This weekend we have an opportunity to look back nine months to the Annunciation on Saturday 25 March. At the time we were all thinking about Mothering Sunday the next day. This December weekend sees the annual celebration at Loreto in Italy where the Virgin Mary’s Nazareth house is now found inside a basilica. The […]

Today is the Immaculate Conception when we focus on the VIrgin Mary who gave birth to Jesus. We are celebrating the conception of the Virgin  Mary by her parents Anne and Joachim. On 8 September in nine months, after the period of a pregnancy,  we celebrate Mary’s  birthday. Mary was immaculate because she was born […]

The National Trust has decided to be consistent by maintaining the name Father Christmas rather than Santa. The Trust has been under fire for issuing the guideline to staff across its many sites.  As body with high standards it is correct. The seasonal figure has been known in England as Father Christmas since Tudor times. […]

Copies of Keeping Advent & Christmas are on sale at Church House Bookshop in Westminster and Southwark Cathedral shop. Or online.

Today in many churches we light the first candle on the Advent wreath. It’s not Christmas yet and the wreath with its four candles reminds us that there are four Sundays before we celebrate Christ’s birth. Vestments today are purple except in Salisbury where they are blue by ancient tradition. Our church service is less […]

Advent starts at dusk as we prepare to light the first Advent candle tomorrow on Advent Sunday. Christmas is several weeks away. Tonight there will be the first Advent carol services, often by candlelight, at London’s St Paul’s Cathedral, Durham Cathedral, Lincoln Cathedral, Salisbury Cathedral and Winchester Cathedral. In Oxford there are carols at Christ […]

Today is Christ the King Sunday although it is better known as Stir Up Sunday. This is thanks to the opening words of the ancient collect for this Sunday which is now heard as the post communion prayer at today’s Anglican Eucharist. Stir up, O Lord, the wills of your faithful people; that they, plenteously bringing forth the […]