The Rev'd Dr. Udobata Onunwa severed his links with the Parish after four and a half years at the helm. We thank him for his guidance, invaluable hard work and leadership in that he has provided the foundation for taking this parish forward in the quest to reorder this parish for this community. He will leave the core of a good progressive team led by our Reader Mr. Ken Wooldridge and trainee Reader, Mr. Ian Abram, Mr. Norman Miller and Mr. Gordon Lester our recently elected Churchwardens (2010). Our Church and Community Development Worker Mrs Clare McKenzie, Chester Diocese and the PCC will be supportive. We wish Udobata and Dorothy a happy and spiritual filled future.
From Dec 1st 2009 the Parish of St. Andrew, Grange began a period of interregnum (between Vicars). We have not been neglected because the Bishop of Birkenhead. the Rt. Revd Keith Sinclair as asked retired Vicar the Rev. Douglas Jamieson and his good lady Jennie to minister to us during this period. We are no strangers to Douglas and Jennie and we welcome them both back having helped this parish out in times past.
For reflection this month, I print a leading article penned by our Patron, the RR Peter, Bishop of Chester in the Chester Diocesan News.
Bishop
Peter writes about holidays
and holy days amid the all-too human-centred greyness of modern living
August
used to be the main time when people took holidays, and for those with school
age children it still is. Others now take more frequent holidays, at any time of
the year. Holidays are a more prominent part of our lives than used to be the
case.
The world 'holiday' is, of course, a contraction of 'holy day', and many of our
public holidays still derive from the Christian year. Indeed, the whole idea of
a special day of rest comes from the Jewish practice of the Sabbath, which
Christians turned into Sunday - a special weekly celebration of the
resurrection.
Religious festivals are a feature of all religions, but there was always
something unique about the Jewish Sabbath, simply because of the strict emphasis
upon rest from human effort, and human achievement. The Sabbath was to be a day
of peace and quiet before God, not a day of religious striving to find God. In
its time, and in new ways today, it was a revolutionary idea.
During my years as Bishop I have seen the effects of the deregulation of Sunday,
and the effective abandonment of trading restrictions.
No doubt for many people this feels like a gain,
but I sense that Sunday has disappeared into the all-too-human-centred greyness
of the rest of the week. It isn't only religiously inclined people who have lost
out, but society as a whole, and especially family life.
As a society, we are too busy: obsessed with information, but lacking wisdom.
Let the holiday atmosphere of August help us all to relax, stand back from the
hurly-burly of things, and focus our thoughts upon our Creator and Redeemer.
After all, He began it all, with the original Sabbath Rest, on the seventh day
of creation, when he finished his work of creation and beheld it to be 'very
good'. May our holidays, and holy days, train our eyes to see the goodness of
God in the world.
+Peter