Benefice-Priest in Charge
Katrina Dykes
December 2020
Dear friends,
One of the things that clergy spend a lot of time doing, as you might expect, is thinking about Christmas! We usually start thinking about it around January, reflecting on what went well the previous year and what we might change for the year to come.
It then drops off the radar for a few months as we prepare for Easter, but when things calm down again over the summer we spend our idle moments trying to remember what we had decided back in January and coming up with wildly creative and completely impractical ideas for things we could do in the winter to come.
Generally those wildly creative ideas never make it off the drawing board, and we end up doing more or less the same as usual – even (and I’ll let you in on a trade secret here) re-using the odd sermon if we’re confident that the congregation had indulged in enough pre-service sherry or mulled wine to have forgotten our deeply profound and meaningful reflections the previous year.
This year, however, has been completely different. Planning ahead for Christmas this year has felt more like a game of Snakes and Ladders where one roll of the dice can send you sliding back down a completely different path and you have to start all over again!
So we have made some plans for holding services both in Church and online, and we are excited about what we’re hoping to offer to help our communities celebrate Christmas this year. But we also know that a word from the Prime Minister, or an increase in local cases, could scupper some of these plans and send us back to the drawing board.
All this uncertainty has given me a new perspective on the Christmas story itself, because the more I reflect on it in this year of disruption, the more I realise how disrupting the events of the first Christmas were for those involved.
Mary and Joseph were engaged to be married, they no doubt had their plans for what their lives would look like, until the angel Gabriel turned up and sent all their plans out the window. Then, just as they were getting used to the idea that they would have a baby, the emperor ordered a census so they had to set off away from home on the long journey to Bethlehem. Not what they had planned at all.
Or what about the shepherds, sat happily in their fields just doing their job until the angels appeared and sent them running into the village to find the newborn Jesus. And then there were the wise men, sent on a perilous journey to a far off land because of the appearance of a new star in the sky. None of these people could have predicted or planned what would happen to them, but when the disruption came they went with it and in doing so they met God face to face.
We all approach Christmas with our own sets of expectations and hopes, rituals and traditions, and after all we’ve been through this year it may feel heartbreaking that we won’t be able to celebrate in the ways that we usually do. But perhaps this Christmas, this strange and disrupted Christmas, gives us an opportunity to learn anew from Mary and Joseph, the wise men and the shepherds, and to allow the strange turn our lives have taken to lead us closer to the God who is always with us.
Rev'd Katrina
Dear friends,
One of the things that clergy spend a lot of time doing, as you might expect, is thinking about Christmas! We usually start thinking about it around January, reflecting on what went well the previous year and what we might change for the year to come.
It then drops off the radar for a few months as we prepare for Easter, but when things calm down again over the summer we spend our idle moments trying to remember what we had decided back in January and coming up with wildly creative and completely impractical ideas for things we could do in the winter to come.
Generally those wildly creative ideas never make it off the drawing board, and we end up doing more or less the same as usual – even (and I’ll let you in on a trade secret here) re-using the odd sermon if we’re confident that the congregation had indulged in enough pre-service sherry or mulled wine to have forgotten our deeply profound and meaningful reflections the previous year.
This year, however, has been completely different. Planning ahead for Christmas this year has felt more like a game of Snakes and Ladders where one roll of the dice can send you sliding back down a completely different path and you have to start all over again!
So we have made some plans for holding services both in Church and online, and we are excited about what we’re hoping to offer to help our communities celebrate Christmas this year. But we also know that a word from the Prime Minister, or an increase in local cases, could scupper some of these plans and send us back to the drawing board.
All this uncertainty has given me a new perspective on the Christmas story itself, because the more I reflect on it in this year of disruption, the more I realise how disrupting the events of the first Christmas were for those involved.
Mary and Joseph were engaged to be married, they no doubt had their plans for what their lives would look like, until the angel Gabriel turned up and sent all their plans out the window. Then, just as they were getting used to the idea that they would have a baby, the emperor ordered a census so they had to set off away from home on the long journey to Bethlehem. Not what they had planned at all.
Or what about the shepherds, sat happily in their fields just doing their job until the angels appeared and sent them running into the village to find the newborn Jesus. And then there were the wise men, sent on a perilous journey to a far off land because of the appearance of a new star in the sky. None of these people could have predicted or planned what would happen to them, but when the disruption came they went with it and in doing so they met God face to face.
We all approach Christmas with our own sets of expectations and hopes, rituals and traditions, and after all we’ve been through this year it may feel heartbreaking that we won’t be able to celebrate in the ways that we usually do. But perhaps this Christmas, this strange and disrupted Christmas, gives us an opportunity to learn anew from Mary and Joseph, the wise men and the shepherds, and to allow the strange turn our lives have taken to lead us closer to the God who is always with us.
Rev'd Katrina
October 2020
Poppies and Cyclamen
I was reminded recently about how when the soil of a place is disturbed, it often produces new plants from seeds that have long lain dormant. A friend told me that due to the amount of attention her garden had received this year, she now had an abundance of ‘wild’ Cyclamen. She put this down to the increased soil disturbance from her lock-down digging.
When we had the enormous Leylandii hedge removed from The Rectory garden not long after we moved in, not only did it make the house lighter, but it produced a stunning crop of poppies. Of course the abundance of poppies growing on the Battle Fields of Flanders and The Somme has been attributed to the massive disturbance of the earth in those locations from the heavy shelling.
Disruption and growth go together in other areas of life too, it seems to me. As I consider the massive disruption to all our lives on account of Covid 19 I can also see unexpected new growth that has come about as a result.
As a result of re-potting our church services to an online environment, we have grown in unforeseen ways. We have welcomed friends and family not only from across the globe, but from down the road, including those unable to physically come to the church building. Together we have grown a community who have been able to support one another through these difficult times. I know many have found these services to be a great blessing.
Men’s Café too has blossomed in this season, increasing in numbers attending and the frequency of their meeting.
Wedding couples whose preparations were thrown into disarray have spoken about a rediscovery of what is really important. Through the pruning back of their plans many are relishing the intimacy and simplicity of the occasion, as well as saving a load of money!!
The turmoil of the past months, have also yielded a bumper crop of creativity as we have sought to find other ways of doing things. I thought the alternative fete in Abbotts Ann in September was a great success – whilst it may not have raised the funds of past years, it was a wonderfully, uplifting community event and lovely to have it spread around different venues in the village.
As we head into the autumn and winter I am pleased to be receiving fresh ideas about how we will be able to commemorate and remember with respect and dignity those who have died whether in war or in more recent times and closer to home. We are also exploring some exciting options for how we will be able celebrate Advent and Christmas. You never now, perhaps these adverse conditions will result in the creation of new traditions that we will come to treasure when things do finally return to normal.
As the days shorten and the temperature drops, please remember that the local church is here for everyone and we are determined to find ways old and new, to invite and welcome you to join in the important events and celebrations in the coming weeks.
God bless you.
Rev’d Katrina
Poppies and Cyclamen
I was reminded recently about how when the soil of a place is disturbed, it often produces new plants from seeds that have long lain dormant. A friend told me that due to the amount of attention her garden had received this year, she now had an abundance of ‘wild’ Cyclamen. She put this down to the increased soil disturbance from her lock-down digging.
When we had the enormous Leylandii hedge removed from The Rectory garden not long after we moved in, not only did it make the house lighter, but it produced a stunning crop of poppies. Of course the abundance of poppies growing on the Battle Fields of Flanders and The Somme has been attributed to the massive disturbance of the earth in those locations from the heavy shelling.
Disruption and growth go together in other areas of life too, it seems to me. As I consider the massive disruption to all our lives on account of Covid 19 I can also see unexpected new growth that has come about as a result.
As a result of re-potting our church services to an online environment, we have grown in unforeseen ways. We have welcomed friends and family not only from across the globe, but from down the road, including those unable to physically come to the church building. Together we have grown a community who have been able to support one another through these difficult times. I know many have found these services to be a great blessing.
Men’s Café too has blossomed in this season, increasing in numbers attending and the frequency of their meeting.
Wedding couples whose preparations were thrown into disarray have spoken about a rediscovery of what is really important. Through the pruning back of their plans many are relishing the intimacy and simplicity of the occasion, as well as saving a load of money!!
The turmoil of the past months, have also yielded a bumper crop of creativity as we have sought to find other ways of doing things. I thought the alternative fete in Abbotts Ann in September was a great success – whilst it may not have raised the funds of past years, it was a wonderfully, uplifting community event and lovely to have it spread around different venues in the village.
As we head into the autumn and winter I am pleased to be receiving fresh ideas about how we will be able to commemorate and remember with respect and dignity those who have died whether in war or in more recent times and closer to home. We are also exploring some exciting options for how we will be able celebrate Advent and Christmas. You never now, perhaps these adverse conditions will result in the creation of new traditions that we will come to treasure when things do finally return to normal.
As the days shorten and the temperature drops, please remember that the local church is here for everyone and we are determined to find ways old and new, to invite and welcome you to join in the important events and celebrations in the coming weeks.
God bless you.
Rev’d Katrina
September 2020
Dear Friends
Looking back over the past six months we have been through a phenomenal amount of change and disruption. It has been hard at times, to keep up with current guidelines and know what we should be doing where and when.
Many of us have adapted pretty well to the new environment we find ourselves in, learning how to Zoom, carrying sanitizer and face masks with us at all times and checking up on our neighbours regularly.
What has been harder to adapt to has been the sense of loss and grief. We have lost much loved and respected members of our communities and we have been unable to show our sympathy and support for one another in the ways we would have liked. We have missed sharing time with family and friends and being in physical contact with loved ones. We may also feel we have missed a summer and a much needed holiday.
Autumn is approaching and our patience and resilience is perhaps growing thin as we long for life to return to normal. At the same time we may fear a second spike and increases in infections and deaths.
But, as we enter the season of ripening fruits and harvesting crops, I wonder whether there isn’t yet another harvest to be gathered up, that will sustain us in the weeks ahead.
Paul wrote in his letter to the Galatians that if we allow the Holy Spirit to take up residence in our lives and grow in his influence over us, he will produce fruit in us that is consistent with his character. Fruit that we seem to be more in need of than ever.
The fruit is called love and Paul unpacks what he means by elaborating that this love shows itself in us as joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. This fruit does not come from striving and trying really hard to do the right things or pretending to be something we are not. It comes from allowing God to live and move and have his being within us.
If we feel the grief of separation from loved ones; if we become frustrated with inconvenience and find ourselves brushing off the consequences of careless actions; if we become impatient with this situation seeming to go on and on, and if we feel ourselves growing weary, perhaps it is time to ask God to take up residence in our hearts and grow his fruit of love in us, that we may see a harvest of joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control that we can truly give thanks for and will sustain us through the winter.
Katrina
Rev’d Katrina Dykes
Priest-in-Charge, Abbotts Ann, Upper Clatford and Goodworth Clatford.
Dear Friends
Looking back over the past six months we have been through a phenomenal amount of change and disruption. It has been hard at times, to keep up with current guidelines and know what we should be doing where and when.
Many of us have adapted pretty well to the new environment we find ourselves in, learning how to Zoom, carrying sanitizer and face masks with us at all times and checking up on our neighbours regularly.
What has been harder to adapt to has been the sense of loss and grief. We have lost much loved and respected members of our communities and we have been unable to show our sympathy and support for one another in the ways we would have liked. We have missed sharing time with family and friends and being in physical contact with loved ones. We may also feel we have missed a summer and a much needed holiday.
Autumn is approaching and our patience and resilience is perhaps growing thin as we long for life to return to normal. At the same time we may fear a second spike and increases in infections and deaths.
But, as we enter the season of ripening fruits and harvesting crops, I wonder whether there isn’t yet another harvest to be gathered up, that will sustain us in the weeks ahead.
Paul wrote in his letter to the Galatians that if we allow the Holy Spirit to take up residence in our lives and grow in his influence over us, he will produce fruit in us that is consistent with his character. Fruit that we seem to be more in need of than ever.
The fruit is called love and Paul unpacks what he means by elaborating that this love shows itself in us as joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. This fruit does not come from striving and trying really hard to do the right things or pretending to be something we are not. It comes from allowing God to live and move and have his being within us.
If we feel the grief of separation from loved ones; if we become frustrated with inconvenience and find ourselves brushing off the consequences of careless actions; if we become impatient with this situation seeming to go on and on, and if we feel ourselves growing weary, perhaps it is time to ask God to take up residence in our hearts and grow his fruit of love in us, that we may see a harvest of joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control that we can truly give thanks for and will sustain us through the winter.
Katrina
Rev’d Katrina Dykes
Priest-in-Charge, Abbotts Ann, Upper Clatford and Goodworth Clatford.
July 2020
Dear friends,
I very much hope that this letter finds you and your loved ones in good health, in body, mind and spirit. These past weeks have been testing for us all in many ways. However, I am pleased to write to you now, with the news that we will very soon be able to worship in our church buildings again.
First, I would like to reassure all of you who are not yet ready to come out to church, that we will be continuing all of our current activities online through-out the summer and into September.
The Sunday midday service will be simplified a little, but will still include the Bible reading for the week, a sermon and intercessions. I am pleased to say you will also get a little more variety as the Ministry Team begin to take on more of these services from their homes. The noon service will also continue be available to listen to on the phone line which we have provided for those who don’t have computers.
Sunday evening Zoom services will also continue, covering a wide variety of themes and input from others in our church community.
Daily Night prayer will also still be available.
In addition, from Sunday 19th July we will be able to offer a service of Holy Communion at 10am in one of our churches each week. In order to abide by government and Church of England guidelines, I am afraid that numbers do have to be restricted to allow for social distancing, although I am hopeful we have sufficient space for all who wish to join us. It would be exceedingly helpful to know who to expect each week, so please would you let Sarah Derbyshire our benefice administrator know if you are intending to join us. A simple phone message: 07393-944245 or email: officeannabenefice@gmail.com by noon the Friday before the Sunday and please let us know who will be coming with you.
If you have friends or neighbours who do not receive this mailing, please do let them know about this arrangement.
The Order of Service will be available to download and print from the website, if you would like to bring your own with you, but we will also have printed copies in the church.
We will be doing all we can to make worship in our church buildings a safe and meaningful experience. We will be able to distribute the communion bread to all who wish to receive, but at this time only the priest is able to take the wine on behalf of everyone.
If you are feeling unwell please do not attend church. Face coverings are not currently required (but do keep an eye out for updates, as this may change), however you may want to wear one for the safety of others. We will be asking for a contact phone number or email for the purpose of track and trace, in case needed.
On the next page of this letter you will find details of which church will be hosting the service on which Sundays over the summer.
I very much hope I will see you soon, but please do feel free to be in touch if you want to ask about anything we are currently offering.
Wishing you peace and joy,
Katrina
Rev’d Katrina Dykes
Priest-in-Charge, Abbotts Ann, Upper Clatford and Goodworth Clatford.
Sunday 10am Services of Holy Communion in the Anna Benefice
Please leave a phone message on 07393-944245 or email officeannabenefice@gmail.com if you are intending to join us, letting us know if anyone is coming with you.
Thank you.
Sept
6 St Mary Abbotts Ann
13 St Peter Goodworth Clatford
Message from Katrina May 2020
‘New Normal’ is a phrase I am hearing quite a bit at the moment as life is anything but old normal at the moment! Even in our little villages, where we are largely shielded from the harsher consequences of the Coronavirus, life has changed and people are beginning to ask whether the experience will change us and if so how?
Unable to meet in person, many of us have picked up new skills for working and socialising online. We are even ‘doing’ church online with Facebook and Zoom. One of the benefits of this for our church community has been the inclusion of people who haven’t been able to come to church for some time, now being part of a worship service with others once again. Sadly, not everyone is au fait with this way of doing things, and we miss them being part of our gatherings on Sundays.
For families there has been the huge adjustment to home schooling. A great opportunity for parents and children to spend more time being together and share in lots of creative activities. At the same time the pressure of trying to work from home, making sure children have their lessons and get opportunity to run off their energy, is a lot to juggle and can lead to arguments and stress.
I know many are using this time to get on with home improvement projects or spending time working in the garden. The sense of achievement and pleasure this brings is of great benefit to many. Whilst others are anxious about how long this will go one for and when they will be able to get back to work.
There has been a great outpouring of kindness and neighbourliness in our villages. People coming together to look out for one another, collect prescriptions and deliver shopping. More people are out and about walking and cycling and stopping for chat, as we have the time to catch up with friends old and new. And the peace and tranquillity of the countryside with fewer cars passing through our villages, draws our attention to notice the little things so easily missed, insects and birds, leaves slowly unfurling and the delicate colours of spring flowers.
I am sure there will be aspects of this experience we will want to leave behind as soon as we are able. But I hope that the good things we have discovered will stick. That we will move forward changed for the better, reconnecting with the good from the old normal and leaving the bad. Leaving the pain of the current normal, but taking with us all the good we found in this most abnormal of times, as we forge ahead into the ‘New Normal’.
There is a strong precedent in the scriptures for both change and stability to be part of the normal human experience and leave you with these words that have stood the test of many centuries whilst still remaining fresh:
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
Lamentations 3:22-23
Church services:
Mon-Sat: 6pm Night Prayer Facebook Live
Sundays: 12 noon Facebook Live
6pm Zoom service
‘New Normal’ is a phrase I am hearing quite a bit at the moment as life is anything but old normal at the moment! Even in our little villages, where we are largely shielded from the harsher consequences of the Coronavirus, life has changed and people are beginning to ask whether the experience will change us and if so how?
Unable to meet in person, many of us have picked up new skills for working and socialising online. We are even ‘doing’ church online with Facebook and Zoom. One of the benefits of this for our church community has been the inclusion of people who haven’t been able to come to church for some time, now being part of a worship service with others once again. Sadly, not everyone is au fait with this way of doing things, and we miss them being part of our gatherings on Sundays.
For families there has been the huge adjustment to home schooling. A great opportunity for parents and children to spend more time being together and share in lots of creative activities. At the same time the pressure of trying to work from home, making sure children have their lessons and get opportunity to run off their energy, is a lot to juggle and can lead to arguments and stress.
I know many are using this time to get on with home improvement projects or spending time working in the garden. The sense of achievement and pleasure this brings is of great benefit to many. Whilst others are anxious about how long this will go one for and when they will be able to get back to work.
There has been a great outpouring of kindness and neighbourliness in our villages. People coming together to look out for one another, collect prescriptions and deliver shopping. More people are out and about walking and cycling and stopping for chat, as we have the time to catch up with friends old and new. And the peace and tranquillity of the countryside with fewer cars passing through our villages, draws our attention to notice the little things so easily missed, insects and birds, leaves slowly unfurling and the delicate colours of spring flowers.
I am sure there will be aspects of this experience we will want to leave behind as soon as we are able. But I hope that the good things we have discovered will stick. That we will move forward changed for the better, reconnecting with the good from the old normal and leaving the bad. Leaving the pain of the current normal, but taking with us all the good we found in this most abnormal of times, as we forge ahead into the ‘New Normal’.
There is a strong precedent in the scriptures for both change and stability to be part of the normal human experience and leave you with these words that have stood the test of many centuries whilst still remaining fresh:
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
Lamentations 3:22-23
Church services:
Mon-Sat: 6pm Night Prayer Facebook Live
Sundays: 12 noon Facebook Live
6pm Zoom service
