BBC TV “A Passion for Churches”: John Betjeman 1974
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- Опубликовано: 9 июн 2017
- A "celebration of the C of E" by the Poet Laureate, who looks at several churches in the Diocese of Norwich and considers their architecture, history and worship. First broadcast on BBC TV on 7 December 1974.
He visits the choirs of Wymondham Abbey and St Mary's Church, Martham. 
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This is how a documentary should be. No prattling presenter, no drawing attention to himself, no stupid jokes and no silly giggles. Just a calm, almost hypnotic, voice. Cannot bear to watch modern documentaries.
Diversity hires pretending to care about a subject never makes for compelling viewing
No silly accompanying music either……
As well as no bloody over the top music
What a beautiful, quiet, scholarly and personable documentary. Not a banal piece of BBC dumbed down tripe - by today’s standards. There’s an assumption that the person watching isn’t an idiot.
I wish television were still like this. And yet it’s gone, to be replaced by 99% utter insulting dross.
so true
Intentionally so. people sit around an electronic device and watch their culture dismantled. This television program shows real life, people gathering at church. I wish our lives were still like this. But wishing alone is not enough, do I wait until I am old? Am I too busy to try? Are there even any people still meeting at my local church? it always seems so empty when I pass by as the TV has drawn hundreds of millions of good souls away.
Amen to that!
Everyone has his tastes, but I look at this and say to myself, "This is what television once was," and I wish it still were.
This is what our country and culture once were.
As the saying goes, we get the politicians we deserve. Same goes for TV - and church. Alas! 😥
The English language, when it is spoken by people like Mr Betjeman, is a marvellous language !! Absolutely marvellous !!
An absolute gem of a programme! If only television were still this good...
Sir John Betjeman is an eloquent soul, whose mastery of the English language knows no equal. Poetry that rhymes. Even in the commentary. A love of churches and railways, both fine institutions worthy of support. A person for whom always appreciated the finer things in life. Our loss, is Heaven's gain.
Poetry that rhymes, yes (on the whole), but his autobiography, "Summoned By Bells", was written in blank verse and is still considerable poetry.
he was instrumental in saving some fine old buildings in London. can't remember all the details, but one of his favourite pubs was earmarked for demolition until he and others successfully petitioned for it to be saved
One of the best documentary I have ever seen! I realised I to have a passion for Churches.
Every Brit should visit #Walsingham at least once in their lives..
Expat Sth Londoner watching from Edmonton Canada...Thank you for this ,thank you so much,listening and watching this is like being in a warm bath with a couple of stiff Vodka and Oranges Monday morning after a night shift :0)
Agree with these comments….such a pleasure to see it again after all these years - half a century!
A wonderful look at the past, makes me nostalgic for those days, I love Norfolk and Suffolk and have explored a few of these beautiful buildings. A gem of a programme that has brightened up a somewhat dull and cold Monday.
Beautiful documentary! Thank you and God bless you in Jesus name amen!
What a gem! Could watch documentaries like this for hours.
l agree!!!
Hello from Texas, brothers and sisters 🏴
Truly Truly amazing what our ancestors could build in the medieval era! A very capable and hardy people! ❤️
Hi Texas, you are most welcome, America and England stand together 🇺🇸❤️🏴
I used to watch everything he did. His voice was mesmerising and his programmes were full of interest. There is so much noise these days.
Sublime. Thank you.
From the Golden Age of programme making alongside such gems as Alec Clifton Taylor's Enhlish Country Towns, WG Hoskyns the Landscapes of England and Kenneth Clarks Civilization.
This is Documentary is Gold
Where's the percussion in the background, the yodelling music, the whizz of camera from short scene to short scene? Oh I forgot. This is documentary done with respect to its subject and the viewer's intelligence.
What a wonderful calming man to listen to. Makes me want to look in every church and praise our Englishness ❤️🙏😇🙏❤️🦢🦋🪴
Absolutely agree with you 👍
Delightful!
43:10 Music from Vaughan Williams' Sixth Symphony (fourth movement)
Came here whilst reading Steeple Chasing by Peter Ross, remarkable how much the attitudes and civility Britain have changed in those 50 years
This would have been a very different programme had JB had his way. The original idea was to feature the Diocese of Southwark, but when he approached Bishop Mervyn Stockwood - a friend of his of long standing - the poor old Bishop was in a bad mood and he refused to help. So it was Betjeman called on his friend Billa Harrod who prevailed upon Maurice Wood, a very different figure from Stockwood - and a conservative evangelical nicknamed "Maurice Britvic" (a play on "Norvic") because of his reputation as a teetotaller - to assist and so it happened that Norwich was featured instead. Sad not to have the programme about Southwark but Stockwood and Betjeman, who could both be quite difficult, would have been hell for any production team! A very good programme and the last really with Betjeman at the height of his powers although still with early Parkinson's. Eminently watchable....
Well, who knew? Thanks for that interesting piece of background. Rightly or wrongly, I am not surprised at dear Mervyn, but I am surprised that his friendship with JB didn't overcome his grumpiness.
Wonderful
Ah yes- that chime barrel at the end... I made a film about that. It's at Glandford St. Martin.
thankyou for sharing this 🙂 x
A lost time....weird how quickly things are forgotten...this being 50 or so years ago.
Real reason for television to exist.
Brilliant
Very interesting x
Derelict church at 43:33 is Corpusty; now conserved with an active friend's group turning it slowly around from ruin.
"So that's nice, isn't it" is such a CofE moment.
He was a great English character. You don’t get them these days.
Billy West speaks so pleasantly
Doesn't he just! One of the ones they don't make any more.
At 25:50 he speaks of the comvent as a place to look to when the world seems mad with too much speed and noise...this is 1974, bet hes glad hes not here in 2022, boy howdy 😂
It's interesting to see the life of Church of England parishes at the time, but the overall impression is that the average C of E parish is nothing more than a pleasant social club. There's no sense of a real gravitas in what they are doing, as befitting the worship of God made flesh, crucified and risen. No wonder the membership decline in the C of E has been alarmingly precipitous since the 1960's.
Absolutely true.
And look what sort of a club it is now !
And all the other churches.
Sort of a by-product when few now indulge in Christianity.
But 'social club' was indeed what being in a congregation was and perhaps is, to most. It is a communal, warm, shared experience where social mores are displayed and society put in balance. The greater mystery should not require profundities, it is accepted or it is not. If all the church provides is a general sense of good fellow feeling that is in itself an achievement.
@@ogilkes1 absolutely wrong