Advent & Christmas News
Hello Barlaston Church Family & Friends,
Tier 3 is upon us, we do encourage you all to keep safe. However things are opening up a little as far as church is concerned and that is good news.
This coming Sunday 29th November is the First Sunday of Advent. The Advent wreath will be there in church (thank you Ellie Hedley & the flower Team) we are open for private prayer only this Sunday.
There is nice surprise for you this week, there are two talks to read, one from Stewart and one from the Bishop of Lichfield. You can read these at https://stjohnsbarlaston.co.uk/reflections
You can also listen to and hear the Bishop’s thoughts at https://youtu.be/V7C3wYCMzP4
A message from Alison Dando:
When a message was received from a Consultant at Royal Stoke Hospital that staff morale was at a real low the Bakers of Barlaston responded with gusto!
Within 4 days more than 200 home made cupcakes had been delivered to staff on the NHS front line.
Huge thanks go to Gill Brealey, Pat Worrall, Margaret Twigg, Sandie Buxton, Hilary Tunstall and her granddaughter Emily, Suzie Griffiths, Sue Croome, Gill Sands and her friend Sue, Michala Black and Maggie Brown.
There will be a service of Holy Communion at 1030 on Wednesday 2nd December and the following weeks. Sunday Communion services will start once more on Sunday 6th December which will be The Second Sunday of Advent. The now usual social distancing and mask wearing will be in operation.
Christmas Services
Despite the covid-19 restrictions we are still planning Christmas Services. They will of course be subject to any restrictions in place at the time.
The Services are as follows:
Sunday 20th December, Carol Service, 4pm
Christmas Eve, Carol Service, 4pm
Christmas Day, Holy Communion, 10.30am
(Both Carol services and possibly Christmas Day service will require people to book a place and Stewart will give details later)
We will not be holding a church Christingle Service on Christmas Eve as previous years but will be involved with one for the whole school on Dec 18th at 9.30am by Zoom.
There will be no Midnight Communion as in previous years. This is because we recognise that there will still be restrictions in place at Christmas and we must be sensible in how we use the building during this period. There will be a Wednesday Holy Communion service on 23rd Dec but not on 30thDec
To offer something else to the wider community we hope we will be organising ‘Call Carol’.
This will be an opportunity for people to book a group of carol singers (no more than six in each group and they will be two metres apart!) on a particular time and day to sing outside the house of the person for whom the booking has been made. Self-booking is allowed! To book you will be asked to call the church telephone number. It will be available on a limited number of early evenings leading up to Christmas and is aimed at people who have been isolated, shielding or simply need a bit of Christmas cheer. Details will be in the next magazine and on cards distributed around the local shops. If you want to help by being part of a group of singers let Stewart know.
Decorating the Church
We plan to decorate the church on Thursday 10th dec from 10am. If you want to help please contact Dennis (dennis@croome.net)
Magazine
The next issue of the magazine will be a joint Dec 2020/January 2021 issue and we will be producing enough copies to distribute to every household in the parish. If you can help with delivering, please get in touch.
With very best wishes
Dennis Croome