The Pensive Pilgrim

I recently watched the livestream of this year's Assumption-Tide Procession at All Saints Margaret Street, London's best known  Anglo-Catholic 'shrine' just off Oxford Street.  As always - and in common with its sister, the annual Corpus Christi Procession - it was a colourful, moving and brilliantly choreographed event, and I was left wishing that I could have been there.  As the vast procession made its way along the streets of London's West End, incense billowing, candles flickering, Our Lady of Walsingham wobbling slightly on her litter from time to time as those responsible for carrying her expertly navigated kerbs and potholes and avoided banana-skins (and worse), as clergy modelled varying degrees of lace (from the tasteful to the absurd) everyone lustily sang a variety of hymns from much loved esoteric Marian devotions to what was once regarded as a 'ranter' for evangelical use only, 'To God be the Glory'.  This was surely Anglo-Catholicism a...

Sermon preached at the Parish Mass, S t Matthew's Perry Beeches, Sunday 4th August Some words of St Paul from this morning’s second reading: I, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. (Ephesians 3:14-21) On the evening of Wednesday 24 th July, a major service was held in the parish church of St Helen, Bishopsgate, London. St Helen’s is well-known as a stronghold of conservative evangelicalism. It attracts a large, predominantly wealthy, middle-class congregation. Its clergy eschew the ‘cool’ look of tee-shirt and chinos popular with so many of their evangelical colleagues and instead wear expensive suits and posh silk ties. The service that took place on the 24 th July was no ordinary service,   indeed it was a profoundly significant event not only for tho...