Change of Address
Bishop John Richards, lately of Ebbsfleet, wishes all New Directions readers to know that his new address is:
Penberth, Stoney Road, Lewdown, Okehampton, Devon EX20 4DQ
Telephone & Fax: 01566 783144
Edenham Regional House – An Appeal
Last month’s New Directions carried an interview with Fr Andy Hawes, the Warden of Edenham Regional House in Lincolnshire. Towards the end of the interview – in almost a throwaway line – Fr Andy mentioned that an Appeal was about to be launched for some £100,000, in order to fund a programme of expansion at the House. We are certain that readers of New Directions, and especially members of Forward in Faith, will want to do all that they can to help Fr Andy – who is Chairman of Forward in Faith in the diocese of Lincoln – with this project. Last month’s issue gave full details of the life and ministry of the House: now we have details of what is planned.
The proposed development is in three parts. The first is the provision of disabled facilities. This will be achieved by the conversion of large outbuildings to provide a disabled bathroom, toilet and bedsitting room – costing £27,102. The second part is to build an exterior staircase and corridor on the north side of the Vicarage, which will provide easy access from one end of the house to another on the ground floor and a fire-safe stairway connecting all floors of the house; the cost of this part will be £28,972. The third part is the refurbishment and re- ordering of the second floor to provide four twin bedded en-suite bedrooms, a separate sitting room and kitchen area and will cost £29, 450.
The development programme, when completed, will provide a much more flexible resource for guests to make use of the House, whilst preserving it as a family home. It will also make more opportunities available for people to stay for longer periods of time. The total cost of the entire programme – including professional fees and VAT – will be £98,000.
Bishop Edwin Barnes writes:
“The Centre at Edenham is, I believe, a unique development in the Catholic constituency, and deserves the support of us all. It is providing a focus for faithful Catholics throughout Eastern England, and it has the potential for doing even more. I have twice celebrated a Chrism Mass there, enabling more lay people and priests who find London or Walsingham too inaccessible to join together in worship. It is a place where I am able to meet those who feel very isolated in Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Peterborough or Leicester. An entire Church Council from an embattled parish some fifty miles distant came to meet me there. I hope that you will give this project your generous financial support and that you will pray for all that Fr Hawes is doing at the House.”
Of course, £98,000 is an enormous sum of money! But consider: if every reader of New Directions sent just œ10; if every Forward in Faith Parish sent just £100 – then Fr Andy’s target would be all but met! Please write to him today at:
The Vicarage Church Lane Edenham Bourne Lincolnshire PE10 0LS
Cheques should be made payable to “Edenham Regional House Appeal Fund”.
547 Days
Have you booked yet? Still a long way to go, of course, and no doubt you’re thinking that there is plenty of time! There isn’t, for just a matter of days after these words are printed, the event will be taking place NEXT YEAR! Credit Card bookings for Priests who wish to concelebrate, please, to Forward in Faith on 0171 976 0727; for lay people (and priests who do not wish to concelebrate) to the London Arena on 0171 538 1212. Names of Singers, please, to Faith House on 0171 976 0727, along with requests for additional copies of the Christ our Future Poster.
Important News about next year’s New Directions!!!
The January 1999 edition of New Directions is set to be one of the best yet. But there are those amongst you who will fail to receive a copy! And the solution, of course, lies with you. Some of you will already realise precisely what the problem is and will be well on the way to solving it. Others will need to read on . . .
One of the most common questions which we’re asked in the Forward in Faith office is “When does my subscription to Forward in Faith run out?” With so many thousands of members – and more joining virtually every day – it is, of course, quite impractical to try and run a system whereby we treat each member on an individual basis and ask him or her to renew their subscription on the exact anniversary of their first joining. Apart from anything else, this would mean that every subscription renewal form would have to be sent out individually by post – at great additional cost. Instead, we work on the basis that a subscription covers a calendar year. Whether you pay in January or February, in September or October, you are paying for the calendar year. This system enables us to issue renewal forms to all who need them in the same month for everyone – May each year. Happily, this coincides with the completion of our audited accounts, so Cyril Wood, our marvellous Honorary Treasurer, is able “to kill two birds with one stone” and send all members the financial report and the subscription renewal form in one document.
Many of you of course pay by banker’s order and do not need to be sent a renewal form. The saving in printing costs, to say nothing of labour in the office, which those who pay by standing order effect, is vast.
The vast majority of those of you who prefer to pay by cheque, postal order, debit or credit card each year do so in May when we send out the renewal form. In order to make life easier for you, we include a prepaid envelope. Thanks are due to the significant number of you who realise that such envelopes cost the charity money and so put a stamp on them! Others, though, procrastinate! And so it is that, come November each year, we have to send further reminders out with New Directions to, I fear, too many of you. Most respond by return; one member warmed our hearts with the following letter last month: “Please accept the enclosed cheque for £30, being my usual subscription of £20, plus £10 as blush money. I do so value your publication that excuses would be pointless and unconvincing.”
But as we go to press with this December edition, numbers of you have still not responded to our reminder. And those of you who have still not paid when we prepare the mailing list for January – before Christmas – will, of course, find that your names have been removed and that you will not receive the first edition of the New Year.
So – if you received a red reminder about your subscription in last month’s New Directions (and if you’re not sure whether you did or not, why not check now?), and if you have not responded yet, please do so without further delay. And if you haven’t responded because you think, or know (or think you know) that you’ve already paid, contact us anyway, because one skill we haven’t yet mastered is reading your mind! No office is perfect and errors creep into the best regulated of systems; if your membership record is wrong, please help us to put it right! And if it isn’t, and you owe Forward in Faith a subscription, then reach for that cheque book right now!