Monthly Magazine and Events, January 2012

Dear friends

It is encouraging to know that Emmanuel!  That is, that God is with us even in 2012! Here are some dates for January:

19th, Thursday, 7.30 – 9pm: Oldham Reaching Muslims at St Thomas’ Vestry.

21st, Saturday, 7.15: Interchurch Quiz – details in Notices.  Booking deadline: 15th.

22nd, Sunday, 10.30: Morning Worship led by the Revd Rick Preston of Oldham 

          Baptist Church.  I will leading worship them.

29th, Sunday, 10.30: A Service for Wholeness and Healing.

                        6.15: Evening Worship in Farsi led by the Revd Omid Moludy

The above dates will have reminded you that 18 – 25 January is the annual International Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.  Aswell as the Interchurch Quiz and the ‘pulpit swap’, I have decided to remind you of the opportunity to focus our private prayers on Christian Unity. The theme for this year’s Week comes to us from the churches in Poland. The writers of the material for prayer remind us ‘of the many times that Poland was invaded, the partitions, oppression by foreign powers and hostile systems.  The constant striving to overcome all enslavement and the desire for freedom are features of Polish history which have led to significant changes in the life of the nation … As we pray for and strive towards the full unity of the church we – and the traditions to which we belong – will be changed, transformed and conformed to the likeness of Christ.  The unity for which we pray may require the renewal of forms of Church life with which we are familiar.  This is an exciting vision but it may fill us with fear!’

Click here for this month's Mission News

Readings and prayers for eight days

These are all printed in the hard copy of this magazine.  (If you are reading online, they can be found on www.ctbi.org.uk/570 Look for WPCU Cover, Welcome and Daily Reflections.) The theme is being changed – by serving, waiting, suffering, struggling, peacemaking, loving, feeding, and uniting. Most of us won’t be able to follow this everyday from 18th January through to the 25th, but do keep going after days when you’ve missed, however long it takes. Andrew Dawson

Christian Funerals

‘For I am convinced that neither death nor life … nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord’ – St Paul to the Christians in Rome 8, 38 – 39.

4 January                              Harold Lees             94 years

6 January                    William John Allison          85 years