This weekend’s Bible readings:
Romans 14:1-12(p 1140) and Matthew 18:21-35 (p 985)
Christianity Explored:
The Alpha course has become Christianity Explored, it will now take place in the Vicarage and it starts this Wednesday at 7.00 pm! Please pray that God, by his Holy Spirit, will be at work in those who attend.
Harvest appeal:
This year’s appeal will be divided between our long standing partners at Kisiizi Hospital in Uganda and the Holy Land Institute for the Deaf, which some of our folk visited last year. Fliers will be available in our churches soon. The cash collection at the harvest services in All Saints and St Catherine’s will go to the appeal; in St Mary’s there will be special envelopes available for your gifts. Alternatively, you can give online to any of the bank accounts detailed later in this notices sheet, using the reference ‘harvest’.
All Saints@6:
Now that we have moved our Centre service to 6 o’clock and changed the format a little, we have decided to change the name to All Saints@6. We are still very much an informal café church but there is now a varying programme for the three weeks of the month (the other is Evensong). Some services (like this week) will be invitational: Joe Boot will be leading a Question and Answer session following a talk on ‘Worldviews in Conflict’, a topic which will interest many, Christian or otherwise. Please join us!
Pop up shop:
The next pop up shop will be on Sunday 24th September at the 10.30am family service at St Mary's. There will be a lot of new stock of fairly traded and ethically sourced products. Any profits made go to our local food bank. If there is something you would like Marion to order for you please let her know.
Giving in St Mary’s:
You may have spotted that gift aid envelopes have reappeared in St Mary’s. We can claim gift aid on cash donations in the collection bags, but only up to a certain amount and last year Standon exceeded that amount. If you’re making a cash donation (in church or at one of our events) and you are a tax payer, it would be helpful if you would complete a GA envelope, please. If you’ve signed an ongoing gift aid declaration, just your name on the envelope will enable us to allocate the donation to your existing declaration. That will mean that we will claim more gift aid on the amount of cash given by non-tax-payers. Thank you for helping us maximise the amount we can recover from HMRC.
This isn’t an issue at present for our other two churches, who haven’t reached the limit and are able to claim tax back on all the cash donations they receive.
Sunday lunch at The Star:
Heather's next Sunday lunch will be on Sunday 24th September at 12.15pm at The Star in Standon. Please contact Heather by Monday 18th September to book a place (07909 065550).
Midweek Music:
Midweek Music at St Mary’s will return on Wednesday 27th September, when Michael will be giving an organ recital.
Lunchtime concert season:
Our lunchtime concert season in St Mary’s is almost upon us. This year’s concerts will be 30th September, 7th and 14th October. The programme will be:
30th September The Rib Singers, directed by David Ranford
7th October Bella Cora, directed by Ros Savournin
14th October Flute Cocktail, directed by Wendy Walshe
A soup and cheese lunch will be served from 12.00, with concerts taking place at 12.30. As usual, we ask for £5 to cover lunch, and there will be a retiring collection for the Friends of St Mary’s.
Basma’s cookery evening – advance notice:
Basma will be hosting another demonstration of Levantine cookery, followed by supper, in the Memorial Hall, Dane End, at 7.00 pm on 21st October. Tickets are available from any of the Sacombe PCC. Proceeds will go to St Catherine’s. We recommend booking early – these always sell out very quickly!
Wednesday café:
Our All Saints church cafe team is desperate for helpers on a Wednesday afternoon, (term time only) to serve the children and parents with cake and drinks between 2.30 and 4.30pm. Deborah normally helps with the children’s work and chats with the parents building up important relationships but now she will be needed to help serve. Please consider helping even if it is a one off. We can guarantee you will enjoy your time there! Please speak to Deborah, Carole or Lizzie (B).
Help needed for Little Munden churchyard:
We desperately need more volunteers to help maintain the churchyard at All Saints. If you can offer some time, please speak to John.
Thank you from Heather:
Heather writes: ‘The musical afternoon in All Saints last Saturday was a great joy to everyone there and raised in the region of £650. I would like to thank Peter A for all the effort and determination he put into making this event a success. Also Michael and the music group, Caroline and Peter H, everyone who supplied all the delicious cakes and to Deborah Jacky and Jane who served the refreshments and everyone who came and supported us. A truly wonderful afternoon. Thank you so much to everyone. Heather and family.’
Concert 21st September:
Hugh and Michael will be performing at St Mary’s, Ware lunchtime concert on Thursday this week. Refreshments are served from 11.30; the concert is at 12.30. Entry is free, with a retiring collection for the church.
Live stream glitch last week:
We apologise that the live stream went down last week part-way through the service. We don’t know why it happened (though some of the High Street has been having some internet problems recently), but the recording of the service has now been uploaded to our usual Your Tube channel, so you can find it there if you’d like to try again.
And lighting issue in St Mary’s:
The electricians switched off the power in St Mary’s this week and, since then, the panel of buttons to control the lights hasn’t been working. Until we can get it sorted, the visitors’ lights (operated with the switch in the porch, just outside the big doors) has been altered so that it puts on all the lights. Please use that one if you need lights on.
Website - changes:
Our benefice website is on the www.achurchnearyou.com platform. The ACNY platform has been/is rolling out a number of changes to improve their site so that benefice information doesn’t need to be duplicated for each church. Please bear with us as we work to populate the new pages.
Some people have been having difficulty reaching the benefice page. It can be reached via this link: https://www.achurchnearyou.com/benefice/32-240BF/. The forward from https://ubsms.org.uk has been updated to point to that new page.
Services for the next few weeks
Midweek services each week:
Tuesdays, 9.30am Holy Communion (BCP), St Catherine's
Wednesdays, 9.30am Morning worship & Bible study, St Mary's
Sunday services:
17th September 8.00am Holy communion, St Mary's
10.30am Holy communion, All Saints
6.00pm All Saints@6, All Saints
24th September 10.30am Harvest family worship, St Mary's
6.00pm Harvest choral evensong, St Mary's
1st October 8.00am Holy communion, St Mary's
10.30am Harvest morning worship, All Saints
6.00pm All Saints@6, All Saints
8th October 10.30am Holy communion, St Mary's
6.00pm All Saints@6, All Saints
15th October 8.00am Holy communion, St Mary's
10.30am Holy communion, All Saints
6.00pm All Saints@6, All Saints