After a two week holiday of glorious sunshine and excellent French food, I wouldn’t be being entirely honest if I started my post-holiday email by saying “it’s good to be back”! Instead I’ll comfort myself with the thought that if I had those things all the time, they would no longer be wonderful holiday treat!
One benefit of travel is you get to see how other nations handle things – and it’s been really helpful to see how another country is coping with Covid. The French are a couple of months ahead of us in coping with Covid, and its all being done with a lot less fuss than here. Face masks were being worn pretty much everywhere even before the government made them mandatory, and I see that from this weekend, they’re mandatory in church here.
This means that from this weekend, you will need to wear a face mask when attending our churches. (Note, we will have a small supply of them available in case you forget, and as always, certain groups are exempt.). I hope wearing one won’t be too distressing for you.
To help us get our services back to a more normal schedule, we’re take the decision to suspend our Daily Prayer videos for the time being. This will give Sue, Alison and I a bit of extra time each week to work on other things. I’m enormously grateful to Sue and Alison for all the work they’ve put into producing the videos and I’m glad that they’ve been a help to many of you each day. If you’d like to continue engaging with a Daily Prayer service, you can visit the Church of England’s Daily Prayer website where each day there is a spoken service and the words are available online. Click here for more information.
We’re also working on a new regular service schedule, which will see a couple of services happening each month in most of our churches. We’re still consulting on this with the service leaders and wardens, but all things being equal, we should be able to start the new regular service pattern in September. Hopefully I’ll be able to tell you more next time.
Here’s a run down of everything going on this week, along with links to some fun things we’ve spotted this week, and our updated prayer list.
1) Services in church, this Sunday 9 August
- Holy Communion, Upton @ 9:30am
- Morning Worship, Welland @ 11am (possibly open-air)
2) Online Services
Click the links on the list below to take you direct to the event at the appropriate time.
Sunday 9 August
Prerecorded, (stream at your convenience)
- Sunday Service (traditional hymn version) – PRERECORDED so you can watch anytime from midnight on Sunday (also available through our Youtube channel).
- Church Family (modern music version) – PRERECORDED – watch anytime from midnight on Sunday at www.hopechurchfamily.org/virtual or through our Youtube channel or join the live Facebook Premiere at 9:30am.
3) Next Weekend (Sunday 16 August)
- 9:30am Holy Communion @ Hanley Swan
- 9:30am Holy Communion @ Ripple
- 11am Holy Communion @ Earls Croome
- Service of the Word (traditional) – PRERECORDED available from midnight
- Church Family (contemporary)– Facebook Premiere at 9:30am and PRERECORDED available from midnight.
4) Church finances – you can make a difference!
Like all small charities, your local church is suffering a significant financial shortfall as a result of lost income from collections and special fundraising events we’d have run through the summer.
Whilst there’s still some hope we might be able to run a few events in the open air later in the summer, we do face a very challenging future financially. If you are in a position to give an additional gift at this time, it would make a huge difference.
To make this simpler, we’ve set up a new GIVING page on our website (https://www.hopechurchfamily.org/giving), with all the information you’ll need to give a one-off, or regular gift to any of our churches.
5) Services on DVDs and CDs
Every week I produce the services on DVD and CD for a small number of folk across the area who don’t have internet access. It’s been a lovely way for them to stay in touch. If you know of anyone else who would be helped by this ministry, please let me know.
6) What Covid-safe church will be like.
These are the basic, common-sense, “ground rules” for a Covid-safe church service.
- If you are experiencing any Covid-19 symptoms (high temperature, new continuous cough, loss/change to your sense of smell or taste) please seek medical advice and do not attend services. We are continuing to provide services online.
- We will need to take contact details from you when you arrive to assist with contact tracing in the event of an outbreak of Covid-19. This will be kept for 21 days and then disposed of.
- Face coverings are now mandatory. Please wear one for the sake of the other people present. Note that service leaders, and anyone speaking in the service (for example when leading prayers or reading the Bible) are also exempt as long as social-distancing is possible.
- When you enter and leave the building, please use the hand-sanitiser provided.
- Where single-use service sheets are supplied, please take them away with you after the service and dispose of them. Please do not leave them on your seat.
- The social distancing rule is 2 metres. In practice during the distribution of communion, it may be hard to maintain the rule, and other risk-mitigating measures may be in place (for example the use of face masks or visors).
- To enable social distancing rules to be maintained, please only sit in the seat(s) you are assigned. It helps us increase capacity if family groups/bubbles sit together.
- At the moment we do not think demand will be such that we have to introduce a ticketing system, but we may have to do this in future weeks. In the event of the building reaching capacity we will have to turn you away, so you are advised to come early to guarantee a seat!.
- Singing is not allowed, due to the risk of virus transmission posed by energetic singing! Shouting and energetic liturgy is discouraged for the same reason!
- Hard though it will be, family groups and bubbles are discouraged from interacting with each other in the building or in the church grounds.
- Children are the responsibility of their parents/guardian during the service. In line with national guidance, childrens corners in churches are currently closed, and we are not yet in a position to offer any Sunday School or Breakfast Church provision.
- Please exit the building as soon as the service ends.
- There will be no refreshments served after the service
- Holy Communion will be served in “one-kind” only (bread) as the common cup is seen as a greater infection risk.
- Cash collections are discouraged. If you give using cash, please consider setting up a standing order or using the Parish Giving Scheme to support our work. You can find out details relating your parish here.
- Please observe all directions the stewards give you.
I’m grateful to you all for your continued patience as we try to work all of this out in a way that is safe for everyone concerned. Please continue praying for everyone involved in reopening buildings and restarting services: we need it!
7) Churches Open For Individual Prayer.
Thanks to the hard work of our volunteer cleaners and organisers we’re able to open three of our churches for a short period each week for individual prayer. You can visit to pray at the following times:
- Mondays 10am-noon St James’ Welland
- Tuesdays 10am-noon St Gabriel’s, Hanley Swan
- Wednesdays 10am-noon St Mary’s, Hanley Castle
- Thursdays 10am-noon St James’, Welland
- Fridays 5pm-7pm St Gabriel’s, Hanley Swan
- Saturdays 10am-noon St Mary’s, Hanley Castle
To help keep you safe, the buildings are being cleaned before and after each opening period, and the three-day gap between each building opening will act as an additional “safety buffer” in which the scientists tell us any virus particles that the cleaners have missed will die.
Notwithstanding that, please help us keep the buildings clean and safe by minimising the things you touch while in the building, using the provided hand gel, observing social distancing, and following all safety instructions in the building.
Please do not enter the building if you are experiencing any of the key Covid-19 symptoms:
- a new continuous cough.
- a high temperature.
- a loss of, or change in, your normal sense of taste or smell (anosmia)
It’s also possible that we may need to close one of the buildings occasionally for a funeral, or other service, or because we haven’t been able to maintain cleaning safety. We’ll do our best to inform you of this.
8) Deanery Plan – Consultation
As part of its plan to restructure and streamline things, the Diocese of Worcester is planning to reorganise its deanery structures. Our parishes currently form part of the Deanery of Upton, which is among the smallest deaneries in the country, and not considered viable at this size. Two options have been considered – merging us with a larger rural deanery (Pershore and Evesham), or with the more local Malvern deanery. Personally I think Malvern makes a lot more sense, but you may feel differently about it. You can download the full details here, and if you have any comments please send them to the address in the consultation letter.
We long for the day when we can all gather together again, but in the meantime, stay safe, stay prayerful, and God bless!
Reverend Barry Unwin
Vicar, Hope Church Family