Are You Part of the Story?

On the Sunday after Christmas a lot of people, including many clergy are away. St Paul's and St Peter's therefore joined together at St Peters to celebrate Communion. The service was led by Canon Chris Oxley who also preached. He spoke about the importance of Christianity being rooted in real events, rather than myths, teaching or philosophy. Were we part of the story? Did Christ's birth and death impact on our lives?


Chris told us that during the vacancy at St Peters he would be back on other occasions. We look forward to welcoming him.

Christmas Family Communion Service

An excited congregation met at 10.00 Christmas day for the family Christmas Communion service. Bright Christmas sweaters were much in evidence. And many had brought Christmas presents they had already opened. Steve (our rector) asked people what experience they had had of celebrating Christmas in the different corners of the world. There were a variety of answers. In his sermon he highlighted the joy of being part of the worldwide church – all worshipping the one who came to the earth at Bethlehem – the one who called for our worship – and our hearts, today.

The celebrations concluded with Sherry and biscuits after the service

Happy Christmas!

It Came upon the Midnight Clear

At 11:30 PM just over 30 people met at St Pauls to celebrate the birthday of Christ, Christmas. With Christmas readings and carols we celebrated that first event, concluding with a celebration of Holy Communion at which we remembered the purpose of Christ’s coming at Bethlehem – to die 30 years later in Jerusalem, as a sacrifice for the  sins of humanity – and to offer eternal life.

Carols by Candlelight

We had a full church this evening (Sunday 22 December) for our service of carols by candlelight. In it we remembered the Christmas story – of how the God of creation became a baby in Bethlehem to share in our experience and then to die for us. We used carols, readings from the Bible and poems. A particular innovation this year was a group with a Tamil background who not only sang the beginning of a traditional Carol in Tamil, but also a Tamil lullaby to the Virgin Mary with her child. It reminded us that Christians all around the world are celebrating the birth of the Christ child at this time.

OUTSIDE/IN – Welcome into the Christmas story

Intercultural Worship

As we continue to explore what it means to be an intercultural worshiping community I am looking forward to our Carols by Candlelight this Sunday evening. During the service we will sing O Come all ye Faithful with the first verse and chorus sung in Tamil. Also in the service a small group will sing a lullaby in Tamil. 

As well as the usual Mince Pies and Mulled Wine after the service there will also be Samosas! 

Do come and join us!

Supertroopers Crafts

One of our leaders of Supertroopers (our primary school aged Sunday morning group) enjoys making things out of wood. Each time the children come back into church we are amazed at the creation he has come up with to help illustrate the Bible story.
A couple of weeks ago as they were exploring the Christmas story we were presented with this balancing machine and we had to guess if the statements were True or False. Once on the scales the correct answer was revealed!
The children thoroughly enjoyed it and everyone in church was impressed.
Thank you Derek for your faithful service in Supertroopers and for all your excellent woodwork crafts and games.

Bishops' Christmas Message

Bishops' Christmas Message

Good News for the Poor

Apart from today’s service having a multicultural theme, it was also a gift service. Presents of about £15 had been bought for nearly 70 children who will spend this Christmas in mother and baby homes, and women’s refuges, near to the church.

Those who had bought and wrapped these gifts brought them forward during a song. In addition, people brought unwrapped gift for the “Welcome Project” for asylum seekers, based at St Martin’s house.

All these gifts will be distributed in the next few weeks.

From Every Tribe and Tongue

In our service today we celebrated our different backgrounds. The church had been invited to come dressed in our culturally different clothes. Some “white British” found this request difficult, although one came in a dapper three-piece suit and umbrella! However, there were some outstanding displays from Nigeria, Uganda and north and south India – not to mention a Scot! All came forward and showed their finery.

When it came to a time of sung worship, we sang the children’s chorus “Jesus loves me, this I know” in a mixture of three languages, Tamil, Yoruba and English.

It’s good to know that we are “All one in Christ Jesus.”

Christmas Fare at Barneys

Every month we offer “Breakfast at Barneys,” a breakfast, including a full cooked breakfast, at a very reasonable price in the Barnabas centre. Today was the last such breakfast before Christmas.

In addition to the usual food, the tables were decorated with crackers and floral displays. The crackers were fun, although the jokes were no better than usual! A good time was had by all.

Thank you so much to all those who helped to make this happen.

Gift Service

This morning was our Gift Service at St Paul's. As in previous years we have been in contact with some local refuge's and found 68 children who will be in their care over Christmas. Members of the congregation were given the gender and age of these children and brought them a Christmas present which we collected in this morning. The Gifts will be distributed this week so that each child will have something to open on Christmas morning.

We Wish You a Merry Christmas

At the invitation of Sainsbury’s, Oadby, near Leicester, a group from St Paul’s sang Christmas Carols to the shoppers for an hour this morning (14 December 2019). We sang most of the well-known Christian carols and also added “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” at the end.

To illustrate our best wishes for our local citizens we handed out sweets as well (in the case of children, only with their parents’ permission). At the height of the secular Christmas sales season it was a good opportunity to remind people of the spiritual meaning of Christmas. People seemed to appreciate it

School Visit

Today we welcomed Foundation Stage from Brookside Primary School to St Paul's. They had all made decoration that they hung on our tree. They also had a look around church, lit the advent candles, explored advent calendars and the nativity scene as well as listening to the Christmas story.

Jennie Frith

Last Friday a packed St Paul's said farewell to Jennie, one of the founder members of St Paul's and a leader of Coffee Pot. Jennie was a well known and loved character and will be sadly missed.

On Saturday we hosted a Hustings event at St Paul's run by Churches Together in Oadby. All 5 candidates for our constituency were present and had equal opportunity to speak. About 100 people from the local community gathered to hear them answer a huge variety of questions that were emailed in in advance.
Today the Barnabas Centre is a Polling Station and I encourage everyone to vote.
Here is a prayer the Church of England has written for the General Election.

God of grace and truth,Send your Spirit to guide usas we discover your will for our country.Help us to discuss the issues before us
with courtesy, truth and mutual respect,and grant that all who stand for parliamentwill seek to serve the common good,through him who came not to be served but to serve,Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen

Alpha 2019 Testimonies

We shared this video of testimonies from our recent Alpha course in church this morning.

Nativity Story Birth to Cross Line Drawing

Fun@4 Advent

Last Sunday we held one of our Messy style Churches, Fun@4 when we explored the theme of Advent. We had one of our biggest attendances! We made advent wreaths, played games and sung songs. We thought about waiting for things and prayed together in our family groups for the light of Jesus to shine in different areas.