Happy Christmas from the Stantonbury Ecumenical Partnership – we have special services to celebrate the birth of our Lord over the next few days.

There will not be services in all churches at the same time – Bradwell and Cross and Stable will hold Christmas Midnight services starting at 11.30pm while Christ Church is holding its Christmas Eve Midnight in Bethlehem service at the earlier time of 9pm.

There are carol services in three churches – Bradwell, St Andrew’s and St James – at 6pm on December 21 but if that is not your choice head to St Mary Magdalene for their Children’s Crib Service at 3pm on the same day.

However if you wish to attend one of the carol services and a crib service then St Andrew’s (4pm), Bradwell and St James’ have crib services on Christmas Eve.

Similarly there are a range of times for Christmas morning worship. As a reminder download the poster for all services here.

The hunt is on in the Partnership to recruit teenagers to form a Youth Gospel Choir in a new drive to encourage youngsters into our churches.

The initiative is being led by the Rev Peterson Feital, the recently appointed house for duty minister.

The Rev Peterson Feital with family members.

He said: “We are currently looking for young people from Year 10 to Sixth Form. However, if your child falls outside this age range, please do come and speak to me because we may have additional spaces available on a discretionary case-by-case basis.

“Our leadership is very excited about what this could offer our young people, but we will be taking things slowly with small, thoughtful steps. Our first step is to gather a group of young people from across the partnership to take part in a Christmas taster session.

“Christmas is a wonderful time when many new people visit our church for carols and Christmas services. We would love to showcase the incredible talents of our young people and share our vision for this choir to our community.

“We will be welcoming Elaine Simpson as our Choir Director.  Here is the link to one of Elaine iconic performances at the Royal Albert Hall. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ubuMr5kjcQ&list=RD-ubuMr5kjcQ&start_radio=1

Further details can be found in the latest SEP newsletter to download here.