Planning for the Millennium - PCC Report

Many of us find ourselves tempted to ask what all the fuss is about. But only a moment’s thought reminds us that it is about that all-important event, the birth of Christ. It is all the extraneous noise that is irrelevant and not the event itself, thus we end up back with the question ‘how should we mark this great anniversary in the Christian calendar?’ This question has appeared regularly on the PCC agenda throughout this year, and after much deliberation we have identified three ways that we feel it is appropriate for St Peter’s to mark this time.

  1. We have agreed to provide financial support to the professional advertising campaign that is running in the City centre to attract newcomers to Christianity - you many have noticed that this has started to appear on buses and elsewhere.
  2. It has been agreed that we will open the Church during the week between Christmas and New Year. This is normally a time of rest for everyone involved in the midweek teams, most especially the clergy. However the PCC felt that as others focussed on what more they could do to mark this special time, one thing that we at St Peter’s are especially good at is providing a place of peace and loving support. We believe that this will be particularly welcome at this time, which could be a time of spiritual unrest or loneliness for so many. We need volunteers to be in church during this week, please let Keith Charter or Frank Riley know if you can help even for a couple of hours.
  3. We undertook to support the Southwell Diocese ‘Millennium 2000 Fund’ by additional fundraising rather than from the PCC budget. This initiative was launched by Bishop Patrick and we were encouraged to pledge our support prior to his retirement in order to ensure that he witnessed the success of the fund whilst still in office. This we did. A target amount was set for each Parish based on our ability to give. Our target is £2,600. We now need to consider how we could raise this money. We will seek donations from members of St Peter’s during December and have agreed to donate the retiring collection on Christmas Eve to this excellent cause but we need more ideas on ways in which we could meet our target.

The causes that the fund will support are:

  • A new Bible translation for the Toba Indians of Northern Argentina
  • A money advice specialist in Mansfield
  • Sacrista Prebend, a house in Southwell for retreats and conferences
  • Scholarship for overseas student to study at St John’s College, Nottingham
  • Time Travelling, educational and evangelistic initiative in the Minster for schools

I know that we will each have our own views of how ‘worthy’ each of these causes are, which means that as a church we can feel fully committed to all of them. I also feel sure that we will want to offer support to both Bishop Patrick and Bishop George by our commitment to this project, so please do look favourably on requests for help.

So we will seek to mark this momentous time in these three ways. Three ways that will give every member of our church a chance to be part of what we are doing and give St Peter’s a chance to be part of what Christians are doing in our own church, in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, in the diocese and in the World.

Alison Maddocks

Find out how our ancestors coped with rather different problems...


http://www.stpetersnottingham.org/misc/y2k.html
© St Peter's Church, Nottingham
Last revised 29th September 1999