The Beaminster Area Team
From The Hub Covid – 19 Weekly Update Friday 20th November 2020
Another week has passed and it seems that the priority is to encourage passing on the virus for five days at Christmas so that we can be locked down for January. This means that there have been no changes, as far as I am aware, to the present guidelines.
Jo, Fiona, and I continue to make plans for a possible return to worship on Sunday 6th December and also for services in the Christmas Season. However, we do not have a crystal ball and, like everyone else, we have no indication as to how and when we will be brought out of lockdown. My priority is to ensure that when we are able to return to worship, we do so with the strongest Covid safety provisions in place. If you think that you will require additional hand gel, wipes, masks, signs, etc then please contact Anne who will make appropriate arrangements.
Last week the General Synod and Archbishops’ Council released Living in Love and Faith Christian teaching and learning about identity, sexuality, relationship, and marriage. This report tackles the tough questions and divisions among Christians about what it means to be holy in a society in which understandings and practices of gender, sexuality, and marriage continue to change. Studying what the Bible, theology, history, and the social and biological sciences have to say, it also includes encounters with contemporary disciples of Christ whose stories ask us to discern where God is active in human lives.
Fiona and I are about to read through this report, all 450 pages, and we will host a time of discussion which will allow all of us to engage and reflect on Living in Love and Faith. This we plan will take place early in the new year.
The December Team News will be printed and delivered as normal. If you know that this will prove a problem delivering locally please can you let Anne know as soon as possible.
Hopefully by the time I write next week things will be a little clearer for us all.
Keep Safe.
David
We have come to the end of the church year and it is time to look back and reflect. It has been an odd year. We haven’t conducted any worship in school since March; no Walk in Wednesday, no after school club, or Messy Church. Weddings postponed, rescheduled, resized. Funerals resized. Online worship created and filmed; a new social media community created. Churches shut, open, worship suspended, restarted, suspended again. We have had to resource our own lives of faith, draw on reserves we didn’t know we had and may have drawn closer to God in the process. It has been an up and down time, but a time where there have been many glimpses of God’s glory. The highlights for me: some slower moments, more family time, a profound sense of God’s presence in the everyday, the kindness of communities, the beauty of creation. I wonder what your highlights have been?
Advent begins next week. We are reading a book together in Advent called Advent Windows by Margaret Silf. It is too late to order a copy via the church office, but it is available from online book sellers. We will also be hosting a daily reflection on our website and have produced a reflective Advent calendar resource for use at home. All the resources will be available online and you can pick up a copy of the Advent calendar resource from the church office once we are open again. Advent resources will be on the website from Tuesday 24th November.
Fiona is hosting an online event during Advent. Tuesday lunchtime fellowship gathering
Day and Time: Starting Tuesday 1st December at 12 noon to 12 45.
“This is a very informal get together on Zoom, with those who would like to catch up with a coffee, and spend some time in a bible passage and discussing its meaning, then we will pray to finish. If you would like to join me, please use the link below Looking forward to seeing you.” – Fiona
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89324392055?pwd=L044d3pTaTNTbjdKMDEzS1g4dHhvdz09
Meeting ID: 893 2439 2055
Passcode: 500410
Messy Church will be back online again on December 12 th at 4pm and again we will be offering fabulous bags of crafts for families to make along with us online. If you would like a resource bag which will be available to collect on Sat 12 th Dec at 10am from St Mary’s Church, Beaminster or picked up the week before from the church office, please email me and let me know the ages of the children.
Every blessing,
Jo