{"id":18757,"date":"2026-04-02T08:58:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T07:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/?p=18757"},"modified":"2026-03-30T11:59:50","modified_gmt":"2026-03-30T10:59:50","slug":"good-friday-2010","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/?p=18757","title":{"rendered":"Good Friday 2010"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Good Friday<\/strong> 2nd April 2010 I went to London first for the annual procession on Victoria Street in Westminster and later for the first Passion Play to be produced in Trafalgar Square since 1965.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Crucifixion on Victoria St<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Westminster<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A man carrying the cross leaves Westminster Methodist Central Hall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There are three major Christian churches on or around Victoria Street in Westminster, Methodist Central Hall, the Catholic Westminster Cathedral and Anglican Westminster Abbey, and for some years there has been a procession, ‘The Crucifixion on Victoria Street’ up and down the street between them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The procession included clergy and people from other churches and organisations in the area. It was led by a large wooden cross carried by men from The Passage, a project for homeless people. Following this were around 500 people including members of The Passage, children from St Vincent de Paul Primary School, the Lord Mayor of Westminster, Councillor Duncan Sandys as well as Westminster clergy and members of various congregations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It began outside Methodist Central Hall before making its way up Victoria St to Westminster Cathedral where on the plaza outside the cathedral it was met by the Most Reverend Vincent Nicholls, Archbishop of Westminster. He became the third Archbishop of Westminster I’ve photographed on these steps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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After hymns, a bible reading by The Reverend Philip Chester, Vicar of St Matthew’s Westminster, a mediation by the Reverend Martin Turner from Methodist Central Hall, a prayer by Mr Mick Clarke, CEO of The Passage and a reflection on peace by the Archbishop the procession went back along Victoria Street for a service in Westminster Abbey, but I left them to get out of the rain then falling steadily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Crucifixion on Victoria St<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Passion of Jesus<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Trafalgar Square<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Jesus’s body taken down from the cross<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Trafalgar Square was packed for the The Passion of Jesus, the first Passion Play there since 1965, performed by around 150 devout Christians and a donkey by a group based on the Wintershall estate in Surrey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Property developer Peter and Ann Hutley, owners of the 1,000 acre estate and retreat centre began staging religious events after a visit to the Catholic pilgrimage centre of Medjugorje in Bosnia and Herzegovina, beginning with a Nativity event in a barn they had just bought in 1989.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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They first staged ‘The Life of Christ’ on their estate in 1999, a five or six hour open air production around a lake in the grounds, with over a hundred actors as well as camels and a flock of sheep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The ‘Passion of Jesus’ in Trafalgar Square was on a slightly reduced scale, but still very impressive and colourful, and a dramatic rendition of the traditional story from the four gospels, with some touches of added spectacle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As I reported, “Although the flogging of Jesus occurred off-stage and the sound effects were rather unconvincing, the crucifixion that followed was a pretty gory sight.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As in the Gospel narrative, the Jewish hierarchy of the time was typecast as villains, perhaps too typecast, and the resurrection too presents some dramatic problems<\/em>.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Wintershall stages performances elsewhere – and I photographed their Staines Passion<\/a> at Easter in 2014. There is another Passion of Jesus<\/a> in Trafalgar Square tomorrow, Good Friday 3rd April 2026, with two free performances at 12 noon and 3:15 pm open to all. You can also watch it on Youtube if you can’t get there in person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many more pictures from 2010 on My London Diary: The Passion of Jesus<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Flickr<\/a> – Facebook<\/a> – My London Diary<\/a> – Hull Photos<\/a> – Lea Valley<\/a> – Paris<\/a>
London’s Industrial Heritage<\/a> – London Photos<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

All photographs on this page are copyright \u00a9 Peter Marshall.
Contact me to buy prints or licence to reproduce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Good Friday 2nd April 2010 I went to London first for the annual procession on Victoria Street in Westminster and later for the first Passion Play to be produced in Trafalgar Square since 1965. Crucifixion on Victoria St Westminster There are three major Christian churches on or around Victoria Street in Westminster, Methodist Central Hall, … Continue reading Good Friday 2010<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,3],"tags":[1916,17330,23900,8824,23897,23898,23904,3865,23906,1493,17,1343,6238,23907,7579,83,23901,23902,23905,23896,23899,737,5736,23903],"class_list":["post-18757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-londonphotos","category-my-own-work","tag-1916","tag-annual-procession","tag-archbishop-of-westminster","tag-christians","tag-crucifixion-on-victoria-st","tag-crucifixion-on-victoria-street","tag-four-gospels","tag-good-friday","tag-gospel-narrative","tag-homeless","tag-london","tag-london-photos","tag-methodist-central-hall","tag-passion-of-jesus","tag-passion-play","tag-peter-marshall","tag-the-passage","tag-the-passion-of-jesus","tag-traditional-story","tag-victoria-street","tag-vincent-nicholls","tag-westminster-abbey","tag-westminster-cathedral","tag-wintershall-estate"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18757","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18757"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18757\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18758,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18757\/revisions\/18758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}