Dear St Mary’s 

What a moving and joyful baptism we had last week  – it was a blessing to worship with you. 

This Sunday, we celebrate Christ the King, marking the end of one Church year and preparing for a new one. At 9am, Revd Vanessa Conant preaches and presides and at 10.30am Revd Jacintha Danaswamy leads our intergenerational service with Revd Vanessa Conant preaching. 

If you haven’t joined us for our intergenerational service, held every fourth Sunday of the month at 10.30am, it is a simple liturgy with hymns, songs, a reflection and prayers and our children help to lead us in worship. This Sunday, we will also celebrate the baptism of Robyn Waddelow and look forward to celebrating with her and her family. We hope you will join us. 

At 6pm, there is evening prayer in the church to which all are welcome. 

This Wednesday 29th November at 6.30pm: Celebrating 25 years of TELCO and No Vespers

It’s not too late to join us for a celebration of 25 years of community organising in East London.  From the Living Wage to affordable housing, youth safety to refugee action, Citizens in East London has been a force for positive change in the last 25 years. On 29 November at 6.30pm, we will celebrate all that’s taken place and all that is to come. The event is free and takes place at the ExCel centre. However, you can travel with a group of us from church (we will be leaving from the church at 5.30pm sharp!) or meet us at the centre for an evening of positive and hopeful community action. There is a free creche for babies and toddlers and accessible parking for anyone who needs it. Sign up to join us here.  Please let us know if you intend to come so that we know to wait for you or to look for you at the event. 

Join our community Christmas choir and sing with us at Carols by Candlelight

Do you join our Christmas choir every year? Have you always wanted to join a choir but never have time? Come and be part of our community Christmas choir this year and sing at our Carols by Candlelight service on Sunday 17th December. We have two rehearsals on Friday 8th (Welcome Centre) and Friday 15th December (in St Mary’s) and then a rehearsal on Sunday afternoon before the service. You will be sent the music and parts to learn at home and anyone is welcome. Feel free to invite friends and family too. Sign up here to join. 

Join a Christmas Team – we need you!

St Mary’s loves celebrating Christmas and we host many events and services to welcome our community to the building and to hear the good news of Jesus Christ. You’ll see our banners are up and our flyers are out. We can only make this happen with an army of people! Getting involved with Christmas services is a great way to meet others and get to know more people in the church. You can also try out an area of church life and see if it’s something you’d like to be involved in. Sign up via this link to support one of our Christmas services.

Community Carolling: join us around Walthamstow to sing

We’re taking our Carols outside again this year and there are three opportunities to join in with community carol singing: 

• 17th December – After church, join St Luke’s for carols at the top of the High Street.
• 20th December at 6pm – Carols on the Drive and Attlee Terrace (meet on the green space at the end of The Drive for hot chocolate and Christmas carols)
• 20th December at 7.30pm – Join St Gabriel’s for Carols on the Square near the Co-op and the library on Wood Street. 

News from St Luke’s

We wanted to share some news from our sister church, St Luke’s. After 16 years on the Farmers’ Market – the 17th December will be St Luke’s final stall with Carols on the Market until 2pm. The community of St Luke’s will continue to meet on Wednesday evenings for Bible study and once a month to eat together. On 28th January at 4pm, we will be holding a service of thanksgiving at St Mary’s to celebrate all that has happened through the market and you are warmly invited. And after this, a new period of discernment as to where God is calling us in this new season and praying especially for the High Street and the surrounding streets and how we serve this part of our parish. Please join us to give thanks for the ministry of St Luke’s and consider whether you might like to be part of the future discernment. 

Donations Needed: Warm Hats and Gloves

Did you know that Waltham Forest College runs an amazing coat and warm clothes bank for the many students who are struggling this winter? With rising numbers of students facing homelessness and the real challenges of the cost of living crisis, we have been invited to donate winter hats and gloves for students in need. You can bring them to church on Sunday and we will pass them to the college. 

New members of the team 

Please join us in welcoming new staff members:

John Chambers joins us as Premises Manager. John brings a wealth of experience from his career as a plumber, electrician and engineer. His role is to help us manage, maintain and repair the buildings of this Parish. He is already making a difference through his repairs to St Gabriel’s and the Welcome Centre and we are grateful for him.

Louise Wallis has joined us as Events Administrator to help us with our events hires and bookings and to develop our work and ministry in this area. Louise brings huge experience of working with others to animate buildings and build relationships – we’re thrilled to have her as part of the team.

Coming up at Christmas in our building

We’re pleased to welcome a number of choirs to our building in the coming weeks for some beautiful concerts.

• Norrsang Choir (the East London Swedish Choir) host their much-loved Sankta Lucia concerts at St Mary’s. With beautiful music, an abundance of candles and Swedish gluhwein, it’s a special event for all ages. There are tickets remaining for the Friday night concert (7-8pm) and Saturday night concert (8-9pm). Follow this link to book tickets and find out more.
  
• London Forest Choir. Our own Jonathan Rathbone directs the wonderful Forest Choir and each year they hold a remarkable Christmas extravaganza concert with both choir and orchestra. Not to be missed – you can find out more and book tickets here.

EcoTip of the Week

If you’re thinking of having a more sustainable Christmas, you might like the hierarchy of ethical gifts! In order from most to least sustainable, this model suggests you give:

• Memories (experiences, memberships) 
• Your time (vouchers to help or sharing your skills) 
• Upcycle (repurpose or improve something) 
• Buy second-hand 
• Make 
• Buy ethically 
• Buy 

Please pray: 

• Please pray for baby Robyn as she is baptised this Sunday and for her parents, Paula and Matt
• Please pray for Elin, Elliot and Grace as they prepare for baptism on 3rd December 
• Please pray for the team of St Luke’s as they prepare for the final stall on the Farmers’ Market and enter a new season of discernment
• Please pray for our Advent and Christmas services that many will come to know the love of God 
• Please pray for the safe release of hostages in Israel and for a cessation of bloodshed in Gaza 
• Please pray for the night shelter and all who are homeless, remembering especially refugees being made homeless in our area 

Reflection 

Today is Thanksgiving in the United States. In our half-American household, we have celebrated differently over the years – sometimes missing the day entirely, sometimes grateful for the gracious hospitality of others, always soothing the pain of distance with video calls to loved ones. 

The mythologized Thanksgiving is difficult, of course. Few historians would agree that the first Thanksgiving was indeed a meal of warm conviviality between the Pilgrim settlers and the indigenous community who welcomed them. For the Wampanoag people, the tribe who first encountered the pilgrims, the reality of the European arrivals was disease, land grabs and ultimately the devastation of war. 

If we can own that history, acknowledge, grieve and repent of it, perhaps there is still something valuable in a holiday dedicated to gratefulness and gratitude. For a culture where consumerism runs wild, Thanksgiving remains focused on people and place and not stuff. Meals, games, times around the table and, at the heart of it, a moment or a corporate acknowledgement of blessing or goodness. 

The monk David Steindl-Rast has spoken and written about how the practice of gratitude infused through daily life, can transform our hearts and the world about us. He says: 

“Gratefulness can change our world in immensely important ways. If you’re grateful, you’re not fearful. If you’re not fearful, you’re not violent. The grateful act out of a sense of enough, not scarcity, so they are willing to share. It’s a nonviolent revolution that even revolutionises the concept of revolution. Grateful people are joyful people; the more joyful people are, the more we’ll have a joyful world.

There are many times where Scripture invites us into gratitude. In the letter to the Colossians, St Paul writes: ‘So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.’ 

This is not a Pollyanna-ish gratitude where we pretend that there is nothing harmful in the world, neither is it gratitude for things which wound and destroy. Instead it is a gentle awareness of the gift of the present moment, the gift of life and breath and the opportunity to love and to serve, even in times of struggle. 

I imagine for most of us, this day will be like any other Thursday. I pray that there may be a moment for you, however brief, where you notice and attend to those things and people and the love of God for which you are thankful and that this will bring you joy. 

Happy Thanksgiving. 

With love 
Vanessa