St Thomas' Day

Most of us won't be there on 3rd July! This message should really have been put up sooner.

Most of us will be in Lincoln Cathedarl where our Curate, George (she's there in the picture in the last post), is being ordained priest.

But Canon Judy McMann, an old member and friend of St Nicolas', will be there to take a simple Family Service for those who do come at 10.30 a.m.

There will be no 9.30 a.m. Communion at St Nicolas', but there will be a big 6.00 p.m. Communion at St Michael's at which George will preside for the first time.

Normal services will resume in August.

Baptism Welcome

Here is the moment this morning when we welcomed two of those baptised at services on Sunday afternoons last month: one of them can be seen reaching out to crush a copy fit the service sheet; the other is out of the picture. The regular congregation is never there on Sunday afternoons so we always invite the families back to take part in the next First Sunday Thing.

Butterflies

We are promised creating butterflies at the First Sunday Thing next Sunday (5th June). By then we will have not only passed Easter but also Ascension Day, and the apparently dead cocoon produces the new life of the buuerfly which then flies.

Although the doors were locked

And here is the prayer for the Second Sunday of Easter in the form in which those who came yesterday folded paper to take it away with them. Among other things we lit the Easter candle, explored the Easter garden, made rubbings of the Easter scene, and sung some Easter songs.

Sunday after Easter

The planning group at the weekend looked forward to our next First Sunday Thing in two weeks time on 1st May. The church will be reading the next bit of the Easter story that day - the risen Lord appearing to the disciples including Thomas. We noticed that God can operate behind our locked doors. We noticed a prayer set for the Sunday beginning Risen Christ, for whom no door is locked, no entrance barred: open the doors of our hearts... It is this theme we will be picking up.

Planning ahead

A small group of us will be meeting informally in St Michael's next Saturday (16th April) to sketch out ideas and plans for the First Sunday Thing for at least May and June. The gathering is open to anyone who wants to come along then or to offer us thoughts in the week before then.

Mother of the Tribe

This is the carving from Mua in Malawi which we looked at this morning. The Chewa sense that God is the 'mother of the tribe' is here made Christian; she has a cross on her forehead and Jesus' death is one of the things going on beneath her feet. Alongside the crucifixion, all sorts of ordinary parts of life (from a school lesson to an old man on a stick) are down there under God's protection as well.