Diocese gets new web site

The Diocese of Leicester has unveiled a new website: leicester.anglican.org

The site has been fully revised and designed with a contemporary layout and navigation. Some aspects are still being implemented but this will hopefully create a more appealing and effective way of communicating the work of the Church in Leicestershire.

Quiz night raised £150 for CMS

Last week's fish and chip supper and quiz night raised an amazing £150 for the work of CMS, a mission society which we're delighted to support.

Ruth Biddulph of CMS writes,

Thank you for your generous gift of £150 towards the work of CMS. We are passionate about transforming lives around the world through sharing Jesus, and we are encouraged that you share this passion.

CMS currently works in partnership with approximately 700 people in mission in over 60 different countries, including the UK.

Thanks to Paul and Teri for organising one of the very best evenings of entertainment at St Paul's.

The Blooming Great Tea Party

Our friends at Adkinson & Son Funeral Directors are organising a Blooming Great Tea Party to raise funds to Marie Curie Cancer Care.

Call in between 1 and 4pm for a cup of tea and a chat, refreshments and raffle.

Further details from Chris Sarson on 0116 271 2340.

Oadby Bible Society Visioning Day - 7 June 2008

An opportunity to hear and pray about the exciting ways in which Bible poverty is being tackled today in our country and overseas, with workshop sessions, a question time and resources available from the Bible Society.

Come along to Barnabas Centre on Saturday 7th June 2008 from 10 am to 3 pm

Revd Paskal Clement

Last Sunday evening, St Peter's Church in Oadby was full for the licensing of Paskal Clement, as Assistant Priest in the Oadby Team Ministry.

Paskal and Ahktar were joined by many friends from the parish of Hounslow, where Paskal had served as a minister since 2004.

One of the Bible readings was read in Urdu and a song was sung in Pujabi. Paskal was welcomed by representatives of the local community and St Peter's and St Paul's Churches. He took the opportunity to express his gratitude to God for the journey that led him from Lahore to Oadby and to look forward to ministry here.

30-40s Christian Singles Group

Lesley Green writes,

Are you in your 30-40s and a single, separated, divorced or widowed
Christian who is looking to meet new people, make new friends & have a fun time? If so we'd like to hear from you. We are seeking like minded people to develop a social group based in Leicestershire / Rutland / Northamptonshire. Activities may include meals, walks, quiz nights, sporting activities, 10 pin bowling, cinema, theatre trips etc. Suggestions welcome. Please contact Lesley (Leicestershire) lesley.green@ebard.co.uk or Mandie (Northamptonshire) mandie.hooson@ntlworld.co.uk. We want to arrange an initial meet up early June so please contact us by the end of May if possible. We look forward to hearing from you.

Revd Mandy Flaherty

In a joint parish service at St Paul's yesterday morning, we thanked Mandy for the last four years in which she's ministered as Curate in Oadby.

Mandy has brought a personal warmth and creativity in ministry and initiated activities that will last - especially Peter's Place and her work in getting alongside young families. As she said at the service, she arrived as one and is on the way to becoming three and I get the feeling that her time in Oadby has been pretty transformational, for all sorts of reasons. We prayed for her and her family, that God will bless and keep them and take them on adventures together.

Thank you, Mandy, and we're glad that you'll continue to be around in the coming months.

Parish magazine article - May 2008

Mandy Flaherty writes,

“Maybe Rosebud was something he couldn’t get, or something he lost.”

If you’re any kind of film buff, you may know the quotation above as a significant one from near the end of Orson Welles’ 1941 film, ‘Citizen Kane’. The film, in its time, was ground breaking in its cinematography but also in its portrayal of a man who had failed, despite being loaded with material possessions and fame. It is a deeply exposing film about loss and loneliness as well as a reflection on how important childhood and family are. The Children’s Society is prominent in its work at the moment in raising awareness on ’What makes a good childhood?’ highlighting the very disturbing fact that ‘the UK fares very badly in bringing about the well-being of its children.’ Britain is not a good place to grow up in, according to new research cited by The Children’s Society, and there is much loss and loneliness, of various kinds, experienced among our children today.

I have been mulling over these thoughts and ideas about a good childhood versus the loss of that childhood for a few weeks now, both on a theological level in preaching and leading services and last month’s Peter’s Place, but also on a personal level as I prepare to adopt my 16 month old son, Jayden. Having a fulfilled and well connected childhood that extends into adult life is so important to be able to deal with all the pressures that modern life throws at us. And, of course, it’s something I want to be able to provide for my children, no matter what disadvantages they face, now or later.

As Christians, we search for what God says to us about how to be fulfilled so that we can take that into our lives and give it to others. As we near Pentecost, one scripture comes to mind that offers some answer to this searching and yearning. In Ephesians 5, just as he warns against filling your life with other things, Paul says, ‘… be filled with the Spirit’. Instead of the huge number of alternatives that the world offers to fulfil our lives and take away the loss and loneliness, Paul urges, ’be filled with the Spirit.’ This is the real alternative and the tool needed to ensure we don’t feel the huge loss and loneliness depicted in Citizen Kane or inferred in the research done by The Children’s Society. A more accurate translation of this phrase is actually ‘keep being filled’ or ‘ be continually filled’ with the Spirit and this is the principle we are urged to live by: to continually ask God to fill us with his Spirit so that we can live an alternative life to the consumerist and addictive modern life that takes up so much of our time and energy. By being filled with God’s Spirit we can have a deeper energy and fulfilment that keeps us happy and contented. May God fill us again this Pentecost with his Holy Spirit that we might know and share the satisfying love of Christ. Amen!

On a personal note: I would like to say a heartfelt thank you to everyone in the parish that I have got to know over the last four years in my role as Curate here. I have met many people; listened to and enjoyed many people’s stories and friendship and all are valuable. Grace and I are looking forward to our lives changing over the next few weeks as Jayden arrives as son and brother and as my role changes. We will still be living in Oadby for the foreseeable future and I will be moving into a teaching role after my adoption leave but hope to continue my ministry as a non-stipendiary priest at a suitable point in the future. Thank you for your prayers and support. See you around…. With a double pushchair!

Every Blessing – Reverend Mandy Flaherty

And be thankful!

Thanks to the kind folks who gave me encouraging feedback on Sunday. It was an over-long sermon but that probably stemmed from trying to take a longer passage from Colossians for the exposition than I should.

The part which seems to have had most impact was our reflection on Colossians 3.15b - "And be thankful."

I've had a number of comments and conversations on the myth that our happiness is just one purchase away, driven by incessant marketing which tells us that we should be dissatisfied with what we have, leading us to work harder and longer to get the cash to pay the debt for what we bought, and driving us to too many evenings where we're too exhausted to do anything but watch TV. If this pushed buttons for you, here's a clip from the wonderful, The Story of Stuff, which kind of makes the same point:

Contrary to our apparent powerlessness, gratitude is a powerful weapon to break the myth and a wonderful antidote to misery-inducing dissatisfaction.

Agenda for Change

On Tuesday 6 May, Joel Edwards of Evangelical Alliance, will bring his 20-event Agenda for Change tour to the All Nations Centre, Leicester.

"Agenda for Change" is the title of Joel's new book, which argues that Biblical witness is not called to tip-toe through the 21st century, but to transform society by presenting Christ credibly to the culture.

The publicity material for the book continues:

"Firstly the church must present Christ credibly. For too long evangelicalism has offered a distorted version of Jesus to the world. It is time to rediscover his humanity, his storytelling, his love for the outlaws and his life-giving and generous nature. It is time to recognise that in a pluralist culture (which is nothing new) Christ must be presented with boldness and confidence amongst the gods. He must be allowed to speak for himself and not shoe-horned into a restricted moral agenda. The church must put more if its energy into lifting him up than denigrating the other gods of our age. In all of this the miraculous and supernatural must be given space to speak to a culture weary of rationalism. And Christ’s conversational model of engagement must be the template for interaction with societies moving beyond the argumentative, win/lose spirit of modernity. Questions and dialogue should be the norm. The church has a vital role to play, despite its flaws, and needs to rediscover a passion for the bible. Intelligence, prayer and moral integrity in all areas will be critical. Social action must become the inevitable outworking of faith.

"Secondly the word ‘evangelical’ needs to be rehabilitated as good news. It has become tainted by association with bigotry, fundamentalism and narrow moral agendas and party politics. There is movement to abandon the label but this would be a mistake. The word has to be reclaimed so that it can once again be synonymous with anguish rather than anger, grace rather than opposition, action rather than argument. The left, right and centre parties within evangelicalism need to see the value in the other and recognise that unity is a biblical truth not an optional extra.

"Thirdly evangelicalism must recognise that the good news is for spiritual and social transformation. It starts with the individual but never ends there. Social change is part and parcel of the gospel. Christians need to adopt citizenship mindsets which see their churches as agents of positive change in society, starting with the square miles surrounding them. The church will become part of the solution to the numerous ills afflicting western culture. This is a long-term project, a cathedral building exercise. It will require strategic and intentional thinking. Many of the benefits will be seen by future generations. The job of the church now is to lay the foundations."

The event at the All Nations Centre begins at 7.30pm on Tuesday 6 May and is (I think) free.