Weekly Email – Remembrance Sunday
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Dear friends,
I want to say a huge thank you to everyone who has contributed in any way both to the launch of our Music Fundraising Campaign and to the keeping of our feast of title over the past week.
It would not be an understatement to say that we have been inundated with donations and gifts to our Music Trust Fund over the past week since the launch of our campaign.
I am very pleased to be able to reveal the extraordinary news that we have managed to raise a total of £37,337 in one week!
This is an outstanding achievement and is testimony to how much people love and appreciate our parish’s musical tradition. I am so grateful to everyone who has responded so generously and freely to our appeal for funds – and especially to those who have made very considerable donations indeed.
The choir concert which launched our campaign last Saturday was an enormous success. I have heard from dozens of people saying how much they enjoyed the event and how touched they were by our Choir and Music Department giving of their time freely to help raise funds. The whole evening raised £4,000, which is a very great triumph.
This initial strong response surely augurs well for the rest of the campaign, and I give thanks to God for such an encouraging first week of the campaign.
Our keeping of All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day has been a very moving experience. Huge thanks go to our servers, our choir, and to those who organise hospitality and welcome, along with those who staff our bar. Without you, these feast days wouldn’t have been the great celebration which they were, and we could not have welcomed so many visitors.
As we look ahead, this Sunday sees a slight difference in our usual pattern of worship over Remembrance Sunday. This year the High Mass will be a full Mass of Requiem, sung to the setting by Fauré. This liturgy will include an Act of Remembrance.
Please make sure you arrive for the High Mass ten minutes earlier than usual as the liturgy will begin at 10.55. This is so we are ready to keep the Two Minutes’ Silence at 11.00 am.
I hope this addition will be an enrichment to our annual liturgical cycle and to this season of remembrance and thanksgiving in which we find ourselves at the beginning of each November, pondering and celebrating those who have gone before us.
With my best wishes, thanks for a wonderful All Saintstide, and my deep gratitude for a terrific start to our Music campaign,
Fr Peter
Make a Donation to the Choir and Music Trust Fund
You can make a donation to our Choir and Music Trust Fund here. There will be no All Saints’ Festival Appeal this year. In its place, all parishioners and friends are being invited to make a special gift to our Music Trust to launch our year-long fundraising appeal.
You can watch the High Mass for All Saints’ Day here.
Join the Music Patrons of All Saints’
The Music Patrons of All Saints’ is a newly founded group of people committed to giving regularly to support the Choir and Music and Trust Fund of All Saints’ Margaret Street.
The idea revolves around giving £10 or more a month. Our Music Patrons will receive the Parish Paper twice a year and a special drinks party will be organised year year around the All Saints’ Festival in the Vicarage to thank them for their generosity.
In order to join the Music Patron of All Saints’, simply set up a regular gift of at least £10 a month via this link.
If you are an American tax payer, you can sign up by making a regular gift of at least $15 a month via our Chapel and York account here.
If you are a UK tax payer, please make sure to tick the box that allows us to reclaim Gift Aid.
You can watch Evensong and Benediction for All Saints’ Day with Te Deum offered in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament here.
Zoom Theology: The Book of Revelation
Our next Zoom theology seminar takes place on 7pm, Tuesday 18th November, 2025, and is focussed on the theology of the Book of the Apocalypse.
Professor Ian Boxall will be leading this session. He is Senior Fellow in New Testament and Professor of Biblical Studies at the Aquinas Institute of Theology in St Louis, Missouri. He has taught previously at the Catholic University of America, and the University of Oxford, from which he received his Doctorate in the Book of Revelation.
He has since published further on the topic, and is considered one of the world’s leading authorities on this complex and enigmatic book of Scripture. Professor Boxall will introduce us to the history and interpretation of Revelation and its place in the canon.
It would be especially useful to have re-read the text itself in preparation for the evening. A number of Professor Boxall’s books are available affordably.
You can see more details about our full Zoom Theology Programme along with the Zoom link here.
Our choir in rehearsal just before last Saturday’s fundraising concert.
Christmas Organ Concert
The next event in our fundraising programme will be a Christmas Carol Organ Concert offered by our Associate Director of Music, Jeremiah Stephenson, on Friday 19th December 2025 at 7.00 pm.
It will be a wonderful evening of organ music for the festive season. The programme will include: Dupré, Variations sur un vieux Noël; plus improvisation on a series of well known and loved Christmas carols.
We are so grateful to Jeremiah for offering this wonderful concert in aid of our campaign.
You can watch the High Mass for All Saints’ Day, at which the Archdeacon of London preached here.
Month of Holy Souls
There will be a weekly Mass of Requiem during the month of November: Saturday 15th at 12noon; Wednesday 19th at 6.30pm and Wednesday 26th at 12noon. If you would like the names of departed loved ones prayed for and named at any of these Masses, please be in touch with the Parish Office.
Immaculate Conception of the BVM
There will be a Low Mass with short homily and hymns at 6.30pm, followed by refreshments at Fr Alan’s, to celebrate this solemnity. All welcome!
Winter homeless shelter
We are looking for volunteers for our parish winter homeless shelter project.
The pattern involves taking the lead in feeding and offering hospitality to some of the homeless of this city at the night shelter hosted at the American Church on the Tottenham Court Road.
We have undertaken to run the shelter on the following nights: Wednesday 26th November 2025; Wednesday 7th January 2026; Wednesday 4th February 2026; and Wednesday 18th March 2026.
If you would like to volunteer, please be in touch with Fr Alan (assistant.priest@asms.uk) and put these dates in your diary.
We are grateful for the wonderful fundraising concert given by our choir last Saturday.
Attendance last Sunday
For your prayers
The Friends of All Saints, Margaret Street
9th – Mark Allan, Martin Amherst-Lock, Robert Austen, Richard Ayling, James Babington Smith, Ruth Baker
10th – Stephen Baldwin, Stephen Barber, Nigel Beanland, Jonathan Beck, William Benefield, William Bonnell, Charlotte Black, John Blackburn
11th – John Bristow, Paul Brough, Michael Brown, David Blunden, Fr Michael Bowie, Graham Burns
12th – Derek Bussey, Katherine Butler, Maureen Cambrey, David Caplowe, David Cardona, Adrian Carlton-Oatley, Timothy Cassady, Norman & Zulette Catir, Kate Charles, Stuart Chillingworth, Robert Chote, Sandy Christian
13th – Roger Clark, Catharine Clarke, David &Mavis Cleggett, Graham Colville
14th – Karolyn Cooper, William Cooper Bailey, Peter Coulson, Steven Cox, Yvonne Craig, Julie Cridland
15th – Ryan Danker, Kirill Dashkovskiy, Keith Day, Christopher Davies, Peter Dennis, Laura Denton, Joshua Dolphin.
The sick
Jean Castledine, Simon Cottee, David Craig, Fr Harry Hodgetts, Vivienne Nally, Daniel Oliver, Fr Peter Roberts, James Rodger, Carol Simmons, Ingrid Slaughter, Juliet Windham
Anniversaries of death
10th – John Groves, Alan Bishton
11th – Paul Leyland, Violet Vanbrugh, Malcolm McHaffie Pr, Dorothy Cavan
12th – John Mayo Pr, Miss CFR Keeble
13th – Arthur Hutchings
14th – Sidney Dines, Annie Searles, George Scott, Ethel Rawll, Sam Thorpe, Graham Hawke, Rachel Clayton
15th – Frank Genge Pr, Herbert Brackley, Janette Brierly, Cecil Everton
Services this week
Saturday 8 November – Our Lady on Saturday
12pm Low Mass
6.00 pm Confessions
6.30 pm Vigil Mass of Sunday
Sunday 9 November – REMEMBRANCE SUNDAY
8.30 am Low Mass
10.55 am High Mass of Requiem with Act of Remembrance
5.15 pm Low Mass
6.00 pm Solemn Evensong and Benediction
Monday 10 November – St Leo the Great
12 noon Low Mass
6.30 pm High Mass of Requiem
Tuesday 11 November – St Martin of Tours
12 noon Low Mass
6.30 pm Low Mass
Wednesday 12 November – St Josaphat
12 noon Low Mass
5.30 Holy Hour
6.30 pm Low Mass
Thursday 13 November – Feria
12 noon Low Mass
6.30 pm Low Mass
Friday 14 November – Feria
12 noon Low Mass
6.30 pm Low Mass
Saturday 15 November – Feria
12pm Low Mass
6.00 pm Confessions
6.30 pm Vigil Mass of Sunday
Sunday 16 November – II Before Advent
8.30 am Low Mass
11 am High Mass
5.15 pm Low Mass
6.00 pm Solemn Evensong and Benediction