Harvest Bring and Share Supper
Please do join us on Sunday 1st October for the Harvest celebration in Otterbourne Village Hall. The supper will begin at 7pm following on from the Choral Evensong service in St. Matthew’s, Otterbourne. Everyone will receive a warm, friendly welcome.
Concert at All Saints’, Hursley. Date for your diary
We are honoured to announce that The Gents of St John’s, Cambridge will be visiting All Saints’ on Saturday 23rd September for an evening of music. The Gents of St John’s are a close-harmony group made up of the world-renowned choral scholars from St John’s College, Cambridge. The evening will showcase music spanning over 600 […]
Morning Service for Trinity 6 2023
We all know about the parable of the sower don’t we, it’s been a favourite with Sunday schools and school assemblies for a couple of thousand years. Even if we no longer live in an agricultural economy, even though we don’t sow our seed by ‘broadcasting’ it indiscriminately anymore, we can all get the analogy. We all get the point that if you are in the business of sowing seed you’re going to get a few failures – we also get the more disturbing point that the success of the seed depends on the nature of the ground onto which it falls – and in turn we might be the one doing the sowing, or the ground that must nurture the seed and bring it to fruitfulness.
Morning Service for Trinity 5 2023
When the bishop’s ship stopped at a remote island for a day, he determined to use the time as profitably as possible. He strolled along the seashore and came across three fishermen mending their nets. In pidgin English they explained to him that centuries before their village had been converted by missionaries. “We, Christians!” they said, proudly pointing to one another.
Morning Service for Trinity 4 2023
“Take your so, your only son, whom you love…”
The Story of Abraham and Isaac is not very nice – it is certainly not suitable for children. This is not an acceptable story for our times – it does not present a gentle, ‘it’s there if you want it,’ view of faith and God. In our time, an hour on a Sunday morning is too much to sacrifice.
Morning Service for Trinity 3 2023
Hagar – what does she mean to you? Does she mean anything to you?
We saw her this morning – in the dry and empty desert in the wilderness of Beer-sheba. There she was, her precious son Ishmael, dying from thirst, she leaves him in his delirium, not able to watch him die – victims both.
Morning Service for Trinity 2 2023
“Is anything impossible for God?”
Surely that’s the question. Was it impossible for Jesus’ disciples to “cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons”? Was it impossible for Abraham at over 100 and Sarah in her Nineties to have a son? Is it impossible for us to have the faith that Paul speaks of, a faith that gives us a hope that will not disappoint, a faith that God’s love has really been poured into our hearts, a faith that God has proved his love for us because Christ died for us?
Charlotte Yonge
On 3 September , we will be holding a special Choral Evensong at St. Matthew’s, Otterbourne which will feature hymns which would have been around during the time of Charlotte Yonge, a famous and successful authoress of the 19th century who lived all her life in Otterbourne. After the service, cheese and wine will be […]
Bring and Share Lunch
The Recory Summer lunch will be held in the Rectory garden on Sunday 16th July at 12.30pm. Please do come along and join us. Everyone will recieve a warm welcome.
Otterbourne village fete
The fete will be Sunday 25th June 1-4pm on Otterbourne Rec. There will be a fun dog show (weather permitting), Otterbourne CE Primary School Maypole dancing, a dog obedience demonstration, Otterbourne Brass Band, and a BBQ and Bar. There will also be refreshments, ice-creams, a sweetie stall, lots of children’s stalls & games, a bouncy […]
Open gardens in Compon Street
Six gardens, including one listed garden, will be open between Compton Street and Place Lane on Sataurday 24th June. The afternoon starts at 2pm and finishes at 5pm. There will also be flower arrangements on display in all Saints Church, Compton as well as a history tour in the church. Cream Teas will be served […]
Morning Service for Trinity 1 2023
“The LORD said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.”
So begins a new chapter in the history of the world. From this point on bible history gets very personal, its concern is with Abraham and his family as we trace the future of this promise, and how all peoples on earth will be blessed through him.
Morning Service for Trinity Sunday for 2023
Someone once famously said, “only connect”. This Sunday, Trinity Sunday, is a day to make connections. Christians often regard the doctrine of the Trinity with some embarrassment; it is so much easier to think in simpler terms of just God, or just Jesus. But that would fail to recognise the unique contribution Christianity has made to the science of God – the understanding that God is not remote, above and beyond all – so far transcendent that he merely sits in judgement, so far apart from us that he can do us no earthly good.
Otterbourne Summer Fete
We are pleased to advise that this year’s fete will be held on Sunday 25 June from 12 noon until 4pm. It will be held on the recreation ground in Otterbourne. Please put the date in your diary and await fruther information. If you would like to volunteer to help on the day, please contact: […]
Charlotte Yonge
On 24 June, there will be an exhibition regarding the life of Charlotte Mary Yonge in Otterbourne Village Hall. There is also a display board in St. Matthew’s church which will be in placefor the summer months. Also, on 3 September, we will be holding a special Choral Evensong in St. Matthew’s which will feature […]
A Service for Pentecost 2023
Words, Words, Words.
Words are confusing but they are the best we have perhaps. Philosophers get very excited about them. The well known twentieth century philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell was said to have problems with numbers larger than two of anything – with two you could say this one is … and that one is the same in these ways but different in those other ways. But with more than two it becomes very complicated. I am told of philosophy university lecture courses which start with chairs. What is a chair? Something you sit on? Then there are lots of people sitting here. Are they sitting on chairs? No! How do you define what a chair is then?
Morning Service for the Seventh Sunday of Easter 2023
Jesus said, “and now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you.”
This morning’s Gospel reading was the beginning of the end of Jesus’s farewell discourse to his disciples, his long soliloquy preparing them for his death and for his glorification, and their future. In the speech Jesus deals with his relationship to God and his relationship to the disciples and their relationship to the world. Jesus speaks of him and the father being one, he then, a little later, talks of the disciples being one and then he says that he is one with the disciples, “I in them and you (that’s God) in me, that they may be perfected into one, that the world may know that you sent me, and have loved them just as you have loved me.”
May Magazine Letter 2023
Easter has long passed by the time you read this, but the church has not done with it so quickly. The chocolate eggs may be just a sweet memory, but there is an endless amount of thinking that will happen before we stop calling the Sundays after Easter ‘Sundays after Easter’. Death and resurrection are all around us, we so often see the former, but we sometimes need to be reminded of the latter.
Magazine letter April 2023
Holy Week – Easter is not a one off event, it is not like Christmas, it is inseparable from what went before. The services of Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday are an essential part of what makes Easter so special. Without any one of them the story is incomplete.
Magazine letter for March 2023
The earthquake in Turkey and North Syria has stopped us in our tracks. So many of the worries and concerns we have suddenly seem so small in comparison to the plight of the many people who have lost everything and who just don’t know where to start to bury their dead, let alone begin the process of rebuilding their lives.