Author: Ian Trimnell

Happy New Year everyone! What a strange New Year it is.  We usually think of the New Year as giving us an opportunity to start afresh; to reflect on the way we would prefer to live our lives, on the things we would like to change, and some people choose to make New Year resolutions. This...

Good morning Friends and welcome to Friday morning prayers on 8th January, the trailing end of the Christmas Season. I wandered round various Christian websites this week just to get my heart and mind warmed up for today and found some interesting ideas amongst our denominational partners. So, let’s greet today in prayer and get started...

Greetings dear friends. Let us pause for a moment as we come before the Lord in thanksgiving prayers for his wonders and love for us his children. Prayer In your hands, dear Lord, is held the whole creation. It is your gift of fragile wonder. It is ours to treasure as you do. It has been...

OFFERINGS OF WORSHIP The word ‘Epiphany’ means manifestation or revelation—There are several instances of this in the Old Testament, notably God’s revelation to Moses at the Burning Bush (Exodus 3:2).  From the middle of the 5th century, the Church at Rome commemorated the revelation of Christ to the Gentiles as signified by the visit to the...

Afternoon of Sand by David Wagoner Like retarded water Sweeping to a shore of houses, The dunes alter. Last year, this rippling hill, Slanted and sheer against the windfence, Was a gulley, and the larch sapling Stood on toes of root above the furze. Now, overcome by the white riptide, All but leaves have gone, And...

Not Yet by Pádraig Ó Tuama  ‘You’re too young to know about The Troubles,’ the peaceman said. And the youngman said: f a t h e r s h o t d e a d m o t h e r f e l l a p a r t b r o t h e...

Shaking Hands By Pádraig Ó Tuama 27ú lá Meitheamh, 2012 Because what’s the alternative? Because of courage. Because of loved ones lost. Because no more. Because it’s a small thing; shaking hands; it happens every day. Because I heard of one man whose hands haven’t stopped shaking since a market day in Omagh. Because it takes...

Huangguoshu Waterfall By Yi Lei [Translated from the Chinese by Tracy K. Smith & Changtai Bi]  Great stones of whitewater hammer down Onto our unhurried walk in the monument’s shade, And our cramped bed at the “Vienna Villa” And the gloomy rooms where no one spoke. Great stones of whitewater hammer Onto the statue of a...

Message in a Bottle By Wyn Cooper  I close in on facts fine as sugar poured from a bottle labeled SALT, comprehend nothing.   I hear a knock, then another, go to the door but no one’s there. I unlock it and leave it open.  When the bottle’s empty a note pops out, its paper faded as...

Thanks By David Whyte  Listen with the night falling we are saying thank you we are stopping on the bridges to bow from the railings we are running out of the glass rooms with our mouths full of food to look at the sky and say thank you we are standing by the water thanking it...

Evening Prayer – Christmas Eve 24 DECEMBER 2020 – 8.00pm Revd Ernesto Lozada-Uzuriaga The House of Christmas by G.K. Chesterton This world is wild as an old wives’ tale, And strange the plain things are, The earth is enough and the air is enough For our wonder and our war; But our rest is as far as...

Love Brought Jesus Down From Heaven “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel; whose origins are from of old, from ancient times—and he will be our peace.” (Micah 5: 2, 5 NIV) Micah provides one of...