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Benefice of Woodhill

Rector: Alison Way

The Rectory

Wood Street,

Clyffe Pypard,

Wilts,

SN4 7PY

alisonway@tiscali.co.uk,

01793 739044

MONTHLY MESSAGE FROM THE VICAR

February 2012

It is gratifying to see the hours of daylight gently increasing, particularly at the end of the day and by the end of this month I am looking forward to it being light until at least 6pm.

The increasing moments of daylight each day visibly reminds us that time is always moving on. As we travel onwards this month – we reach the church’s annual time of preparation for Easter, which begins on Ash Wednesday on 22nd February. Do come to our special benefice communion at St Peter’s Clyffe Pypard at 7:30pm that day, as this is a great way to get started with Lent and to be reassured of God’s amazing forgiveness.

In our services in Lent we will be thinking about the key themes of proclaiming the gospel, worship, service, solidarity and confidence, all of which should be visible in our hearts and our lives as Christians. As a part of Lent discipline this year, each of the churches will be having a communion service using the Book of Common prayer, so do watch out for that.

The first one is on Sunday 26th February at 9:15am in St Lawrence’s Hilmarton – with the ones in other three churches of the benefice following along in March.

Also in March we are hoping to have Lent groups meeting weekly across the benefice looking at our key themes and using the Old Testament story of the Israelites in their wilderness and desert times, after they had escaped from Egypt and before they reached the promised land. We will be using a Bible Reading Fellowship Lent book entitled – The Way of the Desert by Bishop Andrew Watson to help us with this (ISBN 978 1 84101 798 3), but you do not have to read the book to participate in a group.

Details of the groups will be in the churches by mid-February and in the March village newsletters.

With love in Christ, Alison Way,