In April, more than 340 URC ministers gathered in Staffordshire to spend 4 days being inspired and challenged. The event replaced the annual Spring Schools run by individual synods, allowing ministers from across the entire country to meet and share. The theme for the week was Discipleship. With 2 keynote speakers – Rowan Williams, former […]
Jesus is risen – now what?. Sermon given 15th April 2018 at S. Andrew’s Ealing, Revd Susan McCoan Acts 3:12-19 Luke 24: 36b-48 A few years ago, I conducted a funeral in church for a gentleman who had been at one time a regular churchgoer but who, as his health declined, had been unable to […]
Easter reflection – Part 1 Today is Easter Day. It’s also, as you will know, April Fool’s Day. Anybody been April fooled? It’s become a custom for newspapers to print an April Fool story; it’s getting harder and harder for them to think of something that’s more absurd than the real news. It raises the […]
St. Andrew’s United Reformed Church, Ealing, has held a special service to mark Reformation Sunday, five hundred years after Martin Luther first nailed his 95 Theses to a church door and set off the Protestant Reformation. The church is remembering with sadness the bloodshed and the divisions that followed, even as it celebrates the origins […]
Listen to Sunday Worship which celebrated the centenary of the ordination of Congregationalist Minister, Constance Coltman, the first woman to be ordained to ministry in any mainstream church in Britain. Also to Daily Service, with Dr Janet Wootton on the same theme. Read about a celebration weekend of events. And (quite literally) buy the T-shirt […]
Imagine a church where the one and only priority was to equip disciples for their daily lives. Imagine a church where each person had confidence in the gospel; where each had a clear sense that wherever they were, whatever they were doing, they were part of God’s mission. Imagine a church that cared more about […]
A number of members of St. Andrew’s visited Oberammergau in 2010 for the Passion Play. It was, by all accounts, an extraordinary experience. The people of Oberammergau have staged the Passion every ten years since 1634, in gratitude to God for the passing of the Plague from their village. Planning is already well advanced for […]
In 2012, the URC organised a conference, ‘Opening the Gates to Heaven’, to explore the theology of worship – not just what we do, but why we do it. A second conference, ‘Treasuring Word and Worship’, followed in 2014. Out of this came two things: a small book ‘In Word and Spirit’, containing the discussion […]
Sermon given at St. Andrew’s Ealing Sun 7th May by Revd Sue McCoan Ezekiel 34: 7-15 My brother-in-law is a farmer, mixed arable and beef cattle now, but at one time he also kept sheep. One day when we were visiting, he asked Jamie and me to help him move the sheep from the barn […]
Make the most of Reform magazine! The March edition of Reform – the national magazine published by the United Reformed Church – is out now! Hot off the heels of last month’s ‘good question’ (‘Is it antisemitic to criticise Israel?’) this month, we ask: ‘What does the Reformation mean today?’ As usual, the article gives […]
