Special Events / News

The popular Summer Fair returns to the Forge Field and Coronation Hall, Slindon, on Saturday June 15th in the afternoon. A wide range of stalls, games, entertainment and refreshments will be available as usual – some old and much-loved, others new. Put the date in your calendars now!

The Annual Parochial Church Meeting (APCM) is a major event in the life of your parish churches. It is an opportunity for all those with an interest in the role of the churches in their communities to come along and voice their views and ideas. The Annual Report for 2023 will be presented by the Churchwardens, the Rector will give his view on the past year and our Treasurer will present the accounts for the year and answer any questions about the finances. Churchwardens for the coming year will be appointed and there will be elections for the PCC members.

Please do come along, whether you are a regular church attendee or not.

The theme is a celebration of ‘THIS GREEN AND PLEASANT LAND’ by young people aged 4-16.  Slindon families are invited to enter up to three pieces of young people’s work.  Inspired by the theme, the work can be any size, and painting or sculpture in any medium.

Entries to be delivered to the Church on Thursday 16^th May from 4.00-7.00 pm or Friday 17^th May from 9am-12.00 noon.  Please mark each piece clearly with name, age and phone / email details.

Grand opening and prize giving on Saturday 18^th May 12.00 noon

The exhibition will close at 5.00pm on Sunday 19th May – so there will be plenty of time to view the exhibition.

Further enquiries to:- anniesimson64@gmail.com or Annie 01243 814581

A talk by Emerita Professor Catherine Hall

11.00 am Saturday 27th April, St Mary’s Slindon

Edward Long lived most of his retirement years in Slindon – his fine memorial in St Mary’s church celebrates him as a family man, judge and historian – but what more is there to say about him?  Why does he matter? 

Edward Long was a British-born plantation owner best known for his three-volume work, the History of Jamaica written in 1774. He was steeped in post-slavery thinking about the legitimacy of slavery, convincing his readers how much wealth and power it contributed to Britain, and to argue that Black people and White were essentially different – that Black people were born to serve. Catherine Hall will talk about the need to think about Long’s work and grasp its continued relevance to us in the present, drawing on her new book, Lucky Valley: Edward Long and the history of racial capitalism.”

Professor Catherine Hall is an eminent academic working at UCL, author and presenter/researcher for BAFTA Award-winning BBC documentary ‘Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners’ (2015)

To book seats for what will be a popular and fascinating talk please email Moira Richards moira.wordpower@btinternet.com or telephone 01243 814735 

Price £3 (incl. refreshments) payable on the day 

Venue: St Mary’s Church BN18 0RE     Wheelchair access

Easter Day this year is 31^st March – and knowing our highly efficient distribution team, your April magazine may well drop on your doorstep before Easter Day. It is a day full of hope for Christians, please come and join us!

Easter is a moveable feast. I could try and explain how the date works, but it would probably take 3 pages of the magazine to explain and we would all probably be still none the wiser! But here is an interesting question: if you were competing in “Who wants to be a millionaire”, it would be definitely one of those questions that if answered correctly, would get you a lot of money. The question is, what do the years 2018 and 2029 have in common in relation to Easter? The answer is: on those two years Easter falls on April 1^st. April Fools Day. I think quite a good day for Easter – but not for the reasons those of a cynical nature might think.

In my student days there was a monk and theologian called Harry Williams. One of the books he wrote was called “Tensions” – about all the difficulties we face in life. In the last chapter he looks at gifts God has given us to help cope. One of those gifts he suggests is laughter.

His analysis is good. There are different types – one is nasty, laughing at people. In the gospels we quite often read that people laughed at Jesus – “scoffed”, because it was their defence against Jesus trying to open them up to God’s infinite love, which would have involved big changes in their judgemental attitudes.

There is then laughing with people which is very different and life enhancing and brings us closer to people. It can help change how we see something, give us hope. I remember reading a book on resilience in difficult times and the ability to laugh alongside another and with them, was high up the list of helpful attributes.

Harry Williams emphasises something that surprised me. He said the resurrection was laughter in the heart of God and so April Fool’s Day might be thought the appropriate day for Easter Sunday. The world is often a hard place and Good Friday and events leading up to it were certainly hard places for Jesus. On that first Good Friday, you can just imagine all the good people threatened by Jesus and his openness and all-encompassing love and whose scheming had sent him to his death, going to dinner that night thinking “at last we have got rid of him”. And then, on Easter Day he’s back! God having the last laugh. His way of inclusive love having the last word.

And, finally, three quick thoughts about April Fools.

St Paul suggests to us that we are to be fools for Christ.

He also says the foolishness of God is wiser than the wisdom of humans.

And whilst on this subject, in Shakespeare’s great play King Lear, the only one able to speak the truth to Lear was, of course, the Fool.

Happy April Fool’s Day!

Peter

One of my favourite novels is Any Human Heart by William Boyd – it charts in powerful prose the highs and lows of a man’s life – his griefs and his joys.

Holy Week, starting with Palm Sunday, through Good Friday and onto Easter Day has the same feel concentrated into just eight Days.

Palm Sunday (24^th March) an apparent high – Jesus is recognised as a great prophet, the crowds come out and palms are scattered – like the original tickertape welcomes that heroes used to get when arriving in New York!

But the darkness swiftly descends. Those forces which simply could not cope with Jesus’ message of inclusive love for all, perhaps especially for the outcasts and marginalised (those whom every society has and demonises), leads to Good Friday: deserted by friends, a kangaroo court and painful and ignominious death on the cross. The crowds that celebrated with him six days before, now hissing and jeering – another constant in history, the easily manipulated crowd!

That, of course, should be the end of the story. But something then happened. It cannot be tied down, but I have no doubt something did happen – because somehow those broken-down failures of followers were turned into a group that changed the world and, by the way, gave their lives for proclaiming their truth “this Jesus whom you crucified is risen”. A mystery certainly, but one that has changed the world.

I always get slightly irked when people tell me Christianity is an escape from reality: “pie in the sky when you die”, because that is not my belief. For me the Christian story rings true to both the highs and the lows of life. We can experience such utter highs when all is good and life so worth living, but most of us sometime or other experience also lows, where darkness seems to have the upper hand.

And for me, the cross holds both together – both the reality of pain and suffering and the hope that love and goodness are stronger and will triumph. That hope has been a foundation for millions upon millions both over the ages and in the present day. As St John says in his glorious prologue to his Gospel: “The light – the light of Christ – shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.” Our world seems quite a dark place sometimes both globally and sometimes for us: Holy Week can help lead us into the love of God revealed in Jesus.

I invite all who wish to, to joins us in that walk from Palm Sunday, (where I am delighted to say we are joining with St Richards), through Good Friday, to the glory of Easter Day.

This year Ash Wednesday, marking the beginning of Lent, is 14^th February – which, of course, is also St Valentine’s Day.

My first reaction on making the connection was to think that is a bit of a downer: all the romance, positivity and love we think about on Valentine’s Day, doesn’t appear at first sight to go with the seriousness of Lent which for Christians is meant to be a preparation first for the saddest day in the Christian calendar, Good Friday as well, of course, for the glorious day of Easter Sunday.

But the more I thought about this, the more I did see quite an important connection. Jesus’ journey to Good Friday, the day we remember his crucifixion, is a journey of love. It is a curiously overlooked fact and question – why was Jesus put to death? The answer becomes clear by reading any one of the four gospels in its entirety, (something that takes about an hour or so): Jesus proclaimed the inclusive love of God for all people. Not only did he say it but he lived it. As the bible tells us, the good people of the time said angrily “He eats with tax collectors and sinners”!! For so many people that was deeply shocking and offensive, as it challenged their own lack of love and narrow-mindedness. And so, they stitched him up with a kangaroo court of a trial. Even then Jesus showed a depth of love right to the cross itself – whilst being mocked as he was being crucified, saying “Father forgive them for they do not know what they do”.

If all that isn’t about the highest quality of love, what is it? So, this Ash Wednesday, whilst acknowledging the serious nature of the day, I am going to see it also as a celebration of God’s infinite love shown in Jesus.

And then another link came to mind. In the past, we were always encouraged to give up something for Lent, which in my experience used to lead either to failure, which is not a positive feeling, or grumpiness because I wanted that bar of chocolate but could not have it – or indeed both! In more recent years, Chrisitan spiritual writers have suggested, rather than give something up as a symbol of trying to do better, actually to do something positive. And that too is easily linked to loving. Love is not just a romantic idea, but a practical living out of a way of life. So perhaps to think of someone in need of help, or support, or friendship – but somehow, up to now, our busy lives have not quite made the time; or someone with whom we have struggled and whom we find difficult, instead trying to work towards reconciliation or forgiveness.

The love of Valentine’s Day can encompass both the romance AND our living more loving lives, which, for Christians, might well involve looking to, and learning from Jesus, his life and his loving.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Peter

There are twelve days of Christmas ending with the Epiphany – the 12th day – on 6^th January. This is my excuse for staying with a Christmas theme! In November we had some house groups in Slindon and what follows comes from a question that someone attending asked.

As an aside, one of the things I love about church or any discussion group is we learn from one another. As a parish priest, I have always found I have a lot to learn from my parishioners, both from those I meet in church and those I don’t.

The context: I was asking those attending what Christmas meant to them. One member referred to the word for Jesus used particularly at Christmas – “Immanuel” or God with us. So far so good and the rector is still on very comfy ground. Then the question came: so, what would the church look like, feel like, be like, if we lived as if God really was with us?

No longer quite so comfortable. For, of course, behind that question is both the comfort that God in his love is with us, but also the challenge, (a big one), that God’s love is so radical that it led to a profound quality of love and a love that the world found so challenging, that it led to the cross.

And I would suggest that because love is the meaning of the Christmas story, the question I was asked can be asked of any community, though the well-spring for our individual answers might be different. What would our parishes look like if that radical love was at the centre of it?

The hope in my life is centred on a belief that God is with me and us – but I am also to live out the radical love bit, however much I might stumble in the attempt.

By mistake (I misread the passage I was meant to be looking up for the service the following Sunday!), I came across part of the First Letter of Peter Chapter 3. The two letters of Peter are probably the bit of the New Testament I know least well. I very seldom quote from the Bible: but this passage brings together the comfort and hope with the challenge:

“Finally, all of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble. Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing…… Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience……For it is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil……..For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.”

I am hoping in my personal life and in our church life to explore further that question: what would the church look like, feel like and how would its life be – and indeed what would I look like, feel like and how would I live – if I took “Immanuel”, God with us and me, deeper into my life?

Peter

I am writing this on a wet windy day leading up to Remembrance Sunday. The weather is dismal and the world is too – with the unspeakable horrors in Gaza and Israel imprinted daily on our minds. Christmas and what it represents seems a long way away. I shall return to Christmas at the end.

Remembrance Sunday might help too in our wondering what can we do. One of the basic themes of Remembrance is: what can we do in our time to be peacemakers?  Jesus refers to them in the beautiful set of blessings at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. The basic building blocks for peacemaking start with us in our families and our communities – words such a forgiveness, compassion, wanting fairness and justice, thinking of others. That may seem a long way from Gaza – it is – but, that is where peace starts. So, the question is: what can each of us do to bring about peace here in our everyday lives?

Something else we can perhaps do is get informed. I read a great deal about increased polarisation and extremism as a direct result of looking at a very limited selection of media. It was my youngest daughter who referred me to the phrase “echo chamber” – and not in a complimentary setting!! There is a lot wrong with the Church of England: but one of the things I really value about it, is that it is a broad church, trying to listen to very different points of view (however hard that is), and has an honourable tradition of scholarship reaching way beyond narrow confines.

In that context, the most striking article I have read is one suggesting that where you start – some start at 1000 years BC, others as late as 1968, with many significant dates in between – will affect your view.  Which I think is thought provoking. Where do I start and how does that shape my view?

On that note I remember doing a module led by a Professor M R D Foot, a Professor of Modern History at Manchester when I was a student. It was a module on the Irish troubles – at a time when they were violent and with no apparent solution. His opening words were: “The present Irish troubles can be traced back to the sinking of The White Ship on 25^th November 1120, in which Henry 1’s son died.” The weight of history – and its complexity – can mean we literally drown in troubles. And yet, the political will from a leadership across the divides, together with hard and costly work at local community level by community groups, churches and families, has led to a more peaceful place, however precarious that sometimes feels.

And then turning to the Christmas calendar, the third day of the season, December 28^th, is always remembered as the massacre of the innocents – when Herod put to death children in his efforts to do away with the baby Jesus. And whatever our views, surely everyone of us cries out about the massacre of innocent people, including children and babies, in  both Gaza and Israel.

And then Christmas Day itself – for me a shaft of light in the darkness we do seem to face. As Isaiah the prophet says: “the people that walked in darkness have seen a great light”. A helpless baby brought into the world, who went on to show the power of love – seemingly so vulnerable, yet a light of hope that cannot be extinguished. Everyone is welcome to join us as we celebrate that hope this Christmas.

Peter

I have fond memories of my mother’s best friend “aunty” Eileen. She died in 1979 leaving no family. Her picture comes into my mind with regularity. I can picture her talking, laughing and the way she made me a particularly delectable (and large) cherry sponge cake every term I went back to school. It was, I think, the French writer Guy de Maupassant who wrote a short story on the theme that a person, on one meaningful level, does not die until the last person who knew them dies. There is still a conscious awareness of them and, hopefully, of the love they have given and the love they have received. Remembering makes a person or an occasion real: just look back on photos of a holiday and the holiday floods back into the mind.

Remembrance is a traditional theme for November. The church remembers All Saints Day on 1^st November – not a particular person, but the billions of people, names mostly now unknown, who in their lives trusted in God’s love for them, and tried to show a little of that in how they lived.

Then on 5^th November we have a service In Loving Memory. This is much more personal. Anyone who wants to can ask for a name to be read out and a candle lit for those whom they remember with love and thanks, but also a sense of loss. It is always a moving service – and I hope a gentle one.

And then there is Remembrance Day itself – which falls this year on November 12^th – the Sunday when, as a nation, we commemorate the fallen. That is both national and for many intensely personal. We remember millions, but each one an individual. I try in our service to focus on one who died – this year it will be a soldier or sailor who used to live in Madehurst – millions can seem just a statistic, but one death is a tragedy – and so, concentrating on the one can, I think, sometimes bring home the reality of the Remembrance: the grief, the cost, the doing of duty (some reluctantly and some willingly), and so often the bravery. And the remembering can take us from the past to the present and future: to care for those afflicted by war and to work for peace with justice.

The church has regular “remembering” services. They are called Holy Communion. They have been the central thread of worship and the continuation of the Christian faith for two millennia. And they too make things real, which is my understanding of what we mean by that phrase “Body and Blood of Christ”. We remember Jesus’ last meal with his disciples where he enigmatically said he was giving himself in love for others and that we are to remember this in the simple act of eating and drinking. And the next day he died on the cross and three days later, the most enigmatic part of all, the disciples realised that was not the end of the story.

And so, my taking the bread and wine and remembering and picturing that Last Supper, somehow makes real for me his self-giving, his love and the hope that love is stronger than all things. All these acts of remembrance – the personal, the national, the church and Last Supper take place this month and everyone is welcome.

Peter