October 2026

In September we kept harvest festivals in both Clyro and Llanigon. In advance of this celebration within the calendar I remind myself of the Priest who conceived of the harvest thanksgiving as something to be kept in the Church. He was known as ‘Parson Hawker’ to his flock in the parish of Morwenstow in Cornwall and by all accounts was an eccentric. One only needs to spend some time with the Saints, or read a little bit of Church history, to see that Christianity has drawn in quite a number who would be considered eccentric. This does not sit easily with the reported sense that the Anglican Church has drifted toward corporate managerial ways of being. Compliance trumps character. Certainly, my limited experience of the HTB network (evangelical churches within the Anglican denomination linked to Holy Trinity, Brompton) is of uniform smiles, modes of speech and dress. It should be noted that the previous Archbishop of Canterbury was a congregant at Holy Trinity, Brompton.

The Church of England has the following in one of its Eucharistic prayers: ‘fashioned us in thine own image.’ The Roman Catholic Church has something similar in one of their Eucharistic prayers: ‘You formed man in your own image and entrusted the whole world to his care.’ Both put into our prayers the doctrine that we, you and I, are made in the image of God. And we do hold to the notion of Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi which means the law of what is prayed is the law of what is believed. All of us, with our characters and foibles, are made in the image of God. God delights in us having the confidence to be the people that we are, warts and all, and living out our distinctive calls. His choice of people, in the Holy Scriptures and in the Saints, suggest that compliance and competency audits are not His way. To be comfortable and confident in oneself is not to seek to be eccentric, rather it is to be simply who we are; seeking to be eccentric is performance.

As God delights in us being the people who He has made in His image, so we do as Churches in this lovely part of the world. It therefore seems bizarre that there is this slide, led by managers and dull puritans, to managed conformity. We need to encourage one another in being comfortable the people we were made so that the Church continues to be blessed with Parson Hawker’s and S. Francis’.

Please God, let it be that the Please God, let it be that the Blessed Saints, most particularly Our Lady, continue to pray for us!