April E-Magazine 2021
In this edition of E-Magazine we have:
Spiritual Reflection for Easter 2021
Memorial Service for Val Macfarlane, 2pm Saturday 17th April
Daily Hope Phoneline
Mission Area
Prayers Please for our Youth Missioner
Maundy Thursday Service
Services Throughout the Parish
Progress of Repair on St Mary's Roof
Zoom Coffee Morning
Morning Prayer in Yate Parish
Communion Service
Compline 8pm
Easter Week Services
For a full printable magazine click the file below
Spiritual Reflection for Easter 2021
Due to publication schedules I am writing this in the midst of Lent on the eve of Mothering Sunday. As a parish we are still working through Rob Bell’s book exploring the nature of suffering in our world and its effects on our lives, which seems a very far cry from the joy of Easter. It has occurred to me that the Mothering Sunday readings always involve the heart-ache of mothers on behalf of their children. My mind has turned towards the pain being suffered by the mothers of Yemen watching helplessly as their children succumb to starvation, and the unimaginable pain that the mother of Sarah Everard must be feeling right now in light of her daughter’s murder by a police officer whom she should have been able to trust. If we want evidence of the reality of suffering in our world, we need look no further.
But I am aware that by the time you read this it will be Easter, not Lent, and we will be celebrating new life and restoration. So why am I referring back to the suffering of Lent? It is because the two are inextricably linked. The resurrection story of Easter Day has no meaning unless it is set in the context of the pain and suffering of Jesus’ crucifixion on Good Friday. The celebration of Easter is important precisely because it is an annual reminder that in God’s purposes suffering is not interminable. It will, ultimately, give way to new life, restored life when God’s purposes for us will win through and when suffering will be a thing of the past. In the penultimate chapter of Revelation, we are told that a loud voice from the throne declares: “Now the dwelling of God is with his people…. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain”. This promise is as true for the mother of Sarah Everard and for the mothers of Yemen as it is for us and it comes about because Jesus was willing to share the experience of human suffering and face a cruel death on our behalf to rescue us from the powers of darkness. This is what we will be celebrating at
Easter and that is why we have a solid reason to be people of hope.
Ian Wallace
Memorial Service for Val Macfarlane
2pm Saturday 17 April
The 23rd March was the anniversary of the first lockdown. Over that year our community lost some dear people, but we were unable to give them the funeral we would have wished. It’s so important to conduct funerals well, for many different reasons. However, when we are unable to say “goodbye” properly it can be hard for us to come to terms with the new situation. It complicates our grieving.
Val died just before lockdown and her funeral was difficult to organize: we had to change the arrangements several times. Eventually, only six people were able to attend and we were not able to bring her ‘home’ to the church where she had worshipped with her young family for 18 years. We have decided to hold a memorial service at the church she loved, incorporating many of the elements she requested for her funeral, on what would have been her 57th birthday. Some of you may wish to make a 30-second video of some story or memory of Val to be played alongside other memories. If you do, please let me know. I won’t be speaking at the service myself because I told my story online last year. If you would like to see that video again let me know and I can send you a link to it.
The service will be livestreamed and available through the yateparish.org.uk website. We are hoping that perhaps 40 people will be able to attend but by booking only. My thanks go to Hywel and his team for the livestreaming, and to Ian Wallace who will be leading the service and who helped me through the multiple changes of the funeral itself.
If you knew Val I hope that you can ‘attend’. If you would like a memorial service for your loved one, we in the Yate parish team can help you. Peace be with you all.
Iain Macfarlane
DailyHope phone line
DailyHope, a free national telephone line, offers music, prayers and reflections as well as full worship services from the Church of England at the end of the phone. A Church of England initiative in partnership with CONNECTIONS at Holy Trinity Claygate, and Faith in Later Life. The line – which is available 24 hours a day on 0800 804 8044 – has been set up particularly with those unable to join online church services during the period of restrictions in mind; to provide comfort and spiritual nourishment to the most isolated in our society.
Mission Area
You could be forgiven for wondering what has happened to the Mission Area that we are part of with the Fromeside Benefice. I realise that we have provided you with very little information over the past year. Indeed, when the Covid pandemic hit I was inclined to see it as a snowdrift for the Mission Area, blocking any way to further progress as each benefice focused on its own survival. However, I couldn’t have been more wrong. While many Mission Area events have been put on hold, there has also been a lot of innovation and new initiatives have been launched, so here is a quick resumé of what has been happening:
· A lot of thinking has been done together on addressing the issues of mental wellbeing that have escalated as a result of the pandemic. Both benefices have launched a listening service, and a significant number of people are being helped through bereavement and other mental health challenges by regular listening support.
This wellbeing support has also been extended into schools. Fromeside already have a well-developed school support network through their paid Schools Worker, and Yate Parish has recently signed a partnership agreement with the charity Transforming Lives for Good that will train five coaches to provide one-to-one support for struggling children in St. Mary’s School.
The combined work among young people has gone from strength to strength, with Rooted and Rooted + happening every week through Lent as the youngsters work through some Bible Study materials together. The number of young people from both benefices participating through Zoom has grown.
We came very close to appointing a Youth & Children’s Minister for the Mission Area last August. Sadly, the chosen candidates accepted a role with another church. However, we are now recruiting again with interviews taking place shortly after Easter.
A new telephone prayer line was launched early in the new Year and is proving to be both popular and helpful for those people who have discovered it. In addition, the lockdown has spawned an increasing number of WhatsApp prayer groups.
There has also been a significant amount of online activity from both benefices including an online Alpha Course, online school assemblies and many online services, and our communication through both websites has been developed with a joint development of the ‘Explore our Faith’ section which is common to the websites of both benefices.
In addition to all this, we have taken the opportunity to restructure the way we share experiences and learning and co-ordinate our work, resulting in a better forum for the exchange of information. As we look towards the future we are also looking forward to integrating the Parish of Coalpit Heath into the Mission Area: discussions have already begun with their PCC to make this possible.
Ian Wallace
Prayers please for our Youth Missioner
The Yate and Fromeside Mission Area is currently advertising for a Youth Missioner to lead our youth and families work in our communities. This role is key to our vision for the future of the Mission Area and we would welcome your prayers for the right candidate to come forward. The closing date for
applications is 28 March with interviews on 16 April.
Maundy Thursday Service
Online at 7.30pm Thursday 1 April
Maundy Thursday is the day we remember Jesus alone and abandoned in the Garden of Gethsemane as he wrestled in darkness before the last hours of his journey to the cross on Good Friday. In the Parish of Yate we usually mark this with an Agapé meal followed by the ‘Stripping of the Altar’ (a short service when the church building is stripped of its decorations before the starkness of Good Friday). Obviously, things are a little different this year, however, we can still join together for fellowship online and then the ‘stripping of the altar’ with online streaming from St Nicholas via our website. I do hope you can join in as we ‘accompany Jesus in his last day towards the cross’.
Iain Macfarlane
Services throughout the Parish
Sunday 4 April
Easter Day—White/Gold
Acts 10:34-43 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 Mark 16:1-8
To book a place to attend an Easter Service at either St Nix or St Mary’s please call Pam on 07708 159409 or email — parishoffice@yateparish.org.uk The Church Wardens will then arrange the seating in a suitable socially distanced manner. Many thanks.
St Mary
8.15am Communion
10.00am All Age Communion - live stream
6.30pm 630Praise—follow link on website
St Nix
10.30am Communion
St James
10.30am Communion
St Peter
6.30am Easter Sunrise Communion
Please call Pam on 07708 159409 to book a place for this Service
Sunday 11 April
Easter 2—White
Acts 4:32-35 1 John 1:1-2.2 John 20:19-31
St Mary
8.15am Communion
10.00am Communion - live stream
6.30pm 630Praise—follow link on website
St Nix
10.00am Morning Worship
St James
10.30am Communion
St Peter
6.30pm Communion
(Book of Common Prayer)
Sunday 18 April
Easter 3—White
Acts 3:12-19 1 John 3:1-7 Luke 24:36b-48
St Mary
8.15am Communion
10.00am Morning Worship - live stream
6.30pm 630Praise—follow link on website
St Nix
10.30am Communion
St James
10.30am Communion
St Peter
6.30pm Evening Worship
(Book of Common Prayer)
Sunday 25 April
Easter 4—White
Acts 4:5-12 1 John 3:16-24 John 10:11-18
St Mary
8.15am Communion
10.00am Communion - live stream
6.30pm 630Praise—follow link on website
St Nix
10.30am Communion
St James
10.30am Morning Worship
St Peter
6.30pm Communion
(Book of Common Prayer)
Progress on the repair of St. Mary’s roof
I have been overwhelmed by the generosity of people from across the Parish to our appeal for support in carrying out
urgent repairs to the roof of St. Mary’s Church. To date the sum of £9,215.75 has been donated by members of the Parish and when Gift Aid is reclaimed the total will rise to £10,464.60. Amazing! In addition, we have succeeded in securing two other grants from the Gloucester Historic Churches Trust and the All Churches Trust to complement the grant from Historic England. That is a major achievement and means that we can fund this first phase of the roof repair.
If you have been past St. Mary’s recently you will know that it is completely shrouded in a vast scaffolding structure that gives it a false roof to protect while the tiles are stripped off. The interior has also been ‘wrapped up’ to protect it from any falling debris. Regrettably during the construction of the scaffolding some vandals gained access to the roof area before the security shuttering was complete and the alarm was installed. They tried to strip some of the lead flashing and the lightning conductor cables. Most of the damage is in the area being repaired so the loss is minimal but the contractors had to strengthen the Security, which is why the building looks a little like a fortress at present.
The process of stripping the old tiles is now complete and by the time you read this the inspection of all the timbers will have been done and the new felt covering will have been installed. This means that the contractors are willing to allow us back into the church for our Easter services. It may be that the north aisle will still have to be cordoned off, but we will be able to use the nave and chancel area. The retiling of the north aisle will happen either side of Easter with the work being finished in late Spring.
This is, however, only phase 1 of the project. There are other parts of the roof that need repair in the near future that we don’t yet have funding for. A grant application is being made to the Heritage Lottery Fund for the next phase and we have now launched a Sponsor a Tile appeal through which we hope many of the residents of Yate will wish to provide support to the repair work by ‘purchasing’ a tile.
Ian Wallace
Zoom Coffee Morning
All Welcome—Wednesdays at 10am
Get yourself a cup of coffee and join us at 10 every Wednesday morning.
The zoom link is the same every week (bookmark it):
Meeting ID: 810 1932 8072
Passcode: 482269
Morning prayer in Yate Parish
Do you find prayer a little difficult? Would you like some inspiration? Go to the Yate Parish Facebook page to join in Morning Prayer led by our ministry team. You can watch live at 7.30am Monday to Saturday, or watch at any time later in the day. Many people have found it a great start to their day.
Communion Service
Each Thursday 9.45am at St Nix (including Maundy Thursday)
Compline @8pm
Before the lockdown happened, we had recorded the saying of Compline. We ask that each evening at 8pm we light a candle in our window and pray together for our nation using the words of the Compline service - it takes just over 5 minutes.
Visit the parish website and click on the recordings to listen; you will find the words of the service there too.
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