PREPARING FOR CHRISTMAS: Due to Governmental guidelines on social distancing, at present we are only able to accommodate 125 persons maximum at each mass. Chrstimas tends to be a time of year when more people make a visit to Church. In a bid to cope with numbers, I will add some additional masses. There will be no children’s mass this year; and I would ask all parishioners to seriously think about masses they attend. Please don’t all turn up for the first mass, because we will have to turn away parishioners once we have reached our capacity of 125.
Christmas Eve Masses: 5.00pm, 7.00pm, 8.30pm & 10.00pm
Christmas Day Masses: 8.00am, 9.00am, 10.00am & 11.00am
For our older parishioners, those in poor health and for families, it may be useful to have some certainty about the seating at these Christmas services. Therefore, there will be some seats at each service that can be booked in advance. To do that you must send an email to Iain McLay (bloggeriain@gmail.com) stating which mass and for how many people. Your request must be made by Sunday 20th December and will be confirmed by email.
ELECTRONIC CHRISTMAS OFFERING: This year, as always, envelopes will be available for us to make our Christmas Offering, which, as you know, is an opportunity in every Catholic Church for parishioners to make a Christmas gift to their Parish Priest, which forms the major part of their salary. This year our Christmas Offering can also be made electronically. We just need to transfer the money to the parish account with the reference ‘Xmas offering’. Any questions please ask Iain McLay (bloggeriain@gmail.com). The details of the bank account are:
Sort Code: 40-13-22
Account Number: 11019651
Account Name: Catholic Church Loughton St Edmund.
Please make a very special effort to come and celebrate with us this Christmas. We really do need the presence of the Lord in our lives at this challenging and trying time!
With Love & Christmas Peace to you all
Rev Canon John J Harvey