Rector's Blog

Dear All, Do you remember the days when queues for certain events were disorganised rabbles?  Maybe a museum opening involved the lifting of a barrier, then a stampede to the ticket booth.  These days, thankfully, there is more organisation and decorum.  However...

VISION STATEMENT: ‘Knowing God, Showing God, Sharing God’   We want to see this statement realised in fresh ways. In this time of Coronavirus and the immediate aftermath, Frenchay Parish Church commits to: PRAY: for each other, for our parish, for God’s kingdom...

I was recently watching Dan Cruikshank on BBC iplayer, visiting the Bavarian castles designed and overseen by King Ludwig II in the late 19th Century.  He built his own mini Versailles, and his dream turrets and underground caverns following the imagination of Richard...

Dear All, Very soon we will most of us be getting used to a faster pace of life again.  How does that sound to you? For some, I realise the pace of life has never slowed.  In fact, if you are a working parent with children being home-schooled, or a key-worker on extra...

Dear All, "Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, …but God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5 : 7 – 8  NIV) This is a motto verse that David Bate has very kindly offered to make into a...

I had to pinch myself the other day, to make sure that what I had experienced wasn’t a dream, but had truly happened.  It was a day when I had received some professional training.  During the course, I realised afresh that for many people, their working...

Dear All, Earlier this year I had the huge privilege of taking a 3 month sabbatical.  My wife and I were able to travel to Russia, where she had worked for a missionary agency for 13 years.  Also to Canada, where she had spent an important 2 years of her childhood....

Recently I was doing some dabbling around in the historical links between Frenchay and William Penn, founder of the colony of Pennsylvania.  One of my sources mentioned that the naming of Pennsylvania was actually attached to his father’s name (Admiral Sir William...

Dear All, As you read this blog, 2019 is well underway. Time, in fact, to join the Alpha Course running at Begbrook Social Club if you so desired. Why might you consider doing this?  ‘Discipleship’ is the journey of faith that means maturity, fulfilment, generous...

Dear All,This last Christmas we joyfully ‘rent the air asunder’, as the carol, Good King Wenceslas, has it. We gathered in the Redrow showhomes and on the grassy verge. A few days later, we were invited by the Beckspool committee to gather and celebrate...