Our Minister, Rev’d Chris Pritchard, sends the following Message for the month of June 2020 ….
Dear Friends,
It looks like we will finally be able to open the church again for Worship on the 6th June.
This is great news. I hope that many of you will feel safe enough to come back to worship.
The service will be led by my friend and colleague Rev Alma Fritchley.
I know that you will be pleased to return to church for worship but please remember that we are still living with COVID 19 restrictions and so things will be a little different for at least a few weeks.
When you arrive at church please socially distance yourself from others.
You must wear a Face Covering unless you are exempt, only those speaking from the front can remove their mask.
You will be greeted by the door steward who will take your track and trace details and ask you to sanitise your hands.
There will be a plate for the collection in the vestibule, but it will not be brought forward during the service.
The vestry steward will invite you into the chapel where you will be shown to a seat which will be two metres from people not in your household.
You may talk to others nearby in a normal conversational voice, but you should stay in your seat.
The chapel may be colder than normal as we need to provide some ventilation.
At the end of the service each person should wait until invited to leave by the vestry steward. We can mingle and chat outside of the church, but we will not be having refreshments after the service.
The biggest difference in the service itself will be that singing hymns is still not allowed.
Each preacher is finding different ways of leading the service and may use the responsive reading of a Psalm and the congregation may be invited to read hymns together.
In some churches the organist has played a tune and the congregation has read the words while listening to the music.
However we will praise and worship God, listen to God’s word, hear the Good News, and pray together.
The important thing is that we are able to gather together again to worship God even if it is not quite in the manner we are used to.
Hopefully as restrictions relax we can do more things again in church as we plan to share the Love of Jesus with the people of Castle and the wider town of Northwich.
God bless
Chris