29th July 2021

Dear Friends

It is with great sadness that I have to announce the death of Lady Grania Munro. Grania was a devoted member of our 8am congregation. She served and administered the chalice at our early service. Grania was for many years a committed member of a prayer group begun by Gwyneth Cole. What you might not know was Grania’s love for creating icons. An icon is a window onto another world, they are created, yes, by paint, but principally through prayer. To create an icon is a deeply spiritual exercise, where the creator’s hand is literally guided by God. I will miss Grania’s depth of theological enquiry and prayerful nature,her unshakable faith and commitment to others. Our prayers go out to Sir Alan and the family at this very sad time. Rest eternal grant unto her O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon her. + May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed rest in peace and rise in glory. Grania’s funeral takes place in church on Thursday 5 August at 2pm.

On a happier theme. Don’t forget that our 10.30am Mass this Sunday is a family mass and everybody is welcome. 

Sunday 5th September is our Back to Church Sunday, please keep the date in your diary. At 6pm we are holding a service to celebrate our faith and our favourite hymns, bible readings and poems. If you have a favourite hymn, passage of scripture, or poem, please let me know and I will choose the most popular. So far there has been something of a silence to my plea – so it would be good to hear from a few of you! You can email me at 
vicar@stnicholaschiswick.org

God Bless

Fr Simon

Dear Friends

How wonderful it was to be singing again in church last Sunday, even though we had to do so wearing masks! There were more people in the congregation at 10.30 than I’ve seen for a long time, including a few new people. One such person was a delightful lady who was married at St Nick’s 60 years ago and had returned to celebrate her anniversary, although her husband has sadly died. She told me that it was her grandmother who donated the lovely wooden statue of Our Lady in our church many years ago. Her grandmother couldn’t afford to go on pilgrimage to Oberammergau with the church group but she gave them a donation and asked them to bring back a gift for St Nick’s. They returned with the statue. It was lovely to hear her story and I look forward to her joining us again for worship.

On the subject of Oberammergau, I am taking part in a pilgrimage there in September next year to watch the Passion Play and I think we have a few spaces – do let me know if you might be interested in joining us.

With every blessing
Mother Eileen 

22nd July 2021

Dear Friends

I hope you are managing to enjoy this amazing weather – it’s almost too hot. The school summer holidays are upon us, I do hope you will all manage to find some rest and relaxation over the next six weeks, goodness knows we all deserve it. However, with infection rates rising, I do hope you will be extra careful. We will this Sunday be singing hymns once again for the first time since last March 2020, it seems incomprehensible, but there we are. Because of the situation, we will still be advising people who visit church to wear masks and to keep a reasonable social distance. Hand sanitizer will still be available and the Government has advised us to maintain our register of attendance for Test and Trace purposes. We will continue to administer Communion in one kind and at your pew. But we can sing again! 

Talking about singing…on Sunday 5 September – our Back to Church Sunday – we will be holding at 6.00pm a Songs of Praise Service.  Please send me details of your favourite hymns, with either an explanation why this hymn is so important to you, or, if you are willing be prepared to tell me in person on Sunday evening why your particular hymn is so important, I will choose 5 hymns to sing plus a reading and a poem, so if you would rather tell me about a favourite bible passage, or poem please do so.

There are also plenty of Back to Church invitation cards to send out. If you know of somebody who would like to receive an invitation to come to church that Sunday, email the office, or pick up an invitation card yourself and send it to those who you know. It has been proven that personal invitation is the most effective means of bringing people back to church, so this is something we can all do together, to support St Nicholas.

God Bless

Simon

15th July 2021

Dear Friends

I have to be honest, I’m not very good at watching sporting events – especially critical ones on TV. In fact I’m not very good at watching anything sporting on TV. I’m the kind of person who wants to know the result before embarking on the journey. Crime fiction, sporting events, TV, Film, or books, it doesn’t matter whether I’m reading, or watching. So on Sunday, I watched the last two minutes of full time, the last two minutes of extra time and then I couldn’t cope with the suspense, so switched off, rather waiting for the familiar ping on my phone to announce the result.  The result was disappointing. The England team had covered themselves in glory and they strike me as a wonderful bunch of talented sportsmen, led by a thoughtful and inspirational manager. As a nation we are lucky to have such talent – it’s not always been the case. The racial abuse which followed, was depressing and thoughtless. However, if the thoughtless morons believed that their narrow minded, racist abuse would somehow be effective they – as usual- were completely wrong. What it has done, it seems to me, is galvanise people to stand up to this abuse. I have been so impressed at the sight of that defaced mural in Manchester, now restored, covered with notes, cards, poems and pictures of support, literally thousands of them. People have travelled from all over Manchester to voice their support for the inspirational Marcus Rashford, they have even travelled from Liverpool and Birmingham. “He supported and stood up for us, it’s now our turn to support him” one card read. As a nation we should be proud of our players – they really represent the very best. We should be proud that we are a racially diverse country, with all the talent, vision and joy that brings, we are all enriched by our differences. Thankfully most of our young people get that, I pray that they may never lose heart, or hope.

Simon