Second Sunday of Advent, 6 December 2020

6th December 2020 Christ Church, Community, Diocese, Mothers' Union, Parish News, Prayer, St Andrew's, Turton Moorland Team, Walmsley CofE School, Worship

On this Second Sunday of Advent, as we light our second candle in the Advent Wreath, we take another step in Preparing the Way.

Dear Friends,

LOVE and BLESSINGS to YOU

We wish you comfort and joy in this season of Advent.

Please know that you continue to be in our thoughts and prayers.

This week:

Return to Worship
Outdoor Carols
Church of England’s 2020 Christmas campaign
Online services & worship at home
Advent resources
Community updates
Weekly downloadable resources

If you have resources or news items of interest to share, please get in touch or, if you have images / photos for the ‘virtual’ services which are shared across the Turton Moorland Team, please send them to dawn@walmsleyparish.org or directly to Peter Reiss.

Stay safe and keep well.

Love and blessings,

Reverend Carol Hayden
Iain Stewart – Church Warden,
Angie Foster – Assistant Church Warden &
Dawn Hitchen – Church Warden + Authorised Lay Minister for Pastoral Care

Return to Worship

As we return to public worship, please come and join us for a SERVICE OF HOLY COMMUNION this second Sunday of Advent, led by Reverend Carol Hayden, at Christ Church Walmsley: 9.30am.

The second candle of the Advent wreath will be lit. (Social distancing will be in place and all government guidelines followed.)

There will be a mid-week Service of Holy Communion on Wednesday 9 December at 11am – also led by Reverend Carol.

Please note: the next Service at St. Andrew’s will be on Sunday 13 December at 11am and will be led by Reverend Carol Hayden.

Outdoor Carols

The Government guidelines have said that we can sing outside. So: on Sunday 20th December at 3:00pm, we are inviting you to join us outside Christ Church Walmsley, where we can socially distance and sing some of our favourite carols around our beautiful (hopefully decorated) tree, which is now installed.

Thank you to RAMWELLS FARM for the tree and to Andy & Aidan of EVERGREEN LANDSCAPES for putting the tree up. Read more in the Newsletter.

Comfort & Joy

A reminder to let Reverend Carol know if you would like a booklet for ‘Comfort and Joy’ – the Church of England’s 2020 Christmas campaign.

Please contact her on 01204 587150

Online Services

You can enjoy each Sunday’s TURTON MOORLAND TEAM ONLINE SERVICE led by Team Rector Canon Peter Reiss, HERE.

As in past weeks, accessing this link will enable you to watch a wonderful, recorded service (also on FaceBook) from 8am on Sunday morning.

Virtual Evening Prayer

From our own Walmsley Parish, we share with you another ‘VIRTUAL EVENING PRAYER’, recorded in church and led this week by Adrian Golland. Jane Dent (Church Warden) reads from the Old Testament and the New Testament reading is given by John Evans (ALM for Worship). Those of you who usually attend Evensong at Christ Church Walmsley may wish to wait until 6.30 pm for an element of ‘normality’, but you can WATCH NOW.

Worship at Home

For wonderful ‘Worship at Home’ resources for adults and children on the Team Website, please visit: https://turtonmoorlandteam.co.uk/

New and exciting materials are created each week by Revd Jan Ainsworth, Jan Bennett (ALM for worship) & Jo Haslam (ALM for Youth Ministry + Children Changing Places Project member).

Advent

“An Advent Symphony” – Preparing the mind

A four week course with daily readings which you can find here: https://stanneswithstjames.co.uk/an-advent-symphony/

A chance to think a bit more about our faith, what it means, what the Bible is about, and who is this Jesus who we worship and why? Why not make time each day with a cup of tea of coffee to read and then reflect, and please bring back questions and challenges. If you missed week 1 you can find it easily on the website. You can even binge-read several days at once if you prefer!

Advent Acts of Kindness

One ACT for each day up until Christmas Day.

Here is a chance to make a difference each day! (Please let us know how you get on…)

Light a Virtual Candle

We want to continue to offer all the things we normally would, so we have developed a page on our team website with the altar as the backdrop and candles in rows that we hope people will dedicate in memory of their deceased loved ones this Advent. You can view these from the Team website homepage: https://turtonmoorlandteam.co.uk/

The candles will remain ‘virtually lit’ until January 2nd.

1. Each person can have a maximum of 3 candles but each candle should be in memory of a different person.
2. You can have two people named on one candle if they shared the same surname.
3. Your brief message should be a maximum of 50 characters.

There is no obligation to donate but we would be delighted if you wished to support us. A donation button is on our website.

Please have a look at our Light a Virtual Candle page if you would like to have a candle ‘virtually lit’ in memory of your loved one >>>

Christmas Shopping Online

A reminder for you if you place orders through Amazon, as a registered charity, Walmsley Parish PCC has a link with Amazon Smile, which allows supporters to click this code: https://smile.amazon.co.uk/ch/1165756-0 to make Amazon purchases as normal, but 0.5% of the sale will go – at no cost to yourself – to Walmsley Parish (The Parochial Church Council Of The Ecclesiastical Parish Of Christ Church, Walmsley With St Andrews, Bromley Cross.)

Please help if you can when you shop at smile.amazon.co.uk

NEWS from Walmsley Parish Community Hall

Please visit our Hall’s Facebook Page

We’re hiring!

We’re looking for an enthusiastic, community-minded person to take on the newly created role of ‘Hall Manager’ for Walmsley Parish Community Hall.

Flexible hours and a chance to really get involved in achieving the potential of this amazing facility at the heart of Egerton Village. More details HERE. And if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to email parish-hall@walmlseyparish.org

The deadline to apply is next Tuesday 8th December. Thank you!

Yoga with Kim

Yoga classes, which were scheduled to commence at Walmsley Parish Community Hall from next Monday (7th December) will be re-scheduled in the New Year due to government guidance banning exercise classes. Kim says: “Thank you for your support on this matter and I hope to see you very soon!”

Thank You and Please from Canon Peter Reiss

Thank you to those who have given or promised presents for Refugee Families, and thank you to all who have supported the Grub Tub and Urban Outreach, or given toys to Fortalice and other charities. The level of need in parts of Bolton, Bury, Blackburn and Darwen is high, and the recent retail closures will only have made things much worse for many families

If you have new or as-new toys you could give for children to open at Christmas please let Peter know, or leave them at the Vicarage where we will make sure they are distributed to families.

Thank you, too, to all who have contributed kitchen things – we have enough for the next couple of families who are due to move into their accommodation fairly soon we hope. This will make such a difference, and it means so much to them, that people want to help them.

Resources

This information is available as weekly newsletter, to join the mailing list, please contact dawn@walmsleyparish.org