Dundee Methodist Church

24 June 2007

Next Sunday: 01 July 2007

10.45 am
“early singing” - Derek Sutcliffe
11 am
Worship led by Sue Marshall

We give the assurance of our thoughts and prayers to all who are unwell, awaiting or undergoing treatment, or anxious or grieving for the loss of loved ones.

Refugee Sunday

Today and this week we are invited to remember all who have been compelled, for a variety of reasons, to leave their homes. For more information, see pages on the Methodist Church Website. Some of this material is on the news-sheet cover.

Crèche Rota

Provision of crèche facilities is requested over the summer months. Please let Louisa know as soon as possible if you can help with this.

Church Council

Members who have not received papers electronically are asked to collect them today for Wednesday's meeting.

Meetings this week

Date & timeVenueDetails
Sunday 24th June, 6.30 pm Meadowside St Paul’s (map) “Songs of Praise”
Monday 25th June, 7.30 pm Meadowside St Paul’s (map) A concert given by the Cecilian Choir.
Wednesday 27th June Dundee Methodist Church, upstairs Church Council
Saturday 30th June Meadowside St Paul’s (map) Gingerbread Fayre (all items ginger flavoured)
Saturday 30th June, 1 pm St Paul's Cathedral, 1 High Street, Dundee Lunchtime concert given by Leanne Bell (Mezzo Soprano). Tickets £3/2 (available at the door)
Sunday 1st July, 2 pm Meadowside St Paul’s (map) "In the Tent of Abraham" (stories relating to the Abrahamic faiths and of interest to all ages).

Support other Organisations

Bible Society

Our support through the Bible-a-Month Club is invited in June for work in Albania. See library area noticeboard.

Our prayerful attention is drawn this week to :

  • legislation on religious practice due to be implemented after Presidential election in Tajikistan;
  • development of material for the hearing-impaired by staff and volunteers in India;
  • continuing financial support of Bible Society work by congregations and individuals;
  • contacts with children during the summer holidays.

Action of Churches Together in Scotland (ACTS) - news

  • Appointment of General Secretary
    Brother Stephen Smyth will start work in the ACTS Secretariat Office in Alloa on 16th July, following his recent appointment by the ACTS Forum. A member of the Marist Brothers, a Roman Catholic religious congregation, Stephen has been Ecumenical Officer of Glasgow Churches Together for the past seven years.
  • New Methodist members of the Forum will be the Rev Lily Twist (Chair of the Synod) and David Easson.
  • Slave Trade legacies - call on Gordon Brown : at the National Ecumenical Service in Blantyre last Saturday to mark the bi-centenary of the Slave Trade Abolition Act 1807, more than 400 people were invited to sign an agreed Statement on slavery, which includes a call to the UK Government “to be particularly supportive of the nations in Africa and in the Caribbean which bore the brunt of the Slave Trade.”
    The Statement was signed on behalf of the Methodist Church in Scotland by the Rev Jim Jones and individual Methodists present also signed copies, to be sent to Gordon Brown in his first day as Prime Minister.
    During this year a programme of events, some taking place in National Trust for Scotland properties which have links with the Slave Trade, invites recognition of “Scotland's strong but rarely publicly acknowledged connections which the Slave Trade forged between Scotland and the Caribbean.”
    Did you know that
    • in 1695 an African trading company was set up in Edinburgh and sent out a slave ship to Africa?
    • many slave masters and owners in the Caribbean were Scottish: in 1817, 30% of slaves in Jamaica were owned by Scots?
    • the Old Bathgate Academy was built in 1833 with money from John Newland who made his fortune in Jamaica from slave-trading and sugar-plantation?
    • the Rev Robert Walker (of the famous Raeburn painting) persuaded the Presbytery of Edinburgh in 1788 to petition for the ending of the slave trade?
    • millions of people around the world today are being sold and forced to live as slaves - an estimated 1.2 million children are trafficked each year around the world (UN)?
    See

Forthcoming events

Date & timeVenueDetails
Thursday 5th to Tuesday 12 July Blackpool Methodist Conference. Further information on the Conference Website

Prayer Points for this week

  • The Vice-President of Conference (still!) walking the Jurassic Coast (Dorset) for MRDF;
  • Scotland & Shetland's representatives to Conference;
  • Arbroath Annual Church Meeting today;
  • gap-year students' placement schemes (Christian Aid);
  • The Leprosy Mission's work in Mozambique, Southern Africa, and Zimbabwe;
  • reconciliation work of the Church of Ceylon Board of Christian Education (FTM);
  • Bible Society work in Albania;
  • we pray with and for the peoples of Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay;
  • we remember fellow Methodists in the Widnes Circuit (Liverpool District), and in Paisley (Ayrshire & Renfrewshire Circuit).