Dear Friends
Attempting to communicate with you all during this pandemic has been challenging. I apologise if any of you feel that I have not communicated with you well enough. Getting the balance right has been difficult. We will of course continue with our electronic communication and improve it where we can. I am always available via the phone 020 8995 4717 or email vicar@stnicholaschiswick.org if you would like to talk. Please be assured that you are all very much in my daily thoughts and prayers. The next few months are traditionally the busiest in our parish, this year of course we need to consider just how we approach our various activities and services in the light of local restrictions and conscious that these may change at any time. Please keep an eye out for future e-bulletins for information.
As a registered charity we are required by law to hold an annual general meeting, or in our case our APCM. This is your opportunity to hear about the work of the parish and its financial health. Also to elect churchwardens and PCC members. Normally we would hold such a meeting in April, this year it’s very different, we are holding our APCM and the meeting to elect our churchwardens on Tuesday 27 October at 7.30pm. This will be online via Zoom, if you would like to attend please email the office for an invitation.
Our new children’s and family mass at 11am seems to be going well, I hope this is something which will grow and develop, again we need to be flexible and responsive, if you haven’t yet, I do encourage you to join us at 11.00am on Sunday – it’s fun.
With my prayers and blessings to you all.
Simon
Dear Friends
I recently came across this poem by the Irish poet and priest John O’Donohue (1956-2007) which seems to me to offer comfort and hope in our present times.
This is the time to be slow,
Lie low to the wall
Until the bitter weather passes.
Try, as best you can, not to let
The wire brush of doubt
Scrape from your heart
All sense of yourself
And your hesitant light.
If you remain generous,
Time will come good;
And you will find your feet
Again on fresh pastures of promise,
Where the air will be kind
And blushed with beginning.”
On a more upbeat note, I’d like to finish with some wonderful news and congratulations. Father David Adamson, son of Barbara and Clive, was married on Saturday, allowing him and his wife to celebrate with a quota of 30 people present, just before the number was reduced to 15! Further congratulations are in order as the Bishop of Southwark has just awarded Father David and six other individuals a Lancelot Andrewes medal at his Festal Evensong in Southwark Cathedral. These medals were awarded by the Bishop to those on the front line and those he has worked closely with during the Pandemic extending God’s love and the ministry of the Church to the people of South London and East Surrey.
With every blessing
Mother Eileen