Dear Friends,

May 2012 is different to the same month in recent years as this May there is only one Bank Holiday (Monday 7th). Ever since 1978 when the first ‘Early May Bank Holiday’ was introduced we have been used to both the first and the last Mondays in May being Bank Holidays. But we need not feel cheated      because both the first Monday and the first Tuesday in June (4th and 5th) have been designated Bank Holidays to coincide with the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

Everyone will be hoping for warm sunshine but I have some empathy with the great Noel Coward who once famously remarked, “Oh no, not another Bank Holiday we have enough wet, dreary weather as it is!!”

Holidays and days off are a great blessing to us and a time for much needed recreation and fun, but it is right that each year in May the Church designates a special time to bring awareness and practical help to those in countries and situations where holidays are an unaffordable luxury and everyday is a struggle for survival. This is called Christian Aid Week and this year it runs form 13th to 19th May.

We at Emmanuel through the leadership of our Christian Aid             co-ordinator, Angela McKee, will be playing our part in doing all we can to better the lives of others in some of the neediest places on the planet. I am grateful to all who will take part – to our Guides who deliver the envelopes around the area, to those who faithfully collect them, to those who generously give and of course, to Angela for her organisation of it all.

Through your efforts – “He saves the destitute and the needy – so the poor have hope again.” (Job 5:15-16)

Shalom,

Bill