This week's electronic newsletter from Hereford Diocese can be found HERE.
In this week’s video Bishop Richard is inspired by the 24/7 prayer movement to re-ignite our passion for Christ and ensure that prayer and action remain linked together.The message can be watched HERE.
St. Mary's Church, Caynham is holding its ever-popular annual Christmas Tree Festival on the first weekend of December - full details on the downloadable poster.Time to start planning how to decorate your Christmas tree entry for the competition!
Dear Friends,November is always the month that I think of as being Remembrance season, not just because of Remembrance Sunday but because it is in the month in which we remember All Souls and All Saints as well, a time for remembering and giving thanks for those who have gone before us and all those who have been like saints to us. Obviously on Remembrance Sunday we think of all those who have lost their lives as a result of war, either in the two world wars or in conflicts such as the Falklands war, Afghanistan, Iraq and many other places as well.In a very stark way, I believe, the reality of war has been brought home to us this year by the dramatic and horrific escalation in the conflict in the Middle East which has become a dreadful reality for many millions of people in Israel and Gaza over the last few days. We are all, I’m sure, grappling with the horrors unfolding day by day which are being relayed through the media, and the stark images and stories of suffering, the personal stories of loss and grief and the utter hopelessness that many feel as homes, livelihoods and loved ones are taken on both sides. Some of you may have friends or relatives who are in some way affected.This comes in addition to the war in Ukraine that has been going on for so long now and that brought home to us in a very real way how war affects ordinary men, women and children, coping with the devastation and tragedy that is the real cost of war, a war that was not of their making but that has affected people in so many different ways, whether in terms of the daily horrors of living in a war torn country or in causing people to flee from their homes and everything they have known to find safety in another country.With these and many other conflicts raging on I can’t help wondering what my Dad and all those who fought in World War II, a war that they were told would be the war to end all wars would make of the current situation. In the light of everything going on around us it would be easy to despair, to lose hope, and yet I believe there is still hope. Some of you over the last few weeks will have heard me pray during our services for God to raise up men and women of Peace in those war-torn countries and that is and will continue to be my prayer in the coming days. I believe God longs for the day when humanity turns away from the foolishness and futility of war and seeks real and lasting peace across a world that so needs God’s peace. Those days have been long awaited even from Old Testament times when the word of God came to the prophet Isaiah: God will teach us what he wants us to do; we will walk in the paths he has chosen . . . . He will settle disputes among great nations. They will hammer their swords into ploughs and their spears into pruning knives. Nations will never again go to war, never prepare for battle again. Isaiah 2:3-4Today, and in the days to come I will continue to pray for peace in Israel, Gaza, Ukraine and beyond, across our world. I hope that you will share with me in that prayer and that, even now, nations at war will turn back to seek God’s way of peace.Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Matthew 5:9May God fill you with the hope of peace in a troubled world.With my love and prayersLynn
