St James the Great, and St Francis with St Matthew, Barrow-in-Furness
North Barrow Churches 
Autumn has arrived, and there will be chillier days ahead.
St James’ church welcomes you to our warm space between 1pm and 4pm each Thursday afternoon except Christmas Day and New Year’s Day, until spring (around the end of March).
Come join us for friendly welcome, warm space, hot drinks, and sometimes snacks and optional activities. All ages are welcome.
It is free to join us – there is no cost except your time, and friendly chat.
Our annual Harvest Supper of Pie & Peas, with Quiz night and fun.
FREE admission (suggested donation £5).
Will be followed by a service of Complin by Candle light.
For more details see our FaceBook page
The APCM was held on 25th May 2025 at St James the Great, Hindpool, Barrow-in-Furness
The Agenda was:
The Annual Vestry Meeting
The Annual Parochial Church Meeting
The secretary’s report is available to read here and the chairman’s report is available to read here
The treasurer’s report is available on request.
We thank everyone for their support.
The church is planning involvement for the school at church in the morning, and we are also planning a VE Day garden party for the afternoon.
There will be a civic service to commemorate VE Day at 5.30pm on Thursday 8th May backed by Barrow Town Council, with civic dignitaries and representatives of the armed forces – air, sea and land. We believe there will be a parade from the town hall to the church where they will be welcomed by the bells as they approach the church.
Finally to follow the service the bells will ring out again for a quarter peal (about 1 hour) that is part of the Nationwide celebrations for the end of the war in Europe (VE Day Bellringing at 6.30pm).
Last week we were delighted to welcome Bishop Rob for the Confirmations of Paula and Hallie.
Please remember them in your prayers as they continue their journey of faith.
Everybody welcome! Please come along and enjoy a service with all your favourite Christmas carols.
Come and join us between 11am and 2pm on Saturday 30th November for our Christmas fair with all kinds of stalls – crafts and gift ideas to food and prizes, and opportunities to tour the tower and ring a bell (up in the tower) and the new ‘Wombel’ (one-bell) simulator at ground floor level.
There’s something for everyone!
Thank you folks, you’re amazing…. we have raised over £1,000 for BBC Children in Need. https://www.justgiving.com/page/a-peal-for-pudsey and there’s still an opportunity for it to increase further until the end of the month!
Bellringers from Cumbrian towers (Barrow, Dalton and Ambleside), Lancashire towers (Kirkby Lonsdale, Bamber Bridge, Nelson) and Yorkshire towers (Pontefract, and Leeds Cathedral) converged on the Parish Church of St Lawrence and St Paul in Pudsey near Bradford/Leeds, leaving as early as 7.15am to get to the church for the 10.30 start.
Pudsey bear cuddly toy watched over us as we rang the bells.
The peal attempt was supposed to take 3 hours, but unfortunately it was unsuccessful after a mistake about 30 or 40 minutes into the peal, and a subsequent quarter peal attempt came undone (literally) when the rope of the heaviest (tenor) bell unravelled its tucks about half way through and an extra metre of rope was whipping around, forcing us to abort the attempt for the safety of the tenor ringer.
The ringing was going really well otherwise and the bells sounded great while it lasted.
Photos from the day are included above, along with videos from outside Pudsey church, and a recording of us practising the first two leads before we started the peal, that we rang to send in to BBC Northwest Tonight (who included a 12 second clip later in the 6.30pm news bulletin … without the sound of the bells at 20:18 into the programme https://www.bbc.co.uk/…/north-west-tonight-evening-news…).
We will have another attempt to successfully ring the peal sometime over the next 12 months, but probably closer to home at St James in Barrow, or another tower in Furness & South Lakeland such as Kirkby-in-Furness or Flookburgh.
Once again, thank you to everyone who donated and wished us luck.
Our tower captain Andy Pollock has organised a full 3 hour peal of a bellringing method called “Pudsey Surprise Major” for BBC Children in Need. It is quite a complicated pattern, and this will be the first time Andy has rung a peal of this particular method. Our young ringer Jayden Milby is also taking part, and other ringers will be converging from Ambleside, Kirkby Lonsdale, and Yorkshire.
The Peal will take place at St Lawrence and St Paul’s church in Pudsey (near Bradford/Leeds) on the morning of BBC’s Children in Need starting 10.30am on Friday 15th November, and won’t finish until after 1.30pm!
Ringing a peal is a really challenging task, and we really want this to be a success for Children in Need, so we would welcome your support in prayers for both a successful peal, and for money raised to reach or surpass the target of £500.
If anyone would like to make a donation that would be wonderful too. The fundraising page for online donations in support of the Peal is given below, with all proceeds going to BBC Children in Need.
https://www.justgiving.com/page/a-peal-for-pudsey
I include a picture of the Pudsey Surprise Major pattern that we will be ringing:
We’ve gone all high-tech to help make donating to St James easier. From this week we’ll be able to take card payments for your donations!
Can’t get into church at the moment, but still want to make a donation?
Follow this link St James ‘MyGiving Online’ Web Link or use your smartphone camera to scan the following QR Code to make a one-off secure payment.
