ALL creatures great and small packed into a South Woodford church this morning for a rather unusual blessing ceremony.

Dogs, guinea pigs and even a goldfish took up their places alongside the more regular members of the congregation at Holy Trinity Church in Hermon Hill for the special event held as part of this week's Woodford Festival.

The tradition of blessing pets has a long history in Woodford – a similar day used to be held annually at St Barnabas Church in Woodford Green until the retirement of its canon, Father Alan Cross, earlier this year.

Holy Trinity vicar, Rev Robert Hampson, said he wanted to keep the ritual alive, so had agreed to host the ceremony at his church this year.

He said: “Animals are part of God's wonderful creation and so they should get God's blessing too.

“Father Cross was a rarity, he was an incredible priest and so to follow in his footsteps like this is a great honour.”

It was certainly a ceremony with a difference for Rev Hampson. Amid his sermons on Noah's Ark and the patron saint of animals St Francis of Assisi, dogs yelped and guinea pigs shuffled around in their cage, while one naughty dog even relieved himself against a wall.

Nonetheless, everyone was delighted with how it had gone.

Rev Hampson said afterwards: “I suppose you could describe it as organised chaos, but I'm very pleased.

"I would certainly like to do it again next year.”

Ten-year-old Annie Burrows, who came to the service with her mum and pet goldfish Nemo, said: “I really liked it, it was very fun.”

Adam Watson, 13, who came with his family's guinea pigs Madeline and Matilda and dalmatian Decker, said: “We normally come here most weeks so it was really good to have a service like this which was so different. I think Decker enjoyed it.”

Couple Gary and Allyson Putwain came with their dog Mikey.

Mrs Putwain said: “We'd seen something similar on [TV show] the Vicar of Dibley so we thought we'd join in. It was really good fun.”

Go to woodfordfestival.org.uk for more information about the other events being held across Woodford over the next week.