North Barrow Churches

The notable organ at St James is in urgent need of essential repair with a need to raise £5000 to cover the costs of the repairs.

A crowdfunding page continues to invite donations and has raised almost £1,000 so far (at the start of December 2021)

BAE Systems have just informed us of their marvellous and very generous decision as part of their community investment programme in the year of the Shipyard’s 150th anniversary to contribute £1,500 toward the repair of St James’ organ!

This will take the fundraising to almost 50% of the target for repair to this nationally significant church organ, to preserve it in working order for the benefit of our communities to enjoy for years to come.

We would like to invite and welcome you to our services and events over the Christmas Period.

Events

Christmas Fair
Saturday 4th December between 11am and 2pm
The St James’ Church annual Christmas Fair, with the famous cake stall, raffle, tombola, craft stalls. Hot lunches available.
Christmas Music including the Dalton Town band from 12.30 – 13:15.
Father Christmas will be in attendance from 11am to 1pm. All welcome

‘Christmas Magic‘
Thursday 9th December at 7.30pm
Voce and Special Guests bring you a concert of “Christmas Magic” at St James.
Tickets £10 available on the door which open at 7pm

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Services

There will be the usual Sunday services throughout Advent

Tuesday 14th December (6.30pm)	Carol Service with “Brightly Dawns Our Christmas Day” – A Gilbert & Sullivan Nativity at St James
Friday 24th December (4pm)	Christmas Eve Crib Service for parents with toddlers and young children.
Friday 24th December (11.30pm)	Midnight Mass & Blessing of the Crib at St James Traditional Eucharist with carols and candlelight.
Saturday 25th December (10.30am)	Christmas Day Service will be held at St Francis Family Communion – a shortened act of worship for all ages
Sunday 26th December (10.30am)	Boxing Day Joint Team Eucharist at St James

St James – Sunday 25th July 2021 (ringing approx. 9.30 to 10.30am)

A quarter peal will be attempted on the bells at St James for Service on Sunday 25th July for

Patronal Festival of St James
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_the_Great)

and also to mark the

150th year of the Shipyard in Barrow-in-Furness
(https://www.baesystems.com/en/heritage/barrow-in-furness)

And finally to congratulate Phoebe (bellringer in this quarter peal and Goddaughter of tower captain Andy) who has just graduated with a 1st Class Honours Degree in Project Management.

Private Prayer for the Royal Family in the light of Prince Philip’s death

Dear All, 

St. James will be open for Private Prayer this evening (Friday 9th April 2021) from 18.30-20.00 for any who want to come and pray or light a candle.

Keep safe and happy Easter.

Fr. Jack

This year we have the opportunity to hold some communal worship.

Please feel free to download this booklet to help us journey through this week with readings taken mainly from the Book of the prophet Isaiah, and especially the ‘Songs of the Servant’.

Our worship is as follows: 

Date	Time	Church	Service
Palm Sunday (28 March)	10.30 am	St James	Service of the Word and Communion by Extension
Holy Wednesday (31 March)	10 am	St James	Eucharist
Maundy Thursday (1 April)	10 am	St Francis	‘Palm Sunday on Thursday’ Service of the Word and Communion by Extension
Good Friday (2 April)	2 pm 2.30 pm	St James	Private Prayer Worship at the Cross
Holy Saturday (3 April)	7.30 pm	St Francis	The First Eucharist of Easter
Easter Day (4 April)	10.30 am	St James	The Eucharist for Easter Day

At last there are signs of hope. Many will now have received their first vaccine and locally infection rates are much lower then when we decided to close for Public Worship.

After consultation with the PCC we are reopening this Sunday, Mothering Sunday, 14th March and unless advised, will continue to be open. St. Francis will open this coming Thursday, 18th March, Some will be ready to return but others will still be wary, and that’s fine. Looking at the Government Road map I will be able to visit for Home Communions from 17th May.

I will send out details for Holy Week nearer the time along with Palm Crosses, but the plan is to stream a service for Maundy Thursday, open St. James for Good Friday and celebrate Easter at St. Francis on Saturday evening and St. James at the normal time on Easter Day.

Restrictions still apply with social distancing and face masks, no congregational singing and choir limited to three! I don’t foresee that we will be able to sing until restrictions end, but hopefully I will be proved wrong.

Looking ahead, weddings only slowly increase numbers allowed – at present still 6, and afternoon baptisms can restart with a maximum of 30 from 17th May. If any of you have family or neighbours asking about weddings and Baptisms please pass this information on.

News around town is that Revd. Robin Ham is now priest-in-charge of St. Pauls as well as minister in charge of Grace Church. Jonathan Elvey has been licensed as a reader based at St. Mary, Walney. We are still stretched with the interregnum at Walney and Barrow Island, and Fr. Carl is still unwell and unable to minister across the South Barrow team.

In this are the materials for the Vision Refresh Lent Course.

Keep safe

Fr. Jack.

A single bell at St James will toll 100 times on Saturday 27th February in honour of Captain Sir Tom Moore and to mark the day of his funeral.

Shortly after 12 Noon on 27/02/2021

St James bell to toll 100 times in memory of Captain Sir Tom Moore

The funeral for Captain Sir Tome Moore will be a private family service, so there have been calls from Bishops and the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers, for churches across the county to mark the occasion by tolling a bell 100 times on Saturday, 27 February suggesting a time of around 12 noon.

Immediately after the clock chime and Angelus at noon, the tenor (heaviest bell) will be rung up, and then after 2 minutes silence, the tenor bell will be tolled 100 times in memory of Captain Sir Tom Moore, who is held in such esteem and affection across the world.

Captain Sir Tom Moore’s fundraising, kindness and words of optimism have touched many of us. We hope this small act of tolling a bell can remind anyone that hears the bell, of this lovely gentleman, his fundraising, pride and care for the NHS; his wish to combat loneliness; and his positive outlook and hope for the country and everyone beyond the Covid-19 pandemic.

May he rest in peace, and his family and friends find comfort in the love from so many people.

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Note: The ringing of a single bell has been approved by Fr Jack Knill-Jones and will be conducted observing appropriate Covid measures for hands-face-space when accessing the tower.

Owen Osmotherley, a regular bellringer at St James from neighbouring Dalton St Mary’s has sent a copy of a line drawing he completed in 2020

Talented, and looks impressive enough to compete with Alfred Wainwright’s picture on Alfred Wainwright page. Click on the image above to see full size to appreciate the detail.

Sadly we can’t get together for our usual Pancake Party – and I’m sure that you are all going to miss the quiz that I used to set!

I’d hate for you to miss out so I’ve produced a word quiz for you.

As it’s just before Lent and we’re all celebrating Collop Monday, Pancake Tuesday and Ash Wednesday then the answers to the definitions below all contain either the letters COL, PAN or ASH.

No prizes and I’ll give out the answers next week. And if you enjoy the quiz then let me know and I’ll come up with another one.

Stay Safe,

Shelagh

1.	Not black & white	(6)
2.	Similar to a marrow or pumpkin	(6)
3.	To walk in a confident, relaxed, hip-swinging manner	(6)
4.	The study of bells	(11)
5.	A small woodwind instrument	(7)
6.	Dark, milk & white	(9)
7.	Gun Dog	(7)
8.	Tube that launches small projectiles by blowing	(10)
9.	A chronic sleep disorder	(10)
10.	Buttons, zips, needles, thread & ribbons etc	(12)
11.	To make larger	(6)
12.	A person or pet with whom you spend a lot of time together	(9)
13.	Clean with water	(4)
14.	An English county	(12)
15.	African Lily	(10)
16.	Shy	(7)
17.	Women’s loose trousers fitting tightly at the ankle	(10)
18.	Young Horse	(4)
19.	Mechanical linkage for scaling drawings up or down	(10)
20.	A confused or badly organised mixture	(8)

Dear All,

Zoom coffee is as usual (see below for details).

Ash Wednesday

We will be streaming a Service for Ash Wednesday onto Facebook this Wednesday at 7.30pm which as usual will be available from then on. A service sheet is available on the church webpage.

Lent Groups

Lent study groups: The Mission Community will be running two weekly Zoom ‘Lent Gatherings’ across the Mission Community which look at the Vision Refresh. These will run on Tuesday afternoons and Wednesday evenings.

We’d love people to sign-up in advance to these so that we can plan for numbers and break-out rooms. The sessions will be a mix of ‘altogether time’ (interviews, presentations, sung worship/prayers) and ‘Break out rooms’ for Bible-study.

The themes for the first three weeks are : God for All (Introduction), Speak Boldly and Follow Daily.

Bishop Emma has now published notes for the Bible-study groups, which we’ll use, but you may like to take a look: https://www.godforall.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Vision-Refresh-Lent-Group-Materials.pdf

The signup is through this link and this will be how people receive the Zoom links too.

https://forms.gle/gedCBtmLAFomEvef8

Sunday Zoom coffee and chat – from 12 noon

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us04web.zoom.us/j/73169539003?pwd=RlFmQ21KanNibVJUQzNmZDBIZkJDQT09

Meeting ID: 731 6953 9003
Passcode: 8tbsn5

Fr. Jack