St Mary's Parish Church

Last year we received a gift of an altar cloth. An extremely generous gift as our link Parish in the Diocese of Mara, Ikizu, do not have a church. They are currently making their own bricks in order to make a church to worship in. With the long seasons of advent, Christmas and Epiphany, today was the first time we were able to use the cloth. I’m sure you’ll agree that it looks beautiful!

This year, the Lent course will be held on Tuesdays from 23rd February to 23rd March. There are two sessions on each Tuesday, one in the afternoon and one in the evening.

The course is for everyone, no matter how far in your journey as a Christian, you will get something out of the course. The groups are supportive and you will be made most welcome. Sign up on the list in the porch or contact the Vicar.

We will be using a book to support the course. You can buy it in advance from Amazon using the the link below.

It’s a been a few months now since the organ demonstrations and appeal which was so successful. As we said at the time, there was a detailed process which needed following to receive our new organ, so this article is to keep you up-to-date of the progress which has been made so far.

Once the money had been raised, the November PCC meeting officially agreed to the purchase of the organ. We then had to apply for a Faculty. This is like planning permission and is designed to ensure churches in all Dioceses remain in keeping with their design and age and that changes are appropriate. The committee which meets to decide on Faculty applications meets once a month. We completed the application well in time for the December meeting but it was not considered until the January 2010 meeting.

We now have to display a public notice for 28 days, to allow time for people to object to the plans, again a bit like planning permission. The notice will be removed on 12th February and so, assuming there are no objections, a Faculty should be issued shortly afterwards.

The organ is not ‘off-the-shelf’ so will take a number of weeks to build and install. We cannot order it until the Faculty is received.

Once again, thank you for the generosity of everybody who contributed to the purchase of the organ, and for everyone’s patience over the last couple of months. I’m sure the wait will be worth it, and the organ will enhance our worship for years to come.

We will provide further updates in the magazine and web site.

Neal Pinder-Packard, Churchwarden

Apologies for the site outages over the past couple of days which is due to the cold weather. The hamsters which run on their wheels to power the St Mary’s server can’t go as fast when it’s cold. Hopefully things will be back to normal in a few days.

Thank you.

From all at St Mary’s!!

January and early February 2010 calendar is now on the web site and the January 2010 magazine is available in church. These are some photos taken this morning (3rd January) on a beautiful winters day!

Click on each one to enlarge.

Two lovely Christingles this evening with well over 200 people attending. It was magical when the lights go out and the children sing. These pictures don’t really do justice to the atmosphere but you get the jist!

The Church of England have developed a web site www.whywearewaiting.com which contains an Advent Calendar with daily videos and reflections for Advent. It is designed to help people ‘slow down’ in the preparation for Christmas and remember what we are preparing for.

Children’s Activity Day on Saturday 12th December from 10am to 1pm.

St Mary’s Parish Centre. Suitable for children aged 4-11 (accompanied 3 year olds welcome)

Cost: £3 per child

Contact Amanda on (01924) 472375 to book your place.

Update: we raised around £1500!! Well done and thank you to all who helped make they day so successful.

Today, Saturday, 21st November from 10am to 3pm in the Parish Centre.

Lots of things to buy, join in with and eat and drink. Get yourself prepared for Christmas early.

The Lord Mayor of Leeds will judge the organisation noticeboard competition between 1pm and 1.30pm.

Transformational Plans are a Diocese initiative for parishes to consider their present position in the parish and where they want to be over the next five years. The process is very detailed. The PCC had to do audits of all organisations (using SWOT analyses), a community audit which considers the areas the church is in, and we chose to hold a Parish Vision afternoon which people attended to discuss aspects of the parish and church.

The Transformation Plan is in five areas; Prayer and spirituality, Pastoral care, Worship, Evangelism and Community service. The Wakefield Ministry Scheme Core Group members gathered the information from organisation audits and decided upon the areas which came up as the biggest areas to develop.

The areas which make up St Mary’s Transformational Plan are as follows, and progress will be reported in church and the web site:

1. Create a photo board – we want those who visit church to find it easy as possible to get to know people, and be aware of those with whom they wish to speak.

2. Improve communication – we want to be aware of the concerns of our community and to ensure that the community is aware of what St Mary’s offers.

3. Engage with young families and children – we believe that a church where children are not visible and their voices are not heard is poorer for it. We want to foster links, making young families aware of the good news. We aim to have a special focussed weekend to engage with children in Summer 2010.

4. A more flexible building – we want to explore how the church building can be a more effective community space to serve a wider range of people and reflect awareness of differing needs, whilst retaining traditional worship space.

5. Offer community welcome – we want to work with local businesses to make newcomers to our area aware of what this community has on offer, producing a Welcome pack to be given to those who move into the parish.