John Groser

St John Beverley Groser MC (23 June 1890 – 19 March 1966), best known as Father John Groser, was a Church of England clergyman and prominent Christian socialist. Hannen Swaffer described him as "the best-known priest in the East End", and Kenneth Leech, writing in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, viewed him as "one of the most significant Christian socialist figures in twentieth-century Britain".^[1]

Biography

Groser was born in Beverley, Western Australia, to Phoebe (née Wainwright) and Thomas Eaton Groser. He was sent to England to be educated, attending Ellesmere College, Shropshire, before going on to study theology at the College of the Resurrection. Groser's first appointment after being ordained was as a curate in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. He briefly served as a chaplain in France during World War I, during which he won the Military Cross, and then in 1917 was posted to Cornwall. In 1922, Groser was appointed curate of St Michael's, Poplar, in London's East End. He was dismissed in 1927 due to his left-wing activism, but his licence to officiate was restored the following year when he was made priest-in-charge of Christ Church, Watney Street, Stepney. That church was destroyed in the Blitz in 1941, and Groser and his congregation transferred to St George in the East. He remained there until 1948, when he took up an appointment as warden of the Royal Foundation of St. Katharine. Groser died at the Churchill Hospital, Oxford, in 1966, aged 75. He had married Mary Agnes Bucknall in 1917, with whom he had four children.^[1]

Outside of his priestly duties, Groser played Thomas Becket in the 1951 film Murder in the Cathedral, based on a play by T. S. Elliot. Writing for The New York Times, reviewer Bosley Crowther praised his acting as "grandly dignified and benign".^[2]

Views

Groser was an Anglo-Catholic. Both his secondary school and divinity school were high-church institutions, and he was also influenced by the "Catholic Crusade" movement of Conrad Noel, a fellow Christian socialist. Groser advocated a return to the festivals, music, dancing, and processions of the medieval English church, and implemented that to some extent with his own congregations. He believed Christianity (and only Christianity) could established a "new social ethic", and would produce radical social change. A Christian socialist, Groser was influenced by Marxism to some extent, particular its view of class struggle. He was prominent in the anti-fascist movements of the 1930s.^[1]

See also

• List of Christian socialists

References