Showing posts with label Musicians. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Musicians. Show all posts

Carols by Candlelight

Join us on Sunday 10th December at 3pm for a beautiful, festive Carol service, with traditional carols, modern music from our youth group and something from the smallest ones in the parish, there is something for everyone! With a retiring collection for our local Parish project, JDRF, and refreshments in the hall afterwards (including the Prize Draw announcements!)  everyone is very welcome to this festive afternoon.

50 years celebrated in 1 fantastic evening!

The community of St Augustine of Canterbury celebrated in style in Downend on Wed 30th September with a wonderful Mass of Thanksgiving, led by Bishop Declan together with 15 other priests and many Deacons, all in front of invited local dignitaries and a packed congregation of parishioners, old and new.
Before the Mass began we enjoyed songs and hymns sung beautifully by St Augustine’s Primary School choir who were led by the Head teacher, Julian Clements.
The offertory procession was taken up by a selection of parishioners who were here 50 years ago when the Church community began as well as representatives from our most recent Confirmation and 1st Holy Communion programmes showing the bright future of our Church.
All our music groups were involved in the liturgy during the evening, 15 of our altar servers were delighted to serve at the special Mass and a large team of people worked hard to make the whole evening a great success.
During his homily, Bishop Declan spoke about the fact that we are not just celebrating 50 years of the church building being complete, but more than that, this marks 50 years of building a thriving Church Community. He presented Fr Frank with a beautiful Papal Blessing, given to the priest and people of St Augustine’s on this wonderful occasion.
Each family was given a commemorative booklet after Mass (Fr Frank joked that it wasn’t given out on arrival in case people read it instead of paying attention to Bishop Declan’s homily)! The booklet gives lots detail about the history of the Parish with many memories and photographs from those early days and events throughout the 50 years. The forward from Fr Frank talks of ‘community’ being a beautiful title as it symbolises unity and togetherness and that, in marking this special occasion, we are giving thanks to God for the many blessings He has bestowed on our community and we are looking forward to the future with confidence.
The celebrations continued after Mass in the school hall with speeches, cutting of a wonderful cake depicting a 3D icing sugar model of the church in 1965, groaning tables of food, glorious food and lots of catching up between friends old and new.
Here’s to the next 50 years!



Musical Talents!

We are lucky enough to have several musical groups who help enhance the liturgy, at weekend Masses and for special occasions.

CHOIR
The choir is organised by Martyn Le Poidevin and Bella Harding and exists to lead the church congregation in singing. We welcome new members - Some knowledge of music is helpful, but not essential, the main requirement being that you are keen to sing! If you would like to find out more or join, contact the parish office.

CANTABILE
Cantabile is a small music group of friends who enjoy singing and making music together. Between us we are able to sing harmonies in three parts, play violin, viola, piano, flute, clarinet, bass guitar and guitaer and three types of recorder.
We try to share the love of God through our music making and have a good time whilst doing so!
If you would like our skills for either a particular church service or another function, please contact us through the Parish Office.

We also have a new youth music group who are finding their feet and starting to play at Masses - fantastic!

Also a talented parishioner who plays the keyboard for us at regular intervals and also a couple of parishioners who lead us in acapella singing when there is no one on the rota to play.

If you can help by joining a group, or starting a new group up, or by playing/singing solo - please contact Fr Barnabas or call the parish office.