7 attendees: DB = Diana Betts, MM = Mary O’Mahony (Chair), Fr David, OC = Owen Clutton, RW = Roger Wright (Secretary), CP = Caroline Price, JA = June Adams.
Apologies were received from: Peter Lowe, Angela Martin, Geraldine Thompson
The meeting opened with a prayer for Justice and Peace.
It was very good to have Fr David with us for the first time and his support was much appreciated.
Agreed actions shown in bold red type.
1. Minutes of last meeting
OC had been in touch with Paul Chitnis about an acknowledgement for the donations we had made for Zambuko House and a letter had been received. This will be displayed on the notice board and at the forthcoming plant sale (in summary form) as a means of thanking the parish.
2. J&P collections
The collections organised by the J&P group were outlined for Fr David. He agreed that the Foodbank collections should resume at their previous frequency. MM asked that the Foodbank collection scheduled for early September should be moved to the end of July. Supplies were much needed over the school holiday because children in need do not have the usual support of school dinners. Fr David agreed and the weekend of 11-12th July was booked in. 28-29th November was provisionally agreed, both dates being subject to confirmation with the parish office: MM to email details.
CP has a friend who runs the Sidcup Foodbank and she suggested that St James’ could benefit from a short talk about the importance of food banks. It was agreed that CP should contact her friend to see if she could give a talk.
CAFOD Harvest Fast Day will be on Friday 2nd October this year. Further thought is needed in order to fit in a collection for the Manna Society.
Fr David and the parish office will be compiling a calendar which will run from the beginning of the school year. All groups will be involved in this in an attempt to avoid clashes of interest.
[Just for the record, collections/sales organised by J&P in 2013 was as follows:
|
20-Jan-13 |
Traidcraft stall |
|
17-Feb-13 |
Manna Centre |
|
24-Feb-13 |
CAFOD Lent Fast Day |
|
10-Mar-13 |
Traidcraft stall |
|
14-Apr-13 |
Orpington Foodbank |
|
05-May-13 |
Traidcraft stall |
|
16-Jun-13 |
Manna Centre |
|
14-Jul-13 |
Traidcraft stall |
|
21-Jul-13 |
Orpington Foodbank |
|
22-Sep-13 |
Manna Centre |
|
29-Sep-13 |
Traidcraft stall |
|
04-Oct-13 |
CAFOD Harvest Fast Day |
|
10-Nov-13 |
Traidcraft stall |
|
17-Nov-13 |
Orpington Foodbank |
|
01-Dec-13 |
Traidcraft stall |
This worked well and a good level of support was given by the parish throughout.]
3. Traidcraft Stall
The next stall is scheduled for 13-14th June. The rota was agreed as follows:
6pm JA and MM
9.15am GT and RW
11am OC and DB
Peter and Angela may wish to join in.
RW had received an email from Chris Delf suggesting that J&P (LiveSimply) might wish to have a visible presence at the Fun Run picnic. One possibility was to run a Traidcraft stall outside but it was agreed the logistics and effort involved could be too difficult. [This was confirmed by DB after discussion with Geraldine and a stall will not be set up.]
4. CAFOD Climate Change Campaign
The postcard signing had not gone ahead because CAFOD announced that cards could not be accepted any later than two weeks before the General Election. No suitable date could be found to satisfy that requirement.
RW was keen to promote the CAFOD Parliamentary Lobby on 17th June at St James’, especially as he had been involved with canvassing other parishes in the diocese. OC and RW planned to attend the lobby and hoped others might join them. Fr David agreed to posters being displayed and would be happy to publicise the event at Mass. He advised that the message should be given lightly and without repetition as this could put people off. RW was asked to remind Fr David about making an announcement.
Fr David was happy to use the special bidding prayers sent by CAFOD and a copy was handed over.
CAFOD has asked parishes to make bunting for the lobby. The idea is to give the event a festival feel and remind MPs the sort of things that we love and don’t want to lose because of climate change (bees, beaches, chocolate, polar bears, etc.) as well threatening poor communities in vulnerable countries. MM and RW had been asking the parish youth groups for help in this and the Guides have started work. No others had volunteered probably due to pressure of planned activities. RW subsequently realised that if blank bunting was prepared by J&P members, it would be much quicker and easier for everyone, only requiring simple words to be added by children and adults. Recycled material was sought for this and once cut out would be offered to groups for enhancement. The opportunity to add words to it at the Fun Run picnic seemed a good idea, giving parishioners a kind of participation in sending a message to Parliament. MM and RW to progress this.
The Pope’s encyclical should be published in June. Secretary General to the UN, Ban Ki-moon, had invited His Holiness to open the UN summit on Climate Change scheduled for 25th September, demonstrating how influential the Church’s teaching might be.
5. Parish project
Plant sale
DB had worked hard to prepare for the plant sale on 6-7th June in aid of Zambuko House. The plants would be divided into stalls of annuals, perennials and vegetables. There would be a table for the horticultural advisors and two for wrapping and donations (one at each entrance – car park side and at fire door near kitchen). Unfortunately the church cleaning rota for J&P / LiveSimply falls on the same Saturday. It was agreed to simply do as much cleaning as seemed necessary before moving outside to set up the plant sale. MM, OC and JA will be cleaning the church before they help with the plant sale setting up, relieving others to support the latter at the start.
The plant sale rota would be confirmed when DB had been in contact with the LiveSimply garden group and Peter & Angela. The provisional timetable agreed as:
Set up on Saturday morning: Mary, Owen, June, Di and anyone else available.
Saturday from 5.00pm and after 6.00pm Mass: Owen, Di and husband Tim, and expert Mel Deasy.
Sunday after 9.15am Mass: Geraldine, Mary, Roger, Di and expert Anne Said.
Sunday after 11.00am Mass: Roger, Di, Angela (probably), Peter and/or Mary Ingledew possibly, and expert Joe Falzon.
There was discussion about whether or not to price the plants, bearing in mind that it had been originally intended to ask for donations. DB suggested that guide amounts would be displayed because the plants will be of variable quality and accurate pricing was impossible. However, plants would be available for much less than from a garden centre.
Fr David had been told that Morrisons sometimes gave away plants for charitable purposes. There was a suspicion that quality would not be good so this may not be followed up.
Next project
The commitment to Zambuko House would come to an end in August. RW had received a lot of information about the mission of Fr Ivan D’Silva in Tripura, NE India. This contact had come through Fr Tom and the J&P Group was minded to support this cause following his recommendation. OC agreed to look through some of the documentation from Fr Ivan and report back at the next meeting.
It was good to learn that Fr David had been a missionary for 21 years before joining the diocese. His contacts would almost certainly provide ideas for the subsequent project when selected in Aug-Dec 2016.
6. New initiatives
It was agreed to leave discussion of another Leave the Car at Home Weekend until another meeting.
7. Any other business
Fr David mentioned that at a recent Petts Wood Churches Together meeting, the “One World Week” had been discussed. They would like a speaker from CAFOD to take part and he asked RW to speak to Pauline Sparkes (URC) to ascertain the context of such a talk and then ask CAFOD for an appropriate speaker.
The Bromley Borough Foodbank had asked for volunteers to help at a Tesco collection between Thursday 2nd July and Saturday 4th July. This simply involves handing out leaflets at the entrance to various local stores for an hour or two. RW would email the parish office with an item for Briefly.
There being no other business, the meeting closed at 9.00pm.
The next meeting will be held on Wednesday 24 June 2015 at 7.45pm.