Dear People & Friends of St. Clements,

I promised in my ‘Weekly Message’ last week, that this week I would set out the complete programme for St. Clement’s from now until the year end. I’m pleased to be able to write that I am fulfilling my promise as you will see in the latest Info Page in the right-hand side bar. There are still one or two i’s to dot and t’s to cross, but dates & times should remain unchanged. Therefore please use the page to put events into your diary now, or print it out and put it alongside your calendar.

Some words of explanation…….

Sundays

There will continue to be our regular Eucharist at 11.00 each Sunday Morning. This coming Sunday 20th November, we shall celebrate Christ the King, marking the last Sunday of the Church Liturgical Year.

Tuesdays

Our regular meetings for study, discussion and fellowship resume on Tuesday 22nd November between 6.30-8.00pm in the small meeting room on the first floor of Klimentská 18. As we are about to complete one Church Liturgical Year & start another one on Advent Sunday, our topic will be the Church Liturgical Year, how it came into being, how it works etc. This really follows on from our earlier sessions on Anglicanism, and will hopefully be of particular interest to those of you who come from a Free Church background where only Christmas and Easter tend to be celebrated. Having said that, there are many Anglicans who don’t understand why Advent begins on a different date each year or why Easter Day is a moveable feast!

The following Tuesday 29th November, I shall try and give an explanation as to the origin of the Revised Common Lectionary, the three year cycle of Bible Readings that we use each Sunday. Again this is timely as we move from Year A to Year B on Sunday 27th November. If you don’t understand that last sentence it’s a very good reason to come along :-)

Thursdays

On Sunday 23rd October when we celebrated Bible Sunday, in my sermon I commented that the Bible was the “Most popular unread book in the world”, a remark greeted with much laughter! I’m very pleased to be able to tell you that David Hellam has agreed to tackle the problem. He is going to run a three week course entitled ‘How to Read the Bible’, the first session entitled ‘Read it’, the second ‘Study it‘ & the third ‘Apply it’. It will be on Thursday evenings commencing on Thursday 24th November – 7.00 – 8.30pm at his home Námesti Interbrigády 949/3, Prague 6.

The evenings will follow the same format as the Christian Basics course in September & October with a shared meal, followed by a talk, followed by discussion. I’ll get David to say a few words on Sunday during our worship but in the meantime, if you want to know more, contact David david (at) hellam (dot) net or 722 223 097. If the Bible is a closed book to you or you don’t really know where to start, I strongly encourage you to come along on the next three Thursday evenings.

Ethics at Lunchtime

Our next joint event in conjunction with the British Chamber of Commerce in the Czech Republic will be on Thursday 1st December – 12.30-14.00 Bellevue Restaurant, Smetanovo nábřeží 18, Prague 1.

In the light of the coming Christmas season putting a spotlight on charity – and the ongoing questions about certain Eurozone countries subsidizing others – the question for discussion will be “Overseas versus Local Aid – Should charity begin at home?”

The cost of a two course lunch including a non-alcoholic drink is CZK 390 & to register to attend go here which also has full details of the menu!

Christmas Carol Services

Our traditional service of Lessons & Carols will be on Sunday 11th December at 6.00pm. As well as this service, this year there are two other Christmas Carol Services being organised.

As was briefly mentioned by Richard York & Gordon Truefit in Church last Sunday, there are plans for an ecumenical Family Christmas Carols Event on the afternoon of Saturday 10th December, probably at St. Clement’s (at this point of writing I’m awaiting confirmation of Church availability) and commencing at 4pm. Confirmation of the exact details will follow in next week’s message, in Church on Sunday & via our website.

A totally new venture is that on the evening of Sunday 18th December at 6.00pm, we are going to hold a service of Lessons & Carols in Brno. We have a venue, appropriately called the Bethlehem Chapel, and I have a local coordinator, a wonderful English-speaking Czech lady called Katka. Several people who already know about this, have expressed an interest in coming to Brno with me to support this venture. If others are interested in doing so, please speak with me in the next couple of weeks. We shall probably travel down and back by train. I’m hoping that from this service, to establish regular English-language Anglican worship in Brno, initially on a once a month basis from January 2012.

Christmas Eve & Christmas Day

This year is every clergyman or clergywoman’s delight – Christmas Day falls on a Sunday!!! As you will see in the latest Info Page in the right-hand side bar, there will be a Midnight Eucharist on Christmas Eve commencing at 11.30pm. Then on Christmas Day, there will be Family Eucharist at our usual Sunday timeslot of 11.00am.

And finally for this week…..

Don’t forget that our St. Clement’s Christmas Cards will once more be available for sale in Church this Sunday. And if you are about to do some Christmas shopping, don’t forget our Amazon.co.uk & Amazon.com links on our website or by clicking here

Best wishes

Ricky