Finishing up our Houghton Feast celebrations we have Houghton Brass Band in Concert with guest soloist Jim Hayes on Saturday 15th October at 7pm. Tickets available on the door at £5 (£3 concessions).
Join us once again for our Michaelmas celebrations of Houghton Feast this October. The theme this year is Hollywood and the Movies. Hear our very own Gilpin Singers perform at the opening ceremony at 7.00pm on Friday 7th October. Grab a bargain at our Craft and Produce Market on Saturday 8th October from 10.00am. Look out for members of Space4 in the parade on the Broadway dressed as characters from the Wizard of Oz! Mark the centre of the feast with our Feast Civic Service at 10.30am on Sunday 9th October. Join us for our community hymn singing – enjoying hymns from the movies at 6.00pm. Finish up the festivities with a piano concert from virtuoso player William Bracken at 1.00pm on Friday 14th October.
Bring your friends and enjoy!
Come and hear accomplished Hungarian pianist Syuzannah Kaso playing a selection of music by Beethoven, Brahms, Debussy and Rachmaninoff in the beautiful setting of St Michael and All Angels church. The acoustics of the building really add to the experience of hearing an internationally renowned musician. Tickets are £8 payable at the door.
Thursday 22nd September at 7.30 pm – see you there.
For the second year in a row a group of around 50 young people from across Durham Diocese descended on Auckland Castle for a weekend camp. Our curate, Rev’d Bryony and our Young Church leader Clare helped to lead the camp alongside colleagues from Shildon Parish.
The kids arrived on Friday afternoon and we camped in the grounds of the castle which was a beautiful setting at night as we enjoyed a campfire, toasting marshmallows and singing (led by Rev’d Bryony – her time with the Girl Guides coming in useful!) After that we allowed the kids to stay up to watch the fireworks from the nearby Kynren show.
Clare leading the aikido workshop
Saturday, the weather still staying good for us, involved a series of workshops with Bryony offering a juggling workshop and Clare running an Aikido martial arts workshop – complete with swords! We also had a wide game and a samba drumming session (look on Facebook for the video).
Samba Drumming
The day finished with a disco at which the curate embarrassed herself trying to learn the ‘whip nae nae’ dance (if you’re not sure, ask a young person what that is!)
Sunday morning involved a special service led by the young people in the chapel of the castle. Our theme was ‘Who is my neighbour?’
Service in Auckland Castle Chapel
The kids put on a drama interpretation of the Good Samaritan set at our camp – with the ‘Good Samaritan’ being the naughtiest child on camp who’d kept everyone awake! We then considered how God works in the world through each of us, as Teresa of Avila said:
‘Christ has no body now on earth but yours, no hands but yours, no feet but yours, yours are the eyes through which Christ’s compassion is to look out to the earth, yours are the feet by which He is to go about doing good and yours are the hands by which He is to bless us now.’
After the service we did a Treasure Hunt in the beautiful deer park at Auckland Castle.
This yearly youth camp is part of philanthropist and committed Christian Jonathan Ruffer’s vision to regenerate the area of Bishop Auckland and beyond, involving the community in the life of Auckland Castle. Many of the young people on the trip had never been camping before and indeed many of their parents can’t afford to take them on a holiday. This was an incredible experience that we were able to offer these young people.
A big thank you to Alison Tweddle of Auckland Castle, Lucy Mann, Youth Worker and Rev’d David Tomlinson from St John’s Shildon for making it all happen and especially to our very own Clare Taylor for giving up part of her precious summer holiday to volunteer.
– Rev’d Bryony Taylor, Curate
Like many other churches and places of interest around the country, we woke up on Friday morning to discover that we are a Pokémon Go Pokéstop! Pokémon Go is the latest smartphone game craze that is gripping people young and old across the country. It is a game you play on your phone outside where you try to collect Pokémon monsters and battle it out with others in Pokémon ‘gyms’. The catchphrase of the game is ‘gotta catch them all’ – it is like a truly 21st Century version of card swapping or marbles. To catch a pokémon you need to throw a pokéball at it. These balls can be collected at Pokéstops – and there is one such stop at St Michael’s.
So if you see groups of people staring at their phones around St Michael’s, they are probably playing the game – ask them what they’ve caught!
Rev Bryony, our curate, was taught by some local children how to play the game after she downloaded the app to see what all the fuss was about. The game is enabling children to play computer games but outside! It also encourages exercise – walk 2km and you can collect a precious egg!
There have been some safety concerns about the game, it is important to stay alert whilst playing. If you are a parent, the NSPCC has issued this helpful advice:
So now you have another reason to come to church!
Here’s what the Curate’s already caught:
This week we invited the school leavers from Burnside, Gillas Lane and Bernard Gilpin Primary Schools for a special interactive service to help them to look back and give thanks for their time at primary school and look forward to their move to secondary school – putting their concerns into God’s hands.
There were five different prayer spaces:
Sorry
The children thought of regrets they had whilst holding a small pebble and then washed the pebbles clean as a sign of letting go and receiving God’s forgiveness.
Thank you
The children thought of people that they especially wanted to thank God for. They wrote their names on post-it notes and made a person from pipe cleaners to take home.
Please
The children drew around their hands and cut them out and wrote on them prayers of concern about the move to secondary school – symbolising putting their worries into God’s hands.
Jigsaw
The children thought about what made them unique and drew a mini portrait on a jigsaw piece – then they joined up all the pieces together showing how we’re all together but different.
Wow
The children thought about their ‘wow’ moments from their time at school and decorated flags depicting these. Wow moments ranged from school trips to scoring goals to being in an anti-bullying team.
These services were supported by the Prayer Project at Durham Diocese and inspired by similar services that were held for church schools at Durham Cathedral.
Find out more about the Prayer Project on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dioceseofdurhamprayerproject
A big thank you to the Diocese for the resources and support from Phil Togwell and Sharon Pritchard, to our wonderful church volunteers and to all the schools for taking part.
The Belassis Brass which has been away being restored and conserved has been returned to the Gilpin Transept in St Michael and All Angels church. It depicts the remarkable Marjorie Belassis, a friend of Rector Bernard Gilpin and member of the congregation.
Marjorie died aged 90 years, her husband having died when she was 32. Lucky for her as she already had 12 children. She lived in Morton House, which is situated on the small lane between the Chilton Hotel, Fencehouses and the Fence Houses War Memorial. The brass talks of her life’s dedication to hospitality and the relief of the poor.
Come and have a look at the brass in situ, and count her numerous children!
We don’t have many guitarists at Master Musicians, but when we do, they are only the best. Giulio leaves his young family in Italy to play more than a dozen recitals in the North East and he plays works by Rodrigo, Tarrega and Maffani. He will be performing at St Michael’s on Wednesday 22nd June at 7.30pm, Admission is £8.
Don’t miss this opportunity to hear a world class musician here in Houghton!
Here is a taster:
For the last few weeks in Young Church our young people have been creating a beautiful banner to be processed at the Mothers’ Union Festival Service at Durham Cathedral on Tuesday 31st May.
The children loved being part of a huge procession in the cathedral and singing such familiar songs as ‘Our God is a great big God’. I’m not sure if the older members of the Mothers’ Union knew what hit them! The cathedral was full of brightly coloured banners made by children all across the diocese – a wonderful reminder of the work of the Mothers’ Union in promoting family values and education all around the world.
A huge thank you to Sue Elsey and Clare Taylor and all those that helped the children to create our beautiful banner and for attending the service.
A prayer card was given to everyone with the following prayer:
Dear God,
We thank you for
Good things every day
Oranges and all we eat
Drawing and dancing
Inside days for play
Sweets and treats
Laughter and fun
Owls otters and other creatures
Very nice people
Everything
Amen.
This is the finished banner back and front:
Here are some pictures from the day:
-
- Arriving at the Cathedral
-
- Getting ready for the procession
-
- Ella enjoying her windmill
-
- Holding up the banner
-
- Logan, Max and Josie getting a starring role in the sermon!
This Bank Holiday Monday a group of us from St Michael’s joined thousands in the centre of Durham to take part in Durham Pride – celebrating the breadth of diversity across our region.
We had a very positive time witnessing to God’s love for everyone. Plenty of people were delighted to see us there and see what it said on our t-shirts: ‘Jesus welcomes all and so do we! St Michael and All Angels Church, Houghton-le-Spring’.
Lots of interesting conversations were had about being an inclusive welcoming church. We even met one girl who remembered us from Ashes to Go on Ash Wednesday!
Thank you to everyone from St Michael’s who supported us.
