<div id="container-2247"> <div> Hello all It’s with a heavy heart that we are informing you that the St Francis church building will be closed for worship (other than funerals) with immediate effect. To stay open needs the wholehearted agreement of the ECC and their commitment to make it happen. Whilst there was some discussion and difference of opinion, the majority view was that closing for the time being is the most prudent and safest course of action. We will of course keep this under constant review and will keep you informed. There will therefore be no 10am service on Thursdays at St Francis until further notice. The PCC will be making a decision in relation to St Wilfrid’s over the next few days, and we will let you what that is as soon as we are able. Many thanks for your understanding at this challenging time. Blessings Pete Watson & Christine Gillespie </div> </div>
This month Revd. Roy Shaw wishes us all a happy new year in God, and also, with tongue firmly in cheek, imagines what the various Church groups would make the discovery of a sitting Cat in the Bible.Tony Service writes about all matters Methodist, and includes a piece about the annual Covenant Service.Pat Jarvis reports on the Parish Living Advent Calendar initiative, that was well received, and no doubt the start of a ‘tradition’. Meanwhile husband Karl provides an update on the Parish Hall, and shares his, and Pat’s, love of walking in the first part of Walking the St Hilda’s Way.I am grateful for a beautiful poem from Mike Bunn, and Revd. Pete reports on the Carol Singing groups that helped to raise good cheer across the Parish. Next year will be even better! Finally I bring down the tone with suggestions to improve one’s filing system. Works for me!
After a few quiet weeks it's started again - local church office holders such as churchwardens, treasurers etc. have received fraudulent email messages impersonating members of the clergy, typically in their own parish but sometimes more widely, asking for a variety of things including the purchase of vouchers and gift cards.There have been some close calls with one church office holder actually having spent quite a lot of their own money, but fortunately discovered before it was too late.The sender has taken some trouble both with identifying their chosen pseudo-sender and the intended victim (we guess someone is trawling parish church websites). In many cases the sender has used an un-traceable gmail address.In several cases the first message reads "Do you have a moment I have a request I need you to handle discreetly. I am currently busy in a prayer session, no calls so just reply my email."A reply then draws the recipient into a dialogue in which they are encouraged to buy vouchers, and ultimately send images of their serial and security numbers to the fraudster.If you think you have received one of these messages you can report this to the police on their non-emergency 101 number. They will pass it on to Action Fraud, a national agency. It may not help you directly, but by increasing the number of reports we make sure that they continue to take this seriously.No one at St Wilfrid’s - the clergy, the PCC or its officers - will ever ask anyone to spend their own money in an email – and therefore anything purporting to do this is a fraud. This is a low-tech solution – and it’s roughly what the big banks do when they keep repeating that they will never ask for login details by email, and will never ask you to move money to a different account by email.
Hello all Some information to share about this year’s Christmas Eve Midnight & Christmas Day Communion Services in the parish:Christmas Eve 11.30pm: St Wilfrid’s and St FrancisChristmas Day 9.30am: St Wilfrid’s onlyDue to Covid restrictions:-These services will be ‘said’ services only i.e. sadly, there will be no carol singing.-Numbers will be limited, so entry will, unfortunately, be on a ‘first come, first served’ basis.Obviously, we are very sorry about this; it is not how any of us would have chosen to celebrate this year, so thank you for your understanding.BlessingsRev Pete
