Father James's Blog

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Keeping in Touch 47: Gentle progress

Dear Friends,

I’m so pleased that this Sunday we will all be able to sing again in Church! One or two of us might be feeling a bit rusty, but as the person who taught me campanology used to say, ‘it’s like riding a bike’. It will be another change – a really good change I hope! – on our unfolding pandemic experience.

Somewhere else where there is some change, or at least some gentle progress, is around our plans for Reordering. Thank you to everyone who responded to the initial consultation over the winter. Here is a summary of the results if you missed it: click here. This initial consultation confirmed that the church family is very much in favour of pursuing reordering and it also raised lots of good ideas and questions! The next step is to reach out to the wider community and to ask for their feedback. To this end the Reordering Committee will hold a consultation exhibition in church on Saturday 25th and Sunday 26th September, focussing on the three aspects of our vision for reordering: welcome, worship and wider community use. There will be some sketches of how things could look along with some examples from other churches. Everyone will be able to leave their feedback and the committee will be on hand to speak to. I encourage the church family to come and see how things have developed and to contribute any further thoughts. The Reordering group will then use the feedback to further refine plans in consultation with the Diocese and others so that we can start to take them forward.

Meanwhile, something which is not changing is our operating budget shortfall of around £3,000 a year. In other words, we are £3,000 short of what it costs to run the church every year (not new activities and not reordering, which will have its own funding). Clearly this is not sustainable or desirable. Many people, even those connected to church, do not know that we receive no funding from the Government, or the central church. Our finances are our responsibility. We should aim as a minimum to be breaking even, but running at a surplus would enable us to run new activities, or develop existing ones; it would give us some headroom for unexpected costs; and it would allow us to plan to give money as a church family to other causes, rather than through ad hoc special collections.

How can you help meet this challenge? The best thing you can do if you don’t yet is ‘planned giving’. This means setting up a standing order to All Saints, gift aided if you are a UK taxpayer. In order to set up a standing order and to make a Gift Aid declaration please contact Eric Martin: 01923 267604. At present, planned giving plus Gift Aid brings in around £46,000 a year. However, our major cost of the Parish Share is £52,000 on top of which are all our other running costs. The rest of our income is made up of hall hire, fees and fundraising, and despite all our efforts here that £3,000 shortfall remains.

So, please can I encourage you to consider setting up a monthly standing order? As a starter, I suggest the price of a coffee a week, so around £2.50 or £3, in other words a Standing order of about £10 a month. This is part of this year’s 10:10:10 Stewardship campaign which I will be introducing on Sunday and about which you will receive a letter via email in the next couple of weeks.

Many clergy do not like talking about money. However, if clergy don’t explain the situation, we will keep relying on those ‘in the know’ and we exclude those who would like to help – if they knew the need! If you would like to speak to me about any of this then please get in touch.

Our generosity is a response to the abundant generosity of God that we see most of all in Jesus. And I hope we’ll feel something of God’s joyful abundance as we sing together on Sunday.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 29th July 2021

Keeping in Touch 46: The Road of New Beginnings

Dear Friends,

Today I took part in the funeral of a friend and former colleague from my curacy, Marion Jones. Marion was an active Lay Reader, Sacristan and rota wrangler; she ran our holiday club, led assemblies across all the schools in the town and hosted regular parade services of the Scouts and Guides. She didn’t like the limelight and would only reluctantly come forward when being thanked and praised by my Training Incumbent. I saw, chatted to and prayed with her nearly every day for over 3 years and (despite a few minor disagreements now and then!) we got on very well. She was very good to Rachel, always interested, supportive and encouraging of her. In short, she was a good friend.

Death always brings with it reflection and the chance for new beginnings, as well as memories and sadness. I think Marion would find it quite appropriate that her Funeral was held during Easter time. If I could choose a season for mine, I think I’d go for Easter too! The time when, most of all, Christians celebrate that Death turned to New Beginnings – not just for Jesus in the Resurrection, but for you and me. We have the chance for new beginnings: in the forgiveness we receive from God and give others, in our growth as his people in service and mission, and the new beginning of God’s eternity when we reach our own end.

Maybe this feels a bit heavy for the newsletter! But the promise of new beginnings, the promise of Easter, is needed all around us: by people who have lost jobs, security, reliable sources of food; by people who have lost hope, faith, joy; by people who are looking for purpose, meaning and direction in their lives; by people whose minds and spirits have been worn down over this last year and more; by people living through war, terror and injustice. They can all find new beginnings – with the right support – and that goes for people looking for a new beginning with God. Maybe that is someone you know, a family member, colleague, or friend. Perhaps you can invite them gently into our community of All Saints.

We aren’t part of this church family because we have arrived at a destination, but because we are on the road of new beginnings – step by step we hope and pray the loving fire of God’s Spirit will renew us, inspire us and transform us. We are not there yet, but he invites us to begin, in this world and the next.

May Marion, and all those we love but see no longer, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. And rise in Glory. Amen.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 20th May 2021

Keeping in Touch 45: Refreshment

Dear friends,

Firstly, thank you to Ingrid and Sheila for contributing their thoughts to this regular column over the last two weeks while I was away. I’m sure you will agree it is lovely to hear from someone different to me! Rachel and I had a lovely week off and not only are we refreshed but so is the living room which we have now decorated. The colour is ‘celestial blue’, very appropriate for a vicarage. We look forward to welcoming you back to the Glebe in due course so you can see our handiwork… our rates are very reasonable!

‘Refreshing’ is where I think we are coming to in our journey through the pandemic. People are able to refresh their relationships by meeting in person, greater freedoms mean the refreshment of days out, holidays (at least a staycation) and changes of scenery. As ‘non-essential’ shops, restaurants and pubs re-open many people’s livelihoods are more secure and as the Covid figures go down the pressure on the NHS and other key services as well as on everyone’s mental health is eased.

In our life as a church we are at this stage of refreshing too. We have recently started a new outdoor informal service, ‘Church in the Wild’ on the first Sunday of the month at 11.15am and it has been lovely to welcome families along to the first two of these. We have also re-launched our Tiny Tots group and are looking at re-starting our Sunday school ‘Saints on Sunday’ from June, as well as a monthly All Age Eucharist when we all worship together at the 9.30 service. Thank you to everyone who is helping us to re-start and re-think and re-fresh these important parts of our life as a church family – and especially to those who have stepped forward as new volunteers.

Part of our mission as a church is to bring refreshment to the wider community. We seek to share the life-giving water of the God we see revealed in Jesus to others, in our worship, our beautiful open church, and in our life of service. Two important ways we do this are through our Foodbank and through our support for Christian Aid.

This year, the Christian Aid United Service is hosted by Christ Church at 10.30am this coming Sunday via Zoom.

Our Foodbank is a local expression of the same life-giving refreshment of Christ which Christian Aid puts into practice globally. We are currently seeking a volunteer coordinator for this project. If you think that you or someone you know could help in this way then please let me know.

Jesus said, ‘Those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life’ (John 4.14). May you know the refreshment of his love in your heart as you pray for and serve others.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 6th May 2021

Keeping in Touch 44: A Happy Easter Indeed!

Dear friends,

Happy Easter! Thank you for joining in with our Holy Week and Easter worship. Easter was particularly joyful, with all three services very well attended. Particular thanks go to those who organised our new Church in the Wild service – it was wonderful to see so many families having fun in the churchyard, including some new faces. What a great success! We look forward to the next one on the first Sunday of May.

Just a reminder that our APCM is coming up on Sunday 18th April at 11am. Please see above for the Zoom log in details and papers to read in advance of the meeting.

Alleluia, Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed, alleluia!

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 8th April 2021

Keeping in Touch 43: Alleluia is our song

Dear friends,

Apart from one brief window around Christmas time, communal singing in worship has been off limits throughout the pandemic, but finally there is some movement in the right direction! As well as being allowed to field a ‘small choir’ (whatever that might exactly mean…) indoors, we can now enjoy communal singing outdoors.

Having trialled this on Palm Sunday as part of our procession, there will be plenty of singing on Easter Day, with 3 hymns at the 8am Churches Together Service in the churchyard and a sing of some Easter favourites outside after the 9.30am service. I look forward to enjoying a good sing with you! It’s nearly a year since I wrote to you saying that was what I was really looking forward to being able to do again. I’m not sure any of us expected such a long wait.

For me, singing is at the heart of my Christian journey. Singing in the choir as a child was what brought me into the life of the church. Being immersed in hymns and anthems and the musical setting of the Eucharist meant that I learned my Christian faith by musical osmosis (a good job I think as I never went to Sunday school!). And music, especially choral music, touches my soul and feeds my spirituality – as much I think through the connection it brings to the people I sing with as to the sense of God’s own presence. After all, we see God in the face of Jesus, but we are called to find the face of Jesus in our neighbour.

So, I for one am delighted that singing is coming back, even in this limited way. It will be a joy to be able to sing some Easter hymns as a congregation. I’m therefore encouraging you to stay for a few minutes after the 9.30am service this Sunday, come outside and sing!

Our new, monthly ‘Church in the Wild’ service launches this Sunday too. There are refreshments from 10.30am for people coming to this, but if you are at the 9.30am you are welcome to have refreshments to take away. We still need to maintain distancing and ask you to make your way home/into the village garden once you’ve got your refreshments, but it will give us a bit of an opportunity for fellowship between the two services.

Please do pray for this new service – the people who are leading, helping and organising and those who will come. We hope that it will help people who would appreciate a more informal approach to connect and grow in their faith.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 1st April 2021

Keeping in Touch 42: Praying for healing and hope

Dear Friends,

A short note this week and a reminder of our Holy Week services.

You will be very aware from the news of the murder of Sarah Everard last week and of the reactions to it in the media, in protests and in each of us. Can I encourage you to continue to pray for Sarah and her family and friends, for all women who suffer harassment, abuse and violence from men, and all people who feel unsafe in our society. You may like to light a candle and use this prayer.

Secondly, next Tuesday 23rd March sees the anniversary of the first coronavirus lockdown. We are invited to do two things that day: to observe a one minute silence at midday and use this prayer; to light a candle at 8pm and place it in a prominent window as a symbol of hope and remembrance. I’ll be posting a picture to Facebook – you’re welcome to post your own photo in the comments.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 18th March 2021

Keeping in Touch 41: Darkness to Light

Dear Friends,

The return to church on Sunday 21st March is around the corner and so is Holy Week and Easter! For the former, please can I ask you to refer to our guidance and risk assessment. Don’t forget to email allsaintskingslangley@outlook.com by noon on a Saturday to let us know you’re intending to come. Remember to wear a face covering in church, use the one-way system for entry and exit (unless you need level access) and congregations still aren’t allowed to sing! We hope this is a step to greater freedom.

Easter is the time when we celebrate the freedom we have in Jesus Christ. Freedom won for us by Jesus when he passed through death and rose to new life. We have all passed through something of a valley of darkness and death this last year, all of us have been affected by the pandemic, even if not directly. Now we are emerging into the light. Although it might be wise to manage our expectations, it seems clear that we are in a better position than we were 12 months ago. We will celebrate our freedom and new life in Christ with Christians around the world this Easter with the hope and faith that God, the unconquerable light, will be beside us in any darkness. The schedule for our keeping of Holy Week and Easter is below. Please do note where the services are online only. For all those services taking place in church we ask you to book a space.

Many of you will have seen Oprah Winfrey’s interview with Meghan and Harry (aka the Duke and Duchess of Sussex) earlier this week. Whatever the wisdom or purpose of their decision to share more of their story, what they have reminded us of is that privilege is not immune to racism or to mental health issues, two very real darknesses for people at all levels of society. Both things need the light of learning, openness and compassion. Both things will continue to flourish in a climate of judgement, suspicion and denial.

Jesus offered healing, openness and compassion to people from beyond his ethnic community, and to people who we would now understand to be suffering from severe mental distress or illness. He is always our model for how we encounter others, even those who are in other ways very privileged. Darkness comes in many forms, and is not always measurable by external means, like wealth, success or fame. And we are called to face darkness with hope, compassion and healing. To walk in the risen light of Jesus Christ and to share his light and life with others. For he came ‘that all may have life and may have it in all its fullness’ (John 10.10).

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 11th March 2021

*From our Vision in our Mission Action Plan

Keeping in Touch 40: Open to Change

Dear Friends,

I’m very pleased to be able to let you know that we will be returning to public worship in the church building from Sunday 21st March. This will be for the 9.30am service only to begin with and we will follow the same procedures as before. So please book a place at the service each week by emailing allsaintskingslangley@outlook.com, wear a face covering in church, maintain social distancing and use the one-way system for entry and exit (except for those who need the level access on entry and exit). Communion will be in one kind (for some while yet) and there is still no word on when congregational singing is expected to come back. Watch this space…! Of course, if you are still being advised to shield or are unsure about returning to a physical gathering just yet, we encourage you to continue to worship at home and look forward to seeing you when you are ready and/or able!

It will be lovely to be gathered in the building again, even if it will continue to be different. But we are getting used to that! Being adaptable is a good thing for churches to get used to as we look to the future. You will have seen recent reports of the serious thinking the C of E’s bishops are doing about the changes we might need to make as a church as we head into the future. Some of these reports have been rather doom-laden (I’m looking at you, ‘The Spectator’) and an unfair representation of this thinking as a ‘centralised plan to dismantle the parish system’. The ‘central church’ has no power to do this, even if it had that desire, and our own bishops in St Albans are committed to the parish system and enabling it to flourish. As an antidote to the recent doom-mongering, you might like to read Archbishop Stephen Cottrell’s vision of what the church can be and how it can contribute to the world here and Bishop Philip North’s thoughts on the importance of the parish here. You can also watch Archbishop Stephen in conversation with Adrian Chiles here.

Since coming to Kings Langley, I haven’t had a ‘normal’ Lent, Holy Week and Easter! My first was, well, my first one here. The second was at the beginning of the first lockdown and the third is at the beginning of the easing of the restrictions we’ve all been living through. Thank you for all your support and for your prayers. It is all very much appreciated.

Being willing to adapt will be important for us, as it will be for all churches and for many charities and businesses, as we head into the rest of 2021 and into the future. We want All Saints to continue to be at the heart of the community, welcoming people in and helping them to find belonging with us, and deeper belonging with Jesus Christ. As we seek to do that, to aim towards our vision of All Saints being ‘attended by people of all ages who are actively involved in all aspects of a successful and joyful church’* we will need to adapt and try new things. And we will also need each other’s support and prayers along the way. Just as Christ will continue to walk beside us on his Way into the future.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 4th March 2021

*From our Vision in our Mission Action Plan

Keeping in Touch 39: Roadmap

Dear Friends,

Like me, you may be feeling more positive this week with the Prime Minister’s announcement of the ‘roadmap’ out of the present lockdown. It’s good to have some markers that we’re all aiming for, subject to those four tests… On the other hand, you may be feeling anxious about society opening back up again. Wherever we are on that scale, it’ll be important to continue to ‘bear with one another in love’ (Ephesians 4.2) as the weeks unfold.

Part of your Lenten journey might be to reflect on your experience of the Pandemic in these last 11 months. You might like to use this resource from CPAS which invites us to reflect on what we are thankful for, what we are lamenting, what we are learning and what is our prayer: My Pandemic Experience – Church (cpas.org.uk). There is also a version for young families to do together: My Pandemic Experience – Family (cpas.org.uk).

It’s not quite a roadmap, but the reordering committee has had a good look at your responses to the initial reordering consultation document and has produced an overview of your feedback. Thank you to everyone who responded. The key thing to share is that there is 90% support overall for a reordering and that support comes with lots of great suggestions and questions. The feedback overview also outlines the next steps, and there will be some more information about this in the coming weeks. You can find it here.

Continuing on the roadmap theme, you may be wondering when we will be able to return to public worship in All Saints. The PCC are currently considering this question (virtually, via email!) so I hope to be able to share more with you here next week.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 25th February 2021

Keeping in Touch 38: A Little Wilderness

Dear Friends,

We are fast coming round to two anniversaries. One is the anniversary of the first National Lockdown, the other is the anniversary of the first of these weekly ramblings, thoughts and reflections from me. Thank you for your feedback and encouragement, I will keep writing!

In one of my earliest messages, I borrowed some words from a friend about prayer, which are worth repeating at the start of Lent: Little and often is a good way to approach prayer, rather than saving it up for one “big” pray on a Sunday or in times of crisis!  By building up a pattern of regular prayer we are more able to weather the storms and tests of life.

Lent is a really good time to have a look at our patterns of prayer and reflection, of rest and recreation. It isn’t all about giving things up (a rescue mission for a wavering New Year’s resolution?!) but about giving yourself space for a spiritual MOT. That’s the point of the imagery of going into the desert with Jesus. It’s not about starving ourselves, or depriving ourselves in an effort to be better. It’s an image of detachment, of space, of big horizons, of being alone in the wilderness with Jesus – and that being a refreshing, life-giving, restorative thing, not a punishment. In the desert Jesus gets clarity about his mission (symbolised by the temptations he faces) and in the desert we can reconnect with him and with our calling to be his disciples.

So, this Lent I wonder if you can make some little wilderness spaces in your week, between the “big” pray on a Sunday. Can you find a little time to be restored and refreshed in the presence of Jesus? It might be that you can use the #LiveLent booklet to help you do this, or you can download the app. There are prayer resources on our website too which you might find useful. If you would like some help thinking about this, please let me know. And of course, we have the Churches Together Lent course (not too late to sign up!) and Celtic Evening Prayer from next week.

For myself, I am finding that I am missing the traditional language of the Book of Common Prayer, which has been an important part of my spiritual life. My favourite service growing up was Choral Evensong from the Prayer Book, and the service I enjoyed most when I was a ‘Root’ at St Albans Cathedral was the Choral Eucharist – not Prayer Book, but with the same traditional language. To reconnect with that, I’m going to say Compline in traditional language at 9.30pm Tuesday – Friday in Lent and you are welcome to join me via Facebook. You can find the order of service here.

Compline (from the Latin Completorium, ‘completion’) lasts between 5 and 10 minutes and gives a reflective close to the day. The words will be much the same every time, but I think that is a helpful thing – a rhythm to be held in, a space to hold open for Christ, a little bit of time in the restorative wilderness to help us weather the season we find ourselves in, and to grow as God’s people.

With my love and prayers for you,

All Saints Vicarage,
Thursday 18th February 2021