A Requiem Mass will be offered for Fr Kit Cunningham this Wednesday 12 January at 7.30pm at St Etheldreda’s, Ely Place.
Fr Kit, who died just before Christmas in Ireland, was parish priest at Ely Place for 32 years and left it in very good shape both in structure and congregation.
It should be a memorable occasion for all his friends and all who benefitted from his ministry.
See page 62
Journalist Anthony Howard was one of the many eminent people who worshipped at St Mary Abbots in Kensington.
His funeral is at the church this Wednesday 5 January at 12 noon. He was seen in the pews on Sundays until very recently.
His body is going back not just to his own church but to where it all began. When Anthony was born in 1934 his father was a curate at St Mary Abbots.
See page 124.
There are many carol services to choose from in central London this month. Indeed the number seems to grow each year despite our more secular society.
At St Paul’s Covent Garden the acting profession has its own carol service organised by the Actors’ Church Union at 5pm on Wednesday 8 December. This early date allows for those in panto to attend before rehearals start.
The Daily Telegraph carol service at St Bride’s, the journalists’ church, on Thursday 9 December at 12.30pm is open to all.
The main Nine Lessons and Carols service at St Bride’s is on Sunday 19 December at 6.30pm.
There is a candlelit carol Service at St Mary-at-Hill at 6pm on both Monday 13 and Tuesday 14 December.
Southwark Cathedral‘s very popular candle light carol service is on Sunday 19 December at 6.30pm and again on the following Wednesday evening at 6.30pm.
The City’s international population is reflected in several services.
All Hallows-by-the-Tower is staging festival of French carols called Noel Noel at 6pm on Monday 20 January in addition to its traditional service of carols by candlelight on Tuesday 16 December at 6pm.
On Christmas Eve Estonian carols will be sung at 1pm followed by Latvian at 3pm at St Anne & St Agnes Church in Gresham Street, EC2.
The funeral of the Dean of Southwark is to be at the cathedral on Saturday 4 December at 11am. The preacher will be The Dean of St Albans Jeffery John.
Colin Slee’s body is being received at the cathedral on Friday 3 December at 5pm.
The Dean’s death is a shock. People gathered at Southwark Cathedral on hearing the news on Thursday.
He believed in the cathedral having a local role as well as being the mother church of the diocese. The local obituary appears on the London SE1 website.
I don’t always agree with the Prayer Book Society but I am pleased to see that it is making a call for us all to hold off from celebrating Christmas until 24 December.
This year has been the worst I can recall for finding shops and high streets decorated for Christmas in mid November. It is interesting to hear from American visitors that you don’t see lots of decorations in New York until after Thanksgiving which falls on the last Thursday in December.
Next Sunday is Advent Sunday when many churches have Advent carol services.
All Saints Margaret Street, which always keeps the seasons so well, has its Advent Carol Service with the choir at 6pm.
Southwark Cathedral‘s candelit Advent Procession with the theme of the Advent Crown is at 6.30pm.
In West London the lovely St Michael’s Bedford Park has a reflective Advent Carol Service featuring music, scripture and poetry at 6.30pm
I recall enjoying the singing in the round and dark Temple Church one Advent Sunday evening but this year its Service of Carols for Advent is being held as late as St Nicholas Day, Monday 6 December, at 6pm. The reason is that it was to have been on Monday 29 but has been further postponed to the 6th due to a possible Underground strike.
Julian Lloyd Webber is suggesting that a statue of composer John Ireland should be erected in South Kensington.
He was assistant organist at Holy Trinity Sloane Square at later organist and choirmaster at St Luke’s in Chelsea.
The 50th anniversary of his death falls during the Diamond Jubilee celebrations in June 2012 and Julian Lloyd Webber would like the statue to be unveiled around that time.
Julian’s father William was organist at St Cyprian’s Clarence Gate.
Good to see Holy Trinity Portsmouth’s organ featured on BBC South Today.
The claim that Handel played the organ is not far fetched. He may not have been to Gosport but he did play the organ when it was at Cannons in Middlesex.
The mansion has gone leaving Little Stanmore with the splendid St Lawrence Whitchchurch church also known to Handel. The nearest station is Cannons park on the Jubilee Line.
Holy Trinity has an appeal to restore the organ.
See page 56.
St Helen’s Bishopsgate has become the first City Church to have its own app.
Expect this idea to spread.
See page 82.
With the opening next Thursday of the new shopping centre called One New Change behind St Paul’s Cathedral it could be that the City will suddenly be busy at weekends.
Many people think so and already St Vedast in Foster Lane, just opposite the new glass building, has announced that in November it will be open on Saturdays from 10am to 4pm.
This means that the church is now open daily including Sunday when there is a service at 11am.
The church will also be serving refreshments in its hall off the lovely cloister on Lord Mayor’s Show Day Saturday 13 November. Special services soon include St Andrew’s Day on Tuesday 30 November and St Nicholas Day on Monday 6 November at 12.15pm.
Special services in City Churches this month include:
ST ANDREW’S HOLBORN: Abbot Edmund Power of St Paul-without-the-Walls in Rome, the church devoted to Christian unity, is preaching at the Harvest Sung Eucharist on Wednesday 6 October at 6pm.
ST MARY-AT-HILL: The annual Fish Harvest Festival is on Sunday 10 October at 11am. There will be a rededication of the Resurrection Relief now back in the restored west end.
See pages 12 & 64.
