Weekly Email – 2nd Sunday before Advent (Remembrance)
Documents
Fr Michael writes,
As we approach the end of the Church’s year in November, the month of the Holy Souls, our biblical focus moves to the ‘end times’. Sunday’s short first reading from Daniel 12 is a crucial passage: here for the first time in the Bible, the Resurrection of the dead is proclaimed in Daniel’s prophecy:
At that time Michael, the great prince, the protector of your people, shall arise. There shall be a time of anguish, such as has never occurred since nations first came into existence. But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone who is found written in the book. Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever.
The Book of Daniel was written during a great persecution of the Jews a couple of centuries before Christ. It was then that the resurrection of those who remain true to the Lord was first revealed and understood. The earlier Israelites pictured the afterlife as a sort of powerless shadowy half-existence in a place called Sheol, where the dead could not even praise God. Yet there had been many hints of conviction that God would never desert those who love him: ‘I know that my Redeemer lives, and that from my flesh I will look upon God’, wrote Job. As the Old Testament unfolds, God is gradually revealed and understood as offering a relationship beyond that of a local deity with his people at a particular moment in time.
Having celebrated our Festival, including All Souls, with renewed enthusiasm this year, we continue to pray for the repose of the departed, especially on Sunday (Remembrance Sunday) for those who have died in war. Our monthly Requiem will also be celebrated tomorrow week, Saturday 20 November, so please let me have the names of any departed family or friends you’d like remembered at the altar at that Mass.
Tomorrow we offer our Walsingham Devotion, beginning with the Rosary at 11.30am, followed by Mass of Our Lady.
Weekday Mass from 15 to 19 November:
We look forward to adding an evening Mass to our daily offering of worship from 22 November. But in the coming week we have an exciting disruption to our routine: Netflix will be using the church for filming from Monday 15th to Friday 19th of November.
On those days Mass will be offered in the Oratory, providing me with a sense of déjà vu for the unlamented months of lockdown and a new experience for Fr Peter. The Mass will continue to be streamed and in-person attendance will also be possible, but access will be via the front door of number 7 Margaret St: it would help us if those attending in person did not arrive earlier than 1145 on those five days.
Fr Michael
Walsingham Devotion & Monthly Requiem
Tomorrow our monthly Walsingham Devotion, in the form of the Rosary with intercessions, will be offered at 1130 before the noon Mass.
A week tomorrow our monthly Requiem Mass will be celebrated: please let Fr Michael have names of those you’d like remembered at that Mass.
Links for Sunday
The link for the Propers for the 2nd Sunday before Advent is at the end of this email.
And click here for the YouTube live stream.
Evensong and Benediction is at 6pm on Sunday. The music includes Philip Moore Third service, Bairstow Save us, O Lord, Böely O salutaris, and Duruflé Tantum ergo. This service is not live streamed.
Flowers
Prayer list
Prisoners and captives
Nazanin Zhagari-Ratcliffe, Ismaeil Maghrebinejad, Nasrin Sotoudeh
Maira Shabhaz
Rohingya Christians in Pakistan, Karen Christians in Burma, and Tigrayan Christians in Ethiopia
The sick
David Fettke, Vallery Tchukov, Sara Vice, Katherine Lee, Lorna Smith, Beth Klausing, Hilary Porter, Bruce Ross-Smith, Benjamin Woolf, James Shrimpton, Tony Rodger, Fr Michael Gudgeon, Chris and Carole Radley, Fr Harry Hodgetts, Rosemary Orr, Martin Berka, Joan Anna SLG, Sheila Wood, Jennifer Spreckley, Sue Yesnick, Elizabeth Lyon, Rosina Sargon Eskrya, Malcolm Brown, Geoff Vardy, Fr John O’Brien, Max Fernandes, Craig Williams, Ross Dixon, Bernard Holmes, Elaine Bishop, Kathleen McMorran, Sabria Systermans, Peter Hoyle, Bishop Andrew St John, Emily Borland, Hazel Duckett, Fr Bob Nind, Jack de Gruiter, Frank Field, Fr Andrew
Those known to us recently departed
Richard Wheeler Pr, Derek Rodgers, Bob Brice
Anniversaries of death
14th – Sidney Dines, Annie Searles, George Scott, Ethel Rawll, Sam Thorpe, Graham Hawke, Rachel Clayton
15th – Genge Frank Genge Pr, Herbert Brackley, Janette Brierly, Cecil Everton
16th – William Foster, Alfred Stephens
17th – Elizabeth Church, Jonathan Walker
18th – Nadine Olivey, Norman Caplin
19th – Clifford Doyle Pr, Joan Roberts, Donald Page
20th – Florence Searle, Helen Clayton, Douglas Cudmore, Gwendoline Minnett
Supporting All Saints
Parish Giving Scheme
You can set up a regular donation to All Saints here.
We use the Parish Giving Scheme, which allows contributions to be anonymous and deals with Gift Aid, saving our office a lot of time. You can read about how the scheme works here.
Donations for general church purposes
To give by BACS please use the following details, advising the Administrator to collect Gift Aid:
PCC All Saints (Charity no. 1132895)
Sort Code 60-09-15
A/C 04559452
Parish Legacy Policy
We are always delighted to hear from anyone who wants to support us with a donation. Our PCC Legacy Policy encourages people to leave bequests specifically to one of our two related charities to be used for purposes of lasting value (rather than day to day costs):
All Saints Choir & Music Trust (Charity # 802994)
or The All Saints Foundation (Charity # 273390).