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Archive for March, 2012

Bishops Got Talent: Selecting the Next Archbishop?

Posted in Church, Faith, Fun, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on 16 March, 2012| 4 Comments »

Since Rowan Williams stepped down this afternoon from the hardest job in the Church of England (or maybe not, parish life is just a microcosm of the Anglican Communion tbh), Twitter has been awash with suggestions of who will succeed him.

It was suggested that rather than the Crown Nominations Commission we could have a Bishops Got Talent show, with possible candidates competing for the post. This leads to the fun possibility of theme weeks:

  • Sermon week
  • Sitting through tedious civic occasions looking interested week
  • Dealing with the media week (including a round of ‘explaining the basics of the Christian faith to most reporters and especially sub-editors’)
  • Eyebrow styling week
  • Mitre modelling week

It also led to speculation about who could be on the panel. They must obviously conform to the required stereotypes of benign expert/stroppy upstart/foxy chick/joker. First suggestions (who do not necessarily have to be alive or real) include:

  • St John
  • Archdeacon Robert (from Rev)
  • Ellie (the Headteacher from Rev)
  • Adrian Plass.

I’d love to hear your ideas for possible rounds and those you have for alternative panel members.

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Vicars’ Wives Away (including important fashion report)

Posted in Faith, Fun, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on 15 March, 2012| 7 Comments »

What do wives of Christian ministers do when they get together, other than talk (obvs)? Last week at Hothorpe Hall we managed to take in some great bible teaching, pray together, swap tips for local church ministry and still had time to walk in the Spring sunshine (some of round fields, others between charity and coffee shops in Market Harborough). Er, and there was eating and a frock swap and crafty type things.

I also took time to assess the important question of what Vicar’s wives are wearing. A while ago I blogged on this and thought I would revisit it when I observed this year’s trends. So I am able to share with you that the current Vicarage/Manse look is likely to include one or more of the following:

  • Long boots with skinny jeans or leggings (very popular)
  • Converse sneakers (when boots don’t quite work)
  • Long sleeved t-shirt worn under short sleeve tunic or similar
  • Scarves are definitely in (possibly in place of necklaces, which were less in evidence than previously)
  • Fewer gilets this year (perhaps because of the milder weather, or people had remembered that the conference centre is about 20 degrees warmer than our houses).

Some of the essentials for this year's must-have Vicar's wife outfit

 The enjoyable frock swap run by Frock Chick Hilary Nicholls was a fun way for us to get rid of not-quite-right-for-me clothes – the wide-legged jeans and short boots etc. We were able to get new clothes ourselves and also think about whether such a thing would work as a women’s event back home. I’m not sure a clothes swap would work here (our women are probably too diverse in age and fashion sense), but I think an accessories one would. Seems like a fun option for an evangelistic event at church – just add refreshments and a short talk and you’re done.

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The Vicar on Video

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on 14 March, 2012| 6 Comments »

We’ve slowly been souping up our rather basic church website over the past few months. The best thing we did was get our kind computer-literate friend to change it to a WordPress platform, which was familiar to us from blogging. The old site used Joomla and was just too difficult for us to get our heads around.

We try and update the site a couple of times a week to keep it live, and it seems that people are beginning to use it a little. Most of our congregation aren’t on the internet, but we think that the website is especially important for those who aren’t yet in church.

In our quest to make the site friendly and useful, a video of the Vicar has now been produced by Capable, a church member, and Compassion, who is a great friend of our congregation. I think they’ve done a great job and we’re hoping it’ll be a good introduction for people visiting the website. At least they won’t be surprised by the Vicar’s Scottish accent!

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A Collection of Morning Prayers for School

Posted in Faith, School, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on 13 March, 2012| 2 Comments »

Following up from a blog post I wrote nearly 2 years ago(!), I’ve just been putting together some suggested prayers for our church primary school. I used some of the suggested ones in the blog post and some others I sourced from around the web. This is the selection I’ve given them for first thing in the school day:

Good morning Lord
This is your day.
We are your children.
Show us your way. Amen.

God bless the sky that is above us
the earth that is beneath us
your image deep within us
the day that lies before us.
Amen.

Lord, teach us how to keep your day
And lead and bless us all the way. Amen.

For this new morning with its light,
For rest and shelter of the night,
For health and food, for love and friends.
For everything your goodness sends,
We thank You, dearest Lord.
Amen.

Jesus, gentle Shepherd,
Bless your lamb today;
Keep me in your footsteps,
Never let me stray.
Guard me through the daytime.
Every hour, I pray;
Keep my feet from straying
From the narrow way.
Amen.

(Sung)
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.
His mercies never come to an end.
They are new every morning,
New every morning.
Great is your faithfulness O Lord.
Great is your faithfulness.

I found a lovely but very amateur clip of the Calvary 1st Nigerian choir singing this – the singing is gorgeous but the video is rather out of focus so I suggest you look at something else in your internet browser whilst you listen.

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By Faith

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on 12 March, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Starting next Sunday for the rest of Lent (and a bit afterwards) the Vicar will be taking us through a few chapters of Hebrews in his sermons. So this, of course, will be our theme song to accompany the preaching. It’s also one we sang on my conference last week, so it’s sort of in my head anyway.

I’ll have to listen online next week as I’m in Junior Church for a second week. But I think we might try and sing along to this song in the Vicarage at teatime so those of us who’ll not be in the main body of the kirk during the sermon will have a little taste at what everyone else is up to.

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Vicarage Recipes: Easy Anzacs

Posted in Food, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on 9 March, 2012| 1 Comment »

Here’s my take on Anzac biscuits – a fast and fabulous recipe which produces a great mound of tasty coconut and oat treats. I can produce about 40 in a single batch and they are extremely popular with all ages. They are also egg-free, so good for vegans or Asian vegetarians.

Ingredients

  • 3oz/75g porridge oats
  • 3oz/75g desiccated coconut
  • 4oz/100g plain flour
  • 4oz/100g sugar
  • 40z/100g butter or marg (soft is fine)
  • 1tbspn golden syrup
  • 1tspn bicarbonate of soda, dissolved in 2 tbspn hot water

Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Meanwhile, melt the marg and golden syrup in a jug in the microwave, or a pan on the stove if you prefer. Add the bicarb to the hot water in a small cup or dish and then stir the fizzy mix into the warm marg/syrup combo. Then add the warm wet ingredients to the dry ones and stir in carefully.

For smallish Hobnob size biscuits use teaspoons of mixture – I can fit 16 on a standard baking sheet (covered with silicone lining), leaving room for spreading. Bake at about 180ºC (Gas Mark 4) for 8-12 minutes until the biscuits are golden all over and most have flattened out after rising. Transfer to a rack for cooling after they’ve had a few minutes to firm up.

The gallery below shows some slightly larger ones made using dessertspoonfuls of the mixture which gives you about 24 biscuits from a single batch.

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Devotion

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , on 8 March, 2012| 2 Comments »

Back from deepest Leicestershire and feeling rather spacey after three nights in a strange bed with unfamiliar pillows. But on my home computer so able to share the lovely song and video from Stuart Townend that we saw at the Ministers’ Wives conference. It’s not called ‘This is my Devotion’ as I thought it might be but ‘Christ be in My Waking’. Which is what I want, even when I’m feeling rather out of it after being away.

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Encouragement

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , on 7 March, 2012| 1 Comment »

I’ll have lots to blog next week when I get back from Hothorpe Hall where I’m on the Proclamation Trust’s Minister’s Wives conference. I’m being very well fed on a diet of Ezekiel, Luke, tales of minister’s wives from history, seafood pasta and cake.  I didn’t bring a laptop, so I’m using the steamdriven conference centre computer and I don’t want to spend too much time online. There are too many lovely people here to talk to and a wonderful bookstall and space to pray and think.

I was going to upload a great song video we watched yesterday but the Jurassic system isn’t letting me show it to you. So instead, I’m going to commend Open Doors to you and their campaign to get those who are able to write letters of encouragement to Christians around the world who are suffering for their faith. We are writing some this afternoon here at Hothorpe. It’s such an encouragement for us to be here that we want to share some of that with brothers and sisters in far more difficult situations.

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Easy Chopstix

Posted in Food, Fun, tagged , , , , , , on 6 March, 2012| 4 Comments »

At Christmas, my sister bought some great easy-use chopsticks for the kids. They are joined together at the top so are a good way for kids to learn to eat Chinese food in a fun way and not starve. It’s an excellent way to learn not to drop food on yourself. And you can always use a spoon at the end!

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Possible Solution for Musicianless Churches?

Posted in Church, Fun, tagged , , , , , , on 5 March, 2012| 1 Comment »

A friend recently linked to this excellent video on Facebook and suggested it might be the solution in small churches where musicians are thin on the ground. We’ve been blessed recently by musicians playing in our services and replacing the cds and midi files, but one (Rocky, our Ministry Trainee) is leaving in the summer, so we’re praying for reinforcements. If you know any musicians, or even some helpful robots, do please send them our way…

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