ST MARY’S CHURCH, THAMES STREET, HAMPTON TheParishLinkEASTER 2015 Celebrate Easter at St Mary’s ST MARY’S CHURCH • HAMPTON www.hampton-church.org.uk If you have just come to live in Hampton, your Parish Church welcomes you. Please make yourself known to one of the Parish Staff or Churchwardens. Please visit our website, Facebook or Twitter feeds for all St Mary’s Church and our parish information. Connect with St Mary’s… Vicar: The Reverend Derek Winterburn . 020 8979 3071 The Vicarage, 7 Church Street, Hampton TW12 2EB . email: [email protected] Please visit our website for all the latest news, events and activities for all age groups. Asst Priest: The Reverend Geoffrey Clarkson. 020 8977 1434 109 Cambridge Road, Teddington TW11 8DF www.hampton-church.org.uk Asst Priest: The Reverend Alan Jackson . 020 8898 3093 You can also fi nd us on Facebook or 7 Uxbridge Road, Hanworth TW13 5EG follow us on Twitter… Licensed Lay Minister (Reader): hampton.church Pat Felstead, 69a Ormond Drive, Hampton TW12 2TP. 020 8979 9990 Parish Offi ce: . 020 8941 7221 @hamptonchurch Parish Manager: Jane Holmes . email: [email protected] Parish Administrator: Elizabeth Wait. email: [email protected] Or scan our Churchwardens: QR code using Michael Harris, Blyton House, 20a Ormond Avenue TW12 2RU. 020 8979 1903 your mobile phone Hilary Hart, Banchory, Old Farm Rd, Hampton TW12 3QT . 020 8979 5665 and go straight Deputy Churchwardens: to our website. Joan Doane, Flat 2, The Mews, 20 Hogarth Way TW12 2EL. 020 8979 1636 Mike Fraser, 12 Springfi eld Avenue, Hampton TW12 3DT . .020 8979 0948 The Revd Derek Winterburn St Mary’s Vicarage Hon Treasurer 7 Church Street Nigel Francis, 18 Rushbury Court, Station Road TW12 2DD. 020 8941 1467 Hampton TW12 2EB Recorder for Christian Stewardship Tel: 020 8979 3071 Martin Hart, ‘Banchory’, Old Farm Road TW12 3QT. 020 8979 5665 Email: [email protected] Hall Bookings Derek is happy to be contacted at Patricia Lewis, 7 Manor Gardens TW12 2TX . 020 8979 2615 any time except Fridays. Church Flowers Michael Harris, Blyton House, 20a Ormond Avenue TW12 2RU. 020 8979 1903 Worship Band. email: [email protected] How to fi nd us… John Winterburn, 19 Lincoln Crt, Buckingham Rd, Hampton TW12 3JZ . .07816 855941 T Children’s Champion HAMPTON HAMPTON HILL OUTDOOR Jane Thornton, 26 Coleshill Road, Teddington TW11 OLJ . 020 8977 7220 HIGH ST POOL Hampton & Richmond FC Ground BUS STOP HIGH STREET R68 1 The Beveree 1 Children and Families, Work Leader . email: [email protected] 3 A T Sam Waako . .07923 331108 E BUSHY E A3008 R PARK T S H Safeguarding Offi cer C BUS STOP R 111, 216 HAMPTON TRAIN U S H T Carrie Lees, 28 Cardinal’s Walk TW12 2TS . 020 8979 9522 A STATION C T IO N HIGH STREET RO AD Choir Director and Organist ST MARY’S A308 PARISH CHURCH Contact: David Pimm, Cert RCO . .020 8399 2404 TH BUS STOP HAMPTON SUNBURY AM 111, 216, R68 COURT New choir members, adults or children, are encouraged. ES CROSS STR PALACE BUS STOP EET M3 JCT 1 111, 216 HAM PTO N C OU RT Bell Ringers RO AD FERRY CROSSING THE RIVER TH Beginners or experienced ringers are always welcome. AMES Contact: Alison Ward . 020 8979 9848 Front Cover: An original watercolour illustration by Trudi Murray 2015. Registered Charity no. 1133768 2 THE PARISH LINK • EASTER 2015 Celebrate Easter at St Mary’s Contents page Passiontide Connect with St Mary’s ...... 2 the last two weeks of Lent Celebrate Easter at St Mary’s ................................3 Sunday 29 March Palm Sunday 10am An All Age Procession outside with the donkey Reasons to Believe ................4 remembering Jesus’ triumphant entrance into Jerusalem From the Registers ...............5 followed by a dramatisation of the Easter story and activities for children. Come early for donkey rides in the churchyard. Stainer’s Crucifi xion ............ 6 6.30pm Stainer’s Crucifi xion, a refl ective evening service celebrating the beginning of Holy Week. Annie, One, Two, Three ...................8 Mon 30, Tues 31 March & Wed 1 April Magna Carta 800 ................10 9.30pm Meditation and Compline Meditative, quiet evening services contemplating the Hampton’s Charity Easter message. A great way to end the day in Holy Week. Bookshop ................................11 Children and Young Thursday 2 April Maundy Thursday People of St Mary’s .............12 6pm Last Supper in the Church Hall. 8.15pm Holy Communion, including vigil and stripping of the sanctuary. MTV Youth .............................14 Friday 3 April Good Friday St Mary’s School ...................15 10am All Age Service with Hot Cross Buns Children at St Mary’s ..........16 followed by children’s activities 2pm Good Friday Service: An Hour at the Cross Hampton Classics on the Green ..........................17 Sunday 5 April Easter Sunday Open Doors ........................... 18 8am Holy Communion 9.30am Holy Communion Come Dine with Me ...........20 11am All Age Celebration followed by shortened Holy Communion and Easter Egg Hunt List of Advertisers ................23 6.30pmpg Evensong Life at St Mary’s ....................24 Stainer’s Crucifi xion ‘I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live even though he dies.’ Join us for a meditational evening service at the beginning of Holy Week. ComeC andd see me As we refl ect on the impact of Jesus’ sacrifi ce, on Palm Sunday our expanded choir will sing Stainer’s Crucifi xion 10am in the churchyard 6.30pm Palm Sunday 29 March 3 ST MARY’S CHURCH • HAMPTON tells the story of a leader dying an ignominious death – a Reasons to believe victim of blind hatred and a cruel state: a failure. But that apparent defeat was overturned on Easter Day when Written by Derek Winterburn Jesus was raised to new life. I believe the documentary omeone asked me a few weeks ago why I was a evidence for the resurrection stands up to scrutiny; this is SChristian. I was slightly taken aback because I am one clear point when reason supports faith (for example more usually quizzed about why I am a vicar or what see The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel). the Archbishop of Canterbury has just said! I might have But alongside that isn’t it striking that some of the replied in a number of ways, but given the person I was greatest humanitarians of recent history were directly talking to, I said ‘Christianity helps me to make sense of inspired by the way Jesus faced hardship and outright evil the world – it gives me a framework to explore life.’ with love and compassion (Gandhi, Martin Luther King Perhaps non-religious people think that religious people Jnr., Mother Theresa, and Nelson Mandela)? Countless have ‘closed minds’, and it is generally thought that ‘open RE projects are written about these outstanding leaders minds’ are to be preferred. I don’t think a Christian can (I have a son who teaches…) but the pattern that these ever claim to have everything settled and possess all the heroes took for their life was Jesus’s. His conviction was answers. Jesus, after all, very defi nitely disturbed the ideas that he could trust his heavenly father. No matter what of the religious people of his time. Still the circumstances he would be upheld no one has a genuinely blank mind, all of by God – that gave him purpose and us have a ‘mental map’ of life. Comparing courage. The example and teaching of it to others, I think the Christian view of Jesus moulds what I think life can be, the world has much to commend it. what is important and what is of And it has stood scrutiny for a very long ultimate value. time and is more popular than ever. And so the third element must be Here are three ways that I fi nd that being a confi dence of the future. Jesus’ a Christian ‘makes sense of life.’ resurrection is not just about him. The We live in a lovely part of the world. Bible teaches that what he experienced Just now each week brings a new can be true for those who follow unveiling of spring fl owers: snowdrops, him. Death need not be the end of crocuses, daffodils, and bluebells. Our everything for me either. Making our cover (especially in colour – see our website) is radiant peace with God now means that we need not dread with the beauty of fl owers. I want to honour not only the grave. I meet many people who are dying or are a human artist’s brushstrokes but the divine artist’s bereaved. I note that those who have a fi rm grasp of handiwork too. I want to say that a carpet of crocuses the Christian hope are not overcome by the prospect is beautiful, not just I fi nd it pleases me. As Genesis says of their coming end. And although Christians truly about each stage of Creation ‘it was good.’ Jesus speaks grieve for those they have lost, I witness a gentle trust about how it is God who clothes the wild fl owers. I that there will be meeting again, in Christ. want to do more than merely note the complexity that So springtime, Good Friday and Easter Sunday are all evolution has produced by random mutation and natural tremendous occasions to refl ect again on three key selection – but neither do I want to bow down before dimensions of the Christian life – our creation by a anything in the natural world.