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Barnes in Commonthe magazine of Churches Together in Barnes
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Church NewsBaptist Church | Holy
Trinity | Methodist Church Baptist Church
What a joy it was to have Pastor Piyal Mondal share with us at a recent morning service. He shared news about 'Go! West Bengal' and the resulting House Church Ministry that comprises much of Church life and fellowship in that part of North East India. We also heard about the poverty of the people and some of the difficulties faced by many who come to faith in Jesus including being ostracized from other family members and persecution by militant fundamentalists of other faiths, difficulties not uncommon among Christians throughout the world. We hope to be keeping up contacts with Pastor Piyal and will be looking at ways we can help his ministry. Our Sunday morning services continue to take us through Luke's Gospel and in the evening we'll be looking briefly at some harder aspects of our faith such as 'Can a believer fall away and be lost?', 'Suffering: a mystery and ministry', 'What is the unforgiveable sin?'. On Thursday evenings we recently finished the 'Christian life and Today’s World' course and will be embarking on 'Christian Life and Why it Makes Sense' in a few weeks time. Tea and coffee mornings continue monthly on the first Saturday and the Ladies meeting on Tuesdays (2.45 pm) is another good opportunity to come and enjoy some friendly company. You'd be most welcome. Graham Pulham
Holy Trinity
In early June and on what seems to have been the only hot and sunny weekend of our summer this year, we held our first Community Celebration weekend. On the Saturday we held a performance of Captain Noah and his Floating Zoo with a cast from Lowther School, Holy Trinity and North Barnes community. A fantastic mural prepared by children from Castelnau Community Centre was a stunning centrepiece. On the Sunday Holy Trinity resounded to the sound of some 50 African drums as we celebrated Following God’s Heartbeat with adults and children drumming and dancing their way through the service! This was followed by a BBQ and workshops on Sudanese cooking and African drumming. A great weekend! The first phase of our repair works are nearly complete and the second phase is redecoration. However we are preparing an appeal to our community to help us complete these works in order that we can ensure the beauty of our building and continue with our plans to develop activities through the week which are of benefit to everyone. We are well into the planning of our first Space To Be Conference in November—more details in the next edition of BiC. Jean Boulton-Reynolds
Methodist Church
After saying goodbye to Roger and Mair Hutchings with a church family party and special services, we formally welcomed our new minister Rev. Dr. Ebute Obiabo and his family with a Circuit service at Brentford Methodist Church on 28th August when the preacher was our Chair of the District, the Revd. Jenny Impey. Ebute will be looking after Brentford and Chiswick churches as well as us in Barnes. We are looking forward to getting to know Ebute and his family and sharing our mission with him. We restart our FIRST SUNDAYS in September when our church is open from 8.00 until 4.30 and we share breakfast and lunch together. The speakers we are expecting this autumn are Ian Watts of Richmond Churches Housing Trust, DCS Rick Turner, Borough Commander of the Metropolitan Police for Richmond, the Revd. The Lord Richard Harris of Pentregarth, former Bishop of Oxford and Pat Henchie, Head teacher of Lowther School. Everyone is invited to come and join all or any part of the day. Elysia Cunningham
St Mary's
The July visit of Bishop Wilson and his wife from Matabeleland, accompanied by Father Amon, Vicar-General, and Father Shingi, Archdeacon of the western province of the Diocese, was inspiring and enjoyable. They spent a busy week based in Barnes before moving on for a second week in Putney. Bishop Wilson then went on to the Lambeth Conference and the others returned home, where they are sustained through their profound faith and patience, while they wait for long sought political change. St Mary’s inside and out was a hive of activity on Barnes Fair
day, while cakes and sweetmeats were sold on the green itself. Many
were involved, all enjoyed themselves and net takings were 50% up on
last year’s great result. We look forward to our Patronal Festival on Sunday 14 September when Canon Lucy Winkett from St Paul’s Cathedral will be preaching. The following Sunday we say good bye to Cameron Burns who’s made a huge contribution to St Mary’s life through his leadership of the music for 2 ½ years. He leaves us to study for a year in Italy with the world famous soprano, Mirella Freni. Geoffrey Barnett
St Michael's
A great deal has happened in the last few months with our Summer Fare, St Michael`s Tombola at the Barnes Fair and the vicar’s Garden Party. This year the weather was excellent for all these occasions. During August we have had the pleasure of inviting two Choirs, The “Howell's Singers” and “Cantus Firmus” to sing at the Sunday Mass while our choir is on holiday . It is always a joy to have visiting singers who may not generally have the opportunity to sing in a liturgical setting. As St Michael`s Centre`s floor is being re-laid we have had the Wednesday Mass and lunch in the Vicarage garden. There is always the added dimension of trains and planes passing by but they become part of our worship as we pray for them as they pass by. Our monthly book group continues to meet and we recently enjoyed “Why I am still a Catholic”, “Essays in Faith and Perseverance” It is always a good experience to read about how others live out their faith and there were contributions ranging from Cherie Booth, Bruce Kent to Peter Stanford. It is a book well worth reading on holiday. Paul Holland
St Osmund's
Where has the summer gone? The early part of July was a happy time of shared enjoyment – impending holidays to think about, parish and school barbecues and the Junior department production of Oliver. At the end of term mass there is always special focus on friends who are leaving for secondary schools, along with some members of our wonderful staff. Fr Romano, from Uganda, was a welcome visitor again throughout August. He has made friends here now and we need to pray for him and his flock in that northern part of the country suffering from the attention of violent rebels, the self-styled Lord's Resistance Army. For myself, I wonder where the past 20 years have gone. I shall be retiring during September and moving to live in a flat in Richmond, so this is my final contribution to these notes and I pray that the Holy Spirit will continue to bless our shared witness of CTiB. I will remember many friends from your congregations. We have moved on, my first parish priest thought there was something decidedly odd about a (former) curate who had gone to preach one evening in the local Anglican church. Fr Dominic Allain will be returning, he was here during my absence in 2002/03. His Induction to celebrate and Confirmation of 24 or so young parishioners is on 1st November. Of course, a priest doesn't really retire, Tu es sacerdos in aeternum (Ps 109/110 v.4). I will be free as a bird and hope to act as locum, supplying a need when a local incumbent is away. Let us pray for one another, oremus pro invicem: Deo gratias. Fr Anthony Logan
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