Fr. Yenda's Monthly Letters 2009

January 2009

My dear people of St Mary’s

Well another New Year! I do of course want to begin by wishing all our good folk, both of our congregation and our wider parish, a very happy new year. I hope 2009 will be a good year for all of us.

A new year gives us a lot of hope and optimism; and many of us will have an idea of our New Year resolutions, and hopefully some of them might actually last into the first week of 2009! Even if we are not successful in keeping our resolutions, our intentions to do so will probably have been good, and that of course is a good thing in itself!

Now that we are in January, we sees that wonderful feast of the Epiphany, which is one of the fullest liturgical days in the church calendar.

The Epiphany ceremonies involve the proclamation of the date of Easter; as Easter moves its date every year, so to do many other dates of the year move in accordance with it too, such as Whitsunday, Trinity Sunday and Corpus Christi to name but three. The announcement in church of the moveable feasts helps us to plan our year from the very start.

Secondly there is the Blessing of Chalk, and after the service people take some pieces of chalk home and mark their door posts with the names or letters of the Three Kings and the date of the year. Although this is a custom we see largely on the continent, it is in fact a good way of us witnessing to those around us that our homes are lived in by Christian people.

I always think it is wonderful to start the year with the Epiphany on the first Sunday of the year as there is so much in this feast which is wonderful, not least of all with the richness of the gifts which the Three Kings brought with them. Gold, frankincense and myrrh, all of which were, and still are, valuable and precious gifts. In our church we of course make use of the gift of incense every Sunday, and this enhances and beautifies our worship. It also enhances our experience of worship, as we use our sense smell in our worship as well as our other senses.

Epiphany reminds us not only of the gifts the Three Kings brought to the infant Christ-child, but actually of all God’s many gifts to us; gifts that He has asked us to share with those around us.

Each and everyone of us has precious gifts that God has given us, and which we can use to His glory, and the witness to His church here on earth. Epiphany reminds us of all of God’s gifts, and as we start this New Year, let us give thanks for all of those gifts, and look forward to using them in the coming year.

As always it remains my enormous joy and tremendous privilege to serve as your Parish Priest

With all good wishes
Fr Yenda

February 2009

My dear people of S Mary’s.

As I write I have not long returned from a very pleasant week in the north-east. It was wonderful to be back and see old friends and places, and of course explore some places I had never seen before.

Among my trips I went to the most northern town in England, Berwick Upon Tweed, which was delightful, although for some reason rather cold! I also managed to get across to Lindisfarne (Holy Island as it is also called) and it was there that I managed to spend a few moments in what is perhaps the quietest church I have ever been in.

Yet amongst some people I met, there was a note of sadness, as there are a conglomeration of churches in one area where 3 of the 4 churches are marked for closure! One of them is a particularly beautiful and indeed magnificent church, and actually well loved by its people, even if not its current clergy.

What is really worrying though, is that in those communities, once the churches are closed, there will be no church presence there at all. Once the churches are closed, the Christian witness in those places will, sadly, diminish in several ways.

Firstly there will be no parish church in those communities for people to look to; very often for a variety of reasons, people will simply cease to attend church once the church they have always gone to is closed – not always through their own fault, after all how many people who don’t drive can get along to a church at the other side of their town? And how many people want to hop on a church mini bus at 9 am which goes round three estates to go for a service at 10:30am?!

Where of course, do people then go for their funerals? If the churches in those communities are closed, what happens for those occasional offices, weddings, funerals etc? The practical repercussions of church closures are immense.

All these reasons make closures of churches sad, but what is really dreadful (in my humble opinion at least) is that when a church closes (and more so when it is several churches closing) it sends out a message of failure. It sends out a signal that the church in that place has failed.

We all know that nowadays the church has its financial problems – we know that only too well. We know that we have to work harder now than perhaps ever before to raise money to keep our heads above water. Many churches have to share their vicar with a neighbouring parish – again this isn’t ideal but in many places it does work fairly well, although the vicar might of course prefer to have just one church!

When a church closes, the repercussions in a community are enormous, because we all know that even for people who don’t attend church regularly, the church is an important part of any community. When a community is without a church, that community is weakened by its absence. The church building is always a symbol of the witness of the Christian community in that place. It is the building which is consecrated and sanctified for the purpose of divine worship. It stands in its community as a building aside from the pub, the post office, the greengrocer’s and the betting shop, as it is there for an entirely different purpose! It is a building which speaks to those around it as a living witness to the love of God in a particular community.

Hearing about the closure of 3 churches in one go, had got me thinking. How does this kind of failure come about? How can the closure of 3 churches come about against the wishes of their communities?
Such sadness's actually serve as a warning to every church in the land. It makes us realise how much we need the people who work hard in our churches; and it also shows us how very important it is to place a great importance on the growth of our congregations. Growth doesn’t happen over night. It takes years and often generations to encourage new faces in church congregations. That is a challenge that God puts before us, and a challenge that we are privileged to rise to.

In our community, our church is loved by our local people in a very real and tangible way – I know that from people I speak to around the community and also at weddings, funerals and baptisms. We are very blessed to have a church which is so loved, and I am always so touched by those who work so hard to keep the church looking so beautiful.

In the life of our church, we all pass through it for a very short time, and it is our privilege to love and care for our church at this juncture in its long life. Those who worked to build the churches in our land have an expectation that those who follow them will care for them as if they had themselves built them.

I never cease to be overawed by the tremendous privilege it is to care for a medieval church of such beauty as we have here, and I never cease to be impressed by the way our people love and care for S. Mary’s.

In February we remember that Our Lord was himself presented by his parents in the Temple, and as they presented Him there, in that place, at that time, we too continue to be present for the gift of His Holy Sacraments, day by day, week by week.

As always it is my tremendous joy and immense privilege to serve as your parish priest,

With all good wishes
Fr Yenda

March 2009

My dear people of S Mary's,

Well, Lent is upon us, and we have by now decided, I expect, what we are going to give up this year, or take on! Each year it s a good opportunity to diet, or perhaps give time to those things we want to do all year and never get round to.

I am also aware that we are already in March, and the weather this year has been the most severe at the start of the year that we have known for quite some time. Schools have been closed for almost a week in some cases, and the country on one or two occasions last month ground almost to a standstill.

Back in the 1980s of course when I was at school, on days when there was deep snow we still went in - all stood in the hall- and waited for the teachers to arrive as and when they did! Of course we all hoped that the teachers we didn't particularly like would decide to stay home that day, but of course, they were often the first ones in!

I remember a few years back when I made a short visit to Poland they had far worse snow than we had last month, and nothing seemed to be affected. The traffic managed ok, the buses ran ok, even elderly ladies seemed to continue their visits both to church and to the local shops. I suppose if you get used to something, you learn to live with it. For us it is of course something rather unusual, and we are never really sure how we are meant to cope with it.

March of course we hope will be a bit more clement, and we can look forward to some warm weather in a month or two (we hope)!

Yet for all the drama over the weather, we have far greater national concerns at the moment than that - the so called' credit crunch' which I have recently heard is due to go on for at least a year. Politicians talk about that almost as if it is a run of the mill thing... 'it might rain, I think I'll have Wheatabix for breakfast, oh and by the way, the recession will probably go on till next year...'. But for those people who are directly affected by it - which is most of us by rising prices, and others more drastically as their jobs slip from under them, a few weeks or months of recession is bad enough, but a year?!

When we hear about national institutions like Woolworths closing, and people in a car plant loosing several hundred jobs, we can't ignore the gravity of the situation. If we look back to the 1980s (you
will realise my tact at not mentioning who was in power at the time!) we see that we are heading back towards those terrible days. Unemployment might at the moment be only half what it was then, but that has to be a shame and not a political badge of honour.

For those people who are directly affected by the current situation, what they need is to be given hope that things will improve in the near future not the distant future. In this part of the country the house prices are so farcical that actually any modicum of change in interest rates can mean the difference between paying the mortgage or facing repossession. This is further exacerbated by the scandalous lack of council and social housing - people are now having to buy when they really can't afford it, when before the 1980s they would have had a greater opportunity to rent council properties.

If I were to ignore this in my letters, I would in fact be shirking part of my role as the parish priest. The parish priest is here of course to administer the sacraments of the church, conduct divine worship,- conduct occasional offices - and all these are tremendous privileges. Yet he is also here to care for people, and part of that caring is to be concerned for the well being of the people of the parish. When we face a recession like this, we actually feel pretty powerless to do anything, and the parish priest should, in my view at least, be seriously concerned about this kind of situation - regardless of how powerless he actually feels from a practical point of view .

But actually we aren't entirely powerless - we can actually pray about it. We can offer up to God our intercessions for those people affected by the current climate, asking for God's help and strength to them and their families - and for those of us who have so far managed to survive the recession, let us pray that we continue to do so, because none of us know who will be the next one affected; and that is not only a very uncomfortable and worrying situation to be in, it is, in fact, a position that none of us should be in.

.. Sorry to rant! But sometimes even the priest finds that things get under his skin!

As always it remains my very great joy and privilege to serve as your parish priest.

With all good wishes
Fr Yenda

April 2009

My dear people of S Mary’s

I always remember my Gran remarking about Good Friday in the Welsh valleys when she was a girl, and all her friends round and about used to have hot cross buns pretty much all through Holy Week, and they were not allowed any until Good Friday itself. Given that her father was a lay reader, not only did they have to sit very still and quiet in church from the time they were knee-high to a doll’s house, they also had something of a keen understanding of what Good Friday actually meant.

Naturally a big family, with not much money coming in meant that such luxuries as tea-cakes could not be a regular thing anyway, but for all their protesting they never had their hot cross buns until the day itself.

It is interesting of course how early the chocolate Easter eggs come out now! I am pretty sure, although I could be wrong, that there were even some in Woolworths before it met its very sad demise. The eggs have even been on reduction from day one! Easter egg shopping was always a fun thing…I would buy about one or two (to see me through Easter afternoon) and then come Easter week, I would traipse down to the shops and buy up several going half price. That no longer seems to happen…they sell them at reduced prices before Easter even happens – sometimes I wonder if the ‘sell by’ date is actually still valid at Easter, so keen are they to sell them!

But of course, if we take our minds off our stomachs for a moment, we have that wonderful week in Church to think about Our Lord’s suffering and death. Holy Week is pretty much the busiest week in the Church calendar – although never as demanding as it was when I was a student. Being at a college run by a community of monks, half of whom were away doing mission work during Holy Week, and the skeleton crew left were looking after the sick and aged monks, it fell to the students to sing all the offices that the monks would usually sing. Then the Holy Saturday vigil would start on Easter Sunday at well before the crack of dawn, before it was light…if the clocks went forward then you had to start – theoretically at least – even earlier!

The Holy Week services are of course the most powerful in the calendar too – that is why for Monday through to Wednesday the Eucharist is offered twice each day, to make it easier for people to get to church. On Maundy Thursday we have the watch at the Altar of Repose until midnight, and of course on Good Friday we have the full solemn liturgy which speaks to us so clearly about Our Lord’s suffering and death.

On Holy Saturday we have the Easter Vigil (which for practical reasons is at 8pm, rather than 5pm the next morning!) and is when the church is a blaze of glory with both flowers and candles, and the new fire is blessed, the Easter candle is lit, the font is blessed, and we have one of the greatest services of celebration through the entire year.

I always encourage people to come to church for as much of Holy Week and especially the Triduum as they can; it all fits together as a unit, and the more of it anyone is present for, actually the more sense it all makes.

Holy Week leads us to the glory of Easter. Without the Crucifixion, there would be no Resurrection. Without that suffering, there would be no joy at the end of it. Just as my Gran used to have to wait until Good Friday for her hot cross buns, so we too have to wait until Easter for the joy of the Resurrection to come.

I wish you all a good Holy Week, and a glorious, joyous Easter to follow.

As always it remains my tremendous joy and immense privilege to serve as your parish priest,

With all good wishes
Fr Yenda

May 2009

My dear people of S. Mary’s.

May is traditionally that time of year when we think about getting ready for the warm weather – ‘cast not a clout ‘till may is out’ as my Gran used to say – in other words, no matter how warm it might be in may, it could still turn cold, so leave your vest on until the start of June!

If we look back a few years, yes, in May we started to get the nice weather, and by June it was very warm, and by July when we had to sit our school exams (now you realise how far back I am talking!) it was positively sweltering.  Now of course, the seasons are more muddled – we have nice days in April, as well as miserable ones, we even have a mixture of hot and cold weather in March.  Yet I always seem to find that the really nice spells tend now to be around September/October rather than July/August – that said we don’t know this year, having had such a harsh winter, we might get a hot summer…we will have to see.

May is also traditionally the month when we think about S Mary – mother of our Lord and patron of our parish.  I am always aware that there are so many parishes with this dedication, and very often more than one even in one town – for example the parish in the centre of Luton is also S Mary’s as well as us here on the outskirts.  Go a little further up the road and we find S Mary’s also at Harlington, and in the other direction also at Hitchin, to name just a couple. 

It is interesting really that we think of S Mary at this time of year – we have just come through Holy Week and Easter, and there aren’t really any specific ‘Marian’ feasts in this month.  Perhaps this is a good time to think of Her because in a sense we have seen her ‘come into her own’ as we might say during the Easter Season.

As Our Lord suffered on the Cross on Good Friday, she was there; she did not shirk her responsibilities.  At the most darkest time in her son’s life, she showed courage and stood at the foot of the Cross – interestingly enough, someone said to me recently that they would have thought any mother would do the same. Actually quite a poignant comment I remember thinking.

I am always very aware actually of the courage that S Mary showed throughout her life.  When the angel appeared to her at the Annunciation and asked her to be the mother of God’s son, she could quite easily have refused – she could easily have taken an easy option and excused herself from that tremendous commitment; yet she didn’t, she embraced what God had in store for her, and throughout the rest of her life, she was both a devoted mother to Our Lord, and a devoted servant of God.

S Mary however seems to be a very controversial subject in a lot of Christianity, and I always think that during May we have the opportunity to try and redress the balance. 

There has always been a kind of misnomer that Roman catholics (and Anglican catholics for that matter) ‘worship the Virgin Mary’, but that of course is a nonsense.  If we watch those very informative and well produced films such as the Magdalene Sisters, (which I personally consider amongst the best films ever made), we see a view of S Mary where she is used almost as just another stick to beat the already down-trodden inmates of those horrendous Magdalene laundries.  Yet if we think about S Mary herself, we see just how much she really means to all Christian people, and just how much she has done for the Church of today through the love and devotion she gave to her Son – because she shows us that ultimate example of unconditional love.

During this month of May, when we look forward to the summer and with any luck the removal of our vests and the buying of our sun-cream and sun-glasses, we can think about that very special relationship between Our Lord and His mother, and actually how that relationship nourishes the church to this day, and of course beyond.

As always it remains my very great joy and privilege to serve as your parish priest,

With all good wishes
Fr Yenda

July 2009

My dear people of S. Mary’s

I recently had the pleasure of a few days in the north of Portugal – I say a few days, but it was in fact a major skive – I was away for ten days – so I am very grateful to the local retired clergy who covered Sundays and weekdays for me.  If it weren’t for the help of retired clergy very often those of us employed full time as clergy would have a much more difficult time to find cover!

When I was there I was enjoying both sunshine and rain – managed to get a touch of sunburn and also get totally drenched (on different days of course) but that is all part of holidaying outside the school holidays before the prices go up!

Porto in the north of Portugal is one of Europe’s great cities – beautiful architecture, wonderful towns and cities near by and most important of all, the Portuguese are amongst the friendliest people I have known in all the places I have visited abroad.  ‘Manners maketh man’ as my English teacher at school always reminded us, is something the Portuguese seem to have mastered along with good old fashioned helpfulness and so forth.

These are, of course, integral to the British character also – which is why when I was watching the BBC world service from my hotel room I was astounded to learn that in a couple of parts of the country the British National Party had not only attained votes, but had actually won seats in the European parliament – I simply imagined, at first, that I had heard wrong, but sadly no, it was true. 

Each year when I have the privilege of standing at the war memorial with those who lay wreaths in November, I am always aware that in the last war in particular good men and women from our own and other countries fought against the racism which was being perpetrated in Nazi Germany at that time.  To think that a political party which subscribes to the spirit of such a party if not the letter also, is not only deeply concerning, it is, in fact, deeply shaming.

That is why I wanted to write about that this month.  Because very often people look at the Scottish Nationalists and the Welsh Nationalists, and for some reason assume that the British National Party are simply the English equivalent.  This however is not the case.  The rise of fascist groups in other parts of Europe in recent decades must make us surely aware of the dangers of this kind of extremism.  At a time when many of us are feeling the pinch financially in this recession, as well as having seen a number of MPs use our heard earned taxes for their luxuries such as dry rot in houses hundreds of miles away from their constituencies, people have a right to be  both worried and peeved!  Yet in voting for parties such as the BNP no one is helping anyone – a society which has people aiming to divide it will always weaken and collapse. 

The great joy of Luton – well one of the great joys – is the diversity of its people.  People here jolly along generally very well, accepting each other’s differences, and often helping each other across the social and racial lines; and that is what a modern civilised society does.  People who support political parties which aim to divide communities under the guise of sticking up for their particular group very quickly find that they aren’t always going to be top dog, and what happens when they are themselves victimised? 

Extremes of politics are always dangerous.  At the moment we have only to look at the current situation in Iran to see that.  At the time of writing (and things might have improved by the time this magazine is in circulation) we see that president Ahmadinajad has claimed a victory which is not only strongly contested by many in Iran, but which also will do nothing for those who actually find themselves persecuted under the current state. 

Some months back I was chatting to an Iranian woman at a function and she was telling me that before the Revolution in Iran there were several flights between Tehran and London each day – since then there have been but a couple a week, and of course the ordinary man in the street will have suffered.  In Iran it is considered that a woman simply wearing make-up has a right to be beaten in the street, and people who fall short of the extremes of the system can expect stoning or death by slow hanging from a crane.  Should we not, despite it being a different country far away, be shocked and scandalised that there is anywhere in the world where this kind of thing is considered acceptable?!

If we look at the extremes of politics such as the BNP and what it stands for, and the extremes of the present government in Iran, and its determination to remain in power regardless of whether or not it has genuinely been voted for, we can see some unpleasant similarities.  Because both do their best for a small fraction of people who support them, and who are able to subscribe completely to their dictates; yet what of those who don’t fit in?  What of those who cannot live according to those dictates, or who are by birth unable to fit into those groups?  Should they simply have a raw deal through an accident of birth?  Shouldn’t we all have the same chances and expect the same respect and consideration from others regardless of where we have come from? 

I do urge all our readers to pray for the people of Iran at this time, and also for the people of our own country as more and more people become disillusioned with politics – and to avoid the temptation to support extremists who we at first think will support us and do everything for us, because, at the end of the day, we may very soon find out that they don’t!

As always it remains my very fervent joy and privilege to serve as your parish priest,

With all good wishes
Fr Yenda  

September 2009

My dear people of S Mary’s,

It is always the case that the magazine is kept waiting, but this month I seem to have fallen further behind on time, and am typing with some considerable haste to get this done!

August, which is usually the month of quietude and going on holiday (if of course we can afford the shocking and exorbitant prices that anyone involved in the travel industry charge in the summer), and things generally tend to quiet down.

August this year of course saw great excitement however, given that my sister had her third child, born on the 18th, a little girl, Chloe Mary Brodie.  You see from the date that I am, as I have already said, a good way behind on the letter this month!

So, here we are – September – the month when everything starts to get going again.  The schools go back, people pack up their bikinis, shorts, sun hats, flip flops and passports, and return to work, school and the run of the mill – except of course for those people who are able to go on holiday at the end of the summer when the prices go down!   But September sees a new term for the schools, new schools for some children, and after the holiday, many people start back to work with another year before they can look forward to going away again…getting cheerful this, isn’t it?!!

This idea of everything getting going again after the short lull of August got me thinking about the importance of our churches, not just our beautiful medieval church of S Mary here in Sundon, but actually throughout the country, and what a tremendous responsibility we in the Christian community have to maintain them.

It is never an easy task to raise the necessary funds to maintain our churches through out the land, but we know it is essential and well worth the effort!  The church in the parish is a visible focus of the Christian community in that place.  People will hear the bell toll at service time, and will know that the Church is there praying for them, even if at the time they are themselves getting ready for work, stirring the gravy, or whatever.

In many parts of the country there has been what can only be described as a woeful tragedy when churches have been closed.  It is a tragedy because the Church is actually the living presence of the Christian community, there for its people, praying for its people and going from strength to strength in its mission in that particular place.  I often think that even if a church is struggling in a particular area, it is still doing something worthwhile, and it is still showing its witness to its community.

In places where churches are closed, that shows but one thing.  Failure!  It might make life easier from a financial point of view, but actually it sends out a very negative message to those who live around the particular area, and who no longer hear the bell toll and no longer see people going in and out.  It also woefully neglects the important history which every parish church has of the people who have built it, those who have had their occasional offices in it, and those who have worshipped in it over the years.

Here in Sundon, at the turn of last century, our church was derelict.  No services could be held in church and all the services were in (what is now the old) Vicarage.  When I came here someone clearly remembered those days.  Yet the parish worked hard to get the church back in good order, and what a wonderful job they did!  We have a church of outstanding beauty, and more over a church which is used day in day out, and which is actively showing the love of God and the mission of the church in this place.  What would have happened here if all those years ago the church had never been restored and the church simply gave up in this place at that time?  It does not bear thinking about.

Fortunately back in the 1930s, this parish knew that it had a responsibility to keep the church here as a visible sign of the presence of God in this community – and that goodness they did, because we owe them a tremendous debt of gratitude.

Had they failed, this would simply be a place of failure – failure that the church had disintegrated in this place.  But with the efforts that those people had, they brought the church back into use for successive generations – and we too do the same; we too maintain the church which is our privilege before we pass it on to the generations which follow us.  In places where churches are being closed, what does that say to those communities?  Whatever it says, it certainly doesn’t send out a message of success, does it?!

At times we need to realise how fortunate we are here in Sundon to have had a generation of people and clergy who were determined to bring back to life a church which was in such a bad state of repair – so that we now can continue to enjoy our joyful privilege and duty to keep the church here for those who come after us.

For me to serve the people here at such a gem of a church is a joy which even after 5 years of being here never seems to waver.  (My word it doesn’t seem that long since I moved in…I must be enjoying myself!)  

As always it remains my tremendous joy and privilege to serve as your parish priest

With all good wishes

Fr Yenda.

November 2009

My Dear People of St Mary's,

November is the month of Holy Souls, when we have the solemnity of All Souls Day and also Remembrance Sunday. Each year these are poignant dates for many of us, and a time when we come to church to remember those we have loved but see no longer, and whose memory lives on over the years through our memories, thoughts and prayers.

I always think we could be forgiven for thinking that two such occasions so close together on the one month might be depressing, but in reality this is far from the case. When we offer the Requiem there is, in the Preface to the Canon, those wonderful words, ‘Lord for your faithful people, life is changed not ended…’ In a sense it reminds us that these two occasions far from being depressing give us something positive to think of. We know that our loved ones are living with God in glory in a place of refreshment, light and peace.

On All Souls Day those we remember those we have loved and who have touched our lives in some way – be it close relatives or friends, or even people who have influenced us in some way. Very often in a family we know of people who we never met who have been important and have influenced those who have influenced us in some way.

As a priest there are always the clergy I have known, or known of, who have been a great influence on me…they too come to mind at All Souls tide. I always remember Fr Gendall from Cornwall who was always an important figure in our family history as he managed to get my gran her first council house – he died before I was even born, yet his influence is important. Then there is Fr Curson who I knew in Cornwall whose example of spiritual and pastoral ministry has been very important – and then Fr Bebbington who I knew when I worked in the north; a priest with a tremendous sense of humour! All these have been a very rounding influence on how I see the work of a priest. On All Souls Day there is the opportunity to thank God for all those people who have been important to us in whatever way.

Then we come to Remembrance Sunday, and we remember those men and women who gave their lives in times of war. The First World War we still hear about, and rightly so, even though there are naturally fewer and fewer survivors who served in the Great War. I was reading recently an account of the number of young men who signed up and were literally ‘canon fodder’; sent to battle by their superiors with no hope of survival – and the numbers are still probably not known. Every parish in this country alone has a memorial to those who died in the Great War, think of how many parishes in the country there are with all their names marked – not to mention those whose names are known to God alone.

The 2nd World War is of course much closer in our minds – and every year I am reminded of the great sacrifice men and women made during those years in so many ways.

In recent years I have visited both Auschwitz in Poland and Thereseinstadt in the Czech Republic, as well as the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam. Each of these places is both moving and poignant – each place grips you in an indescribable way.

I always think that when people ask whether or not it was right to actually go to war, a visit to these places makes us realise that it most certainly was both right and necessary. If we consider for just a moment the atrocities perpetrated under the Nazi regime in 1930s Germany, it is my view that other countries in the world had no choice but to take decisive action. As I always say every year, the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. Never have we seen this to be more poignant than during those war years.

We also of course hold before God on Remembrance Sunday those who have given their lives in recent conflict; and of course those who have returned from active service and whose lives will never be the same again as a result – albeit from physical injury or mental scars.

On Remembrance Sunday we honour them with our thanks and gratitude for their ultimate sacrifice, and we thank God for them, knowing that in His loving care they are safe and free and living in glory.

As always it is my tremendous privilege and immense joy to serve as your parish priest,

All good wishes

Fr. Yenda.

December 2009

My dear people of S Mary’s,

I can hardly believe that we are in the last month of the year already! It doesn’t seem five minutes since I was writing about Epiphany and the month of January; and now the year is drawing to a close.

So, at the end of the year, we begin a new Church year with Advent. Advent as I always say is my favourite time of the Church year. The lovely purple is around us – and it is a purple representing hope rather than the sombre purple of Lent. We have the loveliest hymns during the year, and there is always something very special about Advent.

This year has been an interesting one really; on the negative side we have had all the fun of the MPs expenses, we have had the threat of the BNP trying to muscle in on our political democracy. On the Church side we have had a new bishop installed in St Albans, and our organist has celebrated 60 years on the organ stool! And of course on the family front, my sister had a baby girl, so I now have a niece as well as two nephews…something tells me that I will have to open my wallet a little wider than usual a little later this month!!

Advent of course leads us into the Christmass season – and as always there are services which I hope people will attend this year as they always do. The Midnight Mass as always is at 11:30pm on Christmass Eve, and the Solemn Eucharist of Christmass Day will be at the usual time of 9:30am.

I always think that at Christmass time our thoughts go out to those for whom Christmass is a difficult time. Those who are recently bereaved, those who have no families, those who have been made redundant and cannot afford the style of Christmass they are used to. Many people find that Christmass day is more a trial than a joy, and I always wonder to what degree this is the festival itself, and how much is the commercialisation that accompanies it – probably 90% the latter I would suggest.

At this point I am reminded of a Christmass edition of The Good Life, where Jerry and Margot’s Christmass had not been delivered, and they went next door to Tom and Barbara – and by the end of the day, Margot was actually enjoying herself! Christmass on a budget seemed out of the question to Margot, but in the end it did work out ok.

This year more than ever, people are going to be feeling the pinch with the recession. It always saddens me when people enjoy Christmass day, only to dread the credit card bills falling through the door in January – there is nothing wrong with enjoying Christmass day, and not dreading the January post as well!

Christmass is about the birth of Our Blessed Lord, and if we help the national economy by spending a few bob on celebrating that, then there is nothing wrong with that. But do we really need to land ourselves in serious financial difficulties in order to do so? More and more we see television documentaries and chat shows about the dangers of over-spending at this time of year.

I do, as always wish everyone a very happy and holy Christmass again this year – and a very joyful and enriched New Year in January.

As always it is my very great joy and privilege to serve as your parish priest.

All good wishes
Fr Yenda