‘Commission For Mission’ is an exciting development in the world of sacred art in East London. As Jonathan Evens’ site at http://commissionformission.blogspot.com/ shows, ‘Commission For Mission’ is already showcasing some first-rate work.
If you can get to St Barnabas’ Church, Walthamstow, this weekend, you have a chance to see Henry Shelton’s Stations of the Cross. Well worth seeing – as is the interior of this fascinating church.
For reasons going back to the Vikings and King Arthur, the River Lea has long been the boundary between London’s East End and what is now the greater part of East London but used to be in Essex – the area that Dickens labelled ‘London Over the Border’.
In Ecclesiastical terms, this area, East of the Lea and largely inside the M25, is the Archdeaconry of West Ham. It contains over 1.25 million people spread across five London boroughs, and it is the place to be right now. It’s the home of the 2012 Olympics, West Ham United, Joan Littlewood’s Theatre Royal Stratford, the bottom half of Epping Forest, street markets galore, and the most culturally-diverse population in the UK.
There are over 120 Anglican churches in the West Ham Archdeaconry – churches of all traditions, many of them thriving and growing amidst the opportunities and challenges of urban life in the 21st century. With the Archdeaconry of Harlow, we are served and led by the Bishop of Barking (thus ‘half Barking’) as well as forming part of the Diocese of Chelmsford.
This blog is my attempt to reflect the life of the people of this area. Who knows how it will develop? We’ll see.
Elwin Cockett
Archdeacon of West Ham
Views from the flats... 