Category: Priest’s Monthly Letters

From the Parish Priest

Dear friends,

By the time you are reading this, you will be in the middle of your family and community Christmas celebrations. I do hope that they are all going to plan and are suitably joyful!

But this is the January Edition, and so it is about January that I should write. We know that as soon as Christmas Day is over, the High Street, or now perhaps I would be better saying the Online Shopping world, quickly removes all vestiges of Christmas, whether they be decorations or canned music, and move on.

What many people forget is that Christmas does not last just for one, or even 12 days. Like many of the other major seasons of the church’s year it lasts for 40 days, and includes within it two other major festivals. The Feast of the Epiphany is kept on the 6^th January. It is when we remember and celebrate the visit of the Magi, or wise men to the infant Christ. It is a festival of sharing, in which the Magi represent Christ being revealed to the whole world, not just to the people of Israel.

This reminds us all that it is “our duty and our joy” to share the good news of the birth and love of Christ, and to celebrate it, no matter how difficult it may seem. We will be celebrating the Epiphany with a Celebration Service as advertised.

I do hope that the new year gives us plenty of opportunity to share the good things we have with one another. The restrictions caused by Covid19 have stopped many of us sharing things, events, and our homes, which has been a great loss to us all. Once we are allowed to, let us make sure that we make up for lost time, and enjoy sharing our lives, time and resources with our family, fiends and neighbours, who, and wherever they may be.

With love and prayers,

Philip

From the Parish Priest

Dear friends,

I am sure that you are all working out how you will celebrate Christmas this year. Things are different. They are inconvenient and frustrating., and we will have to do things differently.

In church there will be no singing together,  no mince pie and mulled wine after services, no church Christmas Parties. The way we celebrate will need to change and, indeed , has changed, but what we celebrate is the same. Nothing has changed in the beauty and truth of the story of God’s incarnation. Nothing has changed in the beauty and truth of the infant in the Ox’s stall, and nothing has changed in the grace and love of God that we celebrate in church, and around the table or fireplace with our family and friends.

We live in an age where the external is so important, where what someone wears, or the car they drive, or where they live can be seen as far more important than what they say or who they are. We live in an age where people feel they have to “push the boat out” to keep up with their neighbours or current social trends, whether for Children’s birthday parties, Wedding Celebrations, or wearing the right brand of trainers.

The Truth of Christmas is the same, whether you are celebrating round your own table or fireplace with your immediate family, or in the banqueting hall of the Ritz hotel. We cannot make Christmas any more special than it is by embellishing it, and we will not make it any less wonderful by celebrating it more simply.

However you will be celebrating, May I wish you a very Happy and Holy Festival, and all my hopes and prayers for you and your families in 2021

With love and prayers

Philip