Faith Stories

Christian Aid Week 2012

Monday 7th May 2012 4:43 PM

Christian Aid Week this year starts on Sunday 13 May.

There will be an all-Island service to mark the launch of Christian Aid Week, held on Sunday 13 May at 6.30pm at St Mary's church, Port St Mary, to which all are invited.

On the Isle of Man the aim is to raise £31,475 to bring clean drinking water to people and livestock in three villages in Mali inWest Africa, one of the world's poorest countries.

This will be done through the digging of wells, together with improving health and hygiene practices.

It has been confirmed that Tynwald's Overseas Aid Committee (OAC) will generously match this funding, thus extending the project to six villages, directly benefitting over 5,300 people.

In the wake of the recent coup and conflict, local Christian Aid staff say this work is especially valuable. The full amount raised on the Island goes to this project; nothing is deducted for administration. Last year during Christian Aid Week a generous and excellent £35,000 was given on the Island - which again was doubled by the OAC - to provide food security and income opportunities in Malawi, as well as reducing vulnerability to drought and flooding there.

If you'd like to help, or your church is not already involved, please do get in touch with Phil Craine on 672224 or at pcraine@christian-aid.org

Posted 4:43 PM | 0 Comments | Permalink

A New Commandment

Friday 20th April 2012 9:17 AM

A New Commandment - A Reflection by Jim Noakes

"Mandatum novum do vobis", the Latin translation of the words of Jesus to His disciples at his last supper with them, was eventually Anglicised into "Maundy" ...

When I found I was to have the honour of receiving a Maundy Purse from HM the Queen at York Minster on Maundy Thursday this year, it made me pay more attention than I had before to this particular day before Easter, and started me on a challenging train of thought.

"A new commandment I give you", said Jesus to his disciples.

How seriously should we take this commandment? How does it rank alongside the Decalogue, those ten commandments that are core to Judeo-Christian faith? And especially alongside what Jesus described as "the two great commandments" - Love the Lord your God … and your neighbour as yourself?

In my, admittedly limited, experience Jesus's command has been preached about and taught less than those in the Decalogue, especially the one about adultery. So what is the 'new' command? "To love each other as I have loved you". And what does that mean? Jesus said: "As the Father has loved me so have I loved you"

So we are commanded to love one another as God the Father has loved Jesus and our standards and examples of how to do this are to be found in the Gospels. Interestingly, that includes Jesus's love for Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him, stole money, and never thought much of Jesus anyway.

I find it interesting too that this command is addressed to the disciples, not to the world at large, for it is not a re-statement of "love your neighbour as yourself". Jesus adds: "For you did not choose me but I chose you." We teach that faith is a gift from God, so those of faith can be said to be chosen?
If the church gave equal importance to Jesus's new command as to the other two great commandments, it would be full of people seeking to love one another, even those who had hurt them or were difficult to love. Wouldn't it?
Factional in-fighting, power-seeking, spiritual snobbery, and judgemental attitudes would be cause for great feelings of regret and remorse and a sense of failure as a church. Wouldn't they?
Churches would be viewed as loving communities (foolish in the eyes of some) where kindness, tolerance, and forgiveness were dominant. Very counter-cultural!
Is that how the church is viewed? I would dare to suggest not.

For too many church-going people belonging to a church is little different from any other charitable organisation they may belong to. Apart from worship, the procedures are much the same, with power structures, committees voting, political posturing, and a chance to criticise or bully the Vicar if he or she has done something I don't like. A survey into why fewer couples were choosing to get married in church produced results that made me really sit up. A large number of those asked said: "We didn't think the church would want us."
So if we are viewed as a load of self-righteous prigs, then we are clearly struggling with the second great commandment. But I would argue that Jesus's new commandment is the key to obeying the other two. Remember St John's teaching? "If anyone says 'I love God', yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen." Yet I have never heard a sermon or had any teaching on the relationship between the "new commandment" Jesus gave His disciples and the "two great commandments upon which hang all the Law and the Prophets".

Working that one through in our lives could make all the difference to the life, health and worth of our church communities.

The Isle of Man cannot and will not escape the consequences of the Great Borrowing Boom. Deleveraging (a horrid American word) means jobs will be lost, mortgages will not be able to be serviced, homes will be forfeit, family relationships will be under pressure as expectations are damaged or destroyed, and so on.

Just the time, you might think, for a foolish, counter-cultural community of love to be a force for healing and reconciliation? Is this the chance for the church to show what Jesus can do?

Posted 9:17 AM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Is God Calling you...?

Thursday 22nd March 2012 9:24 AM

There's more to ordained ministry than you might think...

The Church of England wants to encourage gifted and committed young men and women, from all kinds of backgrounds, to consider whether God is calling them into ordained ministry as priests. From there, there are lots of exciting and challenging job options! You can find out more about those choices on this website. If you feel a sense of calling from God, we'll help you explore that and consider what to do next.

Posted 9:24 AM | 0 Comments | Permalink

’Pray One For Me’ – yes we will

Tuesday 14th February 2012 1:03 PM

Prayer is in the news; banned from council agendas and, according to one opinion poll, ignored by many of those calling themselves 'Christian'.

Yet in time of trouble, crisis, and thanksgiving many of us do 'say a prayer'. Research conducted for the charity Tearfund in 2007 concluded that as many as 20 million adults in the UK (42% of the population) pray.

But for those who find it difficult, the Church of England launches a new website, www.prayoneforme.org, where anyone can post their prayer requests an d know that they will be prayed.

'You can pray about anything,' says the Revd Alison Roche, vicar of St Christopher's parish in Leicester. 'Some people think God's only concerned with the really big things in life. But some people pray for car parking spaces. God is concerned about the big things in life like disasters and relationships breaking up and the very small things. In a relationship with a human being you would communicate on different levels. It's the same with God. So go for it'.



Prayoneforme.org, launching on Ash Wednesday (22nd February), will be supported by church groups and prayer communities across the Church of England. They will pray the prayers. The site will be open throughout the year

The site builds on the success of a similar one the Church of England has run during Lent for the last two years. Family and friends, healing, guidance, thanksgiving and world events where topics for which people regularly asked for prayers.

The new site and its supporting page on Facebook (www.facebook.com/prayoneforme) will also have short profiles about some of the people and groups who will be praying the prayers. It will also link to information for those wanting to know more about praying for themselves.

Posted 1:03 PM | 0 Comments | Permalink

School for Uganda

Monday 13th February 2012 11:30 AM

Bishop Robert has recently become patron of School for Uganda, a Manx registered charity which originally began with a link between Foxdale Primary School on the Island and the Good Hope Primary and Nursery School, Namungoona, north west of Kampala in Uganda.

It all began in 2005 with a joint project, linking two schools in different countries, in distant locations.

Elizabeth Bankes-Jones (Chairman) says on the charity's website:
'During this project children got to know each other by sending letters, pictures, music and information about each other's cultures. The children in Foxdale school recognised that the children in Uganda needed school uniforms and they were the same colours as ours. We decided to send a box of school uniforms out to our friends in Uganda.

Children and parents began to bring in uniforms to package up, and soon the box was full. Things changed, however, when Mr Chris Astley, a parent at school, offered to take out rather more cargo than we had collected. He worked for an airline which offered charitable concessions for cargo, and to cut a long story short, we ended up sending out over one and a half tons of consumable aid to the children Uganda. Chris travelled out with the cargo to hand it over to David and Linda, who run good Hope School. He stayed with them for a week and was treated to a celebration of music and dance by the children at the school.

As friendships grew so did the desire to help. In 2006, Foxdale school produced an hour-long programme with Manx radio called Manx radio Uganda. It was broadcast on Good Friday morning and we were honoured in being granted an interview with the Archbishop of York, who is from Uganda.

It is very difficult to resist helping when one sees an obvious need, and this is what took the project to the next stage. I suggested to David and Linda that I could raise funds with which to build another school for the children who would otherwise have no school to go to. It was in the cool light of dawn that I realised this type of project could not be run from a very small primary school whose children and community had already given so much. This then, is the background to why I formed the charity School for Uganda.'

The charity's website with full details of this exciting story of international support and the encouraging work that has been completed and is ongoing can be found by following the link here.

Posted 11:30 AM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Plough Sunday at Marown

Sunday 8th January 2012 6:42 PM

While walking her dog, the Reverend Diane Marchment, Assistant Curate at Saint Ninian's, Douglas, met David Rawndsley exercising one of his horses. An enquiry about renewing the blessing of the plough from David was passed on to Di's husband, John who is the Reader at Marown Church.

As Epiphany Sunday is also Plough Sunday when the work of farmers and those who tend the soil is blessed in the hope of a good harvest later in the year, at the Parish Church of Saint Runius at Marown the Reverend Gordon Barker blessed the horse drawn plough which had been brought to the church pulled by two horses.

The team of horses belong to David and his wife Nicola and are stabled in Glen Vine not far from the church. The two horses 'Jack' and 'Duke' stood patiently whilst the blessing prayer was read in front a good sized crowd who were attending the two morning services at the church.

The renewing of links such as these within the community is an ongoing part of the life of the church in the Diocese.

Posted 6:42 PM | 1 Comments | Permalink