“On the night of Nov 6th Sr Mary Elizabeth passed to her rest. She had been resident at Heigham Hall since 1886” says the Community Diary...

There are many Sisters within our Community who have used their middle names, rather than their first ones, starting with M. Lavinia and reaching all the way through our history to some of the present Sisters. Some use their first and middle names (Sr Mary Rose and Sr Mary Sophia, for example); Sr Isobel used not her first or her second name, but her third middle name, which is more unusual; Sr Lenora also had three middle names, but used her second name. It is somehow easier

I’m Thomas – the one they call Didymus. You probably know me better as doubting Thomas. But Didymus is the name I was called among the...

Sr Kate was one of those Sisters who dedicated her life to only one of our works; a lay Sister, she is found at the House of Mercy in all...

How often do you throw stones? Metaphorically, if not literally? Stoning was the prescribed punishment for adulterers in the Old...

It’s strange how memory works. I’ve got a distinct memory of an anecdote, but realised the person I thought had told me, couldn’t have done. Which makes me realise I may have miss-remembered it - just to warn you. However, it is very relevant, so here is my memory of someone else’s memory! Margaret first visited All Hallows’ with a friend who was interested in joining the Community; the person who told me was staying at the same time. Later she met one of the Sisters, and ask

They owed their boss millions of pounds: re-paying the debt was proving impossible, but their boss was growing impatient. Summoned before...

Researching the background of our Sisters throws up some interesting comparisons, as well as the occasional tragedy. Take Sr Marianna:...

The bell rang, summoning the Sisters to this special Eucharist. Everything was ready … the girdle and ring waiting to be blessed, cards...

Do you have a ‘bucket’ list? I don’t, but an awareness of the fact that I am going to die one day came nearer last week, when Sr Violet’s...

Many, if not all, of our Sisters grew up in religious households. Some, the daughters of clergy, would obviously have had a strong Christian background; for others, we can only assume. It was with pleasure, then, that I found, via newspaper articles, that Sr Gwendoline’s father, Thomas Bazzard, was sidesman at his local church for a number of years, and was also Honorary Secretary of the Bristol Church Extension Committee, which raised funds to build a church in Bedminster Do

The comments of Jesus to the Pharisees and scribes are well -known. (See, for instance, Mark 7 and Matthew 23).; stated, I suspect, to...

So great a cloud of witnesses surrounds us … not only the Old Testament examples of faith that the writer to the Hebrews mentions in...

Emilie May Margaret Wood was a Londoner, born in Pimlico in 1873; her family seemed to have moved frequently, so by the age of 7 she was...

“It will be a week tomorrow since I heard from you & I have had many anxious thoughts about you” writes M. Lavinia to an unknown Sister, who had decided to leave the Community. Having struggled with difficulties for a while, she had not been open about them with M. Lavinia, who might have been able to help. But as she says “what can I say now?” The letter continues “You have dismissed yourself from the Community – without any spiritual advice - & perhaps without any fear or r

Our Orphanage was founded in the 1860s for girls of the ‘upper classes’; girls of a certain social status, who would normally need to earn their own living, and be educated as such: initially, most of them would have been governesses. In order to educate them to a sufficiently high standard, the Orphanage also took in girls who weren’t orphans, for education. In the census, all these girls are down as ‘pupils’; the orphans paid less, and, if I remember correctly, were provide

I don’t plan on writing a blog about Harry and Meghan, although the latest publicity does give pause for thought. I suspect everybody has...

Our first work started before the Community came into existence. The House of Mercy was founded by a group of Clergy in the Diocese (then...

They’d come a long way, the young couple and their young son. It hadn’t been ideal, travelling with such a young child, but they had to...

St Andrew’s Day is always worthy of a celebration in our Community, commemorating as it does not only the apostle Andrew, but also the...