One of the pleasures of a London summer are the parties. A green swathe of lawn, a glass of ice-cool prosecco, and catching up with people one’s not seen in a while. Perfect.
Last week at one such gathering I bumped into the poet Michael Glover. He has been researching a book on 101 little-known places in London where you can find great art. Top of my suggestion list was the church of Notre Dame de France, or the French Church, tucked away behind Leicester Square, where you can find Jean Cocteau’s stunning murals of the Annunciation, Crucifixion and Assumption. Cocteau was commissioned as part of the rebuilding of the church, damaged by bombs during World War II.
The church is a place of sanctuary for those escaping the West End crowds, but it is also sanctuary for the homeless, often people who are refugees, who rest there away from the chill in winter and out of the heat in summer.
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As well as Notre Dame, other Catholic organisations helping the homeless include the Passage, Providence Row and the Cardinal Hume Centre. Last week, friends, staff and volunteers of the Cardinal Hume Centre attended Mass at the Sacred Heart Church in Victoria, just around the corner from the centre, to mark the anniversary of the death of Basil Hume, and to say farewell to Cathy Corcoran, retiring after 15 years as the centre’s chief executive. These organisations are clearly as much needed now as they were in Cardinal Hume’s day, when he opened Westminster Cathedral’s hall to the homeless, after he was shocked to find them sleeping in the nearby piazza.
On my way back from the Mass, I walked past the Cathedral, where people were tucked into sleeping bags on the steps. Plus ça change. At least nobody officious was telling them to clear off, as happens so often to the homeless.
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The importance of service in the life of the Church is something I’m going to be talking about this week when I address clergy participating in what’s called a consultation at St George’s House, at Windsor Castle. I’ve been asked to speak about the state of the Church to those attending the 10-day event. As a journalist, I like some facts and figures when I give a talk, but the statistics about church attendance are pretty depressing.
One Anglican clergyman due to attend is Alan Everett, vicar of the neighbourhood that includes Grenfell Tower. I’ve been reading his book, After the Fire. His response, like that of the other churches, mosques and temples in the neighbourhood, when they were alerted to the fire in the middle of the night, was to open the doors and turn on the lights.
The public inquiry into Grenfell in recent weeks has exposed the failure of government, central and local, in the aftermath of the fire, but religious groups were not only active straightaway, but were also trusted because they had always been committed to serving the neighbourhood. Their response, like the work of the homelessness organisations, tells me far more about the state of the churches than the statistics.
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St George’s House is part of the college of St George at Windsor Castle, which also includes St George’s Chapel, where the recent Royal Wedding took place.
The chapel is home to the Order of the Garter, the ancient chivalric order dedicated to St George.
It’s not surprising that so much at Windsor, ancient home of the monarch, should be dedicated to England’s patron saint, but I’m surprised that George, a Roman soldier of Greek origin, is England’s patron. My money would be on St Alban, England’s first martyr.
Every year the Cathedral of St Alban holds a pilgrimage on the Saturday closest to his feast day, with a procession through the city that bears his name, a Communion service and evensong. The original Benedictine monastery on the Anglican cathedral’s site was dissolved during the Reformation. The shrine that was destroyed then has been revived, complete with a relic of Alban brought back from Germany where it was taken during the Reformation.
I joined the pilgrims placing roses round Alban’s shrine. That monster, Henry VIII, must be turning in his grave in St George’s Chapel. Medieval Catholic devotion is back.
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I’m off to Cornwall in a few days’ time. Last year when I was there I found a plaque on a bridge near Penzance commemorating pilgrims who would pass by, en route from Ireland to Santiago de Compostela.
Instead of sailing all the way round the Cornish peninsula and risking shipwreck on the rocks, they would cut the journey by travelling six miles across land. Once they reached the southern Cornish coast they would set off by boat again to Spain. They might pray to Our Lady, Star of the Sea, for safe passage, but they were also a canny, pragmatic lot, those medieval pilgrims.
Catherine Pepinster is a former editor of the Tablet and the author of The Keys and the Kingdom – the British and the Papacy (Bloomsbury/ T&T Clark)
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