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Whats on this Week
For Masses, streaming, and church open times see panel alongside
For events for students and young adults see the page here.
Monday 4:30pm Rosary Group – contact parish office
Tuesday 7:30pm Belong and Believe video sessions – see right column
https://zoom.us/j/96161676521 ID: 961 6167 6521
Wednesday 8pm An Evening with Friends
https://zoom.us/j/97896232496 ID: 978 9623 2496
Thursday / 10am: parish discussion group all welcome- see right column
https://zoom.us/j/92452001507 ID: 924 5200 1507
Thursday 8pm Virtual Deep Waters
Friday 6:30pm Stations of Light online
https://zoom.us/j/96302248948 Meeting ID: 963 0224 8948
Friday 8pm Lectio Divina –
https://zoom.us/j/92327977736 ID: 923 2797 7736
see below for details of each event
You are all warmly invited to join us for an evening of Adoration, Praise and Reflection. As we wait for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit as the disciples did at Pentecost we invite you all to come and pray with us for a renewed filling of the Holy Spirit upon ourselves, our Parish, our Church and the world at this time.
If you would like to come for prayer ministry there will be the opportunity to be prayed with for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit with one of our prayer ministry couples. Everyone is welcome to join us in the church – we look forward to praying with you. Come Holy Spirit!
Opportunities on Wednesdays and Fridays
- Wednesdays 8-9pm “An Evening with Friends” NOW RETURNED TO WEDNESDAYS. With recent restrictions we have lost the opportunity to chat with friends and other parishioners at or after Mass. For the moment we have to do everything online, but we are launching a weekly purely social opportunity to be together as a community and chat. Every Sunday evening there will be an hour on Zoom hosted by David Miller. David will ensure that there is an opportunity to talk to each other, and do some fun things together. Join him at 7:30 on Sundays to take part and find out more. The zoom link for this Sunday is https://zoom.us/j/97896232496 Meeting ID: 978 9623 2496
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Fridays 6:30pm Stations of Light Following our successful Stations of the Cross on Fridays through Lent, we are now running a contemplation of the Resurrection, Stations of Light. Join us at 6:30pm each Friday on zoom. If you are not able to join on zoom the service will also be streamed live to youtube – the link will be on our newsfeed and website homepage just before 6:30, in the same way that we post links for streamed Masses. https://zoom.us/j/96302248948 Meeting ID: 963 0224 8948
- Fridays 8pm to 9pm Lectio Divina An invitation to take part in an online Lectio Divina prayer group – from the Benedictine monks in Elm Grove. Lectio Divina, Divine Reading, is a form of praying with scripture, the Word of God, in which we allow the Word and the Spirit to speak to us, to enlighten us and to inspire us. Formerly the preserve of monks, in recent years this has become a widespread form of Prayer in the Church and is encouraged by Pope Francis in Evangelii Gaudium https://zoom.us/j/92327977736 Meeting ID: 923 2797 7736
Fitzherbert Community Hub
Many of you will have enjoyed visiting the community cafe run by the Real Junk Food Project at St John the Baptist before lockdown. It was really popular with parishioners and members of the wider local community alike but because of the condition of the parish hall and kitchen we were only able to open one lunchtime a week, despite such high demand. You will also be aware of the Food Hub, coordinated by Brighton Table Tennis Club, that has been operating out of St John the Baptist. Covid-19 has exposed the extent of food poverty in the area that we serve and the food bank is now providing food for 300 people a week and ready cooked meals to 45 refugee/asylum seeker families, some of whom have no recourse to public finance or cooking facilities.
Building on these two initiatives we are now working in partnership with our three co-located grassroots charities, Voices in Exile, Brighton Table Tennis Club and Real Junk Food Project to raise funding to redevelop the parish hall at St John the Baptist, creating a flexible, multi-purpose, socially inclusive Community Hub with a commercial standard teaching kitchen, dining area, food bank, full disability access (including a lift to the upper rooms) and additional meeting spaces. Central to our plans is the provision of a daily “pay as you feel” (customers pay what they feel the food is worth or what they can afford) community café using food otherwise destined for landfill. This is an exciting opportunity for us as a Parish as not only will we have access to a lovely new parish hall and cafe but we will be able to live out our faith through social outreach and community building.
Full information is on the hub website at https://fitzherbertcommunityhub.org.uk/
Please have a look at the short films in the following link which considers local need and how this project will help:
Mass times
We have been able to attend Mass again starting on Ash Wednesday.
The regular pattern is now that weekday masses are at 10am at St John the Baptist (except Thursdays) and 6pm at St Joseph’s (except Monday). For Sundays there is the 6pm Saturday vigil mass and the 11am Mass at St John the Baptist, and 11:30am and 5:30pm masses at St Joseph’s. . The full details are in the newsletter.
Please remember that the obligation to attend Mass is still suspended, and that anyone in one of the Government’s risk categories should consider carefully before coming to church.
And if you do come to church please remember that the covid risk is still elevated, so full precautions, including not talking socially anyone before, during or after Mass are still very important.
PENTECOST NOVENAS
The Bishops of England and Wales are suggesting two beautiful novenas to be prayed between Ascension and Pentecost.
Follow these links for full downloadable details
newly baptised and confirmed
new Tuesday evening series
Tuesday evenings at 7:30 https://zoom.us/j/96161676521 Meeting ID: 961 6167 6521
new Thursday morning series
Thursday mornings at 10am click https://zoom.us/j/92452001507
Meeting ID: 924 5200 1507
YOUR OFFERING
With restrictions on how many people can attend mass, and on how we give, it has been more difficult to support the costs of running the parish and taking our mission forward. For the moment we are running at some significant loss. There are a number of ways you can give relatively easily, and anyone not signed up to the government gift aid scheme could help us even more by signing the simple form that enables us to get a further pound from the government for every £4 given.
Our New Resource Page
In particular look out for our resources pages, providing links to good things to watch, listen to, or read. Also the Prayers of the Faithful are now published weekly on the newsletter page. We would encourage all parishioners to submit potential prayers by email to the office, so that increasingly these do become the prayers of all the faithful.
Great external courses and events
There are great online worship and events coming up. See our section Upcoming Courses and Events at the top of the Resources page.
Remembrance Book
As we cannot access the remembrance books in the churches this November, we have set up an online remembrance book here. On this page you can view our remembrance book with all the names submitted throughout November.