Following our Good Friday service of meditation and reflection many of our congregation joined the Combined Churches of Beaumaris for the Walk of Witness. This is an event in which we have participated for over 30 years and is an opportunity to witness our faith with all the other Beaumaris Churches. St Martins hosted the fourth and fifth stations. Morning tea of hot cross buns and a cuppa followed the final station at St Michael’s.
The Passion Of Jesus in Word and Song was the theme for the Palm Sunday Service. The choir had prepared for this service over 3 evening rehearsals with a final polish on the morning of the service. We would like to express our thanks to the choir for their hard work in creating this uplifting experience for us. Our special thanks go to Geoff Hinde for his patient and thoughtful leadership, to those family and friends who have augmented the choir and to Luke Drohan – our pianist for rehearsal and performance, as well as to all the readers. We all enjoyed the morning tea afterwards.
The Annual General Meeting of the Beaumaris Uniting Church will be held following the 9:30am service on Sunday 5th May 2019.
The 2018 Annual Report will be delivered and spoken to by Chairperson of the Church Council, Jenny Small and the Treasurer, Margaret Thorburn.
Pancake night at the Beaumaris Uniting Church – St. Martins was held on Sunday 3rd March from 5 – 8pm. In spite of the high 30 degree temperatures we had a healthy gathering of people. Some people enjoyed a picnic tea of fish and chips but everyone enjoyed the pancakes served as dessert with a range of fruit toppings and ice-cream plus a wide choice of drinks. All age groups enjoyed playing quoits on the lawn and as the cool change arrived many of the participants moved outside to sit and enjoy the live music. It was a great opportunity for chatting and catching up on peoples’ news at leisure. We were delighted to be joined by our friends from St Michael’s and All Angels down the road on this festive occasion. We are thrilled that the $370 raised will be donated to Uniting Care Families in Crisis.
Michele Weckman led off a lively discussion to start the year.
After reading the book “The Land Before The Avocado” by Richard Glover, Michele was led to explore the topic “Fifty Years On, Is Life Better for Everyone?” and the article written by Jessica Irvine. In this article she discusses the New Year’s Eve ritual of making a resolution to make the coming year better than the last. But it’s also an interesting time to reflect on the question of whether life is, in fact, getting better.
We all read the article and enthusiastically talked about things that were better and worse. We could have covered many more issues re the pros and cons of this question but as always we left with much to reflect upon.
Our last Friday Morning Discussion Group of the year was held as a coffee and chat at the Ginger Fox Cafe in the Beaumaris Concourse on Friday 7th December.
We had a loose discussion on the “History of the Twelve Days of Christmas”, followed by the reading of the ode “My Twelve Days of Christmas” to strains of hilarity and well understood nods of agreement, as each day was described. I don’t know where this article came from but we present it here for you to enjoy – or keep till next December.
>> “The History of the Twelve Days of Christmas”
>> “My Twelve Days of Christmas
The service of Carols and Readings held on Sunday 16th December 2018 was several months in the planning. First came the task of choosing carols and readings and then over the month leading up to the service there were intensive weekly practices.
Our service was based on the the Christmas Eve “Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols” introduced at King’s College, Cambridge in 1918. Whilst not all the readings from King’s have been used, ours were selected from them and from those used in the Advent Carol Services at King’s, John’s and Trinity Colleges. In choosing we have sought to create a dialogue between the carols in the service. Our thanks go to all the readers and singers, particularly the friends and family from outside the congregation who have augmented The St Martins Singers.
Our choir of 20 sang in full voice and the performance was followed keenly by the congregation and enjoyed immensely.
A special thank you to Geoff Hinde for his patient and inspiring leadership of our music and to Rosa Hwang our accompanist.
>> Photographs of the Choir in full voice can be viewed here
On Friday 7th December approximately 40 members of the Church Congregation met at the Church Hall for a wonderful gathering of fellowship, friendship and fine food. It was extra pleasing to see some old faces join us for the evening.
All families contributed salads and desserts to enjoy along with the barbecued chickens, chips and quiches on offer.
A wonderful array of desserts tempted the palates and wastelines of those enjoying the evening.
Singing of Christmas carols with Geoff Hinde conducting and our wonderful pianist Janette Barklamb enthusiastically leading the group.
Many thanks to Wendy Hinde for her hard work organising this much loved annual event on the church calendar and we look forward to a repeat next year.
Our church’s latest Mission involves working with the Beaumaris Community Branch of the Bendigo Bank to place an “EMPTY” Christmas Tree at the bank for gifts and non-perishable food items to be placed under by members of our local community. This proved to be an extremely successful mission. These goods were delivered to Family Life in Cheltenham for distribution to members of our community who are facing tough times in the lead up to the Festive Season. Thanks to Wendy Hinde for donating the tree, decorations and tub for goods, Alison Davies for the art work and communication with the bank and Graeme McLean for transporting the three loads of items to the delighted staff at Family Life. This was a wonderful community collaboration – we supplied the flyers, posters and tree and the bank spread the word, firstly by emailing all of the Concourse Traders. The traders were extremely generous and Bruce Edmunds and Associates put it out on social media, which in turn encouraged local people to donate. The response was overwhelming and the bank will continue to have a tub for non-perishable food items in the bank on a permanent basis. The bank staff were enthusiastic and loved encouraging their customers to participate and explaining what it was all about.
We will certainly be doing this again next year with our Community Bank and will start in mid-November.
