Dear friends,
This mailing is issued on the eve of the Sacrum Triduum, the Great “Three Holy Days” at the centre of the Christian year: this (Maundy Thursday) evening at 8pm, we will gather to commemorate the Institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper, and the centrality of service to all Christian ministry, in the Washing of Feet. We will also hear the first homily from our guest preacher, the Rt Rev’d Norman Banks SSC, Emeritus Bishop of Richborough. After Mass, the Watch of the Passion will continue at the altar of repose, until midnight.
Tomorrow (Good Friday) morning, with our brother and sister Christians from the Kenton Group of Churches, we will participate in an ecumenical Walk of Witness, setting off from All Saints’ Church at 9am: those who do not wish to walk the whole route can gather instead at St Mary’s, from 9.30am, to await the arrival of the Walk and the concluding prayers – before enjoying friendship and fraternity in our Hall, over cups of tea and hot cross buns.
The Liturgy of the Passion is at 3pm tomorrow – after which, volunteers are kindly requested to help set up the Hall for the Easter Vigil party. Good Friday is a day of abstinence (no meat) and fasting (no more than one main meal, and two additional snacks which – together – do not constitute more than the main meal), unless excused by age or ill health.
Volunteers are likewise kindly requested to help decorate the church for Easter, on Holy Saturday morning: Morning Prayer will be said at 9am; Bishop Norman will lead us in the beautiful devotion of Maria Desolata at 9.30am, and then we will commence cleaning and decorating the church, and arranging the flowers for Easter. Whether you can spare a single hour, or a whole morning, please do come along to help: hot drinks and hot cross buns will be supplied, to keep up our spirits!
Then, at 8pm, the most magnificent liturgy of the year – the Vigil and First Mass of Easter – begins, followed afterwards in the Hall by a bring-and-share parish party! Your kind donations of food for the party can be brought to the Hall from 7pm.
As Pope St Paul II explained, in these great liturgies ‘we walk once more the path of humanity from creation to the culminating event of salvation, the death and resurrection of Christ… We thus catch a glimpse, on [the] night of Passover, of the dawning of that day that never ends, the day of the Risen Christ, which inaugurates the new life, the “new heavens and a new earth”.’
On Easter Day, Sunday 5 April, the 10.30am Parish Mass will include the renewal of baptismal vows, and will be followed by a children’s Easter Egg hunt in the memorial garden.
Please now return your ACS Lent Appeal donations boxes, to be counted: our chosen charity for April is the Humanitarian Aid Relief Fund (HART-UK), which, for over 20 years, has provided humanitarian assistance in the form of food, shelter, healthcare, education and more, across the world. (HART’s founder, Baroness Cox, is a friend of this parish.) Further information is available in church – and your donations (using a Gift Aid envelope, as appropriate) can be placed into the basket at the back: please give generously.
This Sunday will also be the final opportunity to sign the card for Fr Edward, in Easter hope and in loving memory of Katherine Lewis.
Please note that there will be a planning meeting for the church Open Day (scheduled for Saturday, 9 May) on Thursday next week, 9 April, after the 6pm Mass: donations of second-hand books are also requested.
The Holy Father’s Universal Prayer Intention for April is for priests in crisis – that those clergy going through times of trial in their vocation may find the accompaniment they need, and communities which support them with understanding and prayer.
Thank you all so much for your hard work this Holy Week! (And special thanks to those who contributed to the cost of this year’s Easter lilies – which have just been delivered to the church! Almost £700 was donated – and the display should be accordingly spectacular!)
Likewise included with this mailing is a flier giving advance notice of the patronal festival celebrations at St Peter & St Paul, Enfield Lock.
May he, by whose redeeming work you have received the gift of everlasting freedom, make your heirs to an eternal inheritance,
Fr Richard