Home Page

The Parish

St Peter's

St Paul's

Contact Us! 

Comments on this site? email us 

0

20007 letters January February March April May June July August September October November December

Link to other years' letters

Current Year

December 

On Oadby's Redevelopment by Simon  Harvey        

The newly published Oadby Town Centre "Masterplan" is available for public consultation. I've obtained a copy of the full 51-page report and it makes for fascinating reading. Pick up a copy from the council or, if you have internet access, download a copy from www.oadby-wigston.gov.uk. You can offer the council your own thoughts before noon on 21 December 2007. 

The "preferred options plan" sets out an analysis of the issues facing Oadby's town centre and offers a vision for a policy framework, against which future proposals for development will be tested and monitored. 

While people will have varying opinions on the specifics, I welcome what appears to be a positive commitment to the improvement of the heart of our town (or "village" if you prefer). And it's made me reflect on the visions for urban living contained in the Jewish-Christian tradition. 

It's become something of a cliché to note that the Bible begins in a garden and concludes in a city. The paradise of Eden was lost, but the renewed creation which completes the Revelation to John is a city, teeming with life. 

This is a little at odds with English sentiment over the last two centuries. The romantic charms of simple rural living have persuaded generations that the "unspoilt countryside" is always better option than the delights of town and city. It needs pointing out, of course, that precious little English countryside could be described as "unspoilt". Two millennia of organised agriculture have shaped and dressed English hills and fields in a beautiful, but certainly man-made, environment. Still, what could be better than escaping the bustle and noise of the tarmac-covered city streets and breathing fresh country air? 

While I love the countryside, I rather feel that for many people its chief attraction is the isolation and opportunity to get away from others. We all need space and places to stretch our legs but I wonder if the desire to flee into the quiet green shires goes further. Could it have something to do with our rather ambivalent attitude towards other people? So here's the question: Is part of the countryside's attraction as a place to live that it makes it alright to be just a little anti-social? Do people prefer it because it demands less patience and tolerance than the town? 

Urban living brings all the nuisance of cramped social space. Part of the stress of living in towns and cities is the constant negotiation that goes with it. People 'fight' for parking spaces, 'do battle' with the traffic and contend with 'neighbours from hell'. Working out how to share space is inevitable in the town and city and often difficult. 

But if this is the Achilles' heel of urban life, it also offers wonderful possibilities. In the Old Testament era, cities were protected with walls, ramparts and watchtowers. They offered far better security than the outlying scattered settlements. And in large cities, guilds of tradespeople worked together in co-operative enterprise. The security meant that cities were the natural places to build palaces for treasures, places for worship and institutions for learning, space for performance, dance, art and music. No wonder that the blessing of the Promised Land was to exchange the broad open spaces of the "unspoilt" wilderness for the congestions of Jericho - a ready-made gift of urban habitation (albeit with some urgent repairs to do to its walls). 

When Jeremiah's people were later exiled into the foreign city of Babylon, they faced the tough question about whether to participate in it or to sabotage it. God's message to Jeremiah was that the displaced captives should work for the welfare of the city and all its people. It was possible to sing the Lord's song in a strange land after all. 

Jerusalem was finally restored by Nehemiah, who surveyed her broken walls and shattered places. He followed through with divinely-instituted town-planning and renewed the life of the city in bricks, mortar, worship and prayer. The city could not be left desolate - it simply had to be rebuilt with vision, skill and hard work. 

When the apostles took the message of the gospel to the Gentiles, the Holy Spirit guided them to market places and to town squares. And the very fabric of civic life prompted questions - in Athens Paul used a sculpture dedicated to an unknown god to point to the one true God he served. In wealthy Ephesus, with its sophisticated public bath houses and grand aqueducts, he disputed with the guild of silversmiths, who manufactured and traded in the streets surrounding the great temple of Artemis. The names of many New Testament books are the names of city-dwellers that Paul corresponded with: Romans, Corinthians, Ephesians, Thessalonians, Colossians, Galatians. 

The final biblical vision is that of a new city, a heavenly Jerusalem, that is even more spectacular in its life and purpose than in its architecture. 

Back to earth and specifically to the little bit of it that's post-coded "LE2". Oadby's "Masterplan" offers a vision for the life of the town in a series of affirmations: 

• "To establish a distinct and sustainable role for Oadby. 

• To encourage the growth of economic and social benefits for local people. 

• To create a safe, distinctive and pedestrian friendly environment. 

• To achieve an attractive and accessible place to shop, live and work. 

• To ensure that Oadby reflects high quality and inspirational design. 

• To link the town, physically and economically, to its catchment." 

These are welcome aspirations. If realised, they will significantly improve the town in which we live. But I can't help wondering if together we suffer from a lack of imagination about urban (or suburban) living and expect our planners to do all the hard work for us. Certainly, the project of improving Oadby can't be compared with Wren's masterful re-working of London or with Haussman's transformation of Paris. And thankfully the ambitions of the current generation of provincial planners are more modest than those brutal designers of twentieth century modernism, with its concrete and tower block "machines for living". 

But we need to enlarge our vision for shared civic space. It matters enormously that we create an environment that humanises us and introduces us to our neighbours. This vision must be more than retail opportunity and coffee-stops for the middle-classes. The poor, the young, the elderly and the frail must all share the same social spaces as the leisured and affluent. And our ethnically diverse population ought to be properly represented on Oadby's town centre streets. 

So perhaps the greatest and most effective improvement in Oadby will not be the re-worked spaces but the way we use them. Take a look at the plans. Comment, criticise or applaud them. But whatever we end up with, let's civilise the urban environment with generous and wholehearted urban living. Let's not dream of escape to countryside homes from where we'll commute unsustainably. Put down roots in Oadby's tarmaced fields. We'll have a better Oadby yet if we move more gently through her streets, smile more often at strangers, pray for her welfare and cherish the land on which we walk.

November Letter by Revd Helen Bence, Team Vicar.

Dear Friends, 

The 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, the time when the First World War guns fell silent, is marked by two minutes' silence each year, as we remember those who have died in war and conflicts. This year, Remembrance Day falls on a Sunday. In the afternoon, the people of Oadby will pay their respects to the fallen at a special Royal British Legion Service of Remembrance, when wreaths will be laid at the war memorial, and, as we meet as a congregation on Remembrance Day morning, we will hold the two minutes silence at 11 am.

for some, the remembering will be about first-hand experiences of being involved in war: the good times and the bad; the fear and the courage; the horror and the heroism; those who died and those who survived, the big events recorded in the history books and what was important to those individuals in their private lives - getting married on leave and then not seeing each other for years at a time or wasting precious hours and days of leave stuck in a railway siding trying to get home.

Some will be remembering those who have died in wars and conflicts in the sixty two years since the end of the Second World War, and for some, the pain of losing a loved one is much more recent, as they stand to remember those who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. But for many, the remembering can only be at second-hand.
Our society recognizes the importance of remembering: through the national curriculum each generation is taught about the two world wars arid, through Remembrance Sunday Services up and down our land, the whole nation is invited to remember our national history, both to honour those who have fought and died and so that we can learn lessons for the future. But, whether we remember at first hand or at second hand, how will we use the two minutes silence?

It is so rare these days to be silent and still, that we may be very uncomfortable but, I would suggest that, if we use it properly, the silence ought to be a:
silence that shouts at us, for we need to use at least a part of it to face honestly the evil in the world which causes war and to reflect on ways of living together in love and justice and peace. If we are honest about ourselves and about our world, we will need to reflect upon our own part in that evil: our own lack of love; our own tolerance of injustice; and our own contribution? in unloving and selfish attitudes to the destruction of loving, peaceful co-existence. We will need to reflect, too, upon the human race's inability to bring about the just and peaceful society we long for and for which those we stand silently remembering have fought and died.

And if we are to honour the memory of those who fought and died, believing their death would count and make a difference, we will need to remember before God, to acknowledge in the silence, that human solutions haven't worked: to reflect that in the last five and a half thousand years of history, the world has only known 292 years of peace and that over three and a half billion people have died in over fourteen thousand wars.

So as we remember before God and commend to his safe keeping those who have died for their country in war; those whom we knew, and whose memory we treasure; as we give thanks for all those who have lived and died in the service of humanity; and as we remember those whose lives, even though they survived, have been blighted by the physical, psychological and emotional scars of war, let us also use the silence to turn again to the God who created us to live in love and justice and peace and who tells us that we can do it neither by strength nor by might but only by his Spirit living in us.

Helen

October letter by Revd Mandy Flaherty, Curate                                                                            

Dear Friends,  

`Who wants to be a millionaire?'

For those of a particular age and a leaning towards the stage, the above question might spark memories of Frank Sinatra and Celeste Holm singing the song in the 1956 film of the musical `High Society'. However, for most in today's popular culture, it is the title of a television quiz show hosted by Chris Tarrant: a quiz show where each contestant accumulates money by continually giving the right answer to a question. If a question is answered incorrectly, they lose the money. It has a pyramid type structure and the entertainment factor is provided by the contestant accumulating right answers, and money, so that the stakes are much higher when they come across a particularly difficult question. The audience is tense as they watch the contestant's dilemma — `should they play or not?' And the higher the stakes, the more we want them to play and not just take the easy option of accepting the money they've won and bowing gracefully out.

And winning or losing money or fame seems to be at the heart of much that we see; illustrated beautifully in a recent episode of the quiz show when a contestant said `I don't believe money is the source of happiness', yet he was on a show that tried to make him a millionaire!

With our increasingly voyeuristic society where almost anything can be televised, we seem to thrive on either big highs or big lows – we         like to see people winning huge amounts of money or dropping. losing everything. The ordinary isn't good enough these days.  I think we have forgotten what it is to be content. And perhaps we have forgotten to say thank you. I'm glad that we can celebrate Harvest in our parish services and structure it around saying `Thank You'. When Jesus healed the 10 lepers, he makes much of the fact that only one returned to say thank you — and he was a Samaritan;
  `Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except foreigner?'

The Samaritan returned to those he knew despised him and said 'thank you'. That must have been hard for him to do but he was content and returned to say thank you for what he now had in his life.

Contentment and thankfulness — and I don't mean complacency — should bring us to a position of seeing the whole picture and not just the small part of the picture that we are in. And with this, perhaps we will see more of how it works for God: his whole and extravagant love for us individually, no matter what our position, that seeks to bring us close to Him no matter what the cost.  

Mandy

September Letter

Dear Friends

In all the sad and alarming news this year – the weekly fatalities incurred by our armed forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, fighting in conflicts that so many of us pleaded our leaders not to engage in; the alarming, sudden changes in our climate, resulting not only in widespread flooding in England, but also on a colossal scale affecting millions in South East Asia; the obsessive, neurotic media coverage over Madeleine McCann, articulating some hidden, sub conscious need for the nation to find a way of expressing corporately that most human of experiences -the experience of loss and grief – amidst all this, there have been two stories that have caught my eye about faith.   To be precise, they are stories about what the newspapers describe as a “crisis of faith”.  One is about the recently retired athlete, Jonathan Edwards, who allegedly has lost his Christian faith; the other about some letters written by Mother Teresa expressing an inner emptiness and an experience of the  absence of God in her devotional life.  So what do I have to say about faith?

For me, the kind of faith that is best is porous:  open to God’s Spirit.   There are many Christians who resist such a faith.   If a faith is porous, won’t it be in danger of all kinds of contamination?  Won’t the values of this world percolate through so that nothing distinctive is left?  Isn’t this why Christianity in the western world has declined so numerically, and isn’t the gay issue a clear indication that Anglicanism is particularly prone to this charge?  Well, yes this is indeed a danger.  But what are we like if we are not porous?  Take Jonathan Edward’s faith.  How would you characterise it?  I would describe as like a hard, tough, plastic – incredibly strong, and offering lots of protection, but because it was so rigid, it was given no opportunity to grow, and so it cracked and shattered once he retired from the sport and faced a major life change.  

“When I retired, something happened that took me by complete surprise.  I quickly realised that athletics was more important to my identity than I believed possible.  I was the best in the world at what I did and suddenly that was not true any more.  With one facet of my identity stripped away, I began to question the others and, from there, there was no stopping.  The foundations of my world were slowly crumbling.”

Well that kind of rigid faith, admirable and world beating though it may be,  when it is around, is ultimately of little use, because when life hits us really hard, we need something more pliant, more flexible, more porous, that can catch us when we fall.  

But what if we are open to God, and feel, and experience nothing?   Isn’t faith then a pointless exercise?  What of Mother Teresa?  “The smile,” she wrote, “is a mask or a cloak that covers everything.  I spoke as if my very heart was in love with God, a tender personal love.  If you were there you would have said, ‘What hypocrisy’.”….”I am told God loves me, and yet the reality of darkness and coldness and emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul.”  I would suggest that this is a very different kind of “crisis of faith” compared to that of Jonathan Edwards.   Although, it is impossible to verify the exact nature of Mother Teresa’s experience and although it is certainly an experience that one would not wish all Christians to go through, nevertheless this echoes with the important spiritual tradition of “the dark night of the soul.”  The Spanish mystic, St. John of the Cross, wrote that “the soul is conscious of a profound emptiness in itself, a cruel destitution of the three kinds of goods, natural, temporal, and spiritual, which are ordained for its comfort.”   The feeling of being abandoned by God – which is found after all in the cry of Jesus from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”  does not, however, have to result in the abandonment of faith.  Christian experience points to it being a way in which faith acquires a greater depth and maturity.  Perhaps it is the cost of the total giving of oneself to God, the price of being the smile of God to the world, and the personification of the tender, personal love of God. 

For most Christians, thankfully, faith will involve the experience of the tender, personal love of God.   True faith will therefore have emotional intelligence - in the words of the late Bishop John, spoken at the Confirmation Service at St. Peter’s in January, “an awareness of the exquisite sensitivity of God.”  This, in turn, is taken into ourselves and turned outwards to others.  We need to be porous to absorb the pain of the world.  As Fergal Keane writes to his new born son Daniel: “When you are older, my son, you will learn about how complicated life becomes, how we can lose our way and how people get hurt inside and out.”

This is why I believe that Christian faith is not about bashing gays, or slinging out asylum seekers, or condemning most of humanity to an eternity of hell.  My faith is porous, and I have to leave it to God to get rid of any contaminants which might affect my soul and my thought through my engagement with the world.   It is a vulnerable way to live, but vulnerable primarily because of being vulnerable and open to God.  As Augustine wrote in his Confessions, “With your Word, you pierced my heart, and I loved you.” 

                                                                                              Michael Rusk

August Letter by Revd Simon Harvey, Team Vicar based at St Paul's                                

Dear friends,

In the summer and autumn of 1982, when Survivor's Eye of the Tiger topped the UK charts and the first CD player was sold to the public, the building of the new church of St Paul in Hamble Road was completed. We're about to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the opening of St Paul's as a place of Christian worship and service to the people of Oadby.

We're going to celebrate the occasion with a community event on Hamble Green on 15 September and a special service on 16 September. Please look out for the publicity which will begin to appear shortly.

As a relative newcomer, I am enormously grateful for the vision and hard work of those people who enabled those original plans for a church to become a reality. Many current members of the congregations at St Peter's and at St Paul's will remember those early days. And many more have joined us over the years and made their contribution to the flourishing of the Christian community.

Twenty-five years is long enough to notice some really big changes in society, and in the locality, as well as in the way we `do church'. It's a period which roughly corresponds to the length of a human generation, which has real personal significance of most of us. In that time children become parents, parents become grandparents, those in school develop their careers and those in mid-career reach retirement.

The increasing pace of life means that sometimes it's hard for one generation to understand another. and we certainly experience the challenge of keeping church inter-generational. It would be easy to develop pro-grammes that cater for the generations apart, but my vision for a healthy, flourishing Christian community is one in which the generations cherish and value each other, realising that church for one generation only is less than authentic.

Scripture recognises that generations need each other, and sometimes need to be interpreted to each other. God's house, whether it be the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, or St Paul's or St Peter's, must be a place where the Lord ministers to all generations alike – a place of gladness, joy, thanksgiving and praise, where his steadfast love is discerned and celebrated.

Psalm 100 expresses this succinctly:
O be joyful in the Lord, all the earth;
serve the Lord with gladness and come before his presence with a song. 
Know that the Lord is God; 
it is he that has made us and we are his; 
we are his people and the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; 
give thanks to him and bless his name.
For the Lord is gracious; his steadfast love is everlasting,
and his faithfulness endures from generation to generation.

I hope and trust that whether we're from the pre-war generation, the Baby Boomers, Generation X or the Internet Generation, we'll continue to find and celebrate the love of God within our churches and communities, so that the next generation will take our place in worship, service and ministry.

Simon

July Letter by Revd Mandy Flaherty, Curate                                                                            

Dear Friends,

Dogs, trucks and compliments...,

In this current climate of striving to be slim and fit, we all do whatever we can to squeeze healthy eating and exercise into our frenetic lives. Like my friend, who goes jogging with her dog in the evenings, to keep fit. The dog needs a walk anyway, so why not make it a jogging session with the two of them? Man's (and woman's) best friend after all.

So, imagine her consternation when she was stopped by another friend who said `you look as though you're keeping fit'.
`Yes, I'm really trying to lose weight,' my friend replied
`Oh yes, it's working', her friend said as my friend's face beamed, `I can see that your dog's looking really trim!'
Sometimes, it can seem as if all our hard work goes unnoticed by those around us and no-one can see the results of our efforts, not even ourselves. And we all like to be rewarded. It's a basic human need to be affirmed by others for what we do. Maslow, the eminent psychologist, put Esteem needs - i.e. to be recognised, have status and feel good about our position in society - as an essential part of the individual's journey towards being fulfilled.
To continue my friend's flagging day... on her way to work and needing to cross a busy road, she stands on the kerb, doubtless reflecting on the dog's successful weight loss programme, when she suddenly becomes aware of a large truck with its driver earnestly waving her across the road. Snapping out of the daydream and realising there was a traffic build up and subsequent audience of, largely male, drivers, she ventured across the road with as much composure as she could muster, only to stumble and kick her sling backs with Steven Gerrard finesse across the road and into the path of oncoming traffic who screeched to a halt tom avoid a collision with a flying shoe. Now unbalanced, she runs lopsidedly across the road to retrieve her shoe and regain her dignity. No pause for a grateful wave to the thoughtful truck driver but a scurrying away with embarrassment, into her place of work.
And when little things pile up on top of each other, we can be pretty down in the dumps about `these things that are sent to try us' and at that point, any slight recognition is huge.

Sometime later in her day, a colleague of my friend's tells her she looks nice today. What a change occurred! `Thank you', she beamed happily and walked off, dog and truck driver forgotten, with a spring in her step to tackle the rest of the day's tasks with renewed enthusiasm.

Jesus spent much of his earthly ministry encouraging his hearers to be themselves, to be true to themselves, and not worry about others;

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites... they love to stand and pray... so that they may be seen by others... But when you pray... pray to your Father in secret... your Father knows what you need before you ask Him."

`So don't worry about tomorrow, tomorrow will bring enough troubles of its own.'
`But if God so clothes the grass of the field which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you?'

Maslow only touched on the issues of basic human needs in telling us WHAT we need. 2000 years before, Jesus had not only highlighted them in his teachings but offered a way for us to be fulfilled and have the self esteem that we need. Knowing that we are unconditionally loved by and are precious to God helps our esteem to shoot up and encourages us to be confident in who we really are.

So, when we have a bad day, perhaps like my friend, we can recognise how encouragement is a hugely important aspect of our social life and relationships. And can take some heart from the fact that Jesus wanted to be an encourager, indeed, he described one of the aspects of the Holy Spirit to be The Encourager, emphasising how fundamental it is for us to be encouraged in order for us to work, and play, well.

Encourage someone this week - you never know what impact it may have! n.b. the author has her friend's permission to relate, publish and use a certain amount of poetic licence with what was a gossip over coffee! With a serious point nevertheless... 

 Mandy Flaherty

June Letter by Revd Helen Bence, Team Vicar.

Dear Friends.

On the last Sunday of last month (2 -7th May), we celebrated .Pentecost, the coming of the Flo!), Spirit. and on the first Sunday of this month (13rd June) we celebrate Trinity Sunday. when the church focuses on the Godhead.. Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The Alternative Service Book (ISM which was published in '1930 named the Sundays in this season as "Pentecost 1- IS thus breaking with the hundreds of years' old tradition of the Book of Common Prayer (RCP) which numbered the Sundays as the "Sundays after Trinity". However. when the new Common \ \/orship (CW) prayer book was published twenty years later at Me NI iliennihm. the First to the Eighteenth Sundays after trinity had been re-Instated and Pentecost was t.nentioned but once. Does it matter? Well clearly it mattered to the people who produced both the ASB and C W. So what was going on'

In the run up to the production of the AsB, there was a resurgence of the charismatic movement which focuses on the powet of the 1-loiy Spirit in the life of the church and so It was not surprising that the ASB should major on Pentecost, but, by the mid-eighties, the natural tendency of long- established institutions to revert to what is safe and traditional" coupled with a dislike born of fear of the charismatle movement, meant that twenty. years later "The Sundays after Trinity were back with the publication of CW -- and theres no intention to produce another service book In the next twenty years so that s how. It- fi-h. the foreseeable thture.
Now, know there excesses loth of the charismatic !no-vetnent . the Ntne o'clock Service in Sheffield, I-6r ekamplet brought shame on the Church but it has to be said that that incident cannot be blamed on the Holy Spirit - to attempt to do so would be an appalling heresy. 'what clearly Went wrong With that experiment was that the leaders wee unaccountable to the church hievalchy and became cony fed by the tie that the Holy Spirit's power, which (iod gave them to extend his kingdom,
was theirs to use to their own ends and not to His glory. The devil loves to corrupt God's gifts and constant vigilance is necessary to guard against that, hut the devil has surely won if, because of such incidents, the church as a whole backs off from the idea that God has equipped his people through his Holy Spirit to
"Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (Matthew 28.19-20)

During the sixties, seventies and eighties, the Church re-discovered the Holy Spirit as the third person of the Trinity. Many new hymns and worship songs were written celebrating the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in the life of both the individual and the church. Hymn books only publish hymns and songs when they are well established so there is always a time lag but look in the older hymn books, and you won't find many hymns which celebrate Pentecost — I counted only nine in Hymns Ancient and Modem compared with hundreds in Songs of Fellowship, hymns and songs which focus on God's life-giving presence in our lives, giving us peace and new life and equipping us for service, especially for mission.

These songs are theologically sound. Jesus, Emmanuel, was God with us. Before he ascended into heaven, he promised that he would send "another comforter" to be with his disciples; at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came in power on the disciples, transforming them from a bunch of terrified individuals hiding in an upper room with the door firmly locked "for fear of the Jews" into bold witnesses to the truth of the resurrection so that over 3000 people were converted on that very day and the church was born.

Now we are not cowering behind locked doors fearful for our lives, but, I would suggest, we have lost confidence in our ability to witness and thus bring people to faith. And actually, its right and proper that we should have lost confidence in our ability to witness, because mission cannot he undertaken in our own strength but only in the power given to us by God though his Holy Spirit. Peter hadn't been studying effective sermon techniques while he was hiding away behind locked doors, yet when the Holy Spirit came upon him, 3000 came to faith as a result of the powerful sermon he delivered.

One of my favourite modern worship songs which focuses on the [power of the Holy Spirit was written by Graham Kendrick. In 1983: 

Rejoice! Rejoice!
Christ is in you,
The hope of glory
In our hearts.
He lives! He lives!
His breath is in you,
Arise a mighty army,
We arise.

Now is the time for us
To march upon the land,
Into our hands
he will give the ground we claim. 
He rides in majesty
To lead us into victory,
The world shall see
That Christ is Lord!

God is at work in us His purpose to perform, 
Building a kingdom 
Of power not of words, 
Where things impossible,
By faith shall be made possible;
Let's give the glory
To Him now.

Though we are weak, His grace
Is everything we need; 
We're made of clay
But this treasure is within. 
He turns our weaknesses 
Into His opportunities, 
So that the glory 
Goes to Him.

(Copyright © 1983 Kingsway 's Thank you Music. A Songs of Fellowship Worship Resource Printed under CCL ,Licence number: 298000)

What I like about this song is that it insists that "though we are weak, His grace is everything we need"; it reminds us that, when "his breath (ie His Holy Spirit) is in us," "our weaknesses" are turned "into His opportunities" and that "things impossible, by faith shall he made possible." And it focuses on why God has given us this power: "God is at work in us His purpose to perform" and his purpose is that "the world shall see that Christ is Lord", "so that the glory goes to Him." in other words, this song is a celebration of the power of the Holy Spirit to refocus us as individuals and the Church from the defeatism of seeing only our own weakness and the impossibility of achieving the task in our own strength to the opportunities and possibilities which God will give us once His Holy Spirit lives within us, not for our own aggrandisement but for his mission, that "the world shall see that Christ is Lord" and "so that the glory goes to Him."

Over the last couple of years, the diocese has been re-structuring its life around mission by moving towards the creation of Mission Partnerships, which are groups of parishes which agree to work together with the express purpose of enhancing mission. Earlier this year, Canon Pete Hobson, the Diocesan Director of this process wrote:

By faster at least half the diocese will have agreed their mission partners and plans and most other parishes, (including our own), are in active discussion about what is best in their case. Programmes of training and resourcing for Mission Partnership Convenors, and, in due course, all clergy are in place, and the Certificate in Christian Discipleship is offering lay Christians new opportunities for training in mission.

in the early evening of Monday 11th June, there will be a major event at the Cathedral, which will, at its heart, be a celebration of the missionary calling of our diocese. It is aimed at all parishes, both those who will be in Mission Partnership by then, and those who will not, and will include commissioning in our shared task of mission".

So mission is well and truly on the agenda. And if mission is on the agenda, then we neglect the Holy Spirit at our peril. From the end of May to late November the church's Common Worship may focus our minds on the "Sundays after Trinity", but
if li'ssiott is to l eome a recall)' rather than a e'-orgam?.atlon, then et cry Sunday and every day tIi between needs to be "after Pentecost". lived m recognition of the only power capable of bringing people to God and that is the power God himself through the work of his Holy Spirit,

As our parish works towards forging, a mission partnership with Houghton, Keyham, Hungerton, Thurnby., and Stoughton, Great Glenn, Burton Overy, Carlton Curlieu, Kibworth, Sumeaton Westerby. Saddington, .and Foxton. Laughton and Gumley. we need to roediscover the power of the Holy Spirit in the lives each individual and church congregations; we need to seek to understand the work of the Holy spirit through our study of the scriptures we need to pray for a constant re-anointing upon our lives so that we are filled anew by the Holy Spirit for as a very wise Christian friend once said "we leak", and we need to re-discover the power which the Holy Spirit gives us for the task God calls us to do

Helen

May Letter

Dear Friends,

The petrol garage on the A6 opposite Sainsbury's here in Oadby has been closed for several years. No fuel company could compete with the cheaper supermarket petrol, and so the site became derelict. That is until a few weeks ago, when suddenly it burst back into life, not as a petrol station but rather as the "Shiny Hand Car Wash". The advent of the personalised hand car wash first hit Oadby about 18 months ago in the former Working Men's Club car park (now called Signature) in New Street. I used it twice and found it an interesting experience. The men came either from Eastern Europe or the Middle East. Many seemed to be new to Britain. It was never clear to me whether they were part of the great wave of legitimate immigration into the United Kingdom, or if this was a phenomenon brought about by migrants who have no legal rights to stay or work in this country but nevertheless find ways of making themselves useful, demonstrating a determination to survive and make a living in one of the most desirable countries to live in, on earth. It was clear to me the whole enterprise seemed to be operated over the East Midlands and a man could be switched from one location to another from one day to the next. One young man who polished my car with extraordinary energy had been overwhelmed by the wonder of Peterborough Cathedral. I pointed out to him the tower of St. Peter's and he was equally enthusiastic about that. But then I heard that the Council had issues with the New Street car washing spree and though car washing continued, it was scaled down to a fraction of what it had been.

In contrast the garage on the A6 — the Shiny Hand Car Wash — is literally awash with business. Power hoses constantly bombard up to 6 cars at a time and the whole place is a hive of activity. Men swarm round the cars and clean everything from the wheel hubs to the inside of the boot. My son, Matthew, has suggested that someone should open the old filling station shop and provide coffee and newspapers (at a profit) for the stranded drivers who wait patiently for their cars to receive desired make over. It is nice to know that Beauchamp College is producing a generation of entrepreneurs!

The question which I find myself asking is what our churches can learn from the Shiny Hand Car Wash. Here, after all, we have a group of people --- perhaps among the most marginalised in the country — who have spotted a niche market, and who by teaming up together have had a very real and immediate impact upon Oadby life in a very visible way. Moreover, they have achieved this with the slenderest of resources: their main resources are water and their own energy. There is no evidence of any electricity on the site. When it gets dark, all activity on the site ceases till the next morning.

What I love is the energy which has transformed a derelict site. I have even been inspired to go out and wash my own car for the first time in many months. I have been reminded of the energy of the early Christian movement. Of the ministry of John the Baptist whose activities by the River Jordan meant that the river was a hub of activity. Of the unique experience of Jesus who became aware of God's anointing with the Holy Spirit at His baptism. Of the way in which the Holy Spirit flooded the church with energy and spiritual power at the first Pentecost.

In May this year we have a real opportunity as churches within our parish to experience afresh the energy and power which God gives. As we celebrate the Christian message of life after death, we are invited to take to heart the very real needs of the world's poorest and most needy and seek to support. Christian Aid through the door to door collection and the Christian Aid Walk. Then on Ascension Day as we celebrate God's receiving of Jesus into heaven, we ask for God's blessing on our newly elected Church Wardens and Church Councils before waiting for the great festival of Pentecost which celebrates the release of God's Spirit on His people.

So when you pass by Shiny Hand Car Wash on the A6, spare a thought about what lessons St. Peter's and St. Paul's can learn from that hive of activity and pray that God will drench us with His Spirit at Pentecost.

Michael Rusk

April Letter

From Revd Simon Harvey, Team Vicar

Dear Friends,
                                               Avoiding Disappointment 

As I wandered through the aisles at the supermarket this week, the piped music that's designed to put me in a shopping mood was interrupted by a chirpy voice. "Good morning everyone! Welcome to Asda! Did you know that next Saturday, the brand new Playstation 3 gaming console will be available in the UK for the first time?" 

The Monday afternoon pensioners and mums with toddlers that usually share my shopping experience looked didn't like they knew about this earth-changing event. But we all had a feeling that we would soon know more. 

"Yes, and to be the first to own one of these fantastic new game consoles - recommended retail price: £425 - we're making it possible for you to pre-order one today!" 

If this wasn't enough to get me twitching with nervous excitement about the privilege of PS3 ownership, the next part of the sales patter was meant to turn up the pressure. "Please, ladies and gentlemen, book early to avoid disappointment!" 

The idea of 'avoiding disappointment' is one of the tricks of the salesman's trade. Disappointment is conjured up as a looming possibility, with all its associations of regret and sorrow. Disappointment - a dark and gloomy mood to be avoided at all costs, or at least avoided at the cost of a £25 down payment. 

Marketing the avoidance of disappointment is big business. In a culture where instant satisfaction of every whim and want is promised, disappointment means failure. I see parents unable to resist the disappointed look on young children's faces. 

When told that the burger and fries, the late bed-time, or the hoped-for toy isn't going to come, children are skilled at sharing their disappointment. I can't help thinking that those tearful, grumpy toddlers who never learn to cope with disappointment are destined to be tomorrow's angry adults, who blame everyone else for the fact that life is disappointingly boring, unfulfilling, or tough. 

Yet there's a strange fact about disappointment. Disappointment often comes as an early chapter in the stories that finally lead to the most wonderful and exhilarating moments of our lives.

Before entering full-time Christian ministry, I worked in industry for fourteen years, mainly in product and project management. I did some thinking and research about the ways we could build on our successes. One of the surprising things that emerged was that the contracts in which everything went smoothly, without any hitch, weren't quite as effective in leading to new business as those in which there had been significant problems. I noticed that when we let down a key customer, we actually gave ourselves an opportunity to prove our commitment and professionalism by retrieving the situation. Some of our most fruitful business relationships arose from projects in which we seriously disappointed a customer, then admitted our failure, and pulled out all the stops to deliver. 

We know this in everyday experience. If we simply buy something, we may well be satisfied with the transaction. But if we are disappointed that a shop doesn't quite have the thing we want, and the shopkeeper goes the extra mile to get it for us and to ensure we are completely satisfied, we often end up even more pleased than if we had simply taken the item from the shelf. So pleased, in fact, that we may well return or recommend the shop to others. Similarly, the disappointment of a faulty product can lead to us experiencing a surprising pleasure if our complaint is dealt with sympathetically and we are treated with understanding and commitment. 

This may be because the ordinary, merely satisfactory experiences transacted at the till give us little opportunity for a proper engagement with people. But at the 'customer service desk', the extra-ordinariness of a disappointed customer provides the shop with an opportunity to treat us as a real person, and the possibility of turning our disappointment into delight. 

Perhaps we shouldn't try so hard to avoid disappointment, if it's the kind of disappointment that allows someone to draw close to us and put things right again. 

Easter provides a fascinating opportunity to reflect on disappointment and delight. The gospels move toward the final moments of Jesus' life, the culmination of all the hoped-for expectations of the Messiah's mission. His friends and followers find themselves bitterly disappointed, disheartened and depressed. I think we rush too quickly from the stone cold tomb of Good Friday. We should linger instead, exploring the depth of this disappointment, and allowing it to connect with all the disappointments of our own lives. 

One of the most remarkable accounts of the Easter experience is told in Luke 24.13 to 49. Two depressed disciples plod disappointedly away from Jerusalem, from the crucifixion of all their hopes. On the way a stranger draws near and allows them to express their grief. And later, as their companion shares broken bread, they discover that this stranger that came close and walked with them in their disappointment is actually the risen Jesus himself. 

It may be tempting to avoid disappointment, or to console our disappointed children and friends with short-cuts to temporary happiness. But the Christian faith has adequate resources for properly dealing with disappointment. The transformation of grief to joy, from sorrow to hope, can only truly come when we allow God to draw near in the disappointing parts of our own journeys. Then, when we aren't dodging the truth, we may find our hearts burn within us, and find our disappointment turn to delight. 

Happy Easter!

Simon Harvey

March Letter 

Dear Friends

That's an interesting feature of adopting an environmentally friendly lifestyle: you have to foist yourself on others and draw them into the experience! So I got a lift to Launde from the Archdeacon (who already was giving a lift to Bishop John and I suspect, regretting asking me the night before what I had given up for Lent!) and a lift back from the Rev. David White which gave me an opportunity to get to know him for the first time.

February Letter 

Dear Friends

Thank you for your welcome back to me after a three month Sabbatical.  Particular thanks go the Ministry Team, to the Wardens, and the PCC for the work that has been undertaken in my absence.  It is good to come back to discover that our churches have grown numerically with new people joining; that faith has been nurtured through Alpha and teaching programmes; and that a wide range of initiatives have taken place in my absence.  Well done and thanks to all!

One of the key things – perhaps the key thing – which not only defines but shapes what kind of a Christian we are – is how we read the Bible.   It is important not only that we read and love the Bible.  It is just as important to determine how we read it.  Much of the controversy both in the wider Anglican Communion and now within the Church of England itself ultimately hangs on this question.  From the polemic in some sections of the church press, one could conclude that the Bible is no longer read in the Episcopal Church of the United States .  Believe me, in ECUSA the Bible is read.  Indeed often the same readings are read on the same day as at St. Peter’s and St. Paul ’s.  In November, for example, I was asked to preach on Luke 17.11-17 at Trinity Cathedral, Phoenix .  The Bible story was about the ten whom Jesus healed of leprosy.  If I had been taking a Holy Communion service in the parish that day, it would have been the same reading, and you would have got the same sermon!  No, the issue at stake is the interpretation of the Bible.

There is one phrase that is bandied around about scripture that sums up for me all that is unhelpful in the cacophony of claims about what ultimately defines biblical orthodoxy.  This is the insistence that the truth of scripture can be arrived at if we only would read the “plain meaning of scripture”.   But consider how language works:  if I say, “I wouldn’t touch him with a barge pole” and interpreted that by its “plain” meaning, what would I conclude?  Well, the plain meaning would be that I was perhaps somewhere in the region of Foxton Locks and making sure my barge pole wasn’t touching that particular individual!   But we know that isn’t what is meant by the expression at all and that to interpret it by its plain meaning is positively misleading.  Similarly, the expression “I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it” has a plain meaning which involves physically crossing a bridge whether it is over a river or a railway line.  Now, of course, you might use such a phrase while out on a walk, but most of the time you will use it when you mean that you will wait until the particular challenge actually presents itself.  Once again the “plain meaning” of the phrase is more likely to mislead than to illuminate you with the truth.

God has entrusted His Word to human language in all its complexity and subtlety.   The words of scripture come down to us through a long, and precarious history of copying from one manuscript to another.  They need to be interpreted with sensitivity and wisdom – understood in their original context; read in their original languages and in accurate translations; and guided by the Holy Spirit invited to become alive and transformative for us today.   There needs to be a humility and yet a confidence in our reading; an identification of wise exegetes and a willingness to accept that they are wise pointers in our search for truth.  There needs to be a weighing up of the various promptings of scripture to discover within them the true spirit of Christ and to seek to apply that to the church of today.  There needs to be a recognition, too, that everyone brings their own presuppositions and cultural conditioning to the text of sacred scripture.  Some of our insights will throw fresh understanding on the text; other assumptions that we make will be challenged by it.  A wise reading of scripture will not be undertaken just to reinforce a set of doctrinal beliefs that gives us our security (that just imprisons the text) but rather will provide a fresh, authentic, and always provisional dynamic reading of the text.  Here our security is placed on God’s Spirit who leads us into all truth.

So as we pray for the Archbishops of the Anglican Communion as they meet in Dar-es- Salaam , Tanzania on the 12-19^th February, may we apply ourselves to the sacred task of bible study.  For if we take our stand on a wise interpretation of scripture, then the truth will not elude us.  As we journey on, may the words of the psalmist becomes ours:

 “Your word is a lantern to our feet and a light upon our path.”

Michael Rusk.

This February is one of the most important months that the Anglican Communion has ever faced.  On Feb. 12 – 19^th, the Primates of the worldwide Anglican Communion meet in Dar-es- Salaam , Tanzania .  The main aim of the gathering will be to further the process of the Windsor Report and to consider the nature of response to it, so far from the Episcopal Church of the United States and the Anglican Church of Canada.  Archbishop Rowan Williams has written to all the primates inviting them to place dialogue ahead of confrontation in the festering disputes of doctrine and discipline.  

January Letter from Revd Helen Bence, Team Vicar

Dear Friends,

Well here we are in 2007. Seven years since the Millennium - seven New Years Days - and probably seven sets of New Year's resolutions.

What is It about the New Year which makes us want to abandon all the things which we do which we know are not good for us, or do the things we don't do, which we know we should do? It's as if the New Year gives us a renewed hope that a new start is possible and yet. since the Millennium. it's likely, if you are like most people, that those resolutions were quickly abandoned and forgotten, until they were re-resolved on the following six New Year's Days. New Year's resolutions seem to fall into the category of the triumph of hope over experience, yet. in the end, experience triumphs over hope.

As I reflect on that, it seems to me that we human beings really do long for life to be different somehow. We long to be people who have more self-control and so we resolve to drink less or eat more sensibly or give up smoking. We somehow sense that there is more of life than we experience most of the time and so we resolve to take up a new hobby or spend more time with the family. We long to be better than we are and so we resolve to scive our community in some way or raise money for charity or to keep our temper or not gossip. And yet, for most of us, soon after New Year with all our new hope and new sense of longing to be better and live better and do better. it all trickles through our fingers like sand and we are left with our hope dashed and our longings unfulfilled. It's all very discouraging and very frustrating.

You can't help feeling that somehow we're tackling it the wrong way, because those hopes and longings are real and good and somehow it ought to be possible for things to be better: for us to be better for life to be better.  Jesus told a story to illustrate this point:  He told them this parable: 

"No one tears a patch from a new garment and sews it on an old one. If be does, he will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be mined. No, new wine must he poured into new wineskins." Luke 5.36-39

If we try to patch ourselves with old material. or try to put "new wine in old wine-skins" we are bound to fail but the good news is that there is a way and it is possible for things to be better; for us to be better; for life to be better. The trouble is we can't make it happen - only God can - but the good news of the gospel is that God has already sorted it.  Patti writing to the church at Ephesus says:

"You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires: to be made new in the
attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness". (Ephesians 4.22-24)

if we want to keep our new year's resolutions, we need to "put off our old self and "be made new in the attitudes of our minds" and we can't do that in our own strength. Indeed, our "old self " is so "corrupted by its deceitful desires", that, however much we long to be better and do better, and however convinced we are that we will this year somehow manage to keep our new year's resolutions, we're back to our "former way of life" and our "old self' before we know it.

But the Christian message is a message of hope - we can be better and do better - life itself can he better. Paul again, this time writing to the church in Corinth says:

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation: the old has gone, the new has come!" (2 Corinthians 5.17)

Being "in Christ" means letting God into our  lives so that we are changed from the inside. God's promise to each one of us is:

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you, I will remove from you your
heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And 1 will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws." Ezekiel 36. 26-27

If we are prepared to accept that promise, we will be able to follow Jesus' key teaching, which was revolutionary then and is just as revolutionary now for it would revolutionize our world if it were applied today:

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." (John 13.34-35)

The whole story of God's dealings with his people is about making things new. In the Old Testament, Isaiah speaking as God's prophet says:

"Behold, I will create new heavens and a new earth. The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind. (Isaiah 65.17)

In the New Testament, Peter writes:"But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven a and a new earth". (2 Peter 3.13) And in the last book of the Bible, we read: "He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" (Revelation 21.5)

The theme is consistent throughout - God is working his purposes out and his purpose is to renew his creation until it becomes everything God meant it to be when "In the beginning God created...." Genesis 1.1

His purpose is to transform the world which we corrupted until it once again lives by God's principle of love So, this year. why not make just one new year's resolution - to rely on God to fulfill your longing to be better and do better and live better, because as it says in Lamentations 3.22-3

"Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness."

Helen