (Matthew 22: 3) … empty tables at the Moat House, the former Comberford family home on Lichfield Street, Tamworth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
The Syro-Phoenician or Canaanite Woman … a modern icon by Brother Robert Lentz OFM
Patrick Comerford
We are in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and today is the Eleventh Sunday after Trinity (Trinity XI, 16 August 2026). Later this morning, I hope to take part in the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford.
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.
The Crying Women of Sidon … a sarcophagus from Sidon now in the Istanbul Archaeological Museum
Matthew 15: [10-20] 21-24 (NRSVA):
[10 Then he called the crowd to him and said to them, ‘Listen and understand: 11 it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles.’ 12 Then the disciples approached and said to him, ‘Do you know that the Pharisees took offence when they heard what you said?’ 13 He answered, ‘Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be uprooted. 14 Let them alone; they are blind guides of the blind. And if one blind person guides another, both will fall into a pit.’ 15 But Peter said to him, ‘Explain this parable to us.’ 16 Then he said, ‘Are you also still without understanding? 17 Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth enters the stomach, and goes out into the sewer? 18 But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this is what defiles. 19 For out of the heart come evil intentions, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander. 20 These are what defile a person, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile.’]
21 Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre and Sidon. 22 Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, ‘Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.’ 23 But he did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, ‘Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.’ 24 He answered, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.’ 25 But she came and knelt before him, saying, ‘Lord, help me.’ 26 He answered, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.’ 27 She said, ‘Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.’ 28 Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.’ And her daughter was healed instantly.
Iokasti, a restaurant in Koutouloufari in Crete … are there comparisons between Iocasta and her daughter in ‘The Phoenician Women’ and the Greek-speaking Syro-Phoenician or Canaanite woman in Tyre and Sidon? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Today’s Reflections:
The Gospel reading at the Eucharist today comes in two parts: an optional prelude in Matthew 15: 10-20; and then Matthew 15: 21-24. We have read much of both parts in recent weeks: part of Matthew 15: 10-20 when we read Matthew 15: 1-2, 10-14 on 4 August; and Matthew 15: 21-28 as the reading on 5 August.
The second part of today’s Gospel reading (Matthew 15: 21-28) recalls how one of the first decisions of Jesus on his visit to Tyre and Sidon is to hear the cry for mercy from a Canaanite or Syro-Phoenician woman, to heal her daughter, and to commend their faith. The outsiders are counted in, and judgement is experienced as love and mercy, compassion and inclusion.
Can you recall a moment, a place, or an occasion when you felt rejected? To be rejected I do not need to be an outsider. We can be rejected by our own brothers or sisters, by those who live around us, by those who share our religious or cultural values.
We can be rejected because of our lifestyle, our family background, our political and social values, our ethnic or religious backgrounds, our personal habits, our family circumstances, our sexuality, or marital status or lack of marital status … the list is endless.
Can you think of how you feel when you are made to feel rejected, an outsider, sent away?
And, have you found yourself blaming yourself rather than those who reject or marginalise you?
If so, then you know what it is like to become a double victim: a victim of the prejudices of others, and a victim of the perceptions that are projected onto you.
The disciples reject the Canaanite woman who is pleading for mercy, seeing her as unclean and an outsider, and bring judgement down on this woman and her daughter in Tyre and Sidon.
Having heard the Pharisees suggest Jesus should reject them, they now say to Jesus, ‘send her away’ (verse 23).
But there is a paradox in their rejection of her, for they use a word (ἀπόλυσον, apoluson) that also means to set free, to let go, to give liberty to, to release.
The same verb is used to set a debtor free of debts, or to allow a woman to divorce her husband, setting her free from the bonds that tie husband and wife. In wanting to be free from her demanding calls, they – ironically – call for mother and daughter to be freed from their torments.
In our feelings of rejection and marginalisation, how do we find acceptance, liberation, and a place in God’s unfolding plan for his people, for all people, God’s future for us?
The disciples want to turn her away. They see her as a pest, a nuisance, a pushy woman, breaking into their closed space, their private area.
Christ and the Disciples are in the coastal area of Tyre and Sidon, an area of small villages, perhaps looking for a quiet break for a few days. But if they are planning to get away for a few quiet days, those plans are frustrated when this woman arrives with her pressing demands.
This is foreign territory, inhabited by Canaanites or Phoenicians, who were culturally Hellenised and mainly Greek-speaking. It is also the territory associated with Elijah, who raised the widow’s child from death (I Kings 17: 9-24) and who ‘was markedly open to foreigners.’
So, Christ could expect to find himself among a large number of Greek-speaking ‘Gentiles.’ Would the Disciples expect him to behave like Elijah and break all the rules in being open to them, taking miraculous care of a lone mother and her child?
In the classical world, Phoenician women were pushy women. About 400 years earlier, the great Greek playwright Euripides wrote his tragedy The Phoenician Women (Φοίνισσαι, Phoenissae).
The title of the play, The Phoenician Women, refers to the Greek chorus, which is composed of Phoenician women on their way to Delphi and who are trapped in Thebes by war.
The two key women in the play are Jocasta and her daughter Antigone, who have survived against all odds. They challenge the accepted concepts in Classical times of fate and free-will.
In the face of death, they refuse to accept what others see as their destiny, they refuse to be pushed aside, marginalised and dismissed as the men around then compete for power.
So, in Christ’s time, educated people could expect a Phoenician woman and her daughter to be pushy in the face of what appears to be a cruel fate, even if this involves confronting successful or ambitious men: they are prepared to stand up to kings and rulers, prepared to challenge them, and prepared to risk judgement that means rejection and exile.
Faced with her daughter’s needs, this woman ignores the disciples: she is direct and aggressive in demanding healing and justice. And in demanding justice and healing for her daughter, she is, of course, demanding these for herself too.
Nothing is said about the response of the disciples to the woman. They had been trying to push her away, despite her crying, her tears, her distress, her plight over her daughter.
Perhaps nothing is said about the response of the disciples … because we are the disciples. How do you and I respond to encounters like this?
As a social response, for example, we might consider that the confrontation is an illustration of how we might respond to the needs of strangers and foreigners.
Do we find them pushy and demanding?
How do we respond when the foreign woman in our society wants the same treatment in hospital for her child as a child born here?
How do we respond when foreigners who are more open and joyful in conversation, appear to be encroaching on our privacy on the bus, on the street or in a shop?
Are we like the Disciples, and want to send them away? Or are we like Jesus, and engage in conversation with them?
Do we think we have some privileges that should not be shared with the outsider and the stranger?
How do we respond to people who are pushy and continue to demand care for their children in the face of society’s decision to say no?
The parents who want teaching support for children with learning disabilities, the parents who want to know why children’s hospitals are so badly funded that they have to raise funds with charity events while their children wait for treatment.
But this Gospel story also raises questions at a personal, spiritual level too, when it comes to matters of faith.
How many people do you know who give up when they turn to God in prayer and find those who are supposed to represent Jesus appear to turn them away?
How many times have I dismissed the needs and prayers of others because they appear to be outside the community of faith as I understand it?
This woman is insistent, she is persistent; she refuses to accept what other people regard as her fate and destiny.
In the end, she receives the mercy and help she asks for, and much, much more … she is commended in front of the disciples for her faith, and her daughter is healed instantly.
We do not have to accept misery and rejection, especially when others see them as our fate or our destiny. And, in simple prayers, we may find more in the answer than we ever ask for.
‘What overwhelms us?’
‘What can we do about being overwhelmed?’
These questions were put to us some years ago by Bishop Margaret Vertue of the Diocese of False Bay in South Africa, at the USPG conference in High Leigh.
Bishop Margaret, who was the second woman to become a bishop in Africa, was leading that morning’s Bible study in 2017 on Matthew 11: 20-24.
She challenged us to think of how we respond in love and not in judgement. And, drawing on the wisdom of the Carthusian monks of Grand Chartreuse, she asked: ‘I became human for you, will you become God with me?’
To illustrate how we might respond in love and not in judgement, she shared ‘The Story of a Sign’ by Alonso Alvarez Barreda, with music by Giles Lamb. This short film from Purplefeather illustrates the power of words to radically change our message and our effect upon the world.
She challenged us that morning to consider our own contexts and to discuss: ‘What overwhelms us? What can we do about being overwhelmed?’
And she asked, in the words of the wisdom of the Carthusian monks of Grand Chartreuse: ‘I became human for you, will you become God with me?’
‘The Story of a Sign’ by Alonso Alvarez Barreda / Purplefeather, music by Giles Lamb
Today’s Prayers (Sunday 16 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, from 16 to 22 August 2026 (pp 30-31), is ‘Hope in the Making’. This theme is introduced today with a reflection by Grace Murray, a USPG volunteer:
Last summer was my second time at Greenbelt. Volunteering on the USPG stand felt like a natural extension of the things that already shape my life. In my work at a small social impact consultancy, and at the UK Youth Climate Coalition, I spend a lot of time thinking about justice and how change happens. So, the chance to bring together faith, justice and creativity was a big part of what drew me to volunteer.
Being on the stand was a real gift, giving me the chance to learn more about USPG’s work and to have meaningful conversations with festivalgoers about faith, creativity, justice and mission. Getting to know the brilliant USPG staff was also a lot of fun!
One of the highlights for me was meeting Jocabed Solano, whose work with Memoria Indígena I had followed for some time. Hearing her speak alongside Dr Paulo Ueti in Prophetic Voices from the Earth and its Peoples was both grounding and challenging. They shared wisdom from Indigenous theological traditions, reminding us that we are deeply connected to the Earth and to one another. It was a powerful call to listen more closely - to creation, and to voices too often ignored. Back at the stall, we shared the work of the Diocese of Amazonia and invited festivalgoers to write their own prayers for creation.
I walked away with a deeper appreciation for the conversations USPG is willing to host, and a broader view of social, racial and environmental justice from a faith perspective.
Thanks to the team for bringing me along!
Contact volunteer@uspg.org.uk if you’d like to find out more about volunteering at a summer festival or event.
The USPG prayer diary today (Sunday 16 August 2026, Trinity XI) invites us to pray as we read and meditate on Matthew 15: (10-20), 21-28.
The Collect of the Day:
O God, you declare your almighty power
most chiefly in showing mercy and pity:
mercifully grant to us such a measure of your grace,
that we, running the way of your commandments,
may receive your gracious promises,
and be made partakers of your heavenly treasure;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post Communion Prayer:
Lord of all mercy,
we your faithful people have celebrated that one true sacrifice
which takes away our sins and brings pardon and peace:
by our communion
keep us firm on the foundation of the gospel
and preserve us from all sin;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Additional Collect:
God of glory,
the end of our searching,
help us to lay aside
all that prevents us from seeking your kingdom,
and to give all that we have
to gain the pearl beyond all price,
through our Saviour Jesus Christ.
The Theatre of Dionysus, beneath the slopes of the Acropolis in Athens … plays by the great playwrights, Euripides, Aeschylus and Sophocles were first performed there (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
