Letter From Fr. Stuart
Dear friends,
Before Natalie and myself moved to Cornwall we were told how wonderful Cornwall was, and were assured that the summers were better, warmer and sunnier than the rest of the country. For the last two years I was convinced that I’d been lied to about the weather while the summers appeared to be wall-to-wall rain, or liquid sunshine – but this year I’ve realised that maybe the story was true after all (at least on occasions) as we’ve had a good summer as well as a good May half-term. Thinking about this made me start to think about what we do when we speak to others about things we’re passionate about. If we’re speaking to someone who is considering moving down here of course we will tell them about what to see, how things are done “dreckly”, and how wonderful it is to live here in Cornwall. No doubt that will include telling them that it’s warmer than everywhere else and never snows…But what about if someone is starting to ask questions about faith? While we are quite happy to tell others all the wonderful things about living in Cornwall, are we confident speaking in the same way about our Christian faith?On Sunday 26th September the church keeps the so-called “Back to Church Sunday.” It has been shown that the most effective way to encourage other people to come to church is to actually invite them personally, to talk to them. I suppose that’s fairly obvious, considering how good Cornish residents are at persuading others how wonderful it is down here – but we don’t always think about telling others about our faith in quite the same way.But Back to Church Sunday is a time we can give it a try. Because it is a national event it is likely that other people will have heard about it on the news. Of course posters and suchlike can and will go up, but the best possible way to tell someone about the service, and about having a real Christian faith, is to talk to them. You never know what might happen!The word “gospel” means, quite literally, “good news.” Generally others like to hear about good news, whether that might be a friend giving birth, predictions of good weather, or simply how wonderful it is to live in Cornwall. People love hearing about it. Maybe, then, in the build-up to Back to Church Sunday we could all try to think about how we could tell other people about this wonderful thing that is the Christian faith, and invite them to join us in the joyful worship of God.People like hearing about wonderful things – so let’s give it a try!
Wishing you every blessing,
Fr. Stuart