An array of of one-off services once held around the diocese;
Bless Brewood Business
(Brewood St Mary and St Chad)
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This was a simple service designed to say thank-you to all those running shops and businesses in the village whose efforts and sacrifices helped make Brewood the great community it is in which to live. Shop, pub, restaurant and other business owners were all given personal invitations, by hand, several weeks prior to service, and thank-you certificates were prepared for them.
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The service itself was held on a Sunday evening and comprised three hymns, Bible reading, homily, prayers, a live interview with (a) a business owner and (b) a shopper to ask their views of how things were for them and what the church could do to help, a short thank-you ceremony and a blessing. Following this, the church laid on a free buffet supper with food and wine.
- Bless Brewood Business was greatly appreciated by all who came - indeed people in the village still talk about it
Lamb Sunday
(Waterfall Benefice)
Recollections from then-incumbent Paul Skillings: We had twin lambs in a pen in Church & they did what lambs do!!!!!!!!! lots of bleating & interesting smells-- but very cute. The idea was to give thanks for safe delivery & success of lambing season so key a part of the work in this area. It also lent itself to the imagery of Jesus as the Good Shepherd. It was lovely. Our new church warden, a widower, let us have 2 of his lambs which was nice. We had a few extra folk.
'Named' service
(Blore Ray St Bartholomew)
The Blore church in Staffordshire every year invited anyone with the name 'Blore' to come to a special service, using the internet to contact them. Their then Vicar Paul Skillings jokingly said he was going to name one of his other churches 'Smith Church'
Quilt Service
(Bradeley St Mary and All Saints)
Recollections from then incumbent Revd Sue Symons): Take any hobby, allow the church to be used as an exhibition venue, and encourage the close of the event to include a service. Quilts for us is biennial, we have some very keen quilters, and included with the display is teas and trade stands in village hall over the road.
Rogation Service
(Ipstones Benefice)
Then-incumbent Revd Michael Evans wrote: Our Rogation Walk went well and we had a good crowd of walkers who enjoyed the fellowship together. It took the whole day and we covered all four of our churches, calling in for a short service at each one and having lunch prepared for us by some of the Parishioners at Onecote. I worked out it was about 10 miles so the boundaries were well and truly beaten.
Summer Specials
(Maer St Peter)
- Ice Cream Sunday. Everyone was given a piece of paper cone-shaped on arriving, and a pen. The talk was about all the special blessings God gives us like the ice cream and topping on an ice cream. People were then encouraged to write or draw on their cone the blessings God has given them. These cones were then linked on a wire and put up like bunting in the church. They were then given real ice cream at the end of the service.
- St Peters Sunday. They had a St Peters picnic together afterwards where the picnic was all fishy things.
- Hats Sunday. This was Trinity Sunday and there was also a baptism. Everyone came with hats and there was a stand just inside the church for anyone who had forgotten. God wears different hats Trinity. But also they thought about a Jesus hat, a St Peter hat (with a fish and a cross on it) etc. The children were all given cardboard circles which they decorated and when worn as holy hats looked like haloes!
No dramatic conversions or huge numbers but people went away having had fun worshipping God and hopefully this was a step in their journey of faith which will encourage them to come to other things.
Teddy Bear Service
(Stafford St Chad)
Stafford linked this to the Mayors Parade after which they had this service at 12.30pm to which they had invited all baptism contacts and everyone on the Parade. Their Warden, Heather, wrote:
It all came about by 'brain storming' to do a service with the children. We thought of animals but being a town centre church not very practical. So when a baby is born nearly everyone buys them a teddy whatever colour or size. Having taken my Mother to Katherine House Hospice and seeing teddies on sale there I realised a Teddy is for life. As that teddy sat on the bottom of her bed, many babies have them at the bottom of a cot. So from start to finish of life a Teddy should be blessed for bring comfort to everyone young or old. Father John Davis Blessed the children and adults as they held their teddies including the teddies name. They were also given a certificate with their names on and date.
Well Blessing Service
(Ilam Holy Cross)
(More recollections from Paul Skillings): The well blessing service was a communion service in church - emphasis water of life, followed by a procession carrying cross and banners around the village with a little act of blessing, prayers of thanks and poems at 3 of each water source where a well dressing board had been erected. The week before is very involving as the church is used to clay the boards prick out the designs and petal the boards. The churchs board used whole flower heads and depicted Noah's Ark. The lovely thing is that people pop in and out of the church all week with plant material from their gardens or the hedgerow and press their petals on the design - it is almost like painting by numbers. One year we used aspects of 23rd psalm with river Manifold and Thor's cave featured as still waters. people visit form far and wide to see the decorated flower petal design. Another year we celebrated world peace and equality with Nelson Mandela on largest board as the July date coincided with his 90th birthday. This well dressing tradition was revived in 2002 - last record before that was 1901 - someone in the village also started hedgehog rolling to coincide with well dressing weekend!!!!!!!!!!!!! But that does not happen in church though we do have a strict training programme for the hogs!!!!!!!!!!!!! All good involving stuff. Money donated at the well dressing went to local charities - mainly First Responders or Air Ambulance.