Day Off Week 4 2022

 

I had thought of going to the cinema on my day off but that wasn't convenient so we went the previous evening to see Belfast, the new Kenneth Branagh. That's our second recent trip to the cinema as we saw Westside Story the other Saturday. The Branagh film was fine. It's a tiny slice rather than a grand epic but fine, nevertheless. The use of a Van Morrison sound track was a smart move, casting Judy Dench as an Ulster grandmother nit so much. On the day itself, my main project was reading one of my Christmas books - the one on Cromwell's formative years. I am enjoying it as it is well written but Mr Hutton's interests are not the same as mine. Picking up tips about how to write history - useful as I hope to be contributing ti a history book this year. Something else I did, apart from a bit of TV and an important phone call I had to make early in the day, was to have lunch in MacDonalds. I 'm not veggie or vegan but I enjoyed their new McPlant. It tasted good.

10 Famous people with connections to St Giles Cripplegate, London

1. John Milton 1608-1674 Buried there (next to his father)
2. John Foxe 1517-1587 Buried there
3. Oliver Cromwell 1599-1658 Married there (1620)
4. Lancelot Andrewes 1555-1626 Vicar there 1588-1605
5. Sir Martin Frobisher c1539-1594 Buried in the church (though part of him is in Plymouth)
6. John Speed 1552-1629 Buried there (with his wife)
7. Daniel Defoe 1660-1731 Born in the street where the church is and buried nearby
8. John Bunyan 1628-1688 Often preached nearby
9. Ben Jonson 1572-1637 Lived in the parish and two of his sons are buried there
10. William Shakespeare 1564-1616 Lodged here; his rother Edmund had two sons christened there

Obadiah Sedgwick

 

Thomas Athow, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Yesterday evening in London you have heard Shai Lynne in ELT or Tim Keller in All Souls. or you coudl have heard me and others at the Strangers Rest Mission, East London. I spoke on  Puritan and Westminster Divine Obadiah Sedgwick at The Essex Conference. I was preceded by Norman Hopkins giving a presentation on the Huegenots and our host David Min on John Owen (Sedgwick's successor).  In the afternoon several had gone ona  walking tour. I started later then intended so had to be brief but that was probably for the best. The conference is new and probably needs better publicity and some streamlining. The whole thing is a three day event! I'll try adn out my paper online.

10 People who died at the age of 59

It's that time of year again.

1. Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell
2. Preacher and writer John Bunyan
3. Theologian and linguist Desiderius Erasmus
4. Footballer Cyrille Regis
5. Actor Rock Hudson
6. Actor Clark Gable
7. Author Virginia Woolf
8. Author Fedor Dostoevsky
9. Playwright Truman Capote
10. Singer Dusty Springfield

Naseby

My wife and I have been having a few days away this week in King's Lynn and Hereford. En route between the two we saw a sign (in keeping with our trip to the Cromwell museum in Ely) for Naseby and checked it out, as seen here. Naseby is a little village in Northamptonshire. The battle just outside was decisive in the English civil wars or Wars of the three nations. 

Ely

We are away for a few days and en route we noticed we were in Spurgeon country. We couldn't find the place where he was baptised (which we have been shown many years ago) but we saw that we were four miles from Ely and paid a visit. We enjoyed seeing the cathedral and Cromwell's house. The tiny plaque to the martyrs is a reminder of how real Christians tend to be remembered as opposed to the establishment. The music is Bach as played by Jan Akkerman on Focus in Time.

10 Famous portraits

1. Mona Lisa/Leonardo
2. Henry VIII/Holbein
3. Charles I/Van Dyck
4. Oliver Cromwell/Lely
5. Laughing Cavalier/Hals
6. Girl with the pearl earring/Vermeer
7. Blue Boy/Gainsborough
8. Berthe Morisot/Manet
9. Arrangement in grey and black/Whistler (Whistler's mother)
10. Marilyn Monroe/Warhol

(I have excluded self-portraits and paintings that feature more than one sitter) 

Cromwell in the Sun

We know we are living in strange times when The Sun newspaper starts quoting Oliver Cromwell. (Don't ask how I know this please). That's what they have done today. Here is the speech. You can work out why they are quoting it. It was originally given at the dissolution of the Long Parliament in the House of Commons, 20 April 1653. It is high time for me to put an end to your sitting in this place, which you have dishonoured by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice; ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government; ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would like Esau sell your country for a mess of pottage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money.
Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye have no more religion than my horse; gold is your God; which of you have not barter'd your conscience for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth?
Ye sordid prostitutes have you not defil'd this sacred place, and turn'd the Lord's temple into a den of thieves, by your immoral principles and wicked practices? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation; you were deputed here by the people to get grievances redress'd, are yourselves gone! So! Take away that shining bauble there, and lock up the doors. In the name of God, go!