Next Thursday, on Ascension Day, we will walk around the medieval parish of St Mary the Virgin, marking the old boundaries. We walk through colleges and libraries, crossing alleyways and the High Street, from Brasenose, to the Bodleian, to All Souls and University College, all the way around to Oriel. Nowadays, our parish is much larger, incorporating other boundaries of old parishes, churches and communities. The borders have shifted, swayed by changing circumstances over the centuries. What has stayed unchanged is the role of the parish church of St Mary the Virgin, a beacon of Christian community, uniting the University and colleges surrounding us, students, and townspeople, residents in the parish and those coming from afar.

Oxford is a city filled with traditions and we are very fond of keeping them alive, often at the expense of a conflict between our modern reality and the nostalgic flavours of the past. Our Beating of the Bounds is more than that. It is a symbol of our renewed promise of being inclusive and outward facing. We go out of the church, to meet people, to celebrate friendships, old and new. We are more than buildings and traditions, we are a thriving community and we engage with the world around us. And yes, there is tea and cake.

These days, it would be easy for us to lose hope in this ideal of community, to feel rejected, overwhelmed and out of place. Boundaries are being erected everywhere, cramming identities into stark, limited definitions. 

But next week, we go out of the church to strengthen our community through bonds of friendship and hospitality. Instead of a repetition of a medieval tradition, we should look at it as an act of rebellion. Against isolationism and the concept of the Other. It is our duty to mark and extend the meaning of boundaries to include, not exclude, to welcome, not deport, to love, not to hate. And it has as much to do with an annual procession as it has with small everyday actions. 

Ana-Maria Niculcea