The Pensive Pilgrim

Those of a 'churchy' disposition will be aware that after seven years of wasted time, breath and energy, and a great deal of misplaced hope, the 'Living in Love and Faith' process (LLF for short) has finally been euthanised by the House of Bishops. The CofE website describes LLF as 'part of a longer journey......to listen, learn and respond to changing views in our society towards identity, sexuality, relationships and marriage' and recognises that 'Despite big differences over the best approach to take, the church agrees it needs to better include and support LGBTQI+ people'.   Some of us - particularly those who have learned to live with the CofE's flaws for many decades - were sceptical about the process in the first place. Experience has certainly taught me that when bishops say they 'want to listen' it usually means they really want to find a way of doing nothing, preserving the status quo and sparing themselves any aggro. (Apparently th...

"I didn't like the hymns today." "Why did we sing 'x' to the wrong tune?" "The hymns were far too fast this morning." "The hymns were far too slow this morning." Anyone who leads worship regularly will be all too familiar with these - and similar - comments. The selection and performance of hymns can be a major bone of contention in even the most harmonious congregation (if you pardon the pun).   I suspect that many worshippers have little idea of how much time, blood, sweat and tears actually goes into the choosing of hymns, if it's done properly and conscientiously.   Selecting hymns for worship isn't simply a matter of closing one's eyes and sticking a pin in the index of a hymn book, nor of endlessly regurgitating one's own - or indeed one's congregation's -  favourites. It is rather a matter of carefully matching the hymns to the liturgical season, the themes of the set readings for the day (especially the...

The late Queen Elizabeth II once famously referred to the year 1992 as an 'annus horribilis' for the royal family. Whilst the year 2024 may not quite qualify for that title, in our household it's certainly a close contender. At the the beginning of the year, the continuing rapid decline in my Mother's health had culminated in her admission to a specialist Dementia Nursing Home with the inevitable exhausting and frustrating battle to optimise her funding. It was difficult to find opportunities to make the 270 mile round journey to visit Mum, and often when I did so, she would either be in a deep sleep or in a highly confused and distressed state which was very disturbing to witness. Her death in September, though in many ways a blessed release, inevitably came as a painful shock, and she is sorely missed, although, of course, the Mavis that we all knew and loved had not been truly present for almost two years. May she rest in peace. As with any close bereavement, sortin...

My mother died recently.  The death was neither unexpected nor, to be honest, entirely unwelcome, for she had been seriously ill with dementia for the best part of two years.  Dementia is a cruel disease that takes our loved one from us a piece at a time, and I started grieving for her several months ago as I sat by her bedside in the Nursing Home, listening to her unbearable screams, cries of distress and incoherent ramblings, and seeing in her eyes only pain and fear and, often, no vestige of recognition.   When I received the inevitable phone call telling me that Mum had died, my sadness was more than equalled by a sense of relief that her suffering was ended and she was at last at peace. "I've been grieving for my mother for the last year or so," I would say, "because the woman who was my Mum is long gone". But if I imagined that this 'pre-grieving' would somehow diminish the pain of bereavement, I was mistaken.   Grief, as we all know, is a strange ...

I've been involved in a number of discussions in Social Media recently (some of them, it must be said, quite heated) regarding clerical vesture and liturgical practice. Readers won't be at-all surprised to hear that the various forums for these discussions were all of an 'Anglo-Catholic' hue.   In the course of one particular exchange, I was informed that I am (I quote) "A typical 'Boomer'". Well I've been called much worse than that in my time. 'Boomer' I must accept in terms of my vintage, although I have to say 'typical' stings a bit!  I guess, however, that we are all products of our time - and this is as true of clergy and our approach to liturgy as it is of anyone else.  It was in my late teens that I discovered Anglo-Catholicism. At that time in my local parish church, Mass was celebrated 'ad orientem' (eastward facing) at a high altar which stood proudly at the top of several steps in a distant chancel. I loved the s...

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...