Dear People & Friends of St. Clements,
As we approach the most important and significant weekend in the Christian Year, a reminder again of our forthcoming services.
Tonight – Maundy Thursday – 21st April at 7.00pm – Sung Eucharist
This evening, we shall commemorate the Last Supper and the institution of what we know as Holy Communion or the Eucharist. The Gospel Reading from John 13, also tells of how Jesus washed the disciple’s feet & gave a new commandment, ‘mandatum’ in Latin which is the origin of the term ‘Maundy’, to “love one another as I have loved you”. At the end of the service, the altar will be stripped and we shall hear of how Jesus went to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray to his Father in heaven.
Good Friday – 22nd April at 7.30pm – Service of the Word
A service of readings, prayers & hymns to reflect upon the passion and death of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Please note the different starting times of these two evening services. This is because our host congregation do not have a service on Maundy Thursday evening but do have an earlier service at 6.00pm on Good Friday evening.
Easter Day – Sunday 24th April at 11am – Sung Eucharist
Please join us to celebrate Jesus, risen from the dead! Please also be ready to welcome the many visitors who are likely to be joining us for woship whilst enjoying a long weekend in Prague. The service will be followed by Coffee Hour in the hall on the third floor of Klimentská 18.
Easter Week – Monday 25th – Saturday 30th April
As recommended by our Anglican Diocesan Bishop, I shall be taking the inside of next week off as annual leave. However, I will have the Chaplaincy mobile (737 039 082) with me should there be a case of urgent pastoral need & I shall also still check my email regularly. And I will be working on the morning of Friday 29th April – let me explain.
As I’m sure most of you are aware, their is a rather important wedding taking place in Westminster Abbey on Friday 29th April. Czech TV are devoting most of the day to broadcasting the Royal Wedding & have invited me to appear in the first part of their coverage between 09.00 – 11.00 that morning. They want to interview me to explain all about the Anglican Church and the Anglican Marriage Service. It is another wonderful opportunity to make St. Clement’s more widely known & I would value your prayers as I’ve only ever been interviewed for TV once before in the whole of my life.
Looking ahead
Sunday 1st May at 11am – Sung Eucharist for the Second Sunday of Easter
Children’s Ministry will resume and the service will again be followed by Coffee Hour.
Our next Ethics at Lunchtime, a joint event organized by St. Clement’s and the British Chamber of Commerce in the ČR, will be on Thursday 12th May at 12.30pm. It will take place in a new venue, the Monastery Restaurant, Augustine Hotel, Letenská 12/33, Mala Strana. The topic for discussion will be:
‘Are environmental care and profitable business mutually exclusive’
Everyone is welcome but each person will be responsible for paying the Monastery Restaurant for their own lunch (390CZK per person for a two course set menu including coffee, petit fours and one non-alcoholic beverage). This time the set menu will be Minted green pea soup with Prague Ham for starter and the main will be Ox Cheek braised in St. Thomas Beer and mashed potato. Registration for the event is via the BCC website
Church Council
The new Church Council met for the first time on Monday 11th April. As part of a desire to more widely communicate with the congregation, your Church Council intends to seek to provide a regular update as to what it has been doing on your behalf. So here is the first update/summary of our meeting
– Appointments: Steve Entwistle as Secretary, David Hellam as Representative for Children, Young People & Vulnerable Adults, Richard York as Lay Vice-Chairman. The position of Treasurer will be divided into discrete responsibilities to be carried out for the moment by two CC members and possibly further delegated in future.
– Midweek seminars. Following the successful Lent Seminars, an announcement will be made soon by the Chaplain about a new series of midweek seminars. There is scope for using these as an opportunity to extend the contact with other English-speaking congregations.
– Profile raising. St. Clements will look to participate in expat events and will produce a leaflet describing the activities of the church. An interview with our chaplain will also appear in the Prague Post during Holy Week. We are also considering a program of other initiatives which we hope to finalize by the next meeting. In the meantime, we encourage congregation members to bring their friends to church over Easter or to our next Ethics Lunchtime on 12 May.
– Towards Self Sufficiency. We are preparing further information regarding the status of our fundraising to date and future activities to close our annual 185,000kc funding gap and proposed initiatives including possible sales of St. Clements CDs, Christmas cards and clothing. Some investigation on tax consequences may be required. More to come on this. In the meantime, the Pay Pal button is operational on our website and provides a great way to ask friends and family, especially living overseas, to support the work of St. Clements.
– Charity. We are still investigating the practical ways of having a clothes collection for C4C and will inform the congregation when we are ready to go. We are also open to other charitable involvements if congregation members have any proposals.
– Protection of Children. We adopted a new Church Policy Statement on the Protection of Children which is available on the website.
– Vision and Targets. We are preparing a vision and targets statement which includes some of the initiatives already mentioned. It should be ready soon after the next council meeting and we will introduce it to the congregation.
And finally for this week – A Note of Thanks…..
…to Jeremy Ford for kindly rescuing an office chair that his employers were no longer using & making it available to me. I finally managed to collect it last week now my car is mobile once more. I can now sit at my study desk and work without constantly worrying that the chair I’m sitting on will collapse!
With best wishes for the remainder of Holy Week & Easter
Ricky
