I love Easter. Even before thinking about faith, I love the purity of the merch. You can put Christmasness on anything, but Easter has picked its lane. Bunnies, eggs, and chocolate! I do love chocolate. It’s up there with Pizza, Beer, or The Beauty Of The Infinite Cosmos as proof that there must be a loving purpose behind all of this. How Bunnies, Eggs, and Chocolate overlap in the great story of Easter is beyond me – does the bunny lay chocolate eggs? How would it? Let’s not think about that!

I had an issue with one of the eggs someone got me this year – it’s in a box with no hole. Can I be sure there’s an egg in it? I’m not used to this – there’s supposed to be a cut out, isn’t there, where the foil-wrapped egg glints temptingly at us until Easter! Do we know what’s really going on there? Can we see? Can we trust it? Is it all going to work out in the end? Will it be everything we wanted, needed, hoped? That’s a lot of existential crisis for an egg – thanks, Maltesers!

We could ask those same questions of the Easter story though, couldn’t we? Do we know what’s really going on here? Can we see? Can we trust it? Is it all going to work out in the end? Will it be everything we wanted, needed, hoped? I hope we do know what’s going on, we can see – the story is told so powerfully every year, in assemblies, in church, in films. At church we retell it every Sunday, but it’s special to hear it at this time of year. Last Sunday we enacted the Easter Story in our passion service of Palm Sunday – do catch up online here, it was mesmerising.

And it's so powerful. This story is MORE than a story. Like chocolate, really letting it get into you is so much more powerful than reading about it. The first time you take this story seriously, everything changes. Even more so than with chocolate – can you imagine what someone’s reaction would be having chocolate for the first time? This is bigger, better. Can we trust it? How will it all work out in the end? Well – spoiler alert, he comes back! And, I believe, Jesus is still at work in the world, in us. He’s still God.

It is incredible, isn’t it. Literally. Hard to believe. But it’s still the story that makes the most sense of a sometimes senseless and always indescribable world. I just can’t believe it’s all an accident. And if there is God, and that God is love, then coming down here and being with us, being us, seems right. If there is God, and God is love, and died when he had to put things right, that would change everything. That God would come back.

Can we trust it, even though we can’t see? I do. I look at the early church. That bunch of disciples we see portrayed in the Easter story – scared, confused, betraying and abandoning their master and friend, scattered around Jerusalem, they somehow became the seed of a movement that we’re still living in. They mostly went to their deaths proclaiming this same story – people rarely do that for lies; they must really have believed they had seen and known Jesus again. Some powerful force compelled and equipped them, transformed them and transformed – no, transforms – the world through them, through us. That force is the risen God, it is love.

I think – when we look at it – my box, or the Easter story, we can see enough.
Enough to be very excited. I hope you’ll join me on Easter Sunday to open it. 
The story, not the egg – Amelia and I will have eaten it by then!

God Bless,
Rob

What’s On This Week
Sunday 31st March
6:20 for 6:41am - Sunrise Service
10am - All-In @10 Easter Celebration Service

Tuesday 2nd April
11am-2pm - T.A.G in The Barn
6:30-8pm - ‘Moving On’ Lent Course in The Barn

Thursday 4th April
6:30–8:30pm - Belly Dancing in The Barn

Sunday 7th April
9:15am - Traditional Communion Service
11am - All-Age Communion Service

A Walk Through Easter - In Calverley!
Follow Jesus through the events of Holy Week and Easter from Sunday 24th March until Sunday 8th April. Trail details are available online here.

Coffee Shop Advance Notice
Please note there will be no Coffee Shop in Church this Friday.
Coffee Shop re-opens in Church on Friday 19th April.

Pet Service
On Sunday 21st April at 11am we'll be hosting a Pet Service! Bring your pet to church (as long as they can be on a lead or in a container) to join our celebration of animals. It will be a fun service to invite your friends and family to, so please spread the word! And please contact [email protected] if you would like to help with this.

Wine Tasting With A Twist!
Join us for a special Wine Tasting with a Twist event on Friday 26th April, 7:30-11pm in Church. Tickets cost £20 which includes 6 wines to sample and food.
There will be a silent auction and all funds raised will be shared between Church and The Wren Bakery. Tickets will be available to purchase online soon.

Choral Evensong for Eastertide
On Sunday 28th April at 6:30pm we'll be holding a special service of Choral Evensong in Eastertide, with beautiful hymns and refreshments available afterwards. Come along and invite any friends or family who might appreciate the reflective and anticipatory atmosphere of a traditional service.

Time & Talents 2024 - It's Not Too Late!
Over the next few weeks, we'll be looking at how we can offer our Time and Talents to God and the church. It's not too late, so if you feel you have something to offer, please print and complete our Time & Talent 2024 form online here. Even if you’re already on a rota, please complete a form to confirm you’re still happy to be included!

ChurchSuite
Here at Calverley Parish Church we use a secure online database called ChurchSuite to safely store your contact details instead of paper copies. If you haven’t yet provided your information to us via ChurchSuite, it makes it very hard for us to get in touch with you, so please do sign up!
We’ll also be looking to use ChurchSuite to manage rotas in the future.
It will make organising and managing serving rotas far easier for all.
It has the ability to send reminders, allow for easier swapping, and gives visibility of any gaps that need filling. Anyone who regularly supports on a ministry or serving team, please consider signing up to ChurchSuite if not done so already. For more information and to sign up, please click here, and help us be the strong connected community we're called to be.

Bradford North Foodbank
Our local Foodbank continue to support local people and families, and are currently in need of:
- Tinned Tomatoes
- Tinned Vegetables
- Tinned Fish
- Instant Mash
- Coffee
- Cereals
- Long Life UHT Milk
- Long-life UHT Fruit Juice
- Tinned Fruit
- Shampoo
- Deodorants
- Sanitary Products
We also need some volunteer drivers to take the food to Eccleshill, maybe once every month? If you are available to help with this, please contact [email protected]

Weekly Family News Introductory Pieces
Do you have something you’d like to share? How you came to God?
An experience that might interest others? Something about the history of Calverley and its relationship with St. Wilfrid’s that might not be common knowledge? Your own history and relationship with St. Wilfrid’s?
We’re looking to build up a library of articles that could be used as the introductory piece for our weekly Family News Newsletter Email.
It doesn’t have to be a long piece, just something you’d like to share.
If you have a piece in mind that would fit a particular week, please let us know and we can save it for then. All you need to do is put the words together, give it a title, and if you have a suitable picture to go with it you'd like to share send us that too or we will find something appropriate to complement your words. Please send your submissions including Title & Picture to the [email protected]

The Patronage Scheme
What is the Patronage Scheme? It's an opportunity for everybody in Calverley Parish and beyond to help St. Wilfrid’s Church serve the community of Calverley. Our church is an important and beautiful landmark which holds a great deal of the history of our Parish. St. Wilfrid’s has always been at the heart of the community, there for Family Occasions, Baptisms, Weddings, and Funerals, as well as Coffee Shop, Beer Festivals, Concerts and Christmas Carols. Your patronage will support the practical, ongoing costs of running and maintaining this beautiful building – preserving St. Wilfrid’s Church for future generations. Our Church costs an average of £105 per day to heat and maintain. There are also occasional larger repairs beyond these day-to-day expenses. You can choose a particular date, special to you, to support the running costs of St. Wilfrid’s. In ‘sponsoring’ that date your donation will help to cover the costs for your special day. If you would like to buy the same date every year, that would be fantastic! Please click here to access the Patronage Scheme form online.

Generosity
If you would like to give to the work and ministry of our church, which includes missional giving such as Parish Share, please do get in touch with Margaret Roundhill ([email protected]) to talk about The Parish Giving Scheme, a wonderfully simple and tax efficient way to donate regularly, or see the link at the bottom of this email.
Yours with gratitude, Rob.

Please send any items to be included in our Weekly Family Newsletter to:
[email protected]

The work & ministry of Calverley Parish Church is supported by the generous giving of the community, and we receive no outside funding.
You can make a donation or sign up to regular giving, including Gift Aid, via our Parish Giving page online here.
Thank You for your support.