NEWSLETTER

November 2002 From the Revd. Hugh Trenchard, Vicar. Dear Parishioners, In his new chart topping CD Aled Jones begins with these words: One day I'll hear the laugh of children In a world where war has been banned One day I'll see men of all colours Sharing words of love and devotion Stand up and feel the Holy Spirit Find the power of your faith Open your heart to those who need you In the name of love and devotion Yes I believe I believe in the people of all nations To join and care for love I believe in a world where light will guide us And giving our love we'll make heaven on earth Yes I believe Could there be a better beginning for our thoughts as we set our sights for Christmas? Could there be a more hopeful anthem in a world reeling from the horrors of Bali and the other grief-provoking events these last weeks have presented? We are entering autumn/winter and with it the inevitable rise in bouts of Seasonal affective disorder (SAD), we look at the agonising break in Northern Ireland, the sniper in Washington and, as I write, the shooting of students in Australia - and what are we to feel and do? We can of course curl up weep, we can ignore it, pretending we never heard, or we can hunt our very souls for the faith and joy we can bring to every situation we encounter. The God we say we love offered Himself as a Son right into a hurting world and He did it, not because He felt sorry, but rather to wave a giant flag of praise and delight in us His children. We matter to Him whereever we are and through whatever this world can throw at us. I was commenting yesterday that it is so easy for the Church to sound so smugly righteous in rubbishing the consumer Christmas and leaving it there without doing or saying "something righteous and hopeful for a change". (The character of Oddball in Kellys Heroes.) We live at a time when, according to a Church report published this last week, the Church is staring in an abyss of drastically falling numbers. An abyss of irrelevance I would call it. What begins the answer? The reawakening? The Resurrection? First we must re-learn how to celebrate Christmas in a new and positive way. Let the carols and songs ring true inside us. Banish the "thank goodness it's all over" of so many Christmas's past. Then as we enter a new year we will need to look long and hard at just what we do offer to people: people who have got fed up of a tradition which does not make sense to them in the 21st century; people who are longing to express the spiritual side of the existence and need very different services to the ones which still sustain many in Church. Equally, and there are enough unused hours in the week for such experimentation, we must value what has sustained but also we must learn what to let go giving us time to explore the richness we have forgotten. Advent has traditionally been a time of penitential preparation for Christmas. What can that appear to mean in today's society? Sadly it usually means a Church too grumpy or touchy even to prepare let alone do so expectant of the best party in living memory. We need those sentiments with which I began to set us on fire and allow us to live, perhaps for the first time. Good and fun preparations! Hugh Trenchard Vicar