Pressure

A lovely church

Saint Mary of the Angels

Beautiful and welcoming

Gothic gold for God

Here they left their baby

Wrapped up on the steps

Till it was found

And warmly brought inside

 

A loving Irish couple

Lost in London town

In fear to have their baby born so soon

Public scandal local shame

They could not stay at home

Until the child was born

And left forlorn

 

What ruination

What religion this

That pressurises people to conform

When all they did was love each other

And form a loving bond

And from that love a lovely child was born

 

 A lifetime in denial

For people simply good

Their first born left

They could go back home

To a land of saints and scholars

God forgive us all

May present days for other days

Atone

 

Brian Fahy

25 May 2022

 

+ The child left on church steps, in 1965, is now reunited with his family. This story was told in Long Lost Family – Born Without a Trace.

 

+ St Mary of the Angels church in Bayswater, London, was designed by the architect John Francis Bentley, who also designed Westminster Cathedral, and who built the monastery of the Redemptorists in Clapham. The Church of St Mary, in Clapham was designed by William Wardell, and it is clear that Bentley was greatly influenced by this in his design for the church in Bayswater.

 

+ We have often built beautiful churches in which people can find consolation, and yet we have sometimes preached a harsh gospel that causes good people to live in fear of condemnation.