The Anglican Church in St Petersburg

For more on the founding of St Andrew's, see the church's website for a history of the English Church in Moscow, written in 1999 by Jean Coussmaker, wife of Canon Chad Coussmaker, the first permanent post-1917 Moscow chaplain (serving 1993-99): moscowanglican.org/a-history-of-st-andrews/

Our sister church in Moscow, St Andrew's, is today marking the 140th anniversary of the 1st service in its new [current] building with a Victorian-themed tea party from 2pm (and historic "tower tours" from 1pm), with combined tickets costing 1500 ₽

See: t.me/standrewsmoscow

Today is The Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity

If you are in St Petersburg, please join us for our regular 4pm Sunday service in the ground-floor chapel of the Petrikirche, 22-24 Nevsky Prospekt

See: achurchnearyou.com/church/8482/

Peabody's estate in Westminster on Abbey Orchard St was built in 1882 under a slum clearance scheme

In medieval times, the orchard of Westminster Abbey had stood there but by the late C19th, the area was 'an unhealthy maze of narrow alleys & courtyards'

peabodygroup.org.uk/about-us/our-history/

Charles Booth's 1889 map of Westminster shows the streets coloured according to the relative wealth/position of those living there: yellow = wealthy, black/blue = the poorest (& Peabody Trust estate in pink = mixed - some comfortable, others poor)

Source: umich.edu/~risotto/

And when Revd Wilson Carlisle (1847-1942) founded Church Army in 1882, its social action initiatives were also 'initially focused on the slums of Westminister – one of the most deprived and poverty-stricken spots in London'
churcharmy.org/who-we-are/our-history/

An illustration by Gustave Dore from 'Dore's London' (1872), depicting the slum area known as Devil's Acre in Westminster Image: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The church was built in the notorious slum area behind Westminster Abbey dubbed 'The Devil's Acre' by Charles Dickens

The 1851 opening of Victoria Street kickstarted the slum clearance process which continued in 1860s-80s with the building of social housing estates

Gustave Doré (1872)

The church was burnt down by an arsonist in 1977 and was reconstructed to a reduced plan and rededicated in 1984

All that remains today of the original church is from the crossing of the former church to the former altar, together with the beautiful Lady Chapel upstairs

A number of churches are dedicated to the Apostle Matthew including St Matthew's Church, Westminster

Consecrated in 1851, it was designed by local architect Sir George Gilbert Scott as part of a programme of church building in what was a run-down area of slums

Photos: John Salmon, CC BY-SA 2.0

Section of the Victorian painted ceiling in the old English Church of St Mary & All Saints at 56 English Embankment in St Petersburg, showing the symbol of Matthew (Angel) as well as those of the other Evangelists: Mark (Lion), John (Eagle) and Luke (Ox)

www.pinterest.com/anglicanspb/

'The Calling of Saint Matthew' (1600), a painting by Caravaggio, which is in the Contarelli Chapel of San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome Caravaggio shows the moment when Jesus asks Matthew, an avaricious tax collector, to renounce his worldly possessions and follow Him (Matthew 9:9) For a description of the painting, which hangs in the Contarelli Chapel alongside two other paintings of Matthew by Caravaggio, The Martyrdom of Saint Matthew (painted around the same time as the Calling) and The Inspiration of Saint Matthew (1602), see: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Calling_of_St_Matthew Image: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

'The Calling of Saint Matthew' (1600), by Caravaggio, in the Contarelli Chapel of San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome

Caravaggio shows the moment when Jesus asks Matthew, an avaricious tax collector, to renounce his worldly possessions and follow Him (Matthew 9:9)

Public Domain

The Collect for Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist

Today the Church of England celebrates Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist

📷 Window (Heaton, Butler & Bayne, 1870s) in the old English Church of St Mary & All Saints at 56 English Embankment, St Petersburg; Matthew is here depicted holding a money-box, in reference to his former life as a tax collector

Photo of people of the Melanesian island of Nukapu standing near the memorial cross to Bishop Patteson which had been erected in 1885 close to the hut where the bishop had met his death Taken from the book, "Bishop Patteson, Pioneer and Martyr" (1930), anglicanhistory.org/oceania/patteson/drummond1930/

Memorial cross (erected 1885, near to where he died) on the Melanesian island of Nukapu, with the inscription:

IN MEMORY OF JOHN COLERIDGE PATTESON, D.D. MISSIONARY BISHOP, Whose life was here taken by men, for whose sake he would willingly have given it. Sept. 20, 1871

Photo: bit.ly/2cTXk5H

The listing for John Coleridge Patteson in An Episcopal Dictionary of the Church (2000)

episcopalchurch.org/glossary/patteson-john-coleridge/

The Collect for John Coleridge Patteson, First Anglican Bishop of Melanesia, and his Companions, Martyrs, 1871

Today the Church of England celebrates John Coleridge Patteson, First Anglican Bishop of Melanesia, and his Companions, Martyrs, 1871

Image: Carte-de-visite (1860s-70s), © National Portrait Gallery, London (CC BY-NC-ND)

The listing for Theodore of Tarsus, who died in Canterbury #OnThisDay in 690 AD, taken from An Episcopal Dictionary of the Church (2000)

episcopalchurch.org/glossary/theodore-of-tarsus/

The Collect for Theodore of Tarsus, Archbishop of Canterbury, 690

(Taken from the New English Missal for Common Worship, 2010)

Today the Church of England commemorates Theodore of Tarsus, Archbishop of Canterbury, 690

Image: Window in the Chapter House of Canterbury Cathedral. Photo by Lawrence OP, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0, via flickr

For more on Heinrich Bullinger (1504-1575), see his page on the Musée virtuel du protestantisme: museeprotestant.org/en/notice/heinrich-bullinger-1504-1575/

#OTD: Hildegard of Bingen dies; as does Heinrich Bullinger, Swiss theologian & Zwingli's successor in Zurich, from where he helped spread the Reform Movement throughout Europe, esp. influencing the Puritans; & Trimountain, named after the highest local hill, is renamed Boston (from "Botolph's town")

Caritas abundat, a Psalm antiphon for the Holy Spirit by Hildegard of Bingen

Image/text via tinyurl.com/27jdogu7, music video via tinyurl.com/285ufvn4

The listing for "Hildegard, Abbess of Bingen" in An Episcopal Dictionary of the Church (2000)
episcopalchurch.org/glossary/hildegard-abbess-of-bingen/

The Collect for Hildegard, Abbess of Bingen, Visionary, 1179

Today the Church of England celebrates Hildegard, Abbess of Bingen, Visionary, 1179

Image: Hildegard window (1950) in the Pfarr- und Wallfahrtskirche Sankt Nikolaus, Koblenz. Photo by Thomas Hummel, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

For more on the life and poetry of Anne Bradstreet (b. Northampton, 1612; d. North Andover, Massachusetts, #OnThisDay in 1672), see: poetryfoundation.org/poets/anne-bradstreet

#OTD: The 3rd Council of Constantinople, convened by Byzantine Emperor Constantine IV to try to settle differences between the Eastern & Western Church, closes; Tomás de Torquemada, Castilian Dominican friar, royal confessor & 1st Grand Inquisitor, dies; as does Anne Bradstreet, Puritan poet