Saturday 18th July 2026 13:00 to 15:30 at St Mary's, Boston Spa. Dear friends, As discussed at our May Deanery Synod meeting, we are holding an afternoon to focus on Becoming More Like Christ as a deanery. This is open to anyone in our deanery's churches who wishes to contribute and be part of our prayerful discernment. We will begin with a short act of worship at 1pm, followed by a time of sharing, discussion and prayer. The focus of this is the first aspect of our Living Christ's Story vision - Becoming more like Christ. How are our church communities already doing this? Where might the gaps be at present? What support might we need to fill those gaps, and how might we work together better to live Christ's story? We will be using the Rhythm of Life materials as the starting point to ask ourselves the following questions to give us an overview of the ways God is at work and how he might be calling us.I hope you can make it to this opportunity to worship and pray together (the most important aspect!) and to learn from one another as we seek to support one another in building God's Kingdom in our wonderful communities.Yours in Christ, NickThe Rev'd Nick Morgan
Thought for the Week from Rachel Reid, LLM – 22nd June 2026God is on the moveRemember back in 2010? There was a lot of hostility to the church. The New Atheists like Richard Dawkins got a lot of airtime. He wrote books such as The God Delusion and Outgrowing God. Religion, according to Dawkins, fuels war, aids and abets bigotry and abuses children. He lined up arguments which “proved” the improbability of an omniscient, omnipotent, eternal God who created everything. Newspapers were happily predicting that the Church of England would have ceased to exist by 2030. (Hello!) Even the powers that be in the Anglican church were advising that we needed to “manage decline well”. Christians were opposed and othered. But often you must walk through the wilderness to get to the promised land. Something is shifting. The Zeitgeist is changing. There is a sovereign move of God, quiet but slowly gathering momentum, especially among young people. They are coming to church having read the Bible for themselves and wanting to know more. Like the young Samuel in the Temple when Eli was High Priest, they are hearing a Voice, beautiful and utterly compelling, that says their name. If you want to know more about this and you’ve got 25 minutes, watch this short documentary on You Tube on the Awakening in the UK. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDB33nIQtqE Sarah Jackson from Holy Trinity Brompton talks about investing in young leaders because God is really doing something in Gen Z (those born between 1997 and 2012). There is an openness to the Gospel among them. They are praying for their parents to know Jesus and his transforming, burning, world changing love. Sarah comments that we don’t need to plan to grow upward in age and inward in focus. This will happen naturally, without doing anything at all. We only go the opposite way by intentionally focussing on young people. At the beginning of the year, we appointed Amy to be our Children, Youth and Families worker, and she has been building up teams, making relationships in the villages and reaching out to families. A follow up group for young people that are too old for Messy Church is being considered and pondered and planned. If you don’t already know, Messy is a monthly meeting of 50-60 children of mainly primary school age and their families. They come to learn about Jesus through crafts, story and song, and enjoy a hot meal together at the end.Friends, there is one story that leads to life. Let’s tell the story. Let’s tell people about what God has done in our lives. The Hope of the Nations is in Jesus. The emerging generation needs to know the name of Jesus isn’t just a swear-word. If you feel led to offer to help Amy and her team, see the contact details and advert for Little Fish below!Rachel (LLM) Pray for…· All of our seven churches to grow closer as we learn to love Jesus more· Our lovely Vicar Geoff, that he might be encouraged this week in his work for our churches and communities· Amy and her team as they continue to develop a focus on growing younger· More workers to enter the harvest field and tell Christ’s storyGive thanks for …· The renewed interest in faith among young people · All those who work in the background to keep our churches running beautifullyHolidays and summertime
Thought for the week from Alan Johnston Licensed Lay Minister 17th June 2026 Following JesusThis month's Oasis theme is Following Jesus and last Sunday Ian Cartwright brought us the message. The reading that Ian used was John 14: 1-17 and as the reading was delivered verse 12 jumped out at me ‘Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father’ (John 14:12). Following Jesus has with it an expectation, an expectation that we will be active and participate in being a Christian. Christianity is a participation sport, not a spectator sport. Jesus expects us to continue his work on earth, not because we have to, but because we want to. So what does this mean for those of us living in our parishes? Of course the first thing that springs to mind is the Great Commission. Go and make disciples of all men. Actually though, when you think about it more deeply there are many acts that we should be concerned with, which are equally aligned with Jesus’ message. This includes loving one another, supporting one another and accepting one another. In last week's newsletter I focused on God's love, thinking about the simple fact that God loves us, despite who we are. God loves us despite the differences we may have with each other. God loves us even though as individuals we may approach Christianity in different ways. I was reading an article recently that focused on the growth in the Anglican church within Africa. One of the key elements of the article was to suggest that the Anglican church in Africa is more conservative and traditional than the UK Anglican church in how they interpret Christianity. There was the suggestion that the Anglican church in the UK was now more progressive. That in itself made me think on the question that came to mind around the thought that should churches all be the same? For me the simple answer is no. We need different services to meet people's different needs. With that in mind I reflected on the seven churches we now have across our plurality and the offer we provide, an offer built on meeting different needs. There is no one best way, no one correct way. However Jesus should be at the centre of all our services regardless of how we “do church”.I ask you, therefore, to be conscious of others, and their preferences, accepting each other in the love of God, as we follow Jesus together.Pray for …Our ever closeness in our Churches and the villages we serve (Acaster Malbis, Appleton Roebuck, Acaster Selby, Askham Bryan, Bolton Percy, Colton, Copmanthorpe).The Reverend Geoff Mumford, and the work he undertakes across the communities.Our Churches Leadership Team and individual PCCs as they guide us forward in our mission.Give thanks for …The continued commitment of our church communities.Our volunteers who were admitted into the Office of Churchwarden this week.
