A growing Church, in the heart of the Stanley community
All services start at 10am
Sunday 13th June : Sunday morning service: Rev Glenn Coggins will be leading our service and also preaching.
Sunday 20th June : Sunday morning service: Rev David Teece will be leading our service and the preacher will be Joe Harrison.
Sunday 27th June : Sunday morning service: Rev Glenn Coggins will be leading our service and also preaching.
Sunday 13th June 11.30am onwards
After the Sunday morning service (join us for the service at 10am) on Sunday 13th June we will be serving scones with jam and cream, and refreshments.
We hope that the weather will be nice (looking good at the moment!) and we will be able to set the tables up outside and enjoy a chat and a get together.
Please come along and join us, even if you don’t yet feel able to join the service you are more than welcome to join us at 11:30!
Sunday Morning at St Peter’s Stanley – 10am
Pentecost Sunday service: Rev Glenn Coggins will be leading our service and the preacher will be Margaret Taylor.
Sunday Evening at St Paul’s Alverthorpe – 5.30pm
Everyone is welcome to our United Benefice Pentecost Sunday service.
The service will be led by Joe Harrison.
The Annual Parochial Church Meeting (APCM) – 11:30am
More commonly known as an Annual General Meeting (AGM), St Peter’s church will hold its APCM on Sunday 16th May at 11:30am after the morning service. If you want to learn more about the church’s ministry, where the money comes from and how it’s spent, and what the various church officers do, then come along and find out!
This meeting will review what has happened over the past year, as well as setting out the church’s plans for the year ahead. There will certainly be quite a lot to talk about as it has been a very unusual year! Some of our usual activities have not been able to take place, but we also started lots of new activities, such as our online services and Bible groups, and our hot meal deliveries and links with local people in need.
Members will be elected to the Parochial church council (PCC) and officers elected. We have three vacancies on our PCC. It is a great opportunity to join our friendly committee and get involved in planning events and making decisions about the future of our church. If you want to find out more, please contact Rev Glenn Coggins or Ellie Plant in the church office.
You can download the May 2021 parish magazine in PDF format using the link below.
The parish magazine is in Adobe PDF format, if you can’t view the magazine you can download a reader at adobe.com.
Dear Friends,
With the recent easing of lockdown restrictions, both Angela and myself were able to travel to the Lake District to visit her dad. It had been six months since we had seen him so as you would imagine it was quite an emotional visit. During the visit we had a walk down by the river in Cockermouth, birthplace of William Wordsworth, and we were amazed at how the area had been transformed after the impact of various floods over the years. A new pedestrian bridge has been built, flood defences have been improved, everything had been landscaped and it was very pleasant to walk and sit by the river.
When it comes to rainfall it is not called the Lake District for nothing and I remember a particularly bad flood in November 2009 which saw up to 8 feet of flood water flowing down the high street and the local brewery found some of their beer barrels halfway up trees on the riverside.
On the walk I came across a plaque which had a bible quotation from the Book of Isaiah in the Old Testament (chapter 58, verse 12) which reads: “Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age old foundations; you will be called repairer of broken walls. Restorer of broken streets with dwellings.”
The people of Cockermouth and no doubt others had really taken this text to heart and I am sure after yet another flood, most people must have felt like giving up and running to the hills. But no, sleeves were rolled up, plans sketched out and funds found and together resilient people restored the town and river bank to be a blessing to those living there and to the many visitors who flock over the year.
As we start to experience some sort of ‘normal’ life, we pray that the easing of lockdown restrictions will continue and we can start rebuilding our lives and enjoy being able to socialize with family and friends. We may not be rebuilding actual physical buildings or dealing with another potential flood but our mental health has taken a battering and we need time to process what has happened in our lives. God has given us each other as a gift and a blessing and to be present not only in times of joy but also in times of stress and sadness. My prayer is as we journey into a brighter future that we may be willing to be there for our neighbour, that together we rebuild our lives and social events etc and build a kinder and more loving community and life.
At St Peter’s Church we have begun this journey and you are most welcome to join us at our services or any future social events as together we experience the love of God in our midst and rebuild our lives.
God bless and take care and stay safe, Glenn
Dear Friends,
It is hard to believe that is now a full year since that very first lockdown. Who would have thought that we are still living with restrictions in our daily lives but we pray that the vaccination roll out will soon enable us to return to some sort of normality. It was interesting to hear what people are really looking forward to post pandemic: their replies ranged from travel, shopping, eating out, attending live events to of course being with loved ones – families and friends.
I can remember reading a survey conducted several years ago about happiness. The survey attempted to understand what aspects of life improve our general happiness and as one would expect access to money featured highly in this. It was found though that when one had the money to furnish the basics in life i.e. putting a house over one’s head, enough money for food and clothes and some left over for treats and holidays etc; even if a person had a lot more money it did not mean they were far happier in themselves. No, what came out was when the basics in our lives were catered for, it was relationships with others i.e. friendships that really improved our happiness. It was having others to share our lives and feel wanted and loved.
As we approach another Easter, one could argue relationships are at the very core of the Easter message. Jesus goes to the cross on our behalf to offer us a way back to a restored relationship with God the Father. We see on the cross God’s amazing love in action and forgiveness for each one of us if we believe and trust in Jesus. Sam Wells writes: “One could say ‘Jesus hangs on the cross’, to show us the love that hangs on and that if we hang onto that love, it will never let us go”.
It is often said that there are some things in life that money cannot buy and that of course is love – sacrificial and unbounded – God’s love that embraces us in the life and death of Jesus. It is a love that will never let us go and we see it reflected in the love we share between family and friends. It is going to wonderful to spend time again with our loved ones in the weeks ahead and here at St Peter’s Church. You are most welcome to join us at our services or social events as together we experience the love of God in our midst.
God bless this Easter and take care and stay safe
Glenn
Rev Glenn Coggins, Vicar of the United Benefice of Stanley, Outwood and Wrenthorpe and Alverthorpe.
You can download the April 2021 parish magazine in PDF format using the link below.
The parish magazine is in Adobe PDF format, if you can’t view the magazine you can download a reader at adobe.com.
It is very exciting that congregational worship has restarted at St Peter’s church; Palm Sunday was the first service in the church with a congregation since the beginning of January. There are still lots of restrictions in place: numbers are limited, we still have to wear masks, keep our distance from each other, and we can’t sing yet.
A major difference is that many in the congregation have now received their first, or even both, vaccinations. So, even though we still have to take precautions and be careful, there is less risk and less fear about the virus spreading.
At the time of writing, we are still on schedule to re-open the building to community groups from 12th April, in line with the government ’roadmap’. Our children’s activity providers such as Mini-Maestros, Sapphire Supreme Majorettes, and the Total Sport youth club will be resuming straightaway.
We are awaiting further guidance about our community activities for older people, including the Tuesday lunch club, Stanley Community Singers and Knit & Natter but hope that we will be able to restart those too: we can run the activities in a covid-secure way and have all the necessary risk assessments and precautions in place.
We have not made any plans yet about our coffee mornings, other fund raising events and the pantomime, except that we are unlikely to hold a summer gala this year, at least, not on our usual date at the end of June.
You can download the March 2021 parish magazine in PDF format using the link below.
The parish magazine is in Adobe PDF format, if you can’t view the magazine you can download a reader at adobe.com.