Quinquennial
Report

AGENDA

1. Apologies

2. Meeting of Parishioners for election of Churchwardens

3. Minutes of 2005 Annual Parochial Church Meeting

4. Matters arising

5. Annual Report and Accounts

6. Report on the Goods, Fabric and Ornaments of St Mary’s

7. Coventry East Deanery Synod Report

8. Presentation of Revised Electoral Roll

9. Election of 1 representative to Coventry East Deanery Synod

10. Election of 8 Representatives to serve on PCC

11. Reports from Parish Groups

12. Election of Electoral Roll Officer

13. Election of Independent Examiner

14. Any Other Business

Malcolm Tyler

We are pleased to be able to report that this year we finally appear to have emerged from the continual cycle of vandalism to the church and centre that so overshadowed us during the last couple of years. Whilst there have been incidents at the church and church hall they have fortunately been on a very minor scale compared to what had become almost routine.

Our thanks go out to everybody who has taken part in running the church by being on rotas for flower arranging, welcoming, coffee, cleaning and the sacristans who prepare for services, those who count and bank the money each week and do the odd maintenance jobs that inevitably arise. Thanks for leadership go to Malcolm and Frances, Owen Vigeon and David Robinson as Associate Clergy and our Readers Lorraine Baker, Sue Morton and Tony Thistlewood.

Barbara Hancox and Sheila Thistlewood

Mervyn Hancox

Stewardship Report

The figures for both gift aided and non gift aided donations received for the year, 1st January to the 31st December 2005, together with tax reclaimed from the Inland Revenue are as follows:

Non-Gift Aided Donations £ 2,744. 49

Gift Aided Donations £21,997. 70

Tax Refunds £ 6,204. 22
(includes fourth quarter - Oct to Dec 2005
refund which was received on 2 February 2006)

My thanks to Les Dakin for his help with the weekly counting and chauffeuring service.

Jean Hudson

Members
Margaret Davoll - Karen French - Sue Morton - Carole Osselton - Freda Richards

Charitable giving totalled £2250 for 2005 less £170 donated by PCC to the Deanery Youth Project, making a total of £2080 to be allocated.

Members of Mission Group met 3 times in 2005. We received 26 requests for help from a wide variety of organisations and individuals and reported this to PCC on 8 November 2005. PCC approved our recommendations for 2005 giving as follows:

1) Vio - Home of Hope, Romania [Global Care’s Sponsor a Child project] £200
2) USPG – Archdeacon Stephen Taylor in Brazil £400
3) Coventry Myton Hospice Appeal £400
4) Headway [Coventry and Warwickshire branch] – helping people recover from serious head injuries £280
5) Luweero Medical Centre, Uganda – continued support c/o Nobby Clarke, St James’ Church, Fletchamstead £200
6) Gurkha Welfare Trust – helping ex-servicemen and their dependants £200
7) Yeldall Christian Centres – supporting their work with ex-offenders, in particular the homeless, alcohol and drug addiction. £400

TOTAL £2080

We update Mission Board in the foyer throughout the year so that members of the congregation, and visitors to the church, can see and read the latest information. This includes newsletters, thank-you’s and photos/cards. Please continue to pray for the work of Global Care, for Vio and the Home of Hope children and staff in Romania; for Stephen in Rio de Janeiro; for Nobby and the children in Luweero; for the Coventry Myton Hospice fund-raising team; the work of the Gurkha Welfare Trust, Yeldall Christian Centres and Headway.

If you can spare a few evenings over the year and want to know more about Christian action in the UK and overseas, come and join us. We are always happy to welcome newcomers to Mission Group – we are friendly and chatty and enjoy meeting together.

Sue Morton, for Mission Group

This group met regularly over the first part of the year to choose the hymns at our 10am Sunday service. The sudden death of Sylvia Bandy, together with the illnesses of Reg Amos and Sheila Wick meant that hymn selection fell to Margaret Davoll and myself from September onwards. I am pleased to say that the group has now meets again under Pennie Hartopp’s leadership and the system of choosing hymns is again the preserve of more than one or two people. We have continued to use the hymn suggestions of the Royal School of Church Music and this has met with general approval on most Sundays.

Worship for all services, usually on the first Sunday of the months are planned and devised by the Readers or Clergy and they also choose the music for these services.

PCC again chose to repeat the pattern of previous years at Christmas. This has become something of an established pattern at St Mary’s now and seems to suit most if not all people.

Malcolm Tyler

As you know I took over the preparation of the rota in April and I would like to thank everyone for their co-operation and helpfulness during my ‘slip-ups!!!’ and also for standing in at short notice.

Whilst there are currently an adequate number of people on the readers list, it would be good to have more people of all ages to lead the prayers. If you would like to join the team, either as a reader, intercessor or both, I would be delighted to add your name to the list. If you are unsure, help is always available. Please speak to Malcolm, Frances, Pennie or myself.

Jean Hudson

Sacristans work behind the scenes to ensure that everything in church is ready for the conduct of services. Their responsibilities are to get the wine and water cruets prepared for each Sunday; the wafers are counted out in advance and the hymn boards prepared.

Barbara Ellis and Sally Vigeon have been joined this year by Betty Dakin. We are very grateful to Betty for sharing the work load, as commitments sometimes mean that one or more members of the team are not always available on Sunday mornings.

Barbara very kindly does all the laundry and ensures that the right vestments etc are prepared according to the appropriate church season.

We keep a check on the wine and wafers and remind the clergy when supplies are running low. The church silver is cleaned and polished regularly.

Sally Vigeon

Church Cleaning

My grateful thanks go to all the members of the cleaning team who give so generously of their time to keep St Mary’s looking so clean and tidy. Without your help, the church would have to pay a cleaner – if we could find one – which would cost a bomb. My particular thanks go to Hannah and Will Morley-Brown who are leaving for the best of reasons; Hannah is expecting a baby.

Alan Robinson

The Coffee Club meets every other week after the Wednesday morning service. For a donation of £1 members enjoy the best cup of tea or coffee in Walsgrave, or so we are told, and biscuits. As an add on extra, a light lunch is also available. All the proceeds are donated to a local charity and the Church.

During 2005, £279.50 was donated to charity and £194.60, plus an £18 TESCO vacuum cleaner for the organ loft, was donated to the Church.

Set out below is a list of charities who benefited from members’ generosity.

* This was the Coffee Club’s contribution to a special coffee morning held at the church which raised a total of £383.03.

Around 15 members attend regularly and we would like to thank them for their generous and constant support.

Edna and Alan Robinson.

Thank you very much to all those who prepare drinks after the ten o’clock service. Your efforts are greatly appreciated.

In particular I would like to thank Phil and Gill Bowser, who agreed to take Betty and Les Dakin’s place. Betty is now one of the Sacristans and can’t do both jobs at the same time. Thanks also to Gill Giles who stepped in to help Gillian Thompsett following the sad death of Kath Wagstaff.

Alan Robinson

In some ways 2005 was a very difficult year for ringers at St Mary’s. The departure of Ron Abbott meant that we have not always had six ringers on a Sunday morning but we have tried to find a band of ringers as often as we can.

Monday evening practice has continued each week though occasionally we have not had enough people to ring. We were fortunate through most of the year to be joined by ringers from other towers to make the practice worthwhile. During the year Samuel Liggins has started to learn to ring so we now have another young person!

In February some small work was done to two of the bells. Over time the clappers had become a little too loose and this needed to be repaired. The work was carried out by Eayre and Smith a Bell Foundry based in Leicestershire. We had hoped to re-paint the bell frame in the summer but this did not happen and we now hope to do it in the spring.

At the end of the year St Mary’s hosted the Bellringers’ Carol Service which was attended by about 35-40 ringers.

Sadly the year ended on a tragic note with the unexpected death of Jonathan Hughes (aged 22), the Tower Captain at Stoke and Steeple Keeper at the Cathedral and one of the supporting ringers at St Mary’s. Jonathan was found dead in the Tower at Stoke and this was a great shock to all the ringers at St Mary’s and to those who knew Jonathan. Several of our ringers attended his funeral in the New Year.

We hope to continue ringing at St Mary’s but would value older people to join us. Bellringing skills can be taught both at St Mary’s and at Stoke and there are ample opportunities available to improve techniques. Practice night at Walsgrave is on Mondays 7.30pm – 9pm and on Wednesdays at Stoke. Please see Andrew Tyler for more details.

Andrew Tyler

Lazers meet usually three Sundays a month. It is open to all children from year six upwards. We start in Church and wait until the Altar party have taken up their places. We then go out and start our group. We are out of the service until the Peace. At St Mary’s we are lucky to have such a varied group of children. Some just listen, some like to read from the Bible but they all like to join in. The material we have been working on this past year has been about learning to do God’s work - how God loves us and what he wants us to do. The material we have has some good ideas about looking at how to do God’s work through things we do and say every day as we go about our normal activities. The children are always willing to have a go at some of the challenges they are asked to do. The Lazers join in with Junior Church at Christmas to put on the Christmas nativity.
We are very fortunate at St. Mary’s to have a vicar who is always willing to look at new resources for the children and to keep up with the times.

Alison Liggins

This past year the Beavers have been very busy. At the moment we have around twenty Beavers who turn up each week. We are a mixed group of boys and girls with ages ranging from six to eight. We have four who are to go up to Cubs in March and some later in the year. Before Christmas we worked on getting our My Faith badge, in which the Beavers came down to St. Mary’s and learnt the history of the Church. The Beavers also read the prayers at the Toy service. In December we attended the District Carol service and in January the District Beavers Christmas Party. The children all had a great time. They played plenty of games, danced and all had balloons made into different animals hats etc. We also had a visit from RAGS which is the Rabbit and Guinea Pig society who run a voluntary shelter for the animals which people can no longer keep. The children enjoyed this and brought in plenty of food for the animals as a way of thanking them for their time in coming to visit us.
Later in the year we are planning to visit Coventry Council House, the Ricoh Arena and the new Rugby ground. Beavers meet at St. Mary’s Church Hall every Tuesday from 6.30 pm till 8 pm.
Any one interested in joining in should call Alison on 02476 360908 or just pop along on the night.

Alison Liggins

We have about nine Cubs at the moment with more moving up from Beavers later this month. At the moment we only have boys in the Cubs but at the end of March we will have our first two girls joining the group, with more in May. We have been busy doing our badge work this year and some of the badges we have worked on are athletes, D.I.Y. swimmers, campers and cyclist badge. For the cyclist badge the cubs had to bring in a bicycle and show that they knew how to keep it clean and do simple repairs. We also visited Walsgrave Church of England School and the Cubs showed off their skills at cycling. For the D.I.Y badge the Cubs had to make two items out of wood, one was a bird box and the other was bookends. The Cubs had to show how to handle tools correctly and to work with the tools safely. They had to cut some wood, nail the pieces together and varnish them. This project was worked on over many weeks. We also went on the District water weekend which was as usual great fun for all those who attended. The Cubs have also been to the Swimming Gala, CUSO, Chess day and the District Carol service. The Cubs meet on a Monday night from 6.30 pm till 8.30 pm and anyone interested on joining can call Alison on 02476 360908, or just pop in on the night.

Alison Liggins

34th Coventry Scout Troop Report

I think that I may have said this last year, but it is still worth mentioning. At a time when many young people are not interested in joining formal youth groups and where service to the community has become unfashionable, we are truly blessed as a Scout Troop.

We have a committed group of 11 young people who regularly attend our Friday meetings with enthusiasm. In addition to myself, we have 3 adult Leaders: Dave Preston [Group Scout Leader], Gaynor Preston and Colin Hutton who are Warranted Assistant Scout Leaders.

With Gaynor we are able to offer a broader focus for Scouting in the Walsgrave area and can invite girls to join our previously traditional ‘Boy Scout’ Troop, we now have 6 girls and 5 lads.

The strong base of adult Scouters has enabled us to provide Scout meetings every Friday, and to offer our young people the chance to take part in a number of weekend activities throughout the year

We continue to provide a wide and varied programme of activities; camping, orienteering, first aid, DIY skills, science skills, pioneering (constructing bridges, rafts etc using rope and timber spars), cooking, walking, map reading.

This year we were second in the District Raft Race competition, having been the winners for the previous 4 years. One of our challenges this year is to regain our rafting crown.

Our Scouts have competed in the District Scout Major Incident Journey where they demonstrated their knowledge and skills of map reading and compass, first aid and problem solving whilst covering an 8 mile hike. After completing SMIJ we stayed at Rough Close campsite and had a very successful Troop camp.

We organised a very successful Family Activity Day at Coombe Abbey where parents, Beavers, Cubs and Scouts were able to participate in a varied programme of games, with food cooked over an open fire. We will let you know the date of this year’s Family Activity Day and would welcome any Church members to attend.

We have given our Scouts training in Orienteering (‘Cunning Running’). They have attended a number of events run by the Octavian Droobers Orienteering Club. The first Caludon Scout District Orienteering Competition was held at Rough Close campsite in February. The 34th Scout Troop had the winning team and also won first place in the Troop competition.

Over the coming year we aim to provide our young people with further challenging activities, to develop skills for their future adult lives and to get them to undertake community activities such as clearing part of the local canal system in association with the Coventry Canal Society.

We will be taking part in SMIJ again, the District Water Weekend and mountain walking in the Snowdon area of North Wales. Camping will again be a part of our programme, giving the young people outdoors experience and testing again my increasingly old and weary bones.

We have a Night Hike planned at Bradgate Park and we will be taking the Scouts out to the AT7 Centre for abseiling and climbing. We are working at getting the Scouts to gain the Creative Challenge Badge, Orienteer Badge and Expedition Challenge Badge.

Above all we hope to provide our young people with fun and excitement within a responsible and caring environment.

The support and continued interest in our activities provided by the Church community is very much appreciated. In particular the availability of the Church Hall remains vital to our efforts to develop young people in Walsgrave and surrounding areas and we thank you for retaining the building and allowing us to use it.

If there are young people you know who are aged 10yrs 6 months up to 14 years who would be interested in trying out Scouting, then please get in touch with me and we will offer them a chance to sample what we offer to young people in the Walsgrave area.

BILL HANNA
SCOUT LEADER
Tel: 07768 427 363
Email: bill.hanna@jcdecaux.co.uk

I started the N.H.W. group when the estate including the church were experiencing many problems of the anti-social behaviour nature, mainly trouble with large groups of youths causing vandalism often occurring when they were high on drink/drugs or a combination of both.

What started off as a small group covering a few streets has grown to a whole estate group which meets at St Mary’s Church Centre approximately once a month. The meetings are well attended and we have had different speakers including Inspector Prestwich, two people from the drug team, youth offenders team, crime reduction officer and Bob Ainsworth MP to name a few. In the future we hope to have a magistrate, the fire service, people from the hospital re parking issues and a presentation about the Police Helicopter.

I have lots of support from Barbara Cresswell, Community Officer from Stoney Stanton Road Police Station, North East Area Managemen,t Steve Yardley, and our local police PC John Print and WPC Michelle Quinn. We have their mobile phone numbers to keep them informed about what is going on.

There has been an improvement on the estate although currently the main problem is now the riding of mini motor bikes which the police are aware of.

I attended a NHW conference and to my surprise I was given an award for my work which was a pleasant surprise but it was nice to think that our work within the community is appreciated.

I hope with continued vigilance and reporting of what is going on will make our estate a safer place to live. There are lots of plans for the estate to give youngsters and youth more to do in their spare time. Hopefully this will improve things even more because when questioned the plea is always the same – ‘We’ve nothing to do or nowhere to go.’

Ann Rushworth
NHW Co-ordinator

I have taken on the role of this Rota – St. Mary’s serves drinks on 2 wards in Walsgrave Hospital on a Saturday evening, which usually takes around an hour and is much appreciated by both staff and the patients.
Unfortunately our numbers have depleted over the years, so if you feel this is something you could commit yourself to every 4 weeks (at the moment) I would be most grateful if you could have a word with me.

Sheila Wick

Through the Altar Prayer Diary, there isn’t anyone who lives in the parish who hasn’t been prayed for in the past year.

The Prayer Tree in the foyer is another opportunity to care for those who need our prayers and it isn’t restricted to those who live in the parish.

In the past year, we have remembered in prayer 25 baptisms, 20 weddings, 40 funerals and 10 other occasions.

The PLASMA group will welcome other members. Sylvia Bandy’s commitment in various ways will be missed.

Another Parish Quiet Day is due. In this and other ways, PLASMA hopes to freshen up our prayer life in the coming months.

Margaret Sweet and Tony Thistlewood

In 2005 the house Christian Aid collection from St Mary’s, combined with donations from the congregation totalled £592.74. This was a magnificent result, in fact the best for 8 years.

Pledge cards were also given out during the collection, asking people to return them as part of the wider ‘make poverty history’ campaign with other organisations. This culminated in the G8 Gleneagles summit later in 2005 and achieved world wide media attention and significant pledges from Government towards debt cancellation for the poorest nations of Africa (subject to certain tests). It really does prove that large oaks grow from very little acorns and that all that we do, however small, can make a big difference.

We only had 11 willing volunteers for the house to house collection last year, so please do consider lending a hand this May. Imagine what we could achieve with just a bit more help!

Lawrence & Dean

Thank you to all who have supported the Church Tote over the years.

To date £950.85 has been raised for the Church Refurbishment Fund and when the ‘Charity’ share reaches £100 this is donated to a local need.

A tote number is only £1 a month - I am always looking for new members to join this endeavour!!!!

Sheila Wick

I took over the role of BRF (Bible Reading Fellowship) representative for St Mary’s last Autumn from Karen Hauler-Davies when she moved with her family to Wales.

BRF produce books three times a year on two levels, firstly New Daylight which gives a good starting point by providing daily readings from the Bible and secondly Guidelines which is more advanced with in-depth study and commentary of themes alongside its daily readings. We currently have 8 people who receive copies and if anyone has any questions or would like to see examples, please have a word with me.

Lorraine Baker

The facility is available to children under 4 and is run by a leader with a helper to cover the period from the start of the service to the Peace when the children are brought back to their parents. It is going well and is very successful, having moved into the Octagon with the Junior Church group, to give the children more space to play and interact. We have a fantastic team, Clare, Sarah, Alison, Peter, Nicky, Jon and Chris helping entertain and look after the children in crèche who are supported by Hannah, Sarah, Rebecca and Sophie.

Claire Stanley

The over 55’s Group has been meeting at St Mary’s Church for about 20 years. Originally the Group was chaired by Jack Thompson. On Jack’s sudden death I was asked if I would consider taking over. As no-one else came forward it would have been a pity to see all Jack’s hard work come to an end so I took over.

When the group was formal we had about 60 members but over the years with people moving away, suffering poor health or dying the group is now reduced to about 30 members.

We meet every Wednesday from 2pm to about 3.15pm and if anyone feels they would like to come along and join us we will be very pleased to welcome them. Over the years we have arranged Group holidays and outings but unfortunately we have not been able to find enough people to go away on holiday recently. We do however have an occasional outing.

Janet Potter

Butterflies celebrated its 10th Birthday in January with party food and a visit from people who have helped us in the past.

We continue to be busy and still have a waiting list. The afternoon consists of toys, books, puzzles, colouring, drawing, playdough and a craft table. Many thanks to Alison and Luke Liggins for helping with this activity which can be anything from cooking to painting. Malcolm sits on the floor and sings songs with them at the end of the session (its surprising how young they can be when they start joining in). We thank Malcolm for his support – this is a difficult activity to lead.

Our Christmas Party was busy with 30+ children and carers enjoying the fun and a special visit from Santa.

Val Webster and Pat Cox have served us with drinks and biscuits over the last few years for which we are most grateful.

I would like to thank Sheila Thistlewood for her help as joint leader, without her and the other helpers there wouldn’t be a successful Butterflies Group.

Ann Rushworth

Junior Church meets once a week, on a Sunday, during the Family Service at 10.00, with the children rejoining the congregation in time to share the 'peace'.
There is no Junior Church during ‘All Age Services’.

Junior Church is lead by Karen and Melvyn French, Stephen Baker and Claire Stanley.

The number of children attending Junior Church varies from 6 -10 each week.

Most weeks we use material found in Splash! (5 – 8 yr olds) and Xstream (8 – 11 yr olds). Theses are magazines published by Scripture Union which focus on the Bible.

Each week we aim to enable the children to understand and remember a Bible passage. We encourage the children to carry the message of the lesson through the week, and hope that they are inspired to read their Bibles between Junior Church sessions.

Activities in Junior Church are designed to give confidence to the children to explore their own faith through discussion, games, prayer and other activities.

We aim to make Junior Church interesting, challenging and fun. Every week the children will take something away with them. It may be something that they have made, or simply a prayer or a thought for the week.

Occasionally Junior Church will join with the older children (Lazers Group). In the last year this has been to rehearse and perform the Christmas ‘Nativity’ and the song ‘Great is He’ in church. Both were enjoyed by the congregation.

Another enjoyable time is the summer picnic when children of all ages, including those who attend the crèche (0 – pre-school), join together for food, fun and games.

Karen French

Basically the year has passed satisfactorily and the congregation have sung the hymns very well, particularly the ones they know but with a little reluctance to have a go at the lesser known ones. The hymns are usually chosen by the Worship Group but his year there was an unfortunate disruption when in July/August three members, namely Sylvia, Sheila and myself were in hospital leaving Malcolm and Margaret to make the selection. We were able to resume recently along with Pennie. It was with great sorrow and regret when Sylvia died in hospital. She had been a conscientious member of the Worship Group since its outset and we often had the pleasure of her hospitality in her home.

Due to my illness of Sciatica culminating in a spinal injection and then heart surgery for a replacement aortic valve, I was not able to play from April to October. Indeed in the early days following my operation, I though I would not be able to play again, but obviously the Lord decided that I should continue to serve him for a little longer. My sincere thanks and appreciation for all your prayers, get well cards and good wishes during my time in hospital.

I am very grateful to Margaret and Geoff Cowley for covering the period I was away.

The organ has given us another year of trouble free service (far different from some organs I play) for this we have to be grateful again to our organ tuner, Mr John Burns.

Reg Amos

Sadly this year we lost one of our Team members – Kath Wagstaff who passed away on New Years Eve. Kath is sadly missed, not only as a friend but for her efforts and dedication to our team.

We hope that our arrangements bring life and colour to the church we know and love.

The flowers in the porch are the first seen as visitors come through the door – a very welcoming sight. Often the flowers displayed in the Lady Chapel are in memory of a loved one, and of course for special occasions we really “go to town”, but we all find that what we do is not only pleasurable, but fulfilling and hope that they also inspire worship as flowers are a continual reminder of the wonder of the natural world created by God.

Valerie Ekin

We have a small but very dedicated team of servers here at St Mary’s and I am always pleased when we are able to welcome a new recruit as we did recently when Sam Liggins joined us. He has become very dedicated and conscientious and I sincerely hope that his enthusiasm will continue to grow along with his faith.

Last year we were asked to serve for the very special service to celebrate Owen Vigeon’s 50th year in the priesthood. It was indeed a very memorable service and we all felt very privileged to be part of it. Congratulations once again Owen.

If you feel that you might like to join our team, please feel free to come and talk to me. I’m sure that you would find the experience just as rewarding as the rest of the team.

Valerie Ekin