Looking for meaning in Christmas

Whether you’re a ‘Humbug Christmas’ type or ‘Yipee! - let’s get the tree up’ person, one thing is for certain Christmas is coming, and sooner than you think! For many it will be a stress-filled time of frantic lists, shopping, cooking, wrapping presents, followed by rows and disappointments; while others lap-up the eating and drinking, family get-togethers, work parties, dressing up and surprises… but how do we make sense of it all - C  goes in search of the real reason for the season. 

What better way to get young people talking about the real meaning of Christmas than by posting a video on YouTube.This increasingly popular video sharing website will soon be hosting films on the meaning of Christmas thanks to a national competition. Some 100 churches have taken up the challenge to take part and create one minute videos on the ‘True Meaning of Christmas’.

C Magazine goes in search of…The Holy Mail

Where would you get a slice of homemade shortbread served up with your stamps, or a ‘doorstep’ of Dundee cake with your driving licence? In church of course! St Luke’s, Kinoulton has become the Holy Post Cafe for two afternoons and one morning a week, following the closure of their local post office and shop earlier this year.

History was made at St Luke’s on June 5th when the first postal order was purchased from the pews - or rather from a purpose built counter installed at the back of the church.That same week the television crews moved in – and with rural France also encountering post office closures - the main French news channel, TF1, appeared along with the local press and TV.

The Peacemakers

As part of a recent Palestinian Christian Exchange Visit Jane Wyles attended an evening in Southwell Minster to hear two key clergymen from the Middle East in conversation with Pat Ashworth of the Church Times. Peace in the Holy Land: Dream or Reality?

In a hushed nave beneath the powerful Christus Rex an audience of about 100 eagerly wait to hear what Father Fuad Dagher, Rector of St Paul’s Episcopal Church in Shefar’am, Galilee - and Canon Hosam Naoum, Acting Dean of St George’s Cathedral, Jerusalem have to say about the current unrest, and possible future solutions.

The seriousness of the subject is alleviated by the style of the evening, with Pat sitting diminutively between these two rather large and very similar looking men – indeed they are known as ‘The Twins’ in Jerusalem. It is also Father Fuad’s sixth wedding anniversary today, so congratulations are warmly given and received. Canon Hosam has visited Britain several times, and says that it is ‘like coming home.’

Matt makes his Mark!

Matthew Ward is just like any other 18 year old in the diocese just starting university, except that he’s also a churchwarden...

Matt is the youngest churchwarden in Southwell & Nottingham Diocese and I wanted to find out why he had taken on a role usually filled by a more seasoned member of the congregation, so I arranged to meet him at St Mary’s Church, Newstead, along with his vicar, the Revd Liz Turner-Loisel, writes Jane Wyles.

Matt’s appointment came out of a number of changes here at St Mary’s”, said Liz. “In September 2007 we thought the church would have to close. It had always been run by people from Annesley and supported financially by the congregation of Newstead Abbey. I had set a two year deadline for it to be up and running independently but this didn’t happen so reluctantly we decided it would have to close – even though the community wanted to keep it for their funerals and the congregation had grown from six to 28. They just didn’t have the confidence to run it themselves from the Annual meeting in the following March there would be no-one else either.”

Hands to the Pumps

Anyone for beer? Changes are being made at national level to help local churches find new ways of being church. One of those changes is the Revd Joanna Hay’s new post in the far north of the diocese. She has responsibility for Fresh Expressions of Mission & Ministry in Retford Deanery and is Diocesan Adviser on Rural Evangelism.

This first six months has been challenging and exacting but also so exciting and refreshing,” said Joanna. “Previously we have invited the world to come to church. Now we are seeing the need to also take the Church to the world. My work is all about God’s mission. It involves prayerfully discerning and seeing where God is at work and joining in with him, bringing Christ and the message of God’s love into the ordinary, everyday situations around us all, and helping people make the connections with their spiritual hunger and God’s offer of personal relationship with him. Being freed from parish responsibilities, I can work with people where they are, just in the same way as Jesus went about meeting people. Getting into conversation and asking casual questions is such an easy style of interaction and initial mission, and the questions start to quickly flow the other way too.”