Welcome - last updated on 25th Sept at 3.45pm PEW NEWS PAGE ADDED
There is a service of Holy Communion each Sunday at 10am at St Andrew's Heckington and the church is open every day for private prayer from 9am till 5pm.
HARVEST SERVICES
There are two harvest services on offer this Sunday 27th September - An informal one at Swaton Church at 10am led by Canon Beverley Stark, and a harvest/creationtide communion at Helpringham Church at 11am led by Rev Al Jenkins.
ANNUAL PAROCHIAL CHURCH MEETINGS (dates booked so far)
Heckington with Howell - Sunday 11th October at 10.45am in church after morning service.
Helpringham - Monday 19th October at 6pm in church.
Face masks must be worn and social distancing maintained.
News from Rev 'Captain' Chris Harrington - Rector
How we do church is changing, but not stopping.
Prayer worship and pastoral work continue, but in a different way. With the lifting of restrictions under the Corona Virus Pandemic the Archbishops of Canterbury & York have now given the go ahead for public and corporate worship in our church buildings to resume if health and safety and social distancing guidelines are followed. Unfortunately, due to the size of some of our churches, the resumption of corporate worship in some of our churches is still not be possible with 2 metre social distancing restrictions in place. Face masks must be worn in church and there is still no singing.
We will continue to monitor the national situation and advice given by the Church of England. We would welcome feedback from those who attend. Other churches in our group may open again once we are ready and logistically able to do so. As the churches that are open are mainly cordoned off except for worship on Sundays there are no church tours and the books that are usually for sale are out of bounds, so please don't drop off any books as we can't receive them. Sorry.
THE ONLY CHURCHES THAT ARE OPEN IN OUR GROUP AT PRESENT
HECKINGTON CHURCH
Open daily for private prayer 9am to 5pm - No books available or tours at present sorry.
Also open on Sundays for a said service of Holy Communion at 10am. The wearing of face masks is now mandatory.
The APCM for Heckington with Howell will be on Sunday 11th October in church after the morning service. Church wardens to be elected etc.
SWATON CHURCH (UNTIL END OF SEPT)
Open on Sundays only until the end of September for a short informal service at the back of church at 10am - led by Canon Beverley. The wearing of face masks is mandatory. There is a harvest service on 27th Sept at 10am. Please book a place with Bill (01529 421148).
From 4th October the 10am informal service led by Canon Beverley will be moving to Burton Church for the autumn and winter months. Please continue to book a place (01529 421148).
HELPRINGHAM CHURCH
Reopening for worship on a Sunday only (two Sundays a month - 2nd & 4th) at 11am from 27th September where there will be a Harvest/Creationtide Communion Service led by Re Al Jenkins.
The APCM will be on Monday 19th October at 6pm in church.
GREAT HALE CHURCH
Although the church is currently closed for urgent repairs to the floor, the congregation is meeting in Great Hale Village Hall at 9.30am on the 1st and 3rd Sundays of the month for a said service of Holy Communion led by Rev Stephen Huckle. All the current safety precautions are in place and face masks must be worn.
BURTON PEDWARDINE CHURCH
From 4th October onwards there will be a Sunday service at 10am led by Canon Beverly each Sunday. Please book a place as numbers are limited (01529 421148 Bill).
Weekly Pastoral Phone Rota
The weekly pastoral phone round of everyone in our Prayer & Care Directory is continuing . If you haven't received a call either from me, or one of our pastoral team then please give me a ring (01529 460904) as your name might not be in our Prayer & Care Directory, but can soon be added for future weeks. We are also praying for everyone in it by name too.
Sunday Morning Worship on 'Heckington Living Community Radio' at 11am each Sunday
Each week I put a Sunday Morning Service on the 'Worship from the Rectory' page. It has the readings set for that week along with prayers, hymns and a sermon, so you can join in at home if you want to. I record the service at the Rectory either on Friday or Saturday to be broadcast live on 'Heckington Living Community Radio' at 11am that Sunday and afterwards put a podcast on this website (though sadly the sound quality is not as good). In order to add variety, and include the ministries of others, Rev Stephen, Canon Beverley and David Stark contribute sermons every other week, and those who usually lead the intercessions in our churches send in their prayers which I read out on their behalf. To hear the service on a Sunday just Google 'Heckington Living Community Radio' and click on the play symbol - If you don't hear the service straight away don't worry you are on the station just wait for the music to finish which sometimes is 11.05am.
Library of Sunday Service Broadcasts
There are now 29 Audio Podcasts of the radio broadcasts from the start of the Corona Virus pandemic which are available to download from the 'Worship from the Rectory' page, including the latest one which was broadcast on the 15th Sunday after Trinity (20th September).
Daily Prayer
Morning Prayer & Evening Prayer are still being said home each day. If you want to join in at home there are service sheets you can download in the links below and other prayer resources. Please do feel free to phone me for personal prayer and spiritual help if needed (01529 460904).
There is the usual 15 minute daily service from the BBC on Radio 4 LW at 9.45am each morning (Monday to Friday) with plenty of thoughts for each day. Its always worth a listen with a different contributor each day including hymns and songs.
THE CALL TO PRAYER IN OUR GROUP OF CHURCHES
MORE PRAYERS FOR USE DURING THE PANDEMIC
A chance for YOU to contribute to our website
There is a page to our website called 'Reflections, Readings, Prayers and Blogs' in order to share some of the things others have sent in to me. If you want to send me yours please email them to me. I have already posted a couple of Blogs on there and will do more when feel inspired to do so.
Canon Beverley and David organised a daily 'round robin blog' by email for over 80 days and have now published a booklet of reflections from members of that group. If you want a copy let me know. With restrictions easing, their daily blog has now finished but was greatly appreciated by all those who subscribed to it. So a big thanks to them and all who contributed to it.
Other resources
Please do look at the Church of England Website - (churchofengland.org) where there are national updates and lots of resources for prayer and worship at home + links to live-streaming of services around the country. There is also the website of Lincoln Diocese (lincoln.anglican.org) with local news, letters and updates from our Bishops.
In addition to our Sunday Service on Heckington Living Community Radio at 11am every Sunday, there is a daily service on BBC Radio 4 LW at 9.45am each morning with plenty of thoughts for each day. Songs of Praise on Sundays at 1.15pm on BBC 1. Choral Evensong on Radio 3 at 3pm on Sundays and 3.30pm on Wednesdays. BBC Sounds App has lots of resources too. It's a chance to catch up with some great radio programmes you may have missed in the past. In this digital age we are certainly not short of resources!
Financial and Practical Help is available
Please see the 'Practical Help' page on this website for details about help with local shopping and the community larder in Heckington and the Church food bank at Helpringham along with details of charitable trusts for hardship grants.
WHO WE ARE
The Heckington & Helpringham Group of Parishes are a group of eight Anglican Parish Churches who are part of the Lafford Deanery within the southern part of the Diocese of Lincoln. The churches in our group are:
St Andrew's Asgarby
St Andrew with St Nicholas & The Blessed Virgin Mary, Burton Pedwardine
St John the Baptist Great Hale
St Andrew's Heckington
St Andrew's Helpringham,
St Andrew's Scredington
St Michael's Swaton.
They each have their own pages on this website. Do browse the site and if there is anything you are looking for but can't find it please do contact me.Keep safe & enjoy life despite the circumstances.
Rev 'Captain' Chris Harrington