How do we live well in a world that marks many different life defining moments, almost simultaneously? The last 48 hours has brought us the news and horror of an attack on a synagogue during the Jewish festival of Yom Kippur. The news has also brought again a week of witnessing to continued bombing of Gaza and the subsequent loss of life. It has also been a week when a cure for Huntington’s Disease is seemingly possible, and one when the Church of England has made a historic appointment of the first woman to be the Archbishop of Canterbury.  There are things to mourn, times to weep and yet also things of thanksgiving and wonder and celebration. Is it okay to celebrate one thing at the same time as feeling aggrieved in prayer at another? How do we square that? Should we even try to make sense of it? Can we find genuine joy in one thing when it sits alongside tragedy in another? 

Today, the 4th October, is the day the church remembers St Francis of Assisi. A Saint whose story filled both extremes of wealth and chosen poverty. He may not have been aware in the 12^th century of global news from around the world, but he did experience the extremes of both sorrow and joy. One of the striking things about Francis is perhaps once he had made his choice about how he was going to follow God, he appeared to have made peace with that decision, and in that he became a man of peace. A gentle, simple appreciative life was lived in the service of others and the created world. It was his intentional living in this way that perhaps gave rise to some of his more famous moments of compassion. No doubt he continued to have the same human responses of anger and injustice as others around him at what he saw and experienced. Yet he practiced peace. And for that I am truly grateful.

SERVICES THIS SUNDAY 5^th OCTOBER

10am – St Mary’s – Creative Church – Looking at Eve

10:30am – All Saints – Harvest Festival Holy Communion Celebration with Band and Junior Church and Harvest Lunch

6:30am – St Mary’s – Choral Evensong for Dedication

THE WEEK AHEAD

Mon 6th Oct

10:30am – Tiny Tots, All Saints

Tue 7th Oct

10:30am – M4T, St. Mary’s Parish Rooms

Weds 8th Oct

9:00am – Celtic Morning Prayer, All Saints

Thurs 9th Oct

10:00am – Holy Communion, St. Mary’s

Sat 11th Oct

12:00pm – 1:30pm – Saturday Lunches, St. Mary’s

Sun 12th Oct

8:00am – Holy Communion, All Saints

10:00am – Holy Communion, St. Mary’s

10:30am – Pet Service, All Saints

7:15pm – Generations, The Wood

Peace.

Revd Lizzie

This Sunday we celebrate the feast of St Peter and St Paul, two of the most significant followers of Jesus in the New Testament. Both their stories tell of a growth in faith and a call to ministry. For both of them, that call included a change in name.

Simon, the son of John (or Jonah), was a fisherman working on lake Galilee. Jesus called him to catch people rather than fish. When Simon recognised Jesus as the Christ, Jesus gave him the name Cephas, which means rock in Aramaic. In the Bible, this is sometimes written as the Greek word Petros, from which we get the name Peter. He became the rock, the foundation on which Jesus built the church in Jerusalem. He was also the champion of gentile Christians among the Jewish Christians.
 

Saul was a highly educated Pharisee, who was eager to serve God. However, Jesus showed him that serving God did not mean rigid following of the law of Moses, but faith in Jesus. He travelled widely, spreading the good news of Jesus through what is now Turkey and Greece. In Luke’s telling of his story, he switches from using Saul’s Hebrew name to his Greek name Paul, to indicate that he was now looking out into the world beyond Israel.

It is at this time when we think about the ministry of the church today. Not many of us are given a new name, but many of us are called to new and exciting ministries. It is a time to pray about our own calling and whether God is challenging us to take on something new or to continue faithfully in our current work.

It is also the time when the church has traditionally ordained new priests and deacons. From our own community, Kester de Oliveira will be ordained priest this Saturday in Bristol Cathedral. As a community, we will be praying for him and looking for practical ways we can support him in this new phase of his ministry.

This Sunday, although it is a fifth Sunday of the month, we will not be having a benefice service. Instead, there will be services at both All Saints and St Mary’s. The benefice service will be on 6th May, when Kester will preside at communion for the first time. As such, there will be the following services this Sunday:

This coming week we have the usual services with Celtic Morning Prayer on Wednesday at All Saints and Holy Communion at St Mary’s on Thursday. In addition to the Benefice service at All Saints, there will be Choral Evensong at St Mary’s. Note that there is no morning service at St Mary’s. This gives the following services for the coming week:

As we remember the ministry of Peter and Paul, let us pray for the ministry of all the church, in the words of the collect for Embertide:

Almighty and everlasting God,
by whose Spirit the whole body of the Church
is governed and sanctified:
hear our prayer which we offer for all your faithful people,
that in their vocation and ministry
they may serve you in holiness and truth
to the glory of your name;
through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

Yours in Christ,

Mark