As part of the UK precautions relating to the COVID-19 virus the church buildings will be closed until further notice.
News on the Reopening of the Church Buildings – From the Church Council
Church Council is responsible for deciding when the buildings can be opened for Sunday services. A Risk Assessment was presented to council and approved at their video conference meeting earlier this week. We are keen to re-open the building but also concerned for the safety of our congregation. Although we are not opening immediately, in this strange and fast changing world, the position is under review on a regular basis. A team is, however, looking into the reopening as soon as it is practical to do so.
If you would be willing and able to come to the church for services when they restart, say in the autumn, please let us know, via the church office, so we can gauge numbers. You can call the office on 01895 258956 or email office@christchurchuxbridge.org.uk
The URC have produced a personal risk assessment tool to help people assess their own level of risk for attending services which you may find useful. You can access it here.
We have been exploring various ways of continuing to ‘be’ church remotely during this time when we cannot meet together in person.
Worship
We are now live-streaming our services on Facebook every Sunday at 11am and all are welcome to join us. You can find our services here. After the service, you are welcome to join us for a virtual ‘coffee and chat’ via Zoom.
You can also find details of where to access devotional material from the Methodist Church, URC and youth material on our worship page.
Bible exploration group
We will be starting a Bible exploration group over Zoom from 28 July where we will be taking a closer look at some of the people mentioned in the Bible, starting with Hannah. We will be meeting on Tuesday evenings at 7.30pm until around 8.15pm. All are welcome to join us, either via video link or by telephone.
All you need to join in is a Bible, pen/pencil and paper. Our first session will focus on Hannah. If you would like to join us for this, please contact the office for details.
Prayer meeting
We meet for prayer each Wednesday at 7pm via Zoom. Details are sent out in our members’ newsletter. Please contact the office if you would like to join us and have not received details of how to do so, or if you have any prayer requests that you would like us to include. You can also message us via our Facebook page.
Newsletter
Our weekly church newsletter ‘Look-in’ in Lockdown shares news, reflections, prayers, readings and various other items to help us stay in touch and connected during this time. You can find the online version of our newsletter here.
Coffee morning
We are now hosting coffee mornings every other Saturday via Zoom and the details for this are sent out in our members’ newsletter. Please contact the office if you would like to join us and have not received the details. The next coffee morning is on Saturday 25 July, 10.30am – 11.30am.
Zoom
Trying to continue to be church remotely has been a learning curve for many of us! If you are unfamiliar with using Zoom, then one of our church members has written a few guides to using Zoom which you can find below: