The Welland-Fosse Benefice: Prayers and Notices

 Sunday 19 April 2020:  Easter II

• Please remember in your prayers those who are sick: Gill Profit, Jeremy Bagshaw, Kay’s son and Janette Saunders (both with Coronavirus), Barry Broughton, Derek Barker and Sandie Scotney.
• In our wider prayers we remember the Deanery of Greater Northampton and its Rural Dean, Beverley Hollins.
• Why not join us via Zoom for Morning Prayer each day at 8.30am – or Compline on Mondays and Wednesdays at 7.30pm? Our prayers have never been more vital!  If you wish to join, download Zoom on your computer and obtain the Daily Prayer App on your mobile phone and email Simon Aley (sialey@aol.com) who will send you an invitation to the group.

SOUTH LUFFENHAM:

As you may know our Church makes regular donations to the Rutland Foodbank. I have been asked by a couple of people about continuing this even though the church building has had to close. I will be going to the Foodbank in Oakham next week.  If you would like to donate items or cash there will be a collection box just inside our gate (27, The Street) ALL DAY ON TUESDAY 21st APRIL or I can collect from your doorstep if you email me – sally@saltlane.com 

MEDITATION:

Doubting Thomas is symbolic of our age.  He was absent when the Risen Lord first visited the frightened disciples.  Yet inquisitiveness and companionship made him stick with those whose lives had been emboldened by the presence of the Risen Lord in the Upper room. What had gone through his mind during the intervening week?  Had all his friends gone mad?  Are they all a bunch of liars? Are they drunk? Why had he been left out?

Thomas, like many of us, needs evidence before he can believe. It catches up with him as the sermon for today illustrates. Christ, in his generosity, invites Thomas to touch his wounds. But that is not necessary for Thomas.  He is already convinced. “Blessed are those who have not seen me and yet believe”, says Jesus.  2000 years later and in the centre of a pandemic, we experience The Risen Lord. Our buildings are locked but the community of faith finds new ways to worship. God continues to break out in so many different guises. He reaches beyond the locked doors, the chosen few, the culturally defined; the doors of the infection wards and the edge of the grave are no barrier to his presence.   And The Risen Lord is in our hearts, questioning what the new reality might be after the lockdown – and our part in it.

See wellandfosse.org for much more information, including contact details for

The Very Rev Christopher Armstrong and the churchwardens

The Welland-Fosse Benefice: Prayers and Notices.