NEWS
Easter Day saw the welcome return of flowers to the church, including a beautiful display of Easter lilies (the PCC is grateful for donations towards the cost). The flower arrangements in church are widely appreciated and as reported to the APCM, ‘We are fortunate to have such a talented team of flower arrangers’. Thank you MaryJane, Cheryl, Denise, Bridget, Sarah, Margaret, Audrey, Philippa, Chris, Cherry and Diana.
The APCM took place on Thursday 1st May, attended by the PCC and five members of the congregation. Bridget and Cheryl were re-elected as churchwardens and grateful thanks were extended to them for their commitment and expertise in carrying out their responsibilities and duties.
The 80th Anniversary of VE Day was marked in our service on Sunday 11th May in the choice of music and in Canon John Fellows’ thought-provoking and powerful sermon.
The inauguration of the beautiful new service books will be at the Patronal Evensong on Trinity Sunday, 15th June. More on this in the July Newsletter.
Bridget and Cheryl have met the new Bishop of Richborough, the Right Reverend Luke Irvine-Capel SSC, who provides Alternative Episcopal Oversight to Anglo-Catholic parishes in the eastern region of the Province of Canterbury. He was previously Archdeacon of Chichester and was consecrated as Bishop of Richborough at Canterbury Cathedral in February. We look forward to welcoming him to Barsham in due course.
40 members of the Round Tower Churches Society visited the church on Saturday 10th May prior to refreshments and their AGM at the village hall.
The electronic swift calls in the tower have been switched on in the hope of attracting swifts to the belfry nest boxes. Please let us know of any sightings.
We are grateful to the Community Payback Team for their recent work tidying up the vegetation around the parking area.
Sarah Jane’s recent market stalls at Beccles market have raised £251.00 towards the renovation of the Rede tomb, and her next is on Friday 6th June, and then 26thSeptember and 3rd October. If anyone has unwanted household items in good condition, she would much appreciate having them for her stall.
The sales table organised again by Jenny raised a very useful £120.00. The first ever Easter Hamper Raffle realised a splendid £170.00 for the fabric fund.
The Beccles Food Bank thanks Barsham for the 175 items donated in April and would be grateful for the donation of household utensils as well as food.
FORWARD PLANNING
The Summer Lunch will be at St Bartholomew’s Shipmeadow at 12.30pm on Wednesday 25th June. Tickets cost £12.50 per person and should be bought in advance from Bridget.
Barsham walk with Cheryl’s church walking group, 2pm Sat 19th July, starting at the church. Just over 4 miles. Tea afterwards at 4pm. All welcome.
Long-range diary dates (with details nearer the time): Sat 6th Sept at 2pm, Barsham Church: Dr Barry Darch’s talk on the Redes of Beccles. Sat 13th Sept: Ride & Stride. Sun 28th Sept: Harvest Festival Evensong and village hall supper. Thu 18th Dec: Christmas Carol Service.
SNIPPETS – A Blackbird in June
In the centre of the chancel lies the decorative marble ledger stone of Thomas Missenden, Rector of Barsham for 34 years in the mid-18th century (photo, front cover). He furnished his memorial with inscriptions in both Greek and Latin, the latter his reflection on the transient nature of life and translated as ‘The present hour is thine: The next no man can claim’.
So, how to make the most of the ‘present hour’? One answer is a touch of mental housekeeping to bring under control the corrosive ‘noise’ of daily cares and anxieties that clutter minds and steal emotional energy. The Times recently reported on research at Cambridge University suggesting that ‘Taking time to contemplate aesthetically pleasing art can boost abstract thinking and free us from everyday anxieties…allowing for greater clarity and a healthier perspective’. Indeed, pausing consciously to appreciate beauty – not only in art but in a myriad of other forms, including human love and the natural world – can only help to enrich the present.
This notion is perfectly illustrated in Edward Thomas’ poem Adelstrop, written in 1915 during the First World War and recalling a pre-war train journey when the train made an unscheduled halt at Adlestrop (‘…drew up there. Unwontedly.’). The stillness of the halt afforded Thomas a moment of unexpected serenity and tranquility as he soaked up the pastoral scene before him. The poem’s focus is the beauty of the natural world and the value of observing and appreciating often fleeting and unexpected moments of wonder and beauty in the everyday world.
The poem is all the more poignant as Edward Thomas was killed on Easter Day 1917 in the thunderous violence and chaos of the Battle of Arras. The poem was published in the New Statesman three weeks later.
Yes. I remember Adlestrop —
The name, because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontedly. It was late June.
The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop—only the name
And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.
And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.
JUNE DIARY
Sunday 1st June – Seventh Sunday of Easter. 11am Sung Eucharist (BCP). RevdJonathan Olanczuk.
Sunday 8th June – Pentecost. 11am Sung Eucharist (BCP). Revd Canon John Fellows.
Sunday 15th June – Trinity Sunday, Patronal Festival. 11.15am Sung Eucharist (BCP), Barsham. Revd Desmond Banister.
6.30pm Patronal Evensong with new service books. Revd Graham Naylor.
Sunday 22nd June – First Sunday after Trinity. 11am Sung Eucharist (BCP). Revd Graham Naylor.
Sunday 29th June – Second Sunday after Trinity. 11am Sung Eucharist (BCP). Revd Graham Naylor.
Church correspondent: Robert Bacon 07867 306016, [email protected]