Lee Abbey

I have just had a wonderful few days away teaching on a Writers’ Conference at Lee Abbey, down in the wilds of north Devon. I’d love to tell you this is a new thing, but too many people recognised me from the last time I was there. Glorious sunshine, unbroken blue skies. (I was teaching fiction.)

You can't tell from the pics, but there were a lot of other people there as well. Maybe they were all inside at the time, eating cake and preserving their complexions from the fierce sun. Lee Abbey is an International Christian Community, and during a communion service we were all invited to say the Lord’s Prayer in our own native tongue. We were only one line in when I realised I was speaking a minority language: Cathedral. ‘Our Father, which art in heaven…’ I was the only person in the room saying ‘forgive us our trespasses’. Maybe the day will come when the language of the Book of Common Prayer goes the way of Cornish.