Anglican Bordeaux – January Newsletter
Firstly I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a blessed New Year
As I look back on the 2019, I feel very encouraged by the work we have done in Bordeaux, (in sometimes challenging circumstances) and I feel positive about the coming year. We are still actively engaged in looking for new premises for our congregation, and that will continue with meetings already planned for early January.
The Sisters at Le Grand Bon Pasteur continue to offer us the most amazing welcome and patience as we pursue our various options. I think as a community we have been blessed by their loving Christian hospitality.
They have thrown open their doors and welcomed the strangers, something which I believe, we as a community have learned a lot from in the last year.
December saw some amazing examples of our community coming together and working hard to achieve something beautiful.
First, the church bazaar ! This was my first bazaar and I am so very grateful to Deirdre Rankin and Heather Gardener (and all their little helpers) for all they did in co ordinating this event.
Despite the pouring rain, we had many visitors and raised an amazing amount for Chaplaincy funds and for our chosen charities. It was a day full of laughter and chat,
introductions were given and new friends were made.
For our Carol Service this year we once again received a kind invitation from the beautiful Eglise Notre Dame in the centre of Bordeaux.
We received a very warm welcome and around 230 people came and enjoyed the singing, the telling of the Christmas story, and our brilliant talented Sunday School!
My Carol Service sermon was titled “us” which was fitting because it was not as individuals that we made both of these major events in our church life a success but as us, our christian community, our family.
We are immensely grateful to Pere Bruno from the Paroisse du Port for his kind support throughout the year and especially for making the Eglise St Pierre available to us throughout the year and for our Christmas Day service.
It was wonderful to welcome old friends and new, and to celebrate Jesus’ birth together in the most beautiful of settings.
My prayer is that we will continue to grow as a community in 2020, there is no I, in Bordeaux! Just as we have been welcomed, I pray that we will continue to welcome the stranger, that we will continue to search for new premises but that we will continue to search for the lost, the lonely and the broken too, sharing Christ love and shining a light into the dark places of our world.
Charlotte xx
Week of Prayer for Christian Unity: 18 – 25 January 2020
In 2020, Bordeaux will be starting the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity with a bang! France 2 television has invited the evangelical churches in Bordeaux to prepare an ecumenical service. The service will be broadcast on Sunday, 12th January and recorded in the the church which was formerly St Nicholas Anglican church. Our Chaplain, Reverend Tony Lomas and Reverend Charlotte Sullivan will be involved.
On Sunday 19th, we are all invited to an ecumenical celebration at Eglise Saint-Augustin, Place de l’Église Saint-Augustin, 33000 Bordeaux, organised by the Catholic church in conjunction with the Mérignac EPUF Protestant church. The service will start at 10.30, followed by a picnic lunch.
The Caudéran ecumenical study group will be holding a service at Chapelle Jasmin, Rue du Dr Roux, 33320 Eysines on Thursday 23 rd, starting at 19.00 and followed by a bring-and-share finger-food buffet.
Other dates will probably be announced – watch anglicanbordeaux.org
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