Following a meeting with the Churchwardens of the Benefice last Wednesday and after a meeting with 166 other clergy from the Diocese via Zoom on Friday, I have made the decision together with the PCC of St Edmund’s to open the church, this weekend, 12th July for worship. For now, the other three churches will remain closed. The other churches will be opened when they feel it is safe to do so.

We have to prepare a risk assessment for each church and follow Government guidelines in order to make the building safe for worship, which means the capacity for St Edmund’s will be a maximum of 20. In order to accommodate people, we have sounded out the congregation and asked who is likely to attend. We envisage about 18 for the first service, but if there are significantly more, they will be asked to attend the next service and priority will be given to them. It may be that if a larger number want to attend than we can accommodate, we may have to ‘ticket’ services. The service will be held at the normal time of 11.00am, but as I have stated in a previous letter, it will feel quite different to what we have become accustomed to.