Niftynotes news & information from the Diocese www.southwell.anglican.org DECEMBER 2014 Compiled by Nicola Mellors email: [email protected] How much do we care about A window into the Christmas story the elderly and lonely? Householders will decorate their he Bishop’s Lent Appeal next year will focus on tackling social windows in the style of an care and isolation – two of the most pressing issues we face in Advent calendar as part of an Tthe UK. exciting community event being launched in Toton. More than £19bn is spent on caring for the elderly every year yet we all hear the stories about failing care homes and poorly paid care A trail of Advent windows will workers, who have less and less time to spend with the people they be created as an extra window is look after. revealed each day, starting on 1st December. According to Age UK more than half of over-75s live alone, with They will be illuminated from many saying they feel permanently 6pm to 8pm each evening, with lonely; sadly almost five million seasonal refreshments being older people say the television is served outside homes on certain their main form of company. days. The Lent Appeal will support charities working to help people The Advent windows are being trapped in these desperate designed and made by members situations – the names of the Continued on page 2 charities will be announced in the New Year. In this month’s issue: Alongside this, parishes are being encouraged during Lent to explore 2 News in brief ways of supporting the elderly and lonely, in conjunction with a Citizens UK campaign nationally that is seeking to build an alliance 3 Synod report of community organisations, care providers and care workers to press for changes to the provision of social care – more details at 4 Events & information www.icareaboutcare.org.uk 5 Prayer Diary Suggested practical action for churches includes: 9 Training Courses Encouraging people to fast on 19th March in sympathy with 11 What’s On those who are hungry or lonely during Lent 12 Comings & Goings Continued on page 12 2 December 14 News in brief. News in brief. News in brief. News in brief. ‘Special moment’ as new Continued from page 1 Archdeacon is installed of Toton Churches, a partnership between Toton Methodist Church and St Peter’s Anglican Church. Each has a theme linked to the Christmas Story which visitors will be able to follow as they walk, cycle or drive from house to house. There will also be community carol singing around the Christmas tree on Saturday 20th December from 5pm to 6pm in he new Archdeacon of Nottingham Sarah Clark was installed Toton Methodist Garden. during a service at Southwell Minster last month.Sarah became Another Advent window will be the first woman Archdeacon in the Diocese of Southwell and revealed at the end of this event. T Refreshments will include hot Nottingham. After the installation, which was conducted by Bishop Richard fruit punch, hot chocolate and Inwood, Sarah said: “It was one of the most affirming experiences of mince pies. my life”. An Advent Windows leaflet is being delivered to every home in Toton, which includes the Volunteers for The Nottingham Winter locations of each window and Shelter the date they will first be lit. Refreshment days are marked The Nottingham Winter Shelter is recruiting volunteers for this year’s and there is a children’s night shelter during the winter months - when churches work together colouring competition included. from November to March to provide warm safe shelters in church halls for Nottingham's rough sleepers/homeless people. The programme is also available Accommodation and support services was found for 166 people who from www.totonchurches.org or stayed last winter thanks to a dedicated team of staff and 89 [email protected] volunteers. Local schools are also getting on To volunteer please contact Denis board by designing their own Tully, email: denis.tully@ Advent window displays and emmanuelhouse.org.uk or 0115 learning a song to sing at the 950 7140. Follow them Facebook community carol event. www.facebook.com/ nottinghamwintershelter For more information contact Further details: the Revd Liam Lynne and Andrew Pearson on O'Boyle 07860 507318, email: 0115 917 8376 or liam.o'boyle@southwell. [email protected] anglican.org Niftynotes 3 News in brief. News in brief. News in brief. News in brief. New environment policy sets Development plan out to celebrate Creation will see a radical reshaping of the new environmental The report also supported the policy which pledges to installation of solar on panels on St John’s College “celebrate and affirm the churches, halls and parsonages, A The Council of St John’s dignity of Creation’ was where appropriate. College, Nottingham, has agreed presented to Southwell & unanimously to a development Nottingham Diocesan Synod. The Edible Churchyards plan that will see a radical It set out a numbers of objectives: programme should also be reshaping of the college over the To encourage individuals, supported, said the report, next two years. churches and the Diocese to cut bringing people together to find The Church of England is their carbon footprints local solutions to hunger and reviewing ministerial education, To promote recycling and the isolation. It also commended the and St John’s says it is moving responsible use of resources Wildlife Churchyards initiative, to match the needs of the To increase environmental which could be used to “find Church. After many months of awareness local solutions to the destruction prayerful consideration, the of green spaces, plants and college Council and Directorate Synod, which had gathered at St animals”. have agreed to remodel the Saviour’s Church, Retford, for its college to meet future training final meeting of the year, was Synod also approved the budget needs. told that a Freedom of Creation for 2015, with total expenditure The plan will see an end to the Implementation group would of £9,151,000, most of this on admission of new full-time need to be set up, comprising people costs. residential students at the two representatives from each Nottingham campus from deanery, to support the policy. In his address to Synod, Bishop September 2015, and the Richard Inwood focused on development of new models of The report also recommended the justice, but justice infused with ministerial formation and calling of Deanery Moots, moot righteousness. He quoted from training for discipleship. being old English for meeting. the prophet Amos (5:24): “Let Recruitment of new full and These would include Green justice roll down like the waters part-time students on all Champions, and be a forum for and righteousness like an ever Midlands CYM and Extension the sharing of stories and flowing stream”. Studies programmes will resources, and worship. continue as normal. The Bishop said people should St John’s has identified four key The report also commended the “be pleased with just verdicts and areas of development that the use of Diocesan assets in the fitting sentences, but is that the church will need as it trains production of renewable energy end of the matter?” In the leaders for the future. such as wind turbines. This came Christian tradition justice means They are: only days after Diocesan plans to much more. It is often translated build a turbine on land off the as righteousness in the New Contextualized training for A606 near to Upper Broughton Testament, and goes beyond missional leadership: The was turned down by Rushcliffe judgment and sentence – it is college has started to develop Borough Council planning about acting justly and doing context-based training through officers. right in one’s life and in the its Community Mission Pathway community. in which theological reflection Plans for another turbine, on and spiritual formation are fully farmland at Elston, are still to be integrated in a parish setting. determined. Continued on page 12 4 December 14 Events & information. Events & information. Events & informatio Spiritual journey that led to Make a child’s Lambeth Palace Christmas Family Care is personal quest to deepen his own spirituality resulted in a appealing for Notts clergyman being awarded a degree by the Archbishop toys to give as of Canterbury – and writing a book. A Christmas presents to the The Revd Jim Wellington children and went to Lambeth Palace, families it supports, as well as home to Archbishop Justin many other vulnerable children Welby, to receive his across Nottinghamshire. doctorate – known as a Lambeth Degree. If you have a new toy or gift to donate contact your Family Care Jim, who is the Rector of parish link person or telephone Keyworth, Stanton on the Sam Wilson on 0115 360 3010. Wolds, and Bunny with Bradmore, is well versed in The toys and gifts will be the history of the early delivered on 9th, 10th and 11th Church Fathers and the December. development of the ‘Jesus Prayer’ – an ancient prayer popular in the Eastern Free online Church. Advent Calendar At Christmas, many families feel It is becoming more popular under enormous financial with Christians in the West pressure to create the perfect and for many years Jim has Christmas. This short-term studied how it developed pressure often leads to long-term from the biblical Psalms despair for the poorest in society. among desert-dwelling Archbishop of Canterbury Justin monks in the fourth and fifth centuries. Welby has advocated strongly against pay day lenders and it is It was suggested to him that it was suitable material for a PhD, and at Christmas that many families when the idea was accepted Jim spent three years writing his thesis in can feel the most financial his spare time.