Princess Anne to Visit Sea Mills

Word is that HRH Princess Anne (no doubt on her way home from transporting the Olympic flame to Cornwall) will be in Sea Mills on Thursday to officially open the Cafe on the Square - a new community development on Shirehampton Road. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Cafe (pictured) is a church-based community development project, is the result of a partnership between St Edyth's Parish Church, Highgrove Church and Sea Mills Methodist Church. Its aim is be resource for all sections of the community in Sea Mills. 

 

Members of the public are invited to support the official opening of the cafe on Thursday lunchtime, and stay for a bite to eat if they want. 

 

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Foodbank Launched at Oasis

Image via Wikipedia

As an indication of the growing need, and the willingness of local churches and others to get involved, North west Bristol now has its own foodbank. 

The new service was launched in February as a collaborative project between churches in Avonmouth and Kingsweston and the Oasis Brightstowe Community Hub - the academy on the site of the former Portway School in Shirehampton.  

Foodbanks exist to meet the practical needs of people who are going through a period of crisis and are struggling to feed themselves and their families. The local foodbank is focusing its efforts on households in  Shirehampton, Sea Mills, Lawrence Weston and Avonmouth.

The north-west Bristol foodbank is open year round at the following times and locations:

Monday 9:30-11:30 St Andrews Church Avonmouth Bristol BS11 9FE (buses 41, 41A, 517)	Thursday 10-12 Lawrence Weston Baptist Church 117-119 Long Cross Lawrence Weston Bristol BS11 0HL (buses 40, 517, 518)

The Foodbank is run by a team of volunteers from churches in the North West Bristol area and offers its service free of charge to anyone in need in the community, regardless of their faith.

Food is currently sourced from schools, churches and individuals. Offers of good quality food to be donated can be made via email here. 

The Bristol NW Foodbank is part of a national network of 80+ foodbanks, affiliated to the Trussell Trust.

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Not All Bells And Smells

Without making much of a fuss about its existence, a new church has sprung up in Westbury on Trym in the last year or so. Meeting at Badminton School on Sunday afternoons, Emmanuel is a spin-off of Christ Church Clifton and part of the Anglican diocese of Bristol.

As the following video reveals, however, the new church does not look like many Anglican churches you or I might have experienced in our childhood.

Interested to spot Bristol University's Professor of Jurisprudence, Julian Rivers in the video ,who also features on Trym Tales here.

The first half of the video features another new Anglican church in Clifton, Crossnet, currently meeting in homes and at the Boston Tea Party on Whiteladies Road.

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Single Parents' Fair

The Community Church - formerly Henleaze and Westbury Community Church - held its first Single Parents' Fair on May 16th at the Greenway Centre in Southmead.

Over 125 single parents plus about 240 children came to the event and were treated to a range of free events and services.

While mums enjoyed free hairstyling, manicures, and family photos and left with a free goody bag, the kids enjoyed pony rides, face painting, bouncy castle, basketball coaching, break dancing and video games.

Advice agencies were also present giving help on housing, money management, jobs and health.

Church leader Tim Dobson says that several single parent support groups are likely to start as a result of the fair and that the church anticipates running a follow up event in November. "Everything was free, people felt valued and it was lots of fun!"

The Community Church has a long history of practical community action. A large number of its members took part in the recent Bristol 10K run under the Love Running team banner. Love Running raised a remarkable £62,000 as part of the 10K run, the amount being divided equally between its three nominated charities: St Peter's Hospice, One25 and World Vision (Zimbabwe Partnership).

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Hope Springs Eternal for North Bristol Churches

The May Bank Holiday weekend sees hundreds of volunteers from north Bristol churches working in partnership with local residents on a range of community projects and outreach events in Southmead, Manor Farm, Lockleaze and Horfield.

Projects include:

• rubbish and litter clearance in public spaces
• free banquets for over 80 senior citizens on Sunday afternoon
  
• free kids' clubs on Saturday and Monday morning
• sports activities for young people every afternoon in numerous locations
• community fun afternoons on Horfield Common (Saturday), Gainsborough Square (Sunday) and Glencoyne Square (Monday).

Monday afternoon sees an end-of-noise celebration at 4.45 at Glencoyne Square Southmead followed by a Bar-B-Q, which , in keeping with the theme of the weekend, is also free.

Participating churches included the new Community Church, which has recently relocated from Westbury on Trym to the Greenway Centre in Southmead, Ebenezer Church Filton Avenue Avenue, Woodlands Church in Clifton and St Stephen's Southmead.

The Noise is a national initiative which has been running in Bristol for 7 consecutive years. Its website describes the aim of the Noise as "showing God's love in practical ways".

The Noise is part of a wider year-long national project - Hope 08 - which aims to focus hundreds of local churches on outreach and community service in their localities.

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Westbury Church Moves

Eastfield residents will find they have more parking space outside their houses on Sundays from this week as numerical growth has resulted in one of Westbury's popular local churches moving to a larger meeting venue in Southmead.

Henleaze and Westbury Community Church has met for over ten years at the former school building on the corner of Albert Place and Waters Lane, opposite the Westbury Village Hall. The search for a new building to accommodate the 300-strong congregation has been going on for some time and has finally resulted in the move to the Greenway Community Centre on Doncaster Road in Southmead.

The Greenway Centre (pictured) is a former secondary school owned by Bristol City Council and managed by the Southmead Development Trust. The Centre is undergoing major development work to provide upgraded meeting rooms, a sports hall, small business units, a cafe and youth facilities. A new GP facility and Health Centre is also planned for the site. The Centre benefited financially from the sale of part of its grounds in 1999 for the construction of the Next Generation Sports Club.

In a creative partnership between the church and the Development Trust, the congregation is contributing financially to the Centre's renovation costs in return for use of the facilities on Sundays.

The church, meanwhile, has changed its name and is now simply The Community Church. Started in 1993, the church is part of the Woodlands group of churches, with congregations in Clifton and Sea Mills. Church leader Tim Dobson, a former secondary school teacher, is excited about the move and says that "We believe that the church should be actively involved in its community, showing God’s love and concern."

The church will maintain its existing building and will continue to run a large range of mid week activities from it, including its popular IMPS group for parents and carers of pre-school children.

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