News & Features

The season of Lent begins on Wednesday 22nd February this year.  We will mark this beginning with a service of Holy Communion, with the Imposition of Ashes, at 10am in St Peter's Church at Brooke.

Throughout the season there will be opportunties for prayer, study and fellowship; all helping us to prepare ourselves for Holy Week and the celebrations at Easter.

This year we are re-introducing a week day Communion Service on Thursday mornings in March, with the option of coffee and Bible Study to follow for those who wish.  We will keep Mothering Sunday with a celebratory service, inviting community organisations to join with the regular congregation, and offering the opportunity to remember those mothers we cannot be with on the day.

Full details of all our Lent offerings, including an invitation to join the Hempnall Group for their Lent talks: "Local but not parochial....", please see our "Lent, Holy Week and Easter" booklet, which is on the Resources Page and featured on the Home Page.

The Feast of Candlemas, on the 2nd February, marks the end of the Christmas season.  We turn our attention from the stories of baby Jesus to the stories of his passion, death and resurrection.

We celebrated in style in the Brooke Benefice with a candlelit service on Sunday evening and a service for Brooke Primary School on the day itself.

It was wonderful to welcome people from across the deanery to our Candlemas Communion service.  They were greeted by a lantern lit path and the church was aglow with candles.  During the service the candles for use in all our churches this year were presented and blessed, keeping an ancient tradition.  St Peter's Choir gave us a special rendition of the Nunc Dimittis during the Gospel reading and the prophetess Anna made a guest appearance to share her story of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple.  The celebrations concluded with coffee and special Candlemas cake in the Church Rooms.

For a second year the children of Brooke Primary School processed through the village, carrying their handmade lanterns to the church for their own candlemas service.  Year Five and Six children led our worship and acted out the Presentation story.  Candles for use in worship at school were blessed and the school choir led us all in singing "shine Jesus shine".  The children left church to go out and be lights in the world.

We now enter a brief period of "Ordinary Time" before Lent begins and we turn our attention to preparing for our Easter celebrations.

Looking forward to working together in 2023 as we wait to see what God has in store for us.

ADVENT 

in the Brooke Benefice

Another Church year begins as we keep the season of Advent.  It is a time of preparation, as we ready ourselves to celebrate Christmas, and remind ourselves that we await the coming of Jesus in majesty.  In our services we will be linking into the Diocesan theme for the year : being pastoral, and we will be introducing some contemporary Christians who have offered their pastoral services in the work of God.

There are full details of all our services here, on the web-site, and everyone is welcome to come along.

This Sunday is the last of the Church year: the feast of Christ the King.  Our worship will be a great celebration of Christ's coming reign and we will be thinking about our membership of the Kingdom of God.

As we celebrate, we'll look back over the year and look for all the signs of God's kingdom breaking into our lives.  We'll remember those who have come for Baptism and those who have begun their married life in our churches.  We'll give thanks again for all those who have gone before us and set us such a rich example of faithful service and discipleship.  As we pray together, we'll remember our commitment to doing our bit to grow God's kingdom and our calling to "tell the good news".  

Everyone is welcome to our special celebration service which is at Kirstead Church at 10.30am on Sunday (20th November).  If you can't come in person, why not join us on Zoom.  If you've got something else on that morning then use your phone or smart speaker to set an alarm for 11am and spend one minute joining in with our worship wherever you are.