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Samaritans Purse

A SHOEBOX STORY FROM LAST YEAR’S SUCCESSFUL CAMPAIGN

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Climbing the stairs to the little flat we were visiting seemed to take forever. The stairwell was dark, dingy and depressing. But walking through the door of the flat we met a huge contrast. It was not a large flat but you could feel the love, joy and life in that little home. Maria is an incredible woman who gives her life daily for her eleven adopted children and one child of her own. Four of her adopted children are already grown and two of them are away studying medicine (though they still come home regularly for food as they cannot afford to feed themselves). The other two are still living at home at the moment and help their mum with the eight younger children. As we gave out shoeboxes to these children there was so much joy in the room – each child excitedly showing the others what they had got and each of them genuinely showing an interest in what their siblings had received. Leena (9) is a quiet girl with cerebral palsy whose own family was not able to cope with her disability. But here she is a loved part of a family and there was a look of simple happiness on her face. She opened her own box and enjoyed exploring her gifts but for her the real pleasure seemed to be in admiring her sister’s boxes and enjoying with them the treasures which they had received.

Book Club

The Vicar Writes

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“Christ is Risen.”

We met on a grey, cold evening to light our fire.   The flames soon got going, and began to scatter the darkness of the night sky.   We blessed the fire, and then our paschal candle was lit from its flames.    Carrying the candle high, we then entered a darkened Church and proclaimed at the top of our voices:  Christ is Risen!

The Church was soon lit up as light was passed from light, candle to candle, all taken from the great paschal candle.     We saw before our eyes a visual demonstration of how Easter works.   Easter spreads.  It burns up the night, and just a tiny Easter flame gets rid of a whole lot of darkness.

That’s how we celebrated our first part of Easter in S. David’s and S. Timothy’s, and for us, that celebration just keeps on going.  Easter is a fifty day season which lasts right up to Pentecost.  We are now in Eastertide, which takes up a seventh of the Church’s year.

We need such a long time to keep celebrating it, because our eyes and hearts have a very un-Easter default setting.   A lot of the time, our horizons are stuck sometime between Good Friday to Holy Saturday, and that’s very understandable.  It’s not as if these things aren’t real; it’s not as if spectacularly bad things don’t often happen to very good people.

The Christian knows this.  She knows that the darkness in this world is indeed very great.  It’s just that she refuses to live by it, be defined by it or be ruled by it.

The Christian knows the dangerous, subversive truth that darkness, sadness, addiction, separation, pain –even death itself, doesn’t get to have the last word.    Jesus has risen, Easter has landed, and so the last word is always going to be spoken by Love.   The personal reality of Jesus’ risen presence in our lives convicts us of this living truth.

With a mischievous sense of joy, a Christian is therefore someone who goes around lighting fires.   Our faith commands it.     With faith in the Risen one, we light fires of hope and love in dark places, spreading the truth that the message of Easter means the victory of life for all of God’s children.

We are children of the resurrection.   That means more than believing that Jesus rose from the dead.  It means trusting in our daily lives that this is true, and allowing that truth to burn our fears, our anguish, our sorrows.

May the Light of the Risen One keep burning in you.

 

Fr. Jesse

Final Logo

Pathwayz Report

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Word on the Street: Pathwayz Update

 

In everything you do, work with all your heart, as you are working for the Lord and not for other masters. It is from God that you will receive your reward. It is God you are serving.

Colossians 3:23-24

Having left Camelot behind, Pathwayz has gone back in time to ANCIENT GREECE!!! It is the year 776 BC and we are inventing the Olympics. Each week, we will be learning about what makes a good athlete and are focusing on Performance, Responsibility, Pride, Unity and Respect.

 

In our first week back, we met Zeus, a toga-wearing Ancient Greek who welcomed us to Olympia. He taught us all about the 100m sprint and how important it is to try your best. We made our own athlete’s vest with the verse ‘Do you not know that in a race all the runners run but only one gets the prize? Run so you may win!’ (1 Corinthians 9:24) and had our own little sprint races to see which one of us was the fastest. We talked about people on television who might be trying their best and winning (such as Usain Bolt, the Welsh rugby team and JLS) and those who may be trying their best but having some difficulties (such as Cardiff City or Liverpool (sorry to any of you who are fans!)). Finally we talked about all the things we could try our best at this term: making tea for Mum, tidying all our toys away, doing our homework or working hard at rugby and gymnastics. We learnt that it is always important to try your best – and usually we can always try just that little bit more!

 

In our second week, we met Olympia, a lovely toga-wearing friend of Zeus, who taught us all about the marathon. We discovered how important it is in a race of 26 miles to keep going and stick with difficult things. We made little men with movable arms and legs with the verse ‘Press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize’ (Philippians 3:14) and wrote down things which we find really difficult such as behaving ourselves and handwriting! We competed against each other in little endurance tests such as squatting against the wall, holding a heavy object and not-blinking and played a game involving a bar of chocolate, a knife and fork and a pair of socks! We learnt how important it is to endure difficult things, to keep going when we find things hard, and how wonderful we feel when we finally succeed!

 

As we continue to learn how to be good Olympians, we hope to learn our new song, ‘One Way’ by Hillsong. The middle passage, which involves quite complicated actions!, has our kids singing ‘He is the Way, the Truth and the Life, we see by faith and not by sight’. It is hard to explain the emotion felt by our leaders when we see twenty-five children singing this back to us at the end of our sessions but any stress, bad feelings or frustrations you might be dealing with on any given Tuesday melt away.

 

Finally, our new memory verse, taken from St Paul’s letter to the Colossians, teaches us to work with all our heart. At Pathwayz, we try our hardest to provide for the kids of Caerau and to give them an hour and a half of fun, friends and God. We ask that you continue to pray for us, the club and our children, and to help us serve God in any way you can.

Film Society

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The Parish Film Society are organising a showing of Stardust on Saturday 19th May at 6pm at St Timothy’s. There will be a donation of £2 each which includes hot chocolate and popcorn,

Folly Farm

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There is a Parish trip to Folly Farm on Saturday 18th August leaving at 8.30am. Coach fare of £8 to be paid upon booking. Please see the churchwardens for further information.

Pentecost Picnic

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The Pentecost Picnic follows a joint Parish Mass at St Timothy’s on Sunday 27th May.

Pilmrimage to the Shrine of Our Lady of Penrhys

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The pilmrimage to the Shrine of Our Lady of Penrhys is happening on Saturday 12th May at Rhondda Fach Sports Centre, Tylorstwon, starting at 12 noon.

Feast of the Ascension

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The Feast of the Ascension is on Thurs 17th May. There will be a sung mass at St Timothy’s at 6.00pm.

Book Club

Book Club

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The next meeting of the book club is on Sunday 22nd April at 12 Thompson Avenue, Victoria Park. The book the group is discussing is the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.

Sponsoring of the Sanctuary Lamp

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If you would like to sponsor a lamp in memory of a loved one please write down the name and date of the anniversary and give it to a church warden along with the cost of £4 for each candle.

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