Present: Nick Neale, Clare Bryne, Belinda, Anthony, Father Kevin, Richard, Anne, Lindsay.
Apologies. Stephen Parker, Phil Rostant, Mike Campbell
1. Welcome prayer
2. Matters arising from minutes
a. Parish directory (Clare) now done and distributed a few at parish day. Will make some minor updates and then distribute on a Sunday soon.
b. CAFÉ course and The Big Picture. Lindsay reported they will trial “The Big Picture” as a small group course, evaluate and then after Easter do as a Cafe course in the church hall for the whole parish. We have a copy from the diocese for leaders, but attendees may need to buy the book for themselves.
C. Confirmation courses: Richard and Lindsay are running and now are about a quarter of way through, with 26 children on the course. Seem a nice group. Bishop coming 12 o’clock on Saturday December 14th. Discussed whether some sort of party may take place afterwards; Richard and Lindsay will liaise with parents to discuss.
D. Caritas, nothing yet to report but will be in newsletter soon.
3. Trees and wall updates.
Wall. The neighbour is going to look at it but still in progress as they are waiting for an official report/survey.
Trees: Mr Anderson from Treecare did a survey and report. We need to considering issues such as H&S and impact on neighbours. The big tree at the front needs to come down which will be complicated and expensive. He also proposed we remove the sycamores by the football ground and we should do some thinning and remove the silver birch. Friendly discussions with neighbours ongoing about other major pruning. Currently collecting estimates before booking major work. Nick is leading on this.
4. Reports from parish areas. None
5. Item on parish giving. Chris Dingle ask the council to consider a decision taken in parish council 1/3/2011 about giving extra money to needy parishes and disaster appeals in addition to any special collections.
- The council agreed a simple sustainable approach for needy parishes was to double the special collection from parish funds, but this decision did not prejudice giving more should that be appropriate in the future.
- Also the council agreed that the parish should augment what is raised for special disaster appeals and specifically those for CAFOD. General feeling was that we as a parish should be generous and match such special second collections where we can from general funds.
- There is a need to communicate with the parish concerning our commitment to the poor and extra giving.
AOB
- Richard asked about youth club and whether the parish would subsidise the monthly meal they have. General consensus to support this and give £200 pa for now.
- The God who speaks books are a revised translation from King James Version and likely to be adopted in the missal soon. We have a number of these books on Matthew’s gospel. The idea is parishioners buy one and carry it around and read a bit every day. The council was unclear how to take this Diocesan initiative forward as we have only 20 copies, although the principle of encouraging parishioners in regular bible reading was supported. We could facilitate by managing any orders from parishioners, for example on the first Sunday in Advent.
6. Finishing prayer