August 2020 Magazine

St Mary’s Wistaston

& St Luke’s Willaston

Christian Life Online Magazine
August 2020

This month in the Christian Calendar we celebrate :

6 August – The Transfiguration of Our Lord
15 August – The Blessed Virgin Mary
24 August – St Bartholomew

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Ministry Letter
by Revd Mike Turnbull

Dear friends,

I hope you are all keeping well in these most difficult and challenging of times. I don’t think many of appreciated how difficult it would be coming out of lockdown when we went into it, certainly I didn’t.

For many people, the past few months have changed their lives completely and irreversibly. Many have lost loved ones to, or through the knock-on effect of the pandemic. All of us have suffered and have had to make sacrifices on various levels. For some, the challenges of finance and redundancy are just beginning to become a reality. As it’s been said, there are no winners in this.

To some extent coping with and adapting to change is something we as humans do very well mostly. As we look back through history humans have adapted to many situations and I guess that’s no different to the current situation we find ourselves in this year.

On the 15 August, the church celebrates the Blessed Virgin Mary. As we think about changing and adapting, this was something that Mary had to do as she was faced with a life-changing message from an angel, just a normal day, you’re about have God’s son! When we consider that, according to scholars, Mary was only around 13 years old when the angel visited her with the message it is even more remarkable.

Mary is often, and quite rightly, praised for her obedience and willingness to say, ‘I am the Lord’s servant, may your word to me be fulfilled.’ (Luke 1:38 NIVUK). However, there is another quality that she shows when she gives her answer and that is bravery. This is a young girl, a virgin, engaged to be married and she was now going to have to deal with everything that this angel’s message would bring upon her. Her bravery to accept the call of God in extreme circumstances can be a lesson to us today. We may not be called upon to do what Mary was asked to do, but we should be ready and willing to answer God’s call upon our lives and to be brave in whatever that may be.

So, on the 15 August, maybe pause and give thanks for the Blessed Virgin Mary, her example, obedience and her bravery.

Revd Mike

Sunday Streamed Worship

Click below to watch Live on a Sunday
or to watch again at any time

Holy Days in August

Articles are taken from Exciting Holiness which is available online for most saints days at: almanac.oremus.org

The Transfiguration of Our Lord

6 August

The story of the Transfiguration of Jesus on the mount is told in the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, and Peter refers to it in his Second Epistle. Each time, it is made clear that God’s salvation is for all and Christ is the one who brings that salvation. The testimony of the law and the prophets to Jesus are given by the presence of Moses and Elijah, and the event also pre-figures the resurrection, giving a foretaste of the life of glory.

The Blessed Virgin Mary

15 August

Mary was a young Jewish girl living in Nazareth when a messenger from the Lord announced that she was to be the bearer of the Son of God to the world. Her response ‘Let it be to me according to your word’ revealed her natural sense of obedience to God and her reverence for his word, showing her worthy to be the bearer of the Word made flesh. This day is now celebrated as the major feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary throughout most of Christendom.

St Bartholomew

24 August

It has long been assumed that Bartholomew is the same as Nathanael, though it is not a certainty. The gospels speak of Philip bringing Nathanael to Jesus, who calls him an Israelite worthy of the name. He is also present beside the Sea of Galilee at the resurrection. Although he seems initially a somewhat cynical man, he recognizes Jesus for who he is and proclaims him as Son of God and King of Israel.

You can download the service order here

From the parishes of St Andrew, All Saints and St Peter Crewe

On Monday 3rd August at 7.30pm Revd Oliver will be licensed as our priest-in-charge via a Zoom webinar. This is the link to join the webinar:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89954468606

Using this link we will be able to watch and comment in the “chat”, but our videos won’t be seen by the panel, or by anyone else.

From the Astbury family Annual Garden Party…

In a twist to our annual garden party due to the current social distancing measures in place, we plan to sell boxes of homemade goodies instead. We are asking for a minimum donation of £5 per box- each box will contain a mix of 5 items (cakes and biscuits)

All proceeds and donations will go to the local Macmillan team as usual. lf you would like to order any boxes please could you indicate below how many boxes you would like .

Boxes will be ready for collection on Sunday 9 August between 2-4 pm. It would be helpful if you could collect your order- we will be careful to follow social distancing rules. lf you are unable to collect your goodies we are happy to deliver them between 4-6pm on Sunday 9 August. Thanks, Marion.

Willaston WI

Willaston WI are unable to hold meetings in the immediate future due to the strict Corona Virus Regulations. We are using all means possible to keep in touch and hope to meet properly before too long. We can at least look forward to having a lot to catch up on when we do get together and we will be meeting in the newly refurbished Masonic Hall. For up-to-date information please contact Brenda Taylor on 01270 623191 or check out our Facebook Page – Willaston WI.

Best Wishes Brenda

St Mary’s
for Private Prayer

St Mary’s has been open for Private Prayer for a few weeks now. We have the correct measures in place that allow us to offer you a safe place to spend some time in private prayer. It has been fantastic to see people face to face over the past three weeks and to have a ‘distanced’ chat with them! Please do come in confidence if you would like to.

Public Worship
The PCC unanimously agreed to apply to Bishop Keith for the dispensation of Canons B11 & B14 for August on the grounds of it being unsafe to open for Public Worship until better measures can be put in place to mitigate risk. This is mainly to do with the size and shape of both churches and the difficulty in maintaining 2m physical distancing. The application was duly granted by Bishop Keith (you can see a copy of his email here), so St Mary’s or St Luke’s will not reopen for Public worship until at least the 1st Sunday of September. The guidance for the legal side of not reopening for Public Worship and the dispensation is explained in this Guidance from the Church of England.

In the meantime, we will continue to offer Private Prayer sessions at St Mary’s and stream our services through July and August. I know not reopening in August will be disappointing for some people, but we have to consider the safety of people entering a very restricted space.

With all God’s blessings, Revd Mike.

The dates/times for Private Prayer until the end of August – please note that at the moment** the Church of England ‘Strongly advises’ the use of a face covering in church. If you are able to wear one please do so out of consideration to others.

**Face covering Update: from 8 August Face Coverings are mandatory by law in church buildings unless you have an exemption.

Beatitudes for a Global Pandemic

The Midweek Get Together

will return in September

Ways to Give to church whilst you shop at no cost to you

Take out a new home insurance policy with Ecclesiastical (our church’s insurers) and they will give our church £130. https://www.ecclesiastical.com/individuals/home-insurance/trust130/

We’re are registered with easyfundraising, which means you can help us for FREE. Over 4,000 shops and sites will donate to us when you use easyfundraising to shop with them – at no extra cost to yourself! All you need to do is sign up and remember to use easyfundraising whenever you shop online. It’s easy and completely FREE! These donations really mount up, so please sign up to support us at https://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/stmaryswistastonpcc/?invite=2QY49G&referral-campaign=s2s

Giving to our church Online or by Phone Banking

It’s simpler than you may think

A message from Revd Mike.

May I thank everyone who has kept their giving going during the past 3 months, it has been a challenging time and also challenging financially. From a church perspective, most of our outgoings remain the same whether the buildings are open or closed, so the challenge has been keeping the cash flow going to cover these costs. I am grateful to those who have been able to give extra and have given extra to the church.

Handling cash and cheques has caused us an issue during the pandemic and will continue to do so. Cash as we’ve not been able to allow anyone to process cash giving during this time, not that we’ve had much given in this way and cheques mean me having to visit the bank with them.

Joy & Sue attended an online Webinar about encouraging and managing giving during this time which advised that we should encourage people to move away from giving via cash & cheques and ask them to give via online or phone banking.

If you normally give via the plate each Sunday you can give securely via Give a Little by following the link below. If you’d like to give via online banking, which means we don’t lose the Fees, the details are below. You can set this up on your own online or phone banking unfortunately, we can’t process paper forms at this time.

Thank you for your support. Mike (Rector)

Online One off giving

You can give via our very simple online giving partnership with Give a Little and Sum Up. Simply click the button below. Sum Up take a small transaction fee from what you give.

click here to give online

Giving via your bank

You can give via your bank via online banking or telephone banking. If you do it this way we receive 100% of the money you give, there is no transaction fee. Here are the details you need to make a payment directly into the church bank account. For phone banking you may need to take a look at a statement from your bank and it normally has the details of how to do this on the back. You can give once or set up a monthly payment. Please remember to never give passwords over the phone and only call the official number on your statement.

Account Name: St Mary’s Wistaston PCC
Sort Code: 08 92 99
Account No: 65067004
Ref: << your initial & surname>>

Easyfundraising

A very simple way to give, if you shop online or do click and collect, is through Easyfundraising – it doesn’t cost you a penny as by using Easyfundraising a percentage of what you but gets given to the church.
In total we’ve raised over £1600 through Easyfundraising. For more information on this please click the button below.

find out more

Ways to Keep in Touch

News and Information Blog

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Church at Home

Resources for all ages to keep your faith alive at home

Funerals

10 July 2020
13 July 2020
20 July 2020
22 July 2020
30 July 2020

Ian William RIMMER
Alma Wendy GREEN
Paul William TOMLINSON
John HERRING
John Charles WHITE

80
78
62
79
80

Weddings

None this month

Baptisms