St Mark’s in-building services are temporarily suspended
Please read the further update about this here.
Weekly Pattern during lockdown
Monday to Saturday
- 9am Lymington & Pennington Daily prayer on zoom
(meeting id: 895 2990 2640 password: 2020)
Monday
- 10:30am – 12 noon – Weekly study group. Meeting from 11th January via Zoom
(meeting id: 971 631 0618 password: 1839)
Wednesdays
- 10:15am – Social coffee and chat on zoom
(meeting id: 971 631 0618 password: 1839)
Sundays
- 10am – Pennington and Lymington Online shared service on Youtube and Facebook
service also streamed into zoom (meeting id: 971 631 0618 password: 1839) - After service – social coffee and chat on zoom (meeting id: 971 631 0618 password: 1839)
Ash Wednesday and Lent
Lent starts this week, with Ash Wednesday 17th February. We have an online Ash Wednesday reflection and communion at 6pm shared on YouTube and Facebook. We also have a web page with some resources you may find helpful during Lent:
This includes some instructions for how you may want to turn your palm cross from last year into ash to use within the service on Wednesday.
Throughout Lent, we encourage you to set aside time to reflect, to encounter God afresh this season. To support this, attached is a booklet of ideas and prayers that you may want to use at home throughout Lent. Within our services each Sunday, in each church, we will be using a cross and the items mentioned in the booklet. You may want to join in at home, using the simple items suggested.
Rwanda Lent Appeal
Rwanda, like nearly every country, has been affected by the worldwide coronavirus pandemic. The government in Rwanda is responding by implementing strict lockdown restrictions across the country. Without being able to earn a daily wage, many Rwandans face hardship and hunger. Churches have been closed along with schools and public transport. There has also been very heavy rainfall with parts of the country suffering flooding and landslides. Crops and lives have been lost. Many Lyndhurst Deanery parishes launched emergency appeals to support their link parishes in Rwanda and were able to provide direct support at a time of great need.
Rwandan churches set up foodbanks to support their local communities and these have been a lifeline to many of the poorest families. The practical help that the church is providing is a powerful witness with new families knowing the hope of God.
However the pastors themselves have been under great pressure. Seen as a focal point for those facing starvation, they have been providing support where they can. But without the income from regular church services, pastors themselves are facing severe hardship.
Many schools have built additional classrooms so that children can return. This has happened in stages and some normality has returned but the threat of further outbreaks and lockdowns is always present. To support our Rwandan partners, this year we have asked how best we can support each link diocese. In many cases, ongoing support for pastors in training is still the main priority as the parish situation, on top of ministry training, is creating great difficulty.
Parish visits to Rwanda have been put on hold but the established relationships have kept communication channels open, allowing us to practically support, care for and pray into one another’s real needs as we all face a challenging time of uncertainty.
In such times it is important that we do not overlook the needs of our brothers and sisters elsewhere.
Please gift any donations to our treasurer, Teresa, at teresa@penningtonchurch.uk, with specific reference to the Deanery Lent appeal. These gifts will then be sent on to the Lyndhurst Deanery Rwanda Mission Team.
Thank you for your continued support and prayers. Further information can be found in the following resource:
COVID Morning Prayer
With St Thomas in Lymington, we continue to ‘pray for our nation, for its leaders, its health and essential services and all those who suffer’ this week at 9am on Zoom. Led by Jane Nicholson from St Mark’s and Sarah Salisbury from St Thomas, this now runs Monday through Friday. Please do join them either by computer or phone:
- https://us02web.zoom.us/j/
- Meeting ID: 895 2990 2640 Passcode: 2020
- Dial in from a landline phone: 0131 460 1196
Small groups coming back in January!
Find out more about our informal small group discussion groups, in our other post here.
Our small groups have resumed from 11th January, meeting Mondays from 10:30am -12:00 noon. We are continuing with The Heart of it All this week so do please let us know if you would like to join us.
The Wednesday group has decided to take a break for a few weeks as a number of the group have other study commitments to fulfil.
We are considering another bible study group at a different time so do please contact us if you would like to join a small group and let us know what type of studies you would be interested in.
Church Book Club
New for lockdown from St Thomas’s in Lymington, the plan is to find fairly easy reads with a positive message to help lift our spirits. This will include some children’s classics which are so worth re-visiting as adults in these difficult times. We will meet on a Wednesday afternoon slot at 4pm, with a new book every two/three weeks during lockdown.
We now move on to a recommendation from Linda Lee and will meet to discuss this on Zoom on Wednesday 10 February again at 4pm:
Moominland Midwinter by Tove Jansson
‘This is snow,’ Moomintroll whispered to himself. Moomins always sleep through the winter – or they did until the year Moomintroll woke up and went exploring in the silent, snow-covered valley where the river used to scuttle along and all his friends were so busy in summer.
Web: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85117060907?pwd=SThHQWROTGRxSVROMEVVZlprTFJvdz09
Phone: 0203 481 5240
Meeting ID: 851 1706 0907
Passcode: coffee
Join the Sunday service via Zoom
If there are people you know in our congregation who do not have access to the internet and would like to phone in and listen to our services, please share this information with them to join the Pennington Church zoom during the service and listen to the audio. To phone in, please dial 0203 695 0088.
- You will hear: “Welcome to Zoom, enter your meeting id followed by hash”
- The meeting id you need to enter is: 971 631 0618 #
- You will then hear it say “Enter your participant id followed by hash, otherwise just press hash”
- Please just press the # key. then you will be asked for the passcode, please enter 1839 followed by hash (#).
You will then be part of a conference call, and you will be able to listen to the service, and then talk to others afterwards.
Sunday Services – are you in our virtual congregation?
We’d more than ever love to see your photos of you at home getting ready for the service. Plus, as we stream from the Lady Chapel, we’re hoping to see more of you in our virtual congregation as well so please do share a photo of yourself for us to add to our wall by email to takepart@penningtonchurch.uk, it’s such an encouragement for us. After the service, you’re welcome to join us in zoom for coffee (you will have to brew your own!)
Rachel’s art for sale!
If you’d like to purchase art that our priest Rachel has created and showed in our our worship recently, please check out our new Red Bubble shop. Profits from sales of these items all go to support the ministry of Pennington Church.
YouTube and Facebook
All our services can be found on our YouTube channel here. We also stream our services on our Facebook page too, here.
Lords Prayer
We invite you to video yourself on your phone or computer reading the Lords’ Prayer. Please then email your recording to takepart@penningtonchurch.uk
We’re now showing the Lord’s Prayer in our services with each line read by a different person and we’d love to include as many of our congregation in this as we can. Please be brave, and join in the fun. (Trust me, it was strange for me to get used to leading the service in front of a camera or a phone too.) Others in the congregation will be so delighted to see you taking part, as we are each encouraged by seeing those that we know and love.
Hampshire County Council Hub
If you would like to help with the community at large, the new Hampshire County Council Hub to support the community through the crisis has now been established. If you are able to offer support and would like to be involved, please contact them on 0333 370 4000. Your call will then be triaged and you will be passed to whichever organisation or local contact would be most appropriate.