Saturday, 16th June 2018
12.30pm ~ Church Fete ~ Exton Cottage, Exton
6pm ~Confirmation Service ~ Portsmouth Cathedral
Week Beginning
17th June 2018
GDPR arrived on 25th May
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THANKS TO ALL CHRISTIAN AID WALKERS & SPONSORS &
ALL THOSE WHO ASSISTED AT THE DROXFORD COUNTRY FAIR &
AT THE CHURCH FETE AT EXTON
Week Beginning: 17th June 2018
Third Sunday after Trinity Proper VI
8am ~Holy Communion (BCP) ~ Exton
09.45 am ~ Informal Service for Fathers’ Day ~ Droxford
10.30 am ~ Family Communion (CW)
with First Communions and Banns
Corhampton
Week Beginning: 24th June 2018
Fourth Sunday after Trinity (Proper VII) &
the Birth of John the Baptist
8am ~Holy Communion (BCP) ~ Corhampton
Trinity 4
09.45 am ~ Bridging the Gap – All Age Service ~ Meonstoke
10.30 am ~ Holy Communion (CW) ~ Exton
The Birth of John the Baptist
Saturday, 30th June 2018
4 pm~ Ordination of Priests
The Cathedral Church of
St Thomas of Canterbury
Old Portsmouth
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Congratulations to His Royal Highness The Duke of Sussex and
Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Sussex married on
Saturday 19th May 2018
Congratulations to Amy and Matt (28th April 2018),
Alexandra and Bradley (5th may 2018) and Annie and Ian (9th June 2018)
on their weddings too
Well Done and Thanks
Thank you to all those who contributed to, helped organise or attended our recent events:
- Droxford Country Fair
- The Church Fete at Exton
Ordinary Time – Summer
The arrival of the first cuckoo has been reported in The Times and the long days and warmth of the sun tell us that the summer are not far away. We have celebrated Rogationtide, praying for the land, its farmers and other local businesses; and, Lammas will be at the end of July – we give thanks and pray for our rural environment and for our farmers and especially thanking God for the ‘First Fruits’ of harvest.
The 13th-century ‘Cuckoo Song’ often sung as a round telling us that summer is here. The cuckoos have arrived, so summer is here, it is icumen in, meaning it ‘has come’ rather than it is coming as people often think. So if you are reading this on a less than sultry day, go on-line a listen to a rendition to lift your spirits – search for ‘Sumer is icumen in’.
As I have written before, the church is enriched by having season too and I have expressed my view that Ordinary Time, the name for the 33 or 34 weeks of the year which are not part of those traditional seasons like Easter, is misleading and pretty uninspiring for most. The ‘Ordinary’ takes us back to O Level or GCSE mathematics and ordinal numbers relating to position in a series – these are the weeks we number rather than name. Ordinary Time is only ordinary in the mathematical sense, even though numbers play an important part in the Bible, its purpose is far from ordinary in the sense of mundane.
The summer, around the Feast Day of St Peter and St Paul, is also the time when the church yields is fruit of clergy at the ordination (also linked etymologically to order and ordinal and ordinary). We pray for Samantha as she prepares to be ordained priest at 4pm on Saturday, 30th June in the Cathedral Church of St Thomas of Canterbury in Old Portsmouth.
Although we do not celebrate one specific aspect of the life and ministry of Jesus, rather, and especially on the Sundays, we reflect on a wide range of aspects of Jesus’ teaching. Sunday is our original feast day, it is in some ways a weekly Easter. Christians have gathered every Sunday—the day of Christ’s resurrection, the first day of the week—ever since there were Christians. When we gather on Sundays in Ordinary Time, as always, we hear the scriptures proclaimed. The church reads straight through ‘the gospel of the year,’ this year Mark, and next year it will be Luke, followed by Matthew, and back to Mark. (We generally read John during Lent and Easter, and on some special festivals.) Readings are often continuous week-by-week, often resuming where we left off the week before. The other readings have been chosen for their relationship to the gospel passages. Many voices are heard throughout summer. Much of ministry and teaching of Jesus, the mystery of Christ, in all their aspects, unfold.
What is the heart of our Sunday celebration? We do our eucharist; that is, we do our thanksgiving. We praise and thank God for all creation; we pray for the whole world, as we remember Christ’s life, death and resurrection. We share the bread and wine, the body and blood, if we take communion. We are sent out to be the body of Christ in our homes, our workplaces, our villages and our world.
What happens in our churches every Sunday is the fruit of our week. As the fruits and crops flourish through the summer, so we are called, in Ordinary Time, to continue to ‘hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold’ (Mark 4.20) so that our time in the presence of God can never be just ordinary.
Rejoice and Be Fruitful – Summer is icumen in!
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Hackney and Bishop’s Waltham Deaneries Link
Please see our current Pew Sheet for details of the up-coming visit from our brothers and sisters in Hackney to our Deanery.
For many years the Deanery has collected food and clothes for a variety of church needs in Hackney to be taken up in December. Earlier this year our friends in Hackney told us that they now have built up their local contacts including food collections in their local Waitrose and several Schools so that they no longer need distance support. They have asked us to convey their warm thanks for our help over the years. Because of this there will be no collection of food and clothes for Hackney this Autumn. We shall still be grateful for any gifts of money which can be made payable to Bishop’s Waltham Deanery and will support our seven partners including the Winter Night Shelter. We shall be welcoming visitors from Hackney to Bishops Waltham in July and we will hope to meet our partners again during a Walk of Prayer probably in August next year. Norman Chatfield.
Meon Valley Food Bank – PLEASE HELP
Thank You so much for all your kind donations.
Follow MVFB on twitter @MeonValleyFB or at www.meonvalleyfoodbank.co.uk.
