Category: Latest News

On Good Friday at 10.30am in St Wilfrid’s Church we will be holding a Way of the Cross Service.  Although designed specifically for our children, we warmly welcome ALL parishioners to this event.  Following the service we will be sharing hot cross buns in the hall. Donations to our Lenten Appeal, Tiny Tickers, will be gratefully received. 

Over 50’s Activities – St Wilfrid’s Church Hall:

Our next Afternoon Tea will be Thursday 31st March, 2pm to 4pm in the church hall.  Everyone is welcome to this friendly social event.

John & Margaret’s Diamond Wedding Anniversary:  A really big thank you from us and the Macmillan Cancer Support for donating £140.00 which was raised from celebrating our ‘Diamond Anniversary’.   Macmillan understand that cancer can impact people’s whole life – health, money, families, work; everything.  They provide support that’s about all these things, helping people live their life with cancer.  They advise on work and benefits, and are always there for emotional support when things get tough.  They give people the support, energy and inspiration to feel more like themselves.  Thank you.

At St George’s we need someone to train up as a Sacristan, either gender.  As you know we have three Masses a week. Sunday at nine o`clock and Tuesday and Thursday at ten o`clock. It is such a rewarding and uplifting task, preparing for Mass . If you feel you could do it, please ask Fr. Rory, Angela or myself Cathy or ring me 01323 487688 for more information.  Thank you.

I found this account concerning this Sunday’s special significance for us on the Internet:

Mothering Sunday is the fourth Sunday Of Lent. Although it’s often called Mothers’ Day it has no connection with the American festival of that name. Traditionally, it was a day when children, mainly daughters, who had gone to work as domestic servants were given a day off to visit their mother and family. Today it is a day when children give presents, flowers, and home-made cards to their mothers. Most Sundays in the year churchgoers in England worship at their nearest parish or ‘daughter church’.

Centuries ago it was considered important for people to return to their home or ‘mother’ church once a year. So each year in the middle of Lent, everyone would visit their ‘mother’ church – the main church or cathedral of the area.

Inevitably the return to the ‘mother’ church became an occasion for family reunions when children who were working away returned home. Most historians think that it was the return to the ‘Mother’ church which led to the tradition of children, particularly those working as domestic servants, or as apprentices, being given the day off to visit their mother and family. As they walked along the country lanes, children would pick wild flowers or violets to take to church or give to their mother as a small gift.

Another thought is that the name comes from one of the Bible readings for that day, which refers to motherhood in a different way. In Galatians 4:26 we read: “But the Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all”. 

The writer of the text wanted to explain to the Galatian community what their relationship as Christians was to the Jewish Law.

Mothering Sunday was also known as Refreshment Sunday because the fasting rules for Lent were relaxed that day.

Originally, both Old and New Testament lessons on mid-lent Sunday made a point of food. The Gospel reading from the New Testament told the story of how Jesus fed five thousand people with only five small barley loaves and two small fish. The food item specially associated with Mothering Sunday is the Simnel cake. This is a fruit cake with two layers of almond paste, one on top and one in the middle. It has 11 balls of marzipan icing on top representing the 11 disciples. (Judas is not included.) Traditionally, sugar violets would also be added. The name Simnel probably comes from the Latin word simila which means a fine wheat flour usually used for baking a cake.

There’s a legend that a man called Simon and his wife Nell argued over whether the cake for Mothering Sunday should be baked or boiled. In the end they did both, so the cake was named after both of them: SIM-NELL.