The Ross Parishes: Ross-on-Wye, Walford & Brampton Abbotts
Inspiring faith, hope and love in each generation.
Join us for a superb celebration of Epiphany at Choral Evensong in St Mary’s, this evening (Sunday 5th January) at 6.00pm.
Wise men and great music. The perfect 12th night event and the final bit of Christmas (unless you cout Candlemas, 2nd February, – as we do, and will).
#12BigThankYous – 11th Day – To all who help us maintain our digital presence
Thanks to our streaming team, Simon, Roy, Hugh and Martin who week by week take our main services into the homes of those who cannot be with us in church, including a large regular congregation at West Bank Care Home.
And to all who help us maintain our website, our team of social posters and all who follow us on the website, Facebook or Instagram, who like us, repost and share our news more widely. If you’re one of those, please show your solidarity by liking this post right now!
Celebrate Epiphany at our All Age Eucharist at
St Mary’s this Sunday (5th January) at 9.30am. Parts for all – wise men, women, children …, and if you don’t consider yourself “wise” others will and there’s no test! A service for the whole family.
Afterwards, Caroline would love you to join her and three camels outside Hereford Cathedral
for a memorable All Age Epiphany procession: arrive 12.30ish for 1pm start.
If you’d like to meet up, bring sandwiches and meet on the grass (or inside the cathedral if raining). Caroline will be there to greet you with warming cups of hot chocolate and marshmallows!
#12BigThankYous – Tenth Day – For all who provide a welcome and support
Members of the Church Welcome team are around throughout the week to welcome visitors. We thank Rachel Lewis for organising this, and her team: Averil, Barbara, Derek, Hilary, Jane, Janet, Jean, Jenny, Helen, Margaret C, Margaret G, Mary, Nick N, Nick O, Pat, Paul, Teresa J, Teresa N, Toni and Trish. They are, to those who visit our church, very effective ambassadors for Ross, borne out by comments in the visitors book and posts on social media.
A large team of sidemen welcome people to services, thanks to Janet and Nick Nelson for organising them and to each of them.
The Tuesday Tea & Toast team, the people who work in the Community Larder, Wednesday’s Toast & Toddle team and all our catering team. And on Wednesdays, our Toast and Toddle team (already mentioned) welcomes young families.
Finally, to our brilliant administrator Rachael Daniel who has provided daily support from the powerhouse that is the church office. Rachael has the most amazing knack of spotting the small things everyone else has overlooked.
#12BigThankYous – 9th Day – To our musicians
9 – Our musicians
We are proud of our musical tradition at St Mary’s; a large number of people work hard throughout the year to continue it. We particularly thank our organist Adrian Taylor and Mark Sanderson, Director of Music. Our 30 strong adult choir sings for all our main services, supported by the 15 members of our wonderful Youth Choir.
We also need to say a big thank you to all the parents for their support in getting their children to rehearsals, and often sitting through them.
Thanks to those who support our occasional choir Round Byrd and our programme of Come, Sing & Sup events and to all who provide and attend our concert and events programme.
Our First Wednesday @ One programme of free lunchtime concerts was new this year. Thanks to all the performing artists: Chase Baroque, Northwick Baroque, Northwick Consort, Ruth Cartledge, James MacDowell-Scott & Jill Crossland. And those, already mentioned, who generously funded these events.
#12BigThankYous – 8th Day – To our partner organisations in the town
Ross Town Council is one of our key partners, they have helped us with the maintenance of closed churchyard, resurfacing the path by the tower, the running costs of floodlighting the tower – to name but a few, this year.
Ross-on-Wye Community Development Trust for their help in providing a Warm Welcome.
Our partnership with Ross on Wye & District Royal British Legion Branch is most apparent in November but there are other occasions in the year when we work closely with them, not least in organising many big events.
The Friends of St. Mary’s Church, is a bit more local. Rossiter Books is a key partner of theirs and have helped us by bringing many successful book talks to St Mary’s in 2024.
The Ross Gazette does a wonderful job and helps us to promote our work bay advertising and reporting on events. Special thanks to Andy Sherwill.
In October we appointed our new Rector, The Revd Prebendary Kelvin Price, that process involved the most impressive response from the whole community. Thank you for your input. And to all the town organisations who bring their important concerts, parties, conferences, exhibitions … to St Mary’s, thank you, we’re honoured to have you.
Finally to all churches in Ross-on-Wye and District for numerous partnerships throughout the year.
#12BigThankYous – 7th Day – To all fundraisers and the finance team
We owe a huge debt of gratitude to Roy Milnes, or amazing treasurer, also to Paul Cummings our Benefice treasurer.
Cameron Hill has taken over from Paul Eward RIP and now diligently and quietly reclaims Gift Aid on as many donations as possible so that our giving brings in 25% more than it otherwise would. We acknowledge Paul’s many years of service and thank Cameron for taking over this job.
Our Fun, Food and Funds group organises all the main fundraising events. Sincere thanks to Rachel Lewis who chairs that group and to Paul, Jane, Janet, Roy, Pat, Fiona, Jean and Sarah. Their work has brought in over £13,000 this year but this has only happened because many have supported their events.
And then there is the whole army of people who make and serve refreshments throughout at special events, monthly for Coffee @ St Mary’s, which has raised about £3000 this year, and Sunday by Sunday after services. We thank them all.
8th Day – All who look after and beautify St Mary’s Church
A 740 year old building requires constant attention to keep it in a good state of repair and looking good. This work is ultimately the responsibility of the churchwardens and we say a big thank you to Bryan Jones and Mark Sanderson who have been especially busy during this year with no Rector.
Week by week our voluntary cleaning team meets: Ian, Janet C, Janet N, Jean, Paul, Len, Julian, Sue, John, Avril and Toni.
Special thanks to Sue and Bryan who are regularly to be found in church at the crack of dawn with a mop. To all who clean brasses and silver.
Thanks too, to all who donate and arrange flowers through the year, coordinated by Sue Jones. Lynn, Lindsay, Margaret, Marilyn, Pam, Viv, Freda, Penny, and Margaret.
Finally to the contractors who have worked in the building this year, especially the team from EG Carter who have constructed the new nave platform, to the amazing Andrew and Jim from APi Communications who have been back again this year working on our AV systems. Dave Blackham has given very freely of his time and resources to help here too. And thanks too to Gary Owens, our organ tuner.
#12BigThankYous – 12th Day – To our Ministry Team
We are so lucky to have such a strong and capable ministry team to carry us through the vacancy. Many parishes in such situations have no one; we have a team of six. Thank you to Caroline, Colin, David, Derek, Freda and John.
We thank also our Lay Ministry team: Melanie, Paul, Paul, Janet, Anne, Sue, Helen and Ann. They help to lead worship in church and to visit those who can’t get to church.
During the vacancy our churches are being managed by our Vacancy Management Group (VMG). That is Gay, Murray, Matthew, Bryan and Mark. With the support and help of our Rural Dean, Sheila and Archdeacon, Derek. Thank you.
Thanks to our last Rector, Sean Semple – yes, he was here for the first quarter of the year! We continue to wish him well in his new role as Bishop of Cyprus and the Gulf.
We greatly look forward to welcoming our new Rector, Kelvin, with his family, at the very end of April. Then an exciting new chapter begins.
Here’s to 2025!
5th Day – To all who help us look after our churchyard and the environment.
A big shout out to our wonderful team of Churchyard Angels, who meet on the first Saturday of every month (April – October) to help us keep the church yard tidy.
Thanks also to the Community Payback team who are here every month throughout the year. Also to the army of people who tend graves of loved ones. And thanks to EnviroAbility for their help with wildlife projects and signage. Special thanks to John Setchfield, who manages it spends a good deal of time in the open churchyard, often unnoticed.
We are well supported by our local firms to funeral directors and monumental masons who also take great care of our churchyard. Thanks especially to Abbotsfield, Bevans and to Nigel Cave who is currently repairing, free of charge, a war memorial damage by a falling tree in the recent gales.
Ross Town Council do a wonderful job of managing the care of the open churchyard and this year used a considerable budget to resurface the very wide path from the Prospect Gates to St Mary’s Hall. Next year they will refurbish the Plague Cross.
Rosie Winyard is our Eco Church and environmental champion. Look out for an extended focus on the Environment in March. We are also grateful to Greg Collier-Jones of Seven Wye Energy Agency who spent some time with us this year looking at ways in which we might work more towards achieving net-zero status, all sponsored by the Church of England.
#12BigThankYous – 4th Day – In the Christian calendar, today is Holy Innocents’ Day and we say thank you to all who look after our children and young people.
Sunday Kids: Anne, Helen, Ruth & Katherine.
St Mary’s Youth Choir: Mark, Sammy and Adrian.
Messy Church: Caroline, Anne, Ann, Viv, Ruth, David, Sue, Teresa, Rachel, Jane & Katherine.
GROW Youth Group: Caroline, Fiona, David, Jane & Hannah
Toast & Toddle: Helen, Anne, Gill, Geoff, Melanie, Susan, Helen and Angie.
Open the Book teams: Martin, Fiona, Melvin, Judith, Dorothy, Karen, Alison, Pauline, Helen, Lynne, Leah, Charlotte, Sharn, Paul, Margaret, Janet, Sandra, Ann, Elizabeth & Wendy.
And to Wendy and Murray for hosting Paddle & Praise at their home in Walford.
We owe a debt of gratitude to a number of charities and other organisations that have awarded us grants in the past 12 months.
This year we enlarged and improved the platform at the top of the nave; it’s been of real value over the last few weeks. Thanks to all who helped us to pay for that. The William Allen Young Charitable Trust (£5,000), Herefordshire Historic Churches Trust (£5,000), Edward Cadbury Charitable Trust (£3,000), and Ross-on-Wye Town Council (£1,000). The Friends of St Mary’s (£3,000).
Our LifeLink Chaplain project is being partly funded for three years by The Benefact Trust with a total grant of £27,000 – £9,000 each year.
Ross Town Council has also given us a grants to help with the installation of cameras at the top of the tower so that residents and visitors can view our resident Peregrine Falcons. Also to help make some of our community events work, in particular JK300.
Borders Marches Early Music Forum, the Freemasons of Vitruvian Lodge and Rehau’s in the Community Committee have all generously sponsored our free lunchtime concert series, First Wednesdays @ 1 this year.
We’re using the 12 Days of Christmas to say thank you to some very important people in our church and wider community #12BigThankYous
Many thanks to all those folk who quietly support us month by month through the Parish Giving Scheme – a tax efficient and easy way to give to St Mary’s and The Friends of St Mary’s. Also to those who are a part of St Mary’s 100 Club.
For the work of The Friends of St. Mary’s Church, Ross on Wye. We’re looking forward to Open Gardens 2025.
Our Fundraising, Fun and Food group (FFF) work hard through the year on all three of those things. Thank you to Rachel, Jean, Paul, Roy, Pat, Janet, Freda and Fiona.
St Mary’s has begun celebrating the birth of the baby Jesus with our Carol Service and Crib Service. You can see pictures here and, if you missed it, watch the Carol Service here.
Midnight Mass is at 11.30pm tonight (Christmas Eve) and tomorrow (Christmas Day) there is a service of Holy Communion at 8am and Parish Eucharist at 9.30am.
Christmas Eve: Family Crib Service at 4.00pm in both churches, Midnight Mass in St Mary’s at 11.30pm
Christmas Morning: 8.00am Said Communion in St Mary’s, 9.30am Sung Eucharist in both churches.
We wish you a very HAPPY CHRISTMAS from all in the The Ross Parishes.
Full details of services at https://rossparishes.uk/christmas-2024
Bring family and friends! Relaxed, informal, a lovely run up to Christmas! Hope to see you there!
Brampton Abbotts Church is used just six times a year for services. Monday evening was one of them when the carol service took place.
The local choir, Bramptones, sang Gaudete and that went down a storm. They also sang a few carols at The Green, and a young boy heard ‘Away in a manger’ with 3 part harmony, possibly for the first time sung live. He pronounced it “Awesome!” And asked for an encore.
The service was observed by four wooden angels, behind the altar, which were removed several years ago for building work to be done; they reappeared miraculously on Sunday – no one quite knows how. Perhaps it’s a Christmas miracle. Any ideas?
Forget the cold for an evening and enjoy the warmth, colour and taste of Brazil with your hosts, Nick and Janet Nelson. The perfect antidote to the British January weather.
The Friends of St Mary’s are appealing for more gardeners to open their garden on Saturday 31st May and Sunday 1st June as part of Ross Open Gardens. Could this be you, or do you have a neighbour who might help us?
Gardens don’t have to look like Wisley, indeed most visitors prefer small ones with ideas they can take away. Gardens don’t have to be immaculate, in fact this time round we’re teaming up with the Herefordshire Wildlife Trust to feature wildlife gardens also.
Gardeners on the north side of town have been poorly represented over the last few events … St Mary’s Garden Village must have some nicely established gardens by now …
This is one of the big events for the town, and one which raised £9,000 for St Mary’s in 2023. Please think about how you might help it to continue. Please contact us if you can help.
A magical experience awaits; as the Ross Christmas Fayre ends in town, the tension builds in St Mary’s, at 5.00pm.
The Advent Carol Service is one of the loveliest services of the year: full of growing expectation, wonderful hymns and music, making the most of light and dark from different corners of the building. The service will last about an hour.
You can download the order of service here and bring it on your phone. The service is by candlelight and you’ll find it easier to see.
The Ross Parishes: Ross-on-Wye, Walford & Brampton Abbotts 