| Editor: Sonia Marshall | Layout: Dave Merchant | Web version: Mark Warrick |
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Scripture readings for Sunday
With this issue of Priory News begins the second century of parish magazine publishing in Deeping St James. One Monday morning in December Sonia Marshall and I went up the tower to search among the dusty heaps of bound volumes from the past and soon found the 1900 file and the very first Deeping St James Monthly News.
As I sit at my desk typing, I wonder how the Rev Samuel Skene used to write his contributions, and how they were published. Now we have complete in-house publishing, from thinking of ideas to folding and stapling, although we still use a commercial "insert" to gain the wider view and more general articles. The village was very much smaller a century ago, but the numbers of baptism and funerals was not very different, perhaps reflecting the higher proportion of people who availed themselves of what their parish church offered.
This month is more likely to be dominated by the start of the two-thousandth year of our Lord than by the start of the second century of the parish magazine, but a hundred years of bringing the Gospel of Christ, as well as the day-to-day doings of his Church locally, to the people of the parish through the medium of a monthly magazine is nevertheless worth a mention. Once we are over "Millennium Madness" in a few weeks' time, perhaps we could give some thought to marking this anniversary in some way.
1st January, 2nd Sunday of Christmas:
10am: Ephesians 1: 3-14; John 1: 1-18
9th January, The Baptism of Christ,
Plough Sunday:
10am: Acts 19: 1-7; Mark 1: 4-11
6pm: Special readings for Plough Sunday
16th January, 2nd Sunday of Epiphany:
10am: Revelation 5: 1-10; John 1: 43-51
6pm: Philippians 4: 4-7; Luke 11: 9-13
23rd January, 3rd Sunday of Epiphany:
10am: Revelation 19: 6-10; John 2: 1-11
30th January, The Presentation of Christ in the Temple
(Candlemass):
10am: Malachi 3: 1-5; Luke 2: 22-40
6th February, 5th Sunday before Lent: 10am: 1 Corinthians 9: 16-23; Mark 1: 29-39
1st January marks a special day in the history of the Priory Church. It is exactly one hundred years since the very first copy of your parish magazine was issued. At that time it cost one penny and contained just one page of local church news together with a national parish magazine supplement.
One hundred years later we are still bringing you the news - several local pages with pull out calendar and supplement all for less than the price of a first class stamp, brought to you each month by our indefatigable team of distributors (not the same ones as in 1900, we hasten to add!).
In celebration, we bring you a few extracts 'from our archives'. -
"The old year has gone into the past the New Year has come. What it may have in store for us we cannot tell, but let it be mine to wish all of you and yours that it may' be as happy and prosperous a year as may be"
'Now that you have had the first number of our Magazine and have see what it is like, may. we hope you approve of it and will all keep up its circulation? We hope to arrange this month for regular distributors, and should be very glad if anyone who desires a copy regularly would signify so to us.
"The circulation of our Magazine is, I am glad to say. increasing each month, which is a sign that it is being appreciated Last month we issued 112 copies, and for this current month, we shall hope to issue 124....................
The Services at the Station which have had to be discontinued for some lime, will be resumed on the first Sunday in Lent. We hope that our Eastgate friends will avail themselves a little more of this opportunity to worship which is thus brought close to them."
"Since last writing to you, our Parish Church has been presented with a handsome new carved oak lectern, the gift of the Marchioness of Exeter, and supplied by Messrs. J. Wipple and Co. of Exeter, and which harmonises with the rest of the Church furniture. It was first used on Rogation Sunday.
"The Market Deeping Gaslight Company have we see, taken the first steps towards bringing to us a gas supply, and we hope we be able to light the church more efficiently during the coming winter. This will be a great improvement upon the 'dim religious light' of he past. There are other improvements in prospect about which we hope WE may be able to speak more particularly in some other issue of the Magazine.
Hmm! I don't know if the present electric light is an improvement on the gas of which my predecessor speaks so enthusiastically here, but I think we still have a rather dim light! - Mark
We must not close without alluding to the important work that has been commenced on the bells of the Church. We have missed them much, and the school bell is but a poor little substitute for them, but it has been made very plain during the work of taking them down how necessary it was that something should be done towards restoring them .....................
(This extract will be continued) All of the above extracts were taken from the monthly 'Vicar's Letter' and signed by:
Explorers, Climbers and Scramblers have been learning about Advent as a time of preparation for Christmas. We began by making Advent Calendars in the shape of stars, and then the emphasis has been on the practical preparations for celebrating Christmas. Many thanks to Petra and Jane for masterminding the exciting table centres for that special Christmas meal and to Johanna for the luxury-league Christmas crackers.
We are also remembering those less-fortunate than ourselves and will be sending a donation from our weekly collection to Save the Children and The Children's Society.
We look forward to seeing anyone aged 3 - 11 who would like to come along and join us at 9.50am on Sundays, 3-7 at the Vicarage, 7-11 at the Church Hall (except 2nd Sunday in month: Family Eucharist in Church).
Alison Warrick
tel: 345890
If you would like to receive the sacrament but are unable through infirmity to get to church, please let either the Vicar or Sonia Marshall know as soon as possible.
Don't forget to let either the Vicar or Reader know the dates of your stay if you would like us to visit.
The Advent Coffee Morning raised £181.75 which was a wonderful success. Many thanks to all who attended and assisted at this event.
Carole & Margaret
Serves 4-6. Preparation time 20 mins.
This is only an extract from some of our magazine. Residents of Deeping St James can subscribe to the printed version.