Blog
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Celebrating Harvest and Christmas with Robert Hawker
I wrote this as we were preparing for our annual harvest festival at Pip and Jim’s church in Ilfracombe. In medieval England Lammas Day (1st August) was probably recognised as a thanksgiving for the first fruits of the harvest,...
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Blesséd be St Enodoc
A treasured memory of our holiday in Cornwall this summer was to stroll through St Enodoc Golf course, at Trebetherick, and revisit St. Enodoc Church. Situated in sand dunes east of Daymer Bay and Brea Hill on the River...
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Dudley-Smith: How is it between you and Jesus Christ?
On 15th August 2021, the set Common Worship Gospel reading was Luke 1:46-55, the Magnificat. This reminded me of this story: in May 1961, a 34 year-old man living in Blackheath, London, was sent a review copy of the...
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Exeter’s cleverest bishop?
The longest serving Bishop of Exeter in the twentieth century was Robert Mortimer. When I arrived at the preparatory department of Exeter School in 1952, he had already been Bishop for three years and when I left the main school...
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From Bishop Leofric to Bishop Jackie
When Bishop Jackie Searle came to Pip and Jim’s church in Ilfracombe on 13 June, preached, and celebrated communion with us, she was too modest to remind us that there was a Bishop of Crediton nearly 150 years before...
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Remembering an inspirational family
The Wesleys were a remarkable family and dynasty. In 1741 John Wesley began his ministry of travelling and preaching that took him throughout Britain, covering an estimated 250,000 miles, mainly on horseback. He was not always well received, frequently facing...
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Prince Philip: master of the barbecue
Prince Harry paid tribute to his grandpa, the Duke of Edinburgh, as ‘master of the barbecue’. The Rev John Stott, who was Chaplain to the Queen, told me this story. In January 1983 the Queen invited him to preach at...
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Your essential guide to acronyms in Line of Duty
AC-12 Anti-corruption unit 12, where our heroes work to root out bent coppers within Central Police force. We’ve also encountered AC-3 and AC-9 in previous series. AFO Authorised firearms officer. A police officer who has been selected, trained and accredited by their...
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Brussels needs to shake off its remaining ill-will
When Lord Frost voted to leave the EU in 2016, he did so because he thought decisions about our country should be made by the people of this country. Writing in the Sunday Telegraph on 7 March 2021 he...
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The Devon men who shaped the infant Church of England
It is remarkable that two of the thinkers who shaped Anglicanism in the first 50 years of its existence were both Devon men, and one of them was actually born in our group of churches – John Jewel who...
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