One year on - but there will still be Holy Week

 I’ve been looking at the March 2020 issue of this Parish Magazine. We’d had to put in extra pages to cover all the things we were planning from celebrations of Mothering Sunday and St. Cuthbert’s Day, Messy Church and Mothers’ Union, plans for coffee mornings, lots of Annual Reports in preparation for Annual Meetings, and a wonderful rhythm of meeting, prayer and worship as we continued our way through Lent to Holy Week and Easter. Then abruptly with the first pandemic Lockdown it all had to stop. I celebrated the Eucharist alone on Mothering Sunday - and after that even clergy were told we couldn’t go into church to pray…

A year on, three Lockdowns and 125,000 deaths later, we’re again in the season of Lent. There are hopes of a return to some sort of normality. With the rollout of the vaccines and the publication of the Government’s “Roadmap” not only are people talking again of meeting with loved ones and even of going on holiday, but my phone is ringing as people look at the possibility of baptizing their children or marrying a partner.   For now I have to advise caution. Do go ahead with your hopes and planning - but see what is really important in them, perhaps what will need to be done with fewer people - recognise the central truths these sacraments proclaim.

As I write, we have suspended public services of worship - and the Bishop of Durham has written this morning to extend his dispensation allowing this up to 12^th April. That’s after Easter. I’m hopeful that we might be “back in church” before then - but that will require a decision on the part of our Church Councils based on careful risk assessment. Watch this space!

Lent has so often been thought of as a season of “giving things up.” The fact is we’ve all had to give up so much during the last year. The great thing about Lent is that it comes to an end; and its point is to get us to that end, to point us to Christ’s Passion, Death & Resurrection which we reach at Easter. Easter is a date that will come regardless. The Resurrection is a truth to celebrate wherever we may be. For now patience is more than ever required - but with it there is hope!                

Martin Jackson

These words are from the March issue of our Parish Magazine - click here to find our online edition