When Jesus came to Birmingham they simply passed him by
They never hurt a hair of him, they only let him die;
For men had grown more tender, and they would not give him pain,
They only passed him down the street, and left him in the rain.
Studdert Kennedy G.A. (1883-1929), The Unutterable Beauty, 1929,
Geoffrey Studdert Kennedy, was known as ‘Woodbine Willlie’ because of the cigarettes he distributed as an army chaplain in World War 1. From a vicarage childhood in a Leeds slum, he went on to serve on the frontline in France where his ministry was transformed. He came to see Jesus through the horrors faced by the soldiers, many of whom he had to bury. After the war, he identified Jesus in ‘down-and-outs’.
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