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Virgin Mary - Notices

Updated: Aug 15, 2021

15/8/21

News from the Benwell & Scotswood Team


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Chris Ofili, The Holy Virgin Mary, 1996 Acrylic, oil, polyester resin, paper collage, glitter, map pins, and elephant dung on canvas, MoMA, New York

 
 

Dates for your diary


Tuesday 17th August

Members of St James Development group to meet

2pm at St James'


Sunday 5th September

Services in all 4 churches:

9.30am - St James' Benwell

9.30am - Venerable Bede

11.15 am - St Margaret's

11.15 am - St John's


Wednesday 8th September

Members of 'Mission Action Planning' group to meet

2pm at St Margaret's


Wednesday 15th September

Treasurers meeting

7pm on Zoom


Sunday 26th September - Sunday 3rd October

Newcastle Diocese Generosity Week


Wednesday 6th October

PCC meeting

7.30pm on Zoom

 

News

Lunch Break to return - Tues 21st September, 12-2pm

Our weekly 'pay what you feel' lunch returns next month at St James!

From 21st September, every Tuesday there will be a simple lunch with teas coffees. You are welcome, whatever your age or background. This is always a great time to get to know all sorts of people in your local community.


Food will be brought to your tables and staff will wear masks. Please sanitise your hands and sign-in with the app or on paper when you arrive.


If you would like to help out with Lunch Break then let us know! We have volunteer opportunities for those who want to cook, wash-up, welcome and serve at tables.

 

Next month worship in all our churches - Sunday 5th September


9.45am - St James

11.15am - St John's

11.15am - St Margaret's

As our last attempt at four services was scuppered by unforeseen circumstances, we are going to try again with a Sunday service in all four of our churches for the first time in over a year! We are trying out different patterns for our clergy to sustain worship in all our buildings without calling in outside help. This is not necessarily the times we will go with in the future

 

Covid-19 update


No doubt you will have heard that covid restrictions are being relaxed. As case rates are still high in our area you won't see too much change just yet! But we do have plans to reintroduce activities.

Most importantly - please get your vaccine if you haven't yet! And stay at home if you develop covid symptoms. Find vaccine times and locations here >

 

Cornerstone Community Cafe open!

Wednesdays & Thursdays 10am - 2pm

62 Armstrong Road, NE4 7TU

  • Delicious affordable meals

  • Outdoor Seating

  • Dog Friendly

  • Kids Corner

  • Computer and Internet Access

  • Computer help

  • Food pantry and emergency foodbank

  • and a great pre-loved shop!

 

Worship texts

Collect


Almighty God,

who looked upon the lowliness of the Blessed Virgin Mary

and chose her to be the mother of your only Son:

grant that we who are redeemed by his blood

may share with her in the glory of your eternal kingdom;

through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,

who is alive and reigns with you,

in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and for ever.

Amen.

 

Reading


Revelation 11.19 – 12.6,10

Then God’s temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple; and there were flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail.

A great portent appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pangs, in the agony of giving birth. Then another portent appeared in heaven: a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. Then the dragon stood before the woman who was about to bear a child, so that he might devour her child as soon as it was born. And she gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. But her child was snatched away and taken to God and to his throne; and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, so that there she can be nourished for one thousand two hundred and sixty days.

Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, proclaiming, ‘Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Messiah, for the accuser of our comrades has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.

 

Gospel


Luke 1.46–55

And Mary said, ‘My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’

 

Sermon


The Revd Chris Minchin


‘Like a virgin touched for the very first time’, as the aptly named ‘Madonna’ sang.

Today we celebrate the ‘Blessed Virgin’ or as I like to call her - ‘Mary’.


Despite the familiar image of a young, serene, modest woman in blue robes and head scarf, for much of the history of Christianity she has been in the eye of the storm of the most bitter controversies. Just like the “flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail” of our first reading.


There is one particular subject that the church seems to define itself around more than any other, and the one subject we are all seem paralysed to name openly in church. Mary has probably had her sex life discussed publicly more than other person in history, to the point where her sexual status is now part of her name- the ‘Virgin’ Mary.


Of course, Mary’s virginity is important in one instance. Christians believe that Jesus was directly begotten by God, that means he is God, and therefore has always existed. That means Jesus could not be conceived by sex. This is the mystery we call the ‘incarnation’. And it really is very mysterious… He was made incarnate in Mary, God’s spirit lit the spark of life in Mary’s womb, so that God could grow into a man. Jesus is fully divine because he is God’s son. But he is also fully human because he is Mary’s son. No man is involved, just God and Mary.


There are people who argue that Mary remained a virgin forever and that the brothers and sisters of Christ mentioned in the gospels must rather be cousins or children from Joseph’s previous marriage. If that is important to your beliefs about Jesus, then that’s fine. I however, don’t think what Mary and Joseph chose to do in the bedroom can make Mary any more or less pure. The virgin birth is entirely dependent on God’s actions, and not Mary’s purity. We do not need to make Mary into a virgin, like Madonna’s song. We don’t need to pretend anything is undone or anything is regained, because nothing is lost by Mary having sex.


This is because there is nothing wrong with sex, and Mary had every right to enjoy sex with her husband, Joseph, as much as anyone else. This sex-hating attitude has persisted throughout history because sex by its very nature requires us to make ourselves vulnerable to another person. This makes us fear our own desires, scared that what we think and feel is somehow wrong or dirty, makes us ashamed of our own bodies and utterly scared they will be rejected.


But we cannot get away from the issue even if we want. None of us would exist without it, it is the primary way humans relate to each other, create life, and define our social lives. Sexual morality is an issue that re-surfaces again and again throughout the Bible and Christian history. It was an issue for Paul, it was an issue for clergy in the middle-ages, it’s been an issue in communities vulnerable to abuse and manipulation and it is an issue that the church of England is still trying to get its head around with gay marriage.


For too long Christianity has defined itself around prohibiting what people should and shouldn’t do. Yet we have had so very little to say about what is good about relationships. And it hasn’t really worked out well has it? On the one hand we say it is our job to protect morality in society, and on the other we have enabled communities where sexual abuse has been rife, where gay people are pushed to suicide, where men can get away with one thing and women cannot, where we have cared more about keeping marriages together than the wellbeing of the people in the marriage. Most people simply ignore us now because our actions just do not match our words.


But what can we do? Well, we might just be able to get some inspiration from Mary:


In our Gospel reading Mary has been told she is with child. She is young and scared, she is newly married and has the Son of God growing inside her body. She could be cast out, murdered, and things are happening to her body that she has never experienced. And her reaction? She sings:


‘My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.


For someone so vulnerable, incredibly she puts her faith in God above what society will think of her. She follows what is the right thing, not what is deemed appropriate by society (and certainly not what is deemed appropriate by her husband who intends to divorce her). Furthermore, she isn’t sad about the situation, but instead rejoices that the order of things is being completely transformed and turned upside down, she declares:


He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.


The light of Jesus in this world reveals things as they truly are. It reveals Mary as not a passive, serene, virgin who just does what she is told, but as the incredibly brave, determined, strong-willed woman that she is. Unlike us, Mary doesn’t first hear what Jesus has to say, or see what he accomplishes, before she accepts him and loves him. For Mary, the reality of God’s love within her trumps all societal expectations.


Our lives and our world are also changed by the love of Jesus in ways no one could have expected. We need to look at things as they are, as God sees them, not as we think they should be. So if we apply this attitude to sex, then we will see that the over-promotion of purity, virginity, and judgmentalism has only led to further pain and suffering and an obsession with self-image and ignoring what is truly good.


Instead of nit-picking over marriage law and gender, we need to start enabling, promoting, and celebrating all relationships that are consensual, healthy, free from abuse, manipulation, and deceit, whatever the gender or marital status.


We need to encourage all to understand, accept and celebrate our bodies as the people God has made us to be. Not the bodies that society wants us to have. Otherwise we reduce people to their actions instead of beautiful diverse people made in the image of God. We need to look at all without judgment, because if we don’t see people and their relationships as they are, then we end up missing people like Mary who shows us the most powerful way of knowing God. We miss out whole parts of how humans can relate to Jesus, as a mother, bearing the presence of God in our bodies, as a real person, not just an abstract idea.

 

Intercessions


Prayers for others:

  • Debbie and Paul Hannon

  • Liz Holliman

  • Joan Finley

  • James, Christina, and baby Xavier

  • Ali Zareie and his family

  • The Riches Family

  • Jill Sorley

  • Joyce Phillips

  • George Snowden

  • Claire Mozaffari

  • Eric Harling

  • Herbert Agbeko

  • Anastasia Miklewright

  • Edward Fraser

  • All those who are Struggling at home or in hospital with Covid-19

Rest In Peace:

  • Michael 'Patchy' Bell

  • Maxine Davison, Lee Martyn and his daughter Sophie, Stephen Washington, Kate Shephard, their killer and all whom he has hurt.

  • All who lost their lives from Covid 19

 

Post-Communion


God most high,

whose handmaid bore the Word made flesh:

we thank you that in this sacrament of our redemption

you visit us with your Holy Spirit

and overshadow us by your power;

strengthen us to walk with Mary the joyful path of obedience

and so to bring forth the fruits of holiness;

through Jesus Christ our Lord.

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