This year St Swithun’s Day will be extra special in Winchester where St Peter’s Roman Catholic Church is celebrating its centenary.

In July 1926 The Tablet newspaper reported that the church was opened on ‘the Feast of St Swithun’.

This year the Mayor of Winchester and guests from the cathedral and local churches will gather at St Peter’s for Ecumenical Vespers on the eve of St Swithun at 7pm on Tuesday 14 July.

The Centenary Mass is on St Swithun’s Day Wednesday 15 July at 11am.

The reredos contains, in canopied niches, statues of St Peter and St Swithun.

The preacher at the Opening Mass on St Swithun’s Day 1926 was Cardinal Francis Bourne who told the congregation that St Swithun did more than anyone else in that part of England for the building up of the civil unity of the country by uniting it in one same religious faith.

‘We know little about Swithun’, said the Cardinal. ‘But we know the fundamental humility of his character, that humility which is the foundation of all other virtues ; humility, which is common in legend, probably historical fact, whereby we are told that he willed that his body should be laid where those who entered the church would walk across it, and upon which the drops of rain should continually fall.’

The Cardinal was recalling at the legend that should it rain on St Swithun’s Day it will rain for forty days.

The hundred year old English gothic St Peter’s incorporates a late Norman doorway of 1174 brought from the Hospital of St Mary Magdalen on the Alresford road.

St Peter’s was one of the last churches of architect Frederick Walters who was also responsible for Buckfast Abbey’s church. In London he designed the Church of the Most Precious Blood which some pilgrims visit when walking from St George’s Cathedral to Southwark Cathedral. before setting out for Canterbury.

St Peter’s parish priest, Fr Mark Hogan, is a canon of Winchester Cathedral.

Winchester Cathedral

At Winchester Cathedral there is no Choral First Evensong of St Swithun on Tuesday 14 July although Evening Prayer will be said at 5.30pm.

On St Swithun ‘s Day Wednesday 15 July there is a Choral Eucharist at 5.30pm, ending with prayers at the Shrine, which will be live streamed on the Cathedral website.

At the end of the Friends Evensong on Saturday 18 July there will also be a procession to St Swithun’s Shrine. This year’s preacher is The Very Reverend Christopher Palmer, the newly-installed Dean.

***A popular rhyme claims that if it rains on St Swithun’s Day it will rain for forty days. The weather forecast is showers during evensong at Winchester.

On Sunday the church of St Thomas in Salisbury marked the coming Translation of St Thomas Becket Day early with its annual Rose Petal Sunday.

The church’s patronal festival was kept with a choral Eucharist of St Thomas presided over by new curate Carly Taylor who was celebrating her first Mass following ordination at the nearby cathedral.

At the end there was a procession out of the church into St Thomas’s Square to see Carly Taylor bless the city from the tower before rose petals were thrown from the castellated top to blow across Salisbury.

The Salisbury church was dedicated to St Thomas Becket around 1220, the year of the translation of his body from the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral to the shrine upstairs.

The church’s great attraction is a doom painting dating from 1470 and best seen at this time of the year when light shines from the west window.

The new Rector of St Thomas Salisbury, Canon Jo Haine, will be installed on Our Lady’s Birthday 8 September.

The Translation of St Thomas Becket falls on 7 July marking the moving of the saint’s body from Canterbury Cathedral crypt to the shrine in the main church in 1220. This was always a much better attended occasion than the anniversary of his martyrdom on 29 December.

Monday 6 July

Cathedral: 5.30pm First Evensong of St Thomas Translation.

St Dunstan’s Church: 7.30pm Annual Thomas More Commemoration Service marking his execution day. Lecture by Court of Appeal Judge Sir Mark Warby called ‘More and more: law and the Charterhouse in London’. (St Dunstan’s is the last church on the PW before the West Gate. St Thomas More like St Thomas Becket defied a King Henry.)

Tuesday 7 July Translation

Cathedral: 8am Holy Communion in Trinity Chapel.

Cathedral: 5.30pm Solemn Evensong & procession to Shrine (live stream via Cathedral website).

Cathedral : 7.30pm RC Mass (live stream).

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Canterbury’s Medieval Pageant and Family Trail on Saturday 4 July includes a Medieval Music Programme.

Ancient St John’s church in Medway’s riverside Halling will be keeping its patronal festival with an open evening.

Wednesday 24 June is St John’s Day when the church is opening from 6-9pm offering free refreshments and a chance to have go at bellringing.

The village has long been on the Pilgrims’ Way as it maintained one of the ferries for crossing the River Medway.

Now the main crossing is Peters Bridge at the south end of Halling. This means that whilst once pilgrims might have split up to cross at Cuxton or Snodland now they head for the bridge.

Halling church, dating from the Norman period, has just restored its 13th-century chancel arch paintings featuring the Crown of Thorns, the Washing of the Feet and the Last Supper.

The churchyard’s wall with lancet windows was the west end of the dining hall belonging to the Bishop of Rochester’s palace.

The church is not at present open daily but it is open weekends 10am-12 noon: Saturday during choir practice and Sunday when the service (Holy Communion/Eucharist) is at 11am.

A pilgrim stamp is available by the hymn books on the back pew. When the church is closed a stamp can be obtained at The Five Bells opposite or in the early morning at Jo’s Cafe coffee stall outside at the pub.

Soon there will be handy PW waymarks found along the route.

The plan is to start in places where they are most needed -for example where the PW is not over the same ground as the North Downs Way.

If there are any places where you have briefly felt confused let us know in the replies/comments. We are looking at both the legs out of Southwark and Winchester as well as the shared path from Otford.

The discs have been funded by the Alpkit Foundation.

This is the 75th year for the Bart’s Summer Fair at Otford.

It was first held in Festival of Britain year 1951 when Abram Games designed the village’s guide book cover. He had been responsible for the official Festival emblem, known as the Festival Star.

Otford in Kent is where the Southwark and Winchester arms of the Pilgrims’ Way come together at St Bartholomew’s church by the pond.

Expected stalls at this year’s fair on the green include: books, plants, white elephant, cakes, raffle, coconut shy and ice cream. .

There will be games for children as well as a bouncy castle.

Lunch and teas will be available.

In 1162 St Thomas Becket was consecrated bishop in Canterbury Cathedral on the Sunday after Whitsun having been ordained priest on the previous day.

He subsequently promoted that Sunday as Trinity Sunday annually ahead of its universal adoption under Pope John XXII in 1334.

Pope John also introduced Corpus Christi on the Thursday after Trinity Sunday.

In 1162 Trinity Sunday and Corpus Christi were already being observed on today’s moveable dates in Liege and Benedictine monasteries including Cluny Abbey.

Becket’s shrine was placed in Canterbury Cathedral‘s Trinity Chapel.

Although Winchester Cathedral is dedicated to the Holy Trinity this only dates from Henry VIII’s reign and is in addition to the older and more popular St Peter and St Paul and St Swithun.

Henry Beaufort was made a cardinal 600 years ago this week: May 1426.

If you start your pilgrimage at Southwark Cathedral you see his shield with its red cardinal’s hat in the south transept.

But if you are setting out from Winchester you find his magnificent tomb alongside St Swithun’s shrine. Bishop Beaufort is depicted wearing his hat.

The broad-brimmed and low-crowned red hat, or galero, dates from the 13th century and was originally a pilgrim hat to shade one’s head from the sun.

Henry Beaufort had royal blood but was barred from the line of succession due to having been born out of wedlock. However, he was Chancellor three times and in office when Henry V won at Agincourt.

Also significant was his concurrent appointment as Bishop of Winchester. The Winchester Diocese embraced Southwark and Bishop Beaufort lived for over forty years at Winchester Palace next to Southwark Cathedral -then known as Southwark Priory.

In 1424 Beaufort presided at the wedding of his niece Joan to the King of Scotland at the priory. The wedding breakfast was next door in the bishop’s great hall whose remains can be seen in Clink Street.

But Beaufort was still not a cardinal. The Archbishop of Canterbury was against the Bishop of Winchester having such a status and Henry V had feared that the wealthy and dominant bishop might become a second Becket.

It may not have helped that Beaufort had gone on pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in preference to attending the King’s wedding at Troyes Cathedral in France.

Bishop Henry’s diplomatic letters to Henry V were sometimes composed by his cousin Thomas Chaucer who was constable of an episcopal residence and acted as his diocesan agent. Thomas, who was also close to the King, was son of Geoffrey Chaucer.

The nomination by Pope Martin on 24 May 1426 was early in Henry VI’s reign. But it was not until the following year that Bishop Beaufort received official promotion .

In March 1427 he landed in Calais to be unexpectedly welcomed by a messenger from Rome confirming his elevation. Three weeks later, on the Feast of The Annunciation 25 March, he went to the town’s Church of Notre Dame to be presented at last with the red hat.

***There has been a mistaken belief that Beaufort was present at Joan of Arc’s trial and death. As a result Winchester Cathedral’s St Joan statue looks towards the Beaufort tomb. The bishop also lived at Farnham Castle (on the Pilgrims’ Way) which led to the decision in 1929 to dedicate the town’s Roman Catholic church to St Joan.

A large banner based on Archbishop William Warham’s shield is now hanging in the tower at Oford Palace.

The new attraction is the work of Jacky Gulczynski.

The heraldic features include a goat’s head and three pilgrim shells.

The Archbishop’s shield can be seen on his tomb close to the Martyrdom in Canterbury Cathedral. It is said that he chose to be buried as near as possible to the spot where Thomas Becket was murdered.

Archbishop Warham rebuilt Otford Palace which was so impressive that it was the model for Cardinal Wolsey’s Hampton Court Palace.

Warham crowned Henry VIII and presided at his wedding to Katharine of Aragon. The couple stayed at Otford Palace on their way to Canterbury.

Only a small part of the palace survives today. The tower will be open on May Bank Holiday Monday. Booking is advised.

***Otford in Kent is where the two arms of the Pilgrims’ Way, from Southwark and Winchester, converge.

This weekend’s Sunday is the Third Sunday of Easter which means that St Aphege does not get much of a mention this year. In some years he is overtaken by Easter Week.

But 19 April is St Alphege’s Day.

Alphege was Bishop of Winchester and then Archbishop of Canterbury. He was martyred in Greenwich by Danish invaders in 1012.

Maybe it was the manner of his death which caused his successor Thomas Becket to invoke the name as he was murdered in the next century.

Alphege took the head of St Swithun with him when he was translated to Canterbury.

You can start your pilgrimage to Canterbury by visiting not only the St Swithun shrine site in Winchester Cathedral but also the St Alphege Chapel on the south side.

There you will find a carved stone Canterbury cross. This is based on a 9th-century bronze brooch found in Canterbury and now reproduced both as a souvenir and in stone to be sent to other cathedrals. One is also found at Bec Abbey which was the mother house of Archbishop Theobald of Bec -Thomas Becket’s immediate predecessor.