Services are online!

During this period of lockdown, our Sunday morning services will be streamed live on our Facebook page. This will also provide the opportunity to catch up later on any services you may miss. Please check the Calendar below for services and times.

A Letter from the Rector

Dear Friends

As we are promoted to Tier 3 and are considered Very High Risk we adjust our sights once again.  

We also enter Advent this Sunday. Advent, perhaps more this year than usual, is a time of waiting in the dark, preparing for the light to come. It is a time of living in the knowledge that though Jesus’ first coming has bought us our redemption we wait in an in-between time of doubt and uncertainty until He sweeps all before Him at his second coming. This will be especially true for those struggling with illness and bereavement at this time.

Perhaps we can use this Advent to fully prepare our heart for a different type of Christmas than the one we are used to. It might be a Christmas where the light of Christ is more central. The switching on of the Church Lights  this evening, though not the amazing event it usually is, reminds us that the light of Christ will always overcome.

Despite being in Tier 3, we are confident that both the carol singing and the Christmas Tree Festival are permissible and that we can do them in a reasonably Covid-secure way.

This Advent Sunday we can start that journey at our online service at 9.45am.

There will also be Wednesday Evening Prayers restarting after Lockdown. These will also have an Advent theme.

Christmas Services will be different this year. Instead of the packed house that we usually have for the Christmas Eve crib service there will be an online Christingle. There will be a midnight Communion and a Christmas Morning Communion. This will have to be limited to the safe capacity of the church, so we are thinking of some sort of booking process. .  

Church Christmas Zoom Quiz – 7.30PM, Friday 11^th December 2020
This is an invitation from the Eyam quiz team that they would like to spread across all our three churches of the benefice.

Christmas Quiz night is nearly here and the two Geoffs (our very own version of Santa's Christmas elves) are working round the clock to ensure we enjoy a fun filled evening of festive facts, myths and trivia, mixed up with some general knowledge rounds. There may even be prizes!

Running the quiz on Zoom requires a bit of technical wizardry so to help us finalise the set up, please let us know as soon as possible if you would like to join in. You can enter a ready made team, or just let us know that you want to take part and we'll allocate you to a team. Please send an email with your name and contact information tofundraising@eyamchurch.org and we'll get back to you with further details.
There's no entry fee, but we are hoping to raise some money for the church re-ordering fund, so we would suggest a voluntary donation of £5.00 per person (which can be gift aided) if you feel able.

God bless

Mike Gilbert, Rector

Christmas Tree Festival 11-13 December 2020

Help us bring Christmas Celebrations to Baslow

This year we can’t hold the normal celebrations to mark this special time of year. No carol service, Christingle, or switching on the lights—the things which bring our community together to share our hope for the world. But with your help we can still do something very special and hold Baslow’s first Christmas tree festival.

How it works

Your group, business or organisation decorates a Christmas tree in a way that reflects and celebrates the things that you do. The trees are displayed in church from 11-13 December. Visitors will be able to see the festival in a Covid-safe way. Refreshments will be served outside weather permitting.

Why it works

We offer you a large, Covid-secure place to decorate your Christmas tree and remain socially distanced. We will organise access to the church so that people can visit to see the trees and have a Covid-safe Christmas experience.  You tell the world that your group or business is alive and working through Covid.

Interested?

Call us for more details: 

Graham Duncan:  07979 900373

Irene Roscoe:       07484 201989

Sue Campbell:    07971 713042

or check out our Facebook page @st.annesbaslow

Harvest recording for High Peak Farmers by the Church Choir & Bel Canto

On Saturday 10 October, a small group of Church Choir and Bel Canto members headed to Gorse Bank Farm, where David Thorpe had kindly agreed to provide the venue for a choir recording.

For the last three years, we have enjoyed being invited to sing for both the Harvest Festivals and Carol Service of the High Peak Farmers. These take place in the ring at Bakewell Agricultural Centre and are organised and led by the Reverend Alan Griggs, our local Agricultural Chaplain. In a normal year, hundreds and hundreds of people from the farming community across Derbyshire attend these events. Needless to say, it is not possible for these services to take place this year ... or not, in quite the same way!

Reverend Griggs instead decided to stage a virtual Harvest Festival and asked if we could film a piece to form part of this.  

And so, we came to find ourselves in the lovely setting of the cow sheds at Gorse Bank Farm - complete with bales of hay and a rather unperturbed and surprisingly interested four-legged audience.

We were few in number due to all the restrictions, and for the first time, our choir members were fully masked whilst singing - as we plan to be throughout the next few months when we meet to rehearse or perform in small, distanced groups.  Wearing face masks to sing in is not ideal, but wanting to protect each other as much as possible, we managed it.  More importantly, it was a lovely escape from our constricted normality and to enjoy the whole experience of singing together.  

Our chosen piece for the filming was “The King of Love Our Shepherd Is”, arranged by Dan Forrest. 

Our thanks to Reverend Griggs for asking us and giving us the inspiration to do something a little different!

Claire de la Haye

Church Choir

During the current lock down, the Church Choir will be practicing on the Church Facebook page, at 6.00pm each Tuesday

Bel Canto will be practicing on the Bel Canto Facebook page, at 6.00pm each Wednesday

New choir members are always welcome, so if interested, please telephone Claire on 07515 287222. 

Church Almoner

June Powell who cares for village residents, on behalf of the Church, gave the following report at the St Anne's Annual General Meeting:

"The Church notice sheets were updated each week for prayers for the sick and for bereaved families. Prayers for the families of the bereaved stay on the sheet for three months. (I first enquire if they would like their names included on the sheet or just for private prayer). A prayer request book is at the back of the church for visitors and the congregation to use.I send “Get Well” cards, Bereavement cards, special anniversary, birthday cards or “welcome to new home” cards. I make visits with flowers or cooking to those who are sick. We have had a number of our elderly congregation in Care Homes to visit and sadly I attend funerals where appropriate. I post the monthly magazine to people who have left the village and who like to keep in touch with us. 

During Covid I have been making phone calls to the sick which luckily overlap with our Senior Citizens members contact list. Leftover cakes from the Pop-up Market were taken each week to people including a note “With love from St Anne’s Church”."

We are very blessed to have June in our community.

Church Library

Our library facility is temporarily closed to minimise the risk of Covid-19 transmission. 

Parish Safeguarding 

The Church of England is called to share the good news of God’s salvation through Jesus Christ. The life of our communities and institutions is integral to how we address this task. The good news speaks of welcome for all, with a particular regard for those who are most vulnerable, into a community where the value and dignity of every human being is affirmed and those in positions of responsibility and authority are truly trustworthy. Being faithful to our call to share the gospel therefore compels us to take with the utmost seriousness the challenge of preventing abuse from happening and responding well where it has.’  HANDBOOK

PCR2

Protocols and practice guidance for the Church of England’s Past Cases Review 2, (PCR2) have been published and are on the National Church of England Website. 

Individual survivors who wish to make representations to the PCR2 process in the Derby Diocese or who need to come forward with information or make any disclosures regarding church related abuse are encouraged to make direct contact with the Safeguarding Team 01332 388678. 

However, recognising that this may not feel safe for those with experience of abuse from within the church, a dedicated national helpline - 0800 80 20 20 - operated independently from the church, by the NSPCC, was set up in September 2019 and remains available.

Survivors were not invited to contribute to the 2007-2009 PCR and the Church has wanted to ensure a different, trauma informed approach is taken by PCR2. Listening to survivor voices has helped to shape how this review will be conducted. 

We are now at the beginning of the PCR2 process, this is an independent review to look at all the safeguarding files, historic and current for both adults and children, including all Church officers. The review aims to ensure that wherever concerns have been raised that the cases have been handled appropriately.

The National Church has given a commitment to undertake a new Past Cases Review (PCR2) which will not only look at all types of harm, both to children and or adults, but will probe much deeper in records or concerns held in parishes, some of which may not have been reported to the DSA. Your vicar (or church warden if in Interregnum) will now have received a letter from +Libby outlining what is required to enable this significant piece of work to be completed. We need to submit the final report to the National Safeguarding team by the end of December 2020. We will be in touch directly with PSOs’ to give the detail of the next step, but it may be helpful if you identify where any parish records are held so that there is less work to do when we ask you for the details. The timescale for responding to PCR2 in the Diocese of Derby is by 31st March 2020.

Safeguarding Concerns

If you have any concerns over any safeguarding matter, please contact the Parish Safeguarding Officer, Richard Nicholson on 01246 583023 or Member of the Clergy, Revd Mike Gilbert on 07947092951 or the Diocesan Safeguarding Team on 01332 388678.