Fr Yenda's report for the APCCM 2006

Parish Priest’s Report to the APCCM

Sunday April 23^rd 2006.

It is again a very great joy and privilege for me to address the members of our PCC and of our Parish in my annual report.

This is now the second report I have made since coming here, being in the 2^nd year of my ministry in this parish.

Funnily enough, a local vicar said to me when I came that in your first year you can do no wrong, in your second year you can do no right and from then on it is fairly evenly balanced!

Well, let’s just say that according to that I haven’t even reached the end of year one yet!

In my first year I was overwhelmed by the very positive response that I had encountered to everything I have tried to introduce and tried to encourage – both liturgically and socially.

This year St Mary’s Sundon has continued to go from strength to strength, and we are seeing enrichment and new life in many areas.

Last year I was over the moon with the attendances at Holy Week and Easter, and this year has been no different…numbers attending church during Holy Week have increased steadily yet again, and the attendances on Palm Sunday and especially Easter day were phenomenally good!

When we have festivals – and yes, I do realise that we have a lot of festivals now – people are always enthusiastic to set about cleaning, decorating the church, providing food, drink, and so on.  Attendances at festivals are also steadily increasing, but there are always pews ready and warmed for one to two extra faces!

I have wanted to instil a sense of stability in what happens here – that is why the service remains unaltered day in, day out, year in, year out…and by now most of us will know the order of service so well that the book is almost unnecessary.  This provides us with a familiarity and comfort in our worship which I have always felt is both valuable and very precious.

In worship we must never lose sight of the fact that we are making our offering to God – and that is partly why the order of worship is undertaken in the style that it is.

In any church there are two important factors as to whether things work or whether they don’t.  One is naturally the style of worship and how it is conducted and embraced by those present, and also the atmosphere amongst the people both during the service and afterwards.

In both factors St Mary’s Sundon scores highly.  The silence and prayerful attention during the Canon of the Mass is very precious and contributes so powerfully to the act of worship that we are offering to God.

The atmosphere amongst people continues in a positive way after worship has ended and people chat, drink coffee or even just say their ‘cheerio’s!

That is not down to me, that is down to the people here, and it has to be both recognised and congratulated.  The number of people who come here to visit and say how friendly the congregation are and how comfortable and at ease they make them feel is both impressive and encouraging, and make no mistake, it is not the case in all churches by any stretch of the imagination!

St Mary’s now has an almost unique place amongst the local churches.  Firstly our style of worship is different to all the other local churches – and this is actually a strength because as time goes on I am convinced that this will encourage more and more people will make an effort to come and worship here.

But also we are unique in that it remains a church that people of different integrities can come to and worship in knowing that their particular viewpoints and their particular theological and sociological preferences are respected, even if I, for example, don’t embrace them myself.

We have had a number of different preachers during the course of the last year, Frs Daniel Humphreys, Mark Williams, Michael Samson, Paul Hughes, Stephen Purvis, Scott Martin, John Gribben CR, Beresford Skelton, Tom Barron, Wealands Bell, Colin Gay, Reginald Rolph and Graham Rowlands.  (I hope I haven’t missed anyone out!)

In just one year, we have been very lucky enough to amass 13 preachers – this will rise to 14 tomorrow when Fr Mark Williams comes here again! All these preachers actually have a very wide spectrum of theological understanding and opinion – and this does further illustrate that we seem to manage a kind of ‘Via Media’ where everyone can live and worship knowing that they are both respected and embraced, whatever their opinion on what happens in the wider church.

We are fortunate here at St Mary’s that we run very much as a parish church – which of course we are – but in a very real way, in that people of the parish look to us for so many of their occasional offices.  I am privileged to conduct a number of funerals, both here in church and at the Crematorium – and that never fails to remain a very great privilege for me.

We also have a number of children brought to St Mary’s for baptism and again that is also a very great joy and privilege.

We also have the great joy of many weddings too.  It is quite wonderful that so many couples choose to come to us for that most happy and wonderful day in their lives.

It has, so far, been my policy not to remarry people who have been divorced.  I have always maintained that this is a largely practical idea…after all, if I were to be approached by a couple, one of whom had the ink on their decree absolute still wet, and it turned out after the wedding that one of them had, for example, left a perfectly good marriage for a new partner, the repercussions could be quite embarrassing.

There is, however, a very strong part of me that is strongly in sympathy with people who wish to remarry in church after divorce, and at times it does pose me a certain feeling of meanness when I do refuse them.

However, I am aware that if I were to re-marry divorcees, once I had done it, it would be more and more difficult to decide when to refuse.  Whilst I still maintain the practice of not re-marrying divorcees, I am able to avoid any difficult situations which might arise as a result.  I do, however, permit people to be re-married in church here if I feel that they have a good case, but at the moment, I would ask another priest to perform the ceremony.

As I did last year, I have to warmly salute and pay tribute to several people who have worked so very hard alongside me this past year.  Both my Church wardens are simply exemplary.  They both tackle the aspects of their wardens’ jobs well above and beyond the call of duty, and entirely complement each other in all that they do.

They both devote enormous time and effort to so many aspects of their roles that my daily and weekly tasks are enormously eased by all that they do.  Make no mistake that without so much of the tedious and tiresome and time consuming jobs that they turn their hands to, I would be far less able to get around the parish as I do.  In this, not only do I owe great thanks to George Bath and Lenore Harris, but in fact so do the entire congregation and wider parish.

Their support to me extends well beyond the call of mere duty, and I have yet to seek their advice, support or even friendship in vain.  Not many parish priests can say that about their church wardens!!

And serious conscientious effort does not stop with the church wardens.  All those people who have jobs take them seriously and do them both enthusiastically and very well indeed.  Jayne never fails to amaze me with the speed that both minutes and important letters appear, and Christine has worked well over and above anything I could have asked of her again this year with the accounts.

Then there are those people who work hard for the Friends – working to keep the money rolling in and the events going on to maintain our wonderful building.  Again really too many people to mention – not least of all because I would be terrified of missing someone out!

Also as I did last year, I must pay enormous thanks and indeed admiration to Joan Clark who at the tender age of 86 still sits on the organ stool and not only remains cheerful, but actually plays the instrument incredibly well too – this was mentioned by Fr Humphreys when he came here during March!  Joan’s efforts and cheerful enthusiasm add so much to our worship here, and we must never underestimate the effort she puts in, or indeed how valuable her work is to us.

Also of enormous importance is the keeping of the grounds of the churchyard.  Brian seems to be up here pretty much every day – and his hard work pays dividends.   Not a week goes by without someone tells me how wonderful the churchyard looks!  We must always realise that this serves as a preface to the beauty of the church that people find once they walk inside.

Sundon, is, all in all, an extremely good parish to work in as a Parish Priest.  We do have challenges, as does everywhere – we still don’t manage to meet the quota payment in full – but there is strong progress in the right direction.  We have a magnificently beautiful church building, which is loved both by our congregation and by the wider community also.  At times it is costly to maintain – but it is worth every penny, because a church which is dearly loved by its people, is a church which can so clearly illustrates its love of God to all those around.  We must never lose sight of the fact that we are the current custodians of this wonderful church, and as subsequent generations have loved and cared for it so that we might have it now, we too must love and care for it, for those who come after us.

So, again, well done everyone, keep up the good work, keep encouraging new people to join us, and most of all, keep enjoying everything that happens in our parish!

Thank you!