Dear Parents / Guardians,

Welcome back after half-term we hope you and your family have enjoyed the break. Thank you for your donations to the tombola in aid of our child sponsorship with WorldShare which costs £180.00 per year. The tombola raised a brlliant £83.00 towards that total , so you can see why your support it is always greatly appreciated.

As you are probably aware we are now into the second week of Lent and our Lenten project in aid of Pump Aid is now underway.Our goal is to raise at least £250.00 in order to provide one village school in either Zimbabwe or Mozambique with a clean water pump any extra water capacity can then be used by the village members to water their food crops.We will try to raise this money to help our brothers and sisters in Africa by asking everyone to donate coin collections either of small change gathered throughout the year or else from pennies saved by Lent fasting i.e. money not spent on sweets ,crisps ,cakes etc.We also request a donation of used stamps neatly trimmed but not so close as to damage the stamp. We raise approximately £!.50 for every kilo we gather. Bags2parish will be held as usual.This involves children and the wider congregation collecting a blue bag provided for the purpose of being filled with unwanted items of clothing,bedding,curtains,handbags and shoes Please collect your blue bag on Sunday 2nd March following the Motherng Sunday Family Service in which Galilee and Nazareth Group members will be performing the presentation of the Gospel.The bags must be returned a fortnight later on Palm Sunday the 16th March.

On Good Friday we are planning a Junior Church Family based event at Christ Church between the hours of 10.a.m. and 2-30 p.m. provided there is sufficient support. Junior Church families will arrive at 10.00 a.m. armed with a packed lunch! Children will go into the Parish Centre, whilst their parents go into the church. Both will then experience a morning of age appropriate activities based around the Passion of Jesus and the retelling of that story with a mid morning refreshment break. At approximately 12.30 p.m. everyone will gather together for their lunch. Following lunch we hope to enjoy a period of shared “Faith Praise” music followed by a short service at 2.00 p.m. to conclude the session. Invitations to book your family a place at this event will be available from March 2nd onwards. I hope many of you will be able to join in this Easter event.

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Junior Church Report - AGM 2007

This year has been another year of growth for the Junior Church .

Staffing.

Growth would not be possible without the consistent and conscientious support of the Junior Church team which currently involves 30 adults and 7 teenage helpers. Their commitment to fulfilling all that their voluntary work entails is remarkable and ranges from the weekly planning of lessons, the attendance of staff meetings and training events, the Saturday rehearsals for Family Service presentations, the making of floral bouquets for Mothering Sunday, the demands of volunteering to help in Holy Week Club to providing the food for the end of term Sports and Picnic Party. In addition they are also happy to participate in social events, which further increases the sense of a shared purpose and a team spirit. This in turn enables the ethos of the Junior Church to be one of an organised, welcoming and vibrant youth group within Christ Church .

There have been few staff changes this year. Three group leaders in total have stepped down. One the result of a move out of area, the other two owing to personal circumstances necessitating a ‘sabbatical' with a view to returning in the future.

Two of the replacement leaders came from ‘in house'. Dan, became a leader in training along with Alison who moved from the role of helper to leader. Helen filled the third vacancy. Andrew also joined our ranks as an adult helper. Sophie, Sam and Sophia have become teenage helpers.

Special reference must be made at this point to Jill Walters, who as my Deputy ensures the ‘on time' delivery of our Church Magazine page to the Editor, who organises the Junior Church Café when required and who in general gives me the stalwart support that you wish for in your deputy.

I would also like to thank Paul Mottershead for his technical support in running the power-point presentations that are now a weekly feature of our meetings and also for his creation and attention to the up dating of our Junior Church web-site.

Last but by no means least I would like to thank the wider church family for their support in our fund raising schemes and in their help with props for plays and materials for Holy Week Club.

Junior Church Statistics.

The number of Children on roll is 107.

Average attendance each term this year has steadily increased
Summer term 2006 : 46 per week
Autumn term 2006 : 49 per week
Spring term 2007: 55 per week

Organisational Changes.

Mainly of a technical nature this year with the introduction of power-point to our Service of Worship and the use of the web-site as another tool for communication with parents and the world beyond. This in turn has led to a new policy re parent permission for children's unidentified images appearing on parish display boards, power-point and the web-site. All parents are now asked to fill in one consent form to last the duration of the child's time in Junior Church .

Certificates of Achievement have been introduced to allow children recognition for their individual efforts within Junior Church in a form they can add to their portfolios in school as evidence of Service to the Community.

Summary of Charity Giving.

The charities supported this year and the nature of donations are shown below ;

This term's chosen National charity is the Samaritans.

Holy Week Club.

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