Dear friends, We have now entered the season of Passion tide and Easter is just around the corner. Between now and Easter Sunday, we have so many wonderful opportunities to engage with the story behind it all, from Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem through to the events of Good Friday and the cross. It is one of the most important times of the year for us as a church and when we participate in the journey, it can be extremely helpful to us on our walk of faith and for reflection on our daily lives and current world situation. It is a journey into darkness and back out again. It is one which carries themes of friendship, loyalty, justice, mob mentality and so much more. In the story of Holy Week we discover the roots of our practice of Holy Communion, something that is now at the heart of the way we worship together as a church community. Since many of you will not be familiar with the additional services we hold in Holy Week I thought I would use this space to give an overview and description of them. Have a think about what you and your family might like to come to as we each ask ourselves where we will find the good news this Easter. Maundy Thursday (Not at St Martin’s) The clergy and licenced lay ministers of the diocese join together at Bristol Cathedral at this me of year. The Bishop blesses oils which are distributed to the local churches and are used throughout the year. This is a symbol of unity and a reminder of our call and vocation. At St Martin’s our Maundy Thursday service centres around the Last Supper – that final meal which Jesus shared with his friends and followers. Here we receive our tradition of Holy Communion, eating and drinking to remember Christ. This is also a famous moment because Jesus showed us what true leadership is all about, serving your community, by washing the feet of his disciples. At St Martin’s one of the most powerful moments is the stripping of the altar, leaving it bare and empty. We then hold vigil in a representation of the Garden of Gethsemane in the Lady Chapel, remembering how Jesus’ disciples attempted to be there for Jesus in that painful time of prayer. Good Friday As with many things at St Martin’s, our Good Friday services offer two very different opportunities to reflect on the last moments of Jesus’ life. In the morning we move around the church, using all our senses to think about what went on and what it might say to us today. It is perfect for the whole family as it is interactive and engaging throughout. For some, our traditional service at 2pm is the service not to be missed. We consume the last of the reserve sacrament (the bread set aside in the Lady Chapel) as we engage in the desolation felt at the death of Christ. Service of the Light (Easter Saturday) Following the darkness of the previous two days, both literally and metaphorically, we finally arrive at the Good News of the Easter story! Our service begins outside in the glow of a fire. Our Pascal candle (large candle by the font) is lit and light returns to our church. As we celebrate the joy of the resurrection and the new light that enters our lives we remember the commitments we make to Christ in baptism and in prayer to follow him and take this light with us through life. It is another service filled with rich symbolism and ancient words, something worth experiencing at least once. Easter Sunday On Easter morning we continue the celebrations begun the night before with two Holy Communions, one at 8:30 the other at 10:30. There are so many elements to the Good News of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead and in this event we find hope, joy and courage but also perhaps a feeling of uncertainty and questioning. We join with the disciples who wonder if it could be true, perhaps joining with Thomas in his doubt or with Mary Magdelene in her grief. As we unpack the story of the resurrection we see that even though life and death are not simple, tidy things, God worked in amongst them and still can today. Expect a beautiful Easter garden, a little bit of incense and lots of Easter eggs to find around the church after the service. Whatever your past experience of Holy Week and Easter, whatever your faith journey looks like, no matter what doubts you carry into this space, know that you are welcome to come and explore. To explore the story and its message, to ask questions and raise eyebrows, but also to celebrate and find hope as we journey with Jesus into the dark and back out again. Blessings, Rev’d Phil
Dear friends, As we continue through the year we continue to read surprising and often worrying news stories from around our country and the world. Some of us have also been reading reflections as part of our Stations of the Cross Lent practice and so often they speak to our current situation and offer us fresh perspective, more on that shortly. This week has been a good one with flowers featuring in church twice – first as part of our Mothering Sunday services and then again on Wednesday when the Sunshine Preschool came to visit. They brought with them a lovely Easter garden as a gift for St Martin’s. This can be seen on the right hand side at the front of church over the next few days. Hopefully the flowers which were lovingly added by the children, will survive for those of you who can’t make it until Sunday. The children sang songs, listened to the Easter story (complete with early palm crosses) and enjoyed seeing some of the smaller details of the lady chapel with me. We thought about all the signs of new life we see around us in Spring and I told them about how the church celebrates new life every Easter. Whether it is through something like Stations of the Cross, a daily Bible reading or me of prayer, our spirituality and faith based practices, should encourage us to have a new perspective on things. Sometimes what we read may inspire us to action or to speak differently about someone. We may find that a passage of the Bible has wisdom to offer us. Or it could be that we take comfort in a sense or a feeling of continuity or God’s sovereignty. Certainly for me, as I looked at the image of Jesus speaking to the women of Jerusalem, I was struck by how these events that unfold on the global stage can feel overwhelming and unprecedented and yet, we see evidence in history of how crisis happens but then things normalise. Often there is a birthing that happens on the other side of the pain. The recent news of a police raid on a Quaker meeting house will have shocked and appalled many of us. Regardless of our view on how the police should deal with significant disruption to our capital city by peaceful protest, the feeling of violation of a sacred place of worship catches our attention. In reality the acts relating to policing of peaceful protest passed in 2022 & 2023 have led to many similar incidents with people even being jailed for talking about a planned action. These are the types of real-life situations that our faith in Jesus should help us to navigate. The cliché Christian mantra What would Jesus do? comes to my mind. How would Jesus respond to this? Perhaps with silence as he did at his own unjust trial? Or perhaps with anger as he did in the temple courts? I would be interested to hear how you feel your spiritual practices equip you to make decisions and to hear how your faith has an impact on your everyday life. This Sunday Rev’d Simon will take both our services of Holy Communion, at 8:30 & 10:30. The la er will include hymns and Sunday Spirit. Hope to see you soon, Rev’d Phil
Dear friends, I hope you are well and enjoying engaging with this Lenten season. We are just over halfway and the anticipation of Easter is growing. There are always lots of ways to engage with the message of Easter at St Martin’s and this year each of our licenced ministers will be taking a service along with myself and Rev’d Simon. As you might imagine the flavour of each will be slightly different as we follow the journey Jesus made to new life via the cross and the tomb. Details of all our services in Holy week can be found in the long, Lent & Easter booklets as well as on our emails. I will also include a brief description along with a few reflections in my next Friday message. With all this rich symbolism and ritual to engage with I hope that many of you can find me during Holy Week and on Easter weekend to join us at church. Several people come to each of these services as they all offer something different, a different part of the story and journey. Those that have engaged with it in this way find that there is a richness and depth to their experience of Easter. Perhaps consider putting some dates in your diary now for you and your family to come along to something you have not seen before? This Sunday we celebrate Mothering Sunday, a day which marks a variety of things for a variety of people. For many the celebration of mothers and caregivers will be central as we acknowledge the hard work, sacrifice and dedication of people who care for others all year round. There is also room for us to contemplate our heavenly parent, God, asking ourselves how God is a mother to us all. Finally, the traditional roots of the day are in the middle ages as people visited the church where they had been baptised, acknowledging its part in their life and faith. For many it is a day of celebration and joy but we also acknowledge that, as with many celebrations, it has difficulties for some in our community. Whether it is because they have been unable to become a mother, did not have a good relationship with their mother or child or because they have lost a family member recently, there are many reasons it might not feel like a celebration for some. Therefore, as we gather on Sunday to reflect on all of these things, as we give flowers and celebrate let’s also pray for those who might be struggling. If you would like to talk with someone, do find myself or one of our ministry team after the service and we would be happy to chat, pray and light a candle with you. As it is a fifth Sunday (a rare occasion), our 8:30 service will be a service of morning prayer led by our licenced lay ministers. At 10:30 we will have a service of Holy Communion which I will take at the Nave altar with hymns and an activity for children and young people. Every blessing, Phil
Dear friends, I wonder what makes you excited? What builds a sense of anticipation in your life? For me it is often music – waiting for the release of a new track or looking forward to going to a live show. The build-up is often a big part of it for me, speculating on what it will be like, what songs they might play, how the new album will go down with the fans. For you it might be something very different that comes to mind such as waiting to unwrap a present or moving into a new house. Equally but in the opposite, I am sure we can all think of times we have been filled with a sense of dread or nerves. Waiting for that meeting to come around at work, wishing you didn’t have to go to a GP appointment to receive test results, watching on as events unfold on the news. Whatever examples we might think of, there is always a sense of heightened emotion leading up to a significant event in our lives. On Wednesday night a small group of us experienced that sense of heightened emotion as we participated in the first of four Stations of the Cross for beginners events in church. I call it an event despite its small scale because it is somewhere between a service and a small group, with space for reflection and discussion built into the me together. As always it was very moving to travel between the pictures, thinking about how Jesus might have felt and allowing our imaginations to help us enter into the scene. It is not too late to join in – no sign up required, just come along on a Wednesday in lent at 7pm and we will explain how we will visit the next four stations. Equally, if you are unable to make it but would like to join in, then the reflections are available either in church or by email (just send a request to Beth). This way you could make your own way around them in your own me after a service. As we continue to move through lent, I would love to hear from you about how you are engaging this year, what have you felt compelled to either give up or take up? I am going to follow Bishop Viv’s advice and try to take me to really appreciate certain things. For me this will involve going on tiny slow walks in my neighbourhood to notice and observe creation and all that is around me as well as making coffee slowly in my garden. Bishop Viv passed on a suggestion by Stephen Cherry: If you love chocolate don’t give it up this year but become a discerning and appreciative chocolate connoisseur – and see what comes of that. As a bit of a coffee snob already, it shouldn’t be too hard for me to take this a step further! So, get in touch or find me after a service and tell me about what you are doing this lent to engage in this season where we allow our senses and emotions to become heightened as we anticipate the coming of Holy Week and Easter. This week we will have Holy Communion services at 8:30 & 10:30 the first being our beautiful spoken service and the second with hymns and Sunday Spirit hopes to capture something of the awe and wonder that comes as we worship a God who is far beyond our imaginations. Come, you are welcome and invited! Hope to see you soon, Phil
