Bowland Benefice
Pews News
31 December 2023

First Sunday after Christmas

Collect
Almighty God,

who wonderfully created us in your own image
and yet more wonderfully restored us
through your Son Jesus Christ:
grant that, as he came to share in our humanity,
so we may share the life of his divinity;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.
This Week in the Benefice
Sunday
31 December

10.30am Benefice Holy
Communion in
Broughton
Hackett

Sunday
7 January
The Epiphany

10.30am Family Service
in Upton
Snodsbury
11.00am Holy
Communion in
Peopleton
6.00pm Evensong in
White Ladies
Aston
Unfortunately Revd Claire has succumbed to a heavy
cold, sore throat and lost her voice but I am very
pleased that The Venerable Frank Bentley (retired
Arch Deacon from Worcester) will take the Benefice
Service of Holy Communion at St Leonard’s.
We are all so grateful that he has ‘stepped into the

breach’ at the last minute.
We wish Claire a very speedy recovery.
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true…
(Alfred Lord Tennyson)

As we begin 2024 we look again at this ancient

New Year Carol

Here we bring new water from the well so clear,
For to worship God with, this happy New Year.

Chorus

Sing levy dew, sing levy dew, the water and the wine;
The seven bright gold wires and the bugles that do

shine.

Sing reign of Fair Maid, with gold upon her toe,
Open you the West Door, and turn the Old Year go.

Chorus.

Sing reign of Fair Maid, with gold upon her chin,
Open you the East Door, and let the New Year in.

Chorus.

This traditional folksong is thought to recall an old
Welsh Folk Custom when very early on New Year's
Day around three or four o'clock in the morning,
groups of boys visited the houses in the
neighbourhood, carrying a vessel of fresh cold spring
water and twigs of box, holly, myrtle, rosemary or

other evergreens.

Using the twigs they sprinkled the hands and face of
anyone they met for a penny or two.
In every house, each room was sprinkled with New
Year's water and the inmates, who were often still in
bed, wished a Happy New Year. For this service and
the good wishes the boys were quite often also given

small coins.

In the light of everything that is going on, it is so easy
to get despondent and ask why things are happening
as they are. There seems to be unhappiness and pain

wherever we look.

I believe that if life is to have meaning and purpose
we need to begin with ourselves, our relationships
and our faith and so as we look forward to 2024 with
all its joys and challenges to come, I dare offer and
share this ancient Sandskrit philosophy with you.
Look well to this day, for it is life, the very best of life.
In its brief course lie all the realities and truths of

existence,

the joy of growth, the splendour of action, the glory of

power.

For yesterday is but a memory and tomorrow is only a

vision.

But today, if well-lived, makes every yesterday a
memory of happiness and every tomorrow a vision of

hope.

Look well therefore to this day.
Prayer for New Year

Lord help me to remember that nothing is going to
happen to me this new year that you and I together

can’t handle. Amen.