City Deanery Report

In last years Messenger I collated various pieces of news as Deanery Secretary, however I am now pleased to tell you about City Deanery as Deanery Leader. Many of you will have witnessed the Commissioning Service at Bristol Cathedral which was a wonderful Service and I felt quite overwhelmed as Bishop Lee announced my name and officially commissioned me.

A few weeks later I felt honoured and a little bit nervous to carry the banner at the provincial President’s Commissioning Service at St Alban’s. It was a lovely day including the lunch and afternoon tea! I also have happy memories of myself and Mary Head walking along the streets of St Alban’s returning the banner and poles to the coach hoping the driver would be there and we wouldn’t have to take it with us for the rest of the day!

Following the Commissioning Service I had a short conversation with Rosemary Kempsall as we had one thing in common which was that our daughters were soon to be married. We compared progress on arrangements and I’m pleased to say that our daughter’s wedding at St Aidan’s Church in St George was just perfect. The Rev’d Trevor Denley, a keen supporter of MU, led a beautiful service and the photo shows the happy couple Jen and Martin walking down the aisle to the traditional Wedding March.  

One of my first official engagements was to join Holy Trinity, Horfield for their annual summer party. This was a most enjoyable afternoon meeting the branch members, the clergy, playing Beetle Drive (I was hopeless) and enjoying a delicious cream tea. Margaret Moyle and her branch worked very hard to make it such a successful afternoon.

My second engagement was the Deanery Festival held on Mary Sumner Day at St John’s, Fishponds. This was organised by Pauline Potter and at this point I’m going to hand over to Pauline as she wrote a most descriptive piece for her Parish Magazine.

It was wonderful to see that this event was so well attended by both Mothers’ Union members, Clergy and members of St Johns. I was delighted to have our Diocesan President Rosemary Thomas with us for the Festival together with our newly appointed Deanery Leader Lynn Crew and East Bristol Partnership priests Keith and Andre. As it had been over ten years since I organized a Deanery Festival to take place at St Johns, it was a truly uplifting sight to see so many smiling faces all around me as I joined the Banner Procession from the Vestry around the aisles of the church, at the start of the service of celebration for Mothers’ Union founder, Mary Sumner. Rays of golden sunshine could be seen shining through the windows of the Church, creating an atmosphere of warmth all around, thus setting the scene on what was to be a joyful Festival, one that gave everyone wonderful opportunities for praise and worship, while at the same time allowing them to experience the joy of gathering together once again at St Johns.

Before all the banner bearers ‘disappeared’ I was able to take a photo of Rosemary Thomas with them.

In a way the Festival was a swan song for St Johns as unfortunately due to the failing health of the members and Pauline wishing to stand down as BL the branch will be closing in December. Hopefully, they will become IMPC linked to St Mary’s or Diocesan members. I wish to thank Pauline for all her hard work over the years in leading the branch.

As one branch closes, earlier in the year we were pleased to welcome St Peter’s, Filton to the Deanery. Members were able to join us at the Festival and also at a recent Deanery meeting. We look forward to seeing them at our future events.

Church of the Good Shepherd, St Mary’s and St Aidan’s have all been busy during the year with their varied programmes and continued support of the Diocesan projects.

My thanks to all the branch leaders and committee members for all their hard work and I hope to meet more branch members in the near future.

Lynn Crew

A discussion evening was held in June with the IYOF in mind as we talked about family life including how it was portrayed in the soaps. A special flower arrangement and table display were done in August to commemorate Mary Sumner Day.

The branch held its annual summer cream tea party in June for the housebound which was enjoyed by all. Members also joined the Pensford and Publow branch for a social afternoon at Chew Magna.

In June, Mary Bone, school nurse gave a very interesting talk about her work with ethnic groups in Inner City schools. The July meeting was AfternoonTea with a Bring & Buy raising money for the Overseas Fund.

Earlier in the year the branch had a very interesting Lent talk by Christine Burbridge, the wife of a team vicar whose talk made members put their 'thinking caps' on. In July the annual lunch was held in the church hall which was an enjoyable occasion.

Annual Cream Tea afternoon with Bring & Buy raising funds for the branch was held in July. All the members who supported the Deanery outing to Lydiard Park enjoyed their day.