St Mary the Virgin
EWELL PARISH CHURCH

ANNUAL REPORT FOR 2003

Background
St Mary the Virgin is the parish church of Ewell. Its postal address is London Road, Ewell, Surrey KT17 2BB although most correspondence is directed through the Vicarage, Church Street, Ewell, Surrey, KT17 2AQ. St Mary’s Parochial Church Council is a charity excepted from registration with the Charity Commission. Members of the PCC are trustees of the charity for the term of their appointment. During 2003 St Mary’s banked with Barclays Bank plc, Epsom. The appointed auditor was Kevin Mallett.

Aims and organisation
The PCC (Powers) Measure 1956 states that the PCC is to co-operate with the incumbent in promoting in the parish the whole mission of the Church, pastoral, evangelistic, social and ecumenical. St Mary’s PCC also has maintenance responsibilities for the Church and Church Hall, for the churchyard immediately surrounding the church, for the large churchyard extensions in Church Street and for the interior of the Vicarage.

In accordance with the Church Representation Rules, Members of the PCC are either ex-officio, elected by the Annual Parochial Church meeting (APCM) or co-opted. During 2003 the following served as members: 

Incumbent:	The Reverend Richard Hanford	Chairman
Reader:	Mr Reginald Saunders			
Wardens:	Mr David Hill		(Vice Chairman until May 2003)
Mrs Gilda Everson	(Vice Chairman from May 2003)
		Dr David Dance			 (from May 2003)
Representatives on Deanery Synod:
		Mr Norman Hale
		Mr Bill Rackham
		Mr Julian Varney
Elected Members:
		Mrs Gill Bird				(until APCM 2003)
		Mr David Crick			
		Mrs Jenny Dance
		Miss Valerie Fuller			
		Mr David Hill				(from APCM 2003)		
Mr George Jarrett
		Mrs Sarah Lutton
		Mrs Miriam Massey			(Joint Treasurer – co-opted after APCM 2003)
		Gp Cpt Freddie Melrose		(until APCM 2003)
		Miss Janet Morrison
		Miss Kathleen Murphy		(Joint Treasurer)
		Mr Peter Pledge
		Mr Richard Rothwell			(from APCM 2003)		
Mrs Angie Samways			
		Mr Morris Scott			
		Mr David Slattery
Mrs Sarah Stovell
		Mrs Lynne Yuille			(Secretary)

The PCC operates through a number of committees, which meet between full meetings of the PCC.

Standing Committee
This is the only committee required by law. It has power to transact the business of the PCC between its meetings, subject to any directions given by the Council.
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Estates Committee
Attends to matters relating to the stewardship of plant, such as the church buildings and fabric, the churchyard, the church hall and the vicarage.

External Affairs Committee
The Committee has overall responsibility for links with, and fundraising for, external organisations including our linked parish in Guyana. The committee oversees flowers for the bereaved at harvest, lay pastoral visiting and the welcome afforded to visitors to St Mary’s.

Church Attendance
There are currently 208 parishioners on the Church Electoral Roll (8 having been removed and 11 added since April 2002). Usual Sunday attendance during 2002 was 165, with numbers increasing considerably at festivals. The ‘family’ services remain popular.

Review of the Year
The full PCC met five times during the year with an average attendance of 83 per cent. An early meeting with the Archdeacon of Dorking ended in disappointment when it became clear that the Diocese was unable to provide any practical help or support to the parish. The provision of a second member of staff remains unlikely in the short term. Council was dissatisfied with the outcome and correspondence continues.

After a long period without a Director of Music, Julie Ainscough was appointed to the post in December.

The new window to commemorate the Millennium and the Queen’s Golden Jubilee will be installed in early April and dedicated by the Bishop of Guildford on Palm Sunday. The Bishop will also dedicate the recently completed Garden of Remembrance.

In May 2002 the PCC set up the Children's Support Group to ensure that the activities we offer for our children evolve, gain in interest and importance to the young people and provide them with a strong Christian ethic. In addition, it was hoped to increase the numbers of young families and children attending the Creche, Children's Praise and the Sunday School.

The group, currently 12, is made up from those involved in activities for children. We have met six times to-date and have reviewed all activities (except the choir) which cater for children and young people.

During the course of the review we have:
	*  adopted some new materials from the Diocesan Education Centre
*  organised an Open Day and renamed the Sunday School as Children's Hour in an attempt to
    present a different image and encourage wider attendance
	*  produced a user-friendly baptismal leaflet  for parents bringing their children for baptism
	*  instigated a monthly page for children in the Ewell Parish News
*  provided "busy bags" to occupy the children of parents who prefer to keep their children with
    them during the services
	*  organised a party for recently baptised children in conjunction with one of the Toddlers groups
	*  relaunched the Wayfarers 
	*  supported an increase in the number of family services to seven a year.  
	*  paid due attention to the requirements of the Diocese in respect of child protection
  
In other words, a great deal of hard work has been done by our helpers and members of the Group to preserve and develop what we already had in place - and with some success. There is a lot to build on. For example, the three Toddlers groups, providing for about one hundred children each week, continue to thrive and to be oversubscribed. Here we have a rich seam to quarry. We do our best to make links between the mothers and Children's Praise and the Family Services with varying success. The Christmas Service for families was particularly well attended and much enjoyed by all.

There is still much to be achieved. Numbers of children are fairly steady but, with the exception of the Toddler Groups, they are still too low. However, we remain confident that we are presenting a friendly welcoming face to newcomers and we hope that time and word of mouth - not to mention the arresting 
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posters displayed - will eventually bring their reward. Our chief concern is to welcome change, build on success and to be open to new ideas, new materials, new methods. We have recently had some most welcome offers of help from members of the congregation. If anyone else feels able to offer ideas or a little help with our work for children, please get in touch. It is not a life sentence! 

A copy of a Progress Report written by the Children’s Support Group for the PCC in November 2002 can be obtained from the Office.  

External Affairs: In barometric terms the year could be described as "quiet, steady", but although things have gone reasonably well the future looks less settled. 

Charitable fundraising at £3,900 overall was slightly less than in the previous two years, mainly because of a downturn in Christmas Market takings, but the Lent Appeal benefited the Parkinson's Disease Society by £1,000, and the Christmas cash collections raised £920 for Children with Leukaemia and the Toybox Charity (for Latin American street children), a fine effort from congregation and parish. The Childrens' Society boxes raised over £500 for, I believe, the first time. 

I would like to pay tribute here to Joan Boulden, who ably runs the popular Wednesday Coffee Mornings for us. Led by her, enthusiasm for the Jeel-al-Amal Boys' Home in Bethany continues unabated and a further £855 was sent to Jeel in January. Jeel and its associated girls' home have the particular misfortune to be "on the wrong side of the line" in Israel/West Bank and their hardships are very considerable (you can read about them in the news sheets that appear on the boards in the Welcome Area from time to time). Besides the monetary usefulness, our donations help them to remember that they are not forgotten over here. I am additionally grateful for the loyal and consistent background help of Frank & Barbara Cannon, not least for their regular fundraising table and for their organising of "coffee club" coach outings.

Thanks are also due to Norman & Sybil Hale who have organised the Christmas Market in recent years, but who have now stepped down. An appeal for an understudy last year brought no response, and so although the benefit of their expertise is still available to us, it does mean that we need fresh organisers very soon if the Market is to continue, even for this year. This is no idle statement:- no organisers means no Market, it is as simple as that. 

We also need to undertake a searching review of Ewell Parish News. This made a loss of some £870 in the year 2001 (I believe 2002 figures are expected to be similar), and during the last few weeks we have had to face up to increased printing costs of some £360 in a full year. We had insufficient notice to be able to approach other printers without a disruption in distribution and so we have decided to pay up (£240) for the rest of this year. The difficulty is compounded by falling sales and resistance to raised prices (which tend to show up in January, when subscriptions become due) and for various reasons we are now short of distributors.

"Churchwatch", the arrangement by which we open the church for an hour at Wednesday lunchtimes with someone in attendance, was set up (with some difficulty) several years ago as a form of outreach to provide people of the parish with a weekly opportunity for quiet reflection in a safe place. In practice, very few have ever come through the door, and the small band of volunteers who man the church for this purpose are feeling the strain and in some cases having to drop out. We are sure that the basic idea was a good one, but its continuation is seriously in doubt and it may now be time to stop. One possibility, however, is to open the church all day on just a few specific days in the year, for example, on Remembrance Day or the anniversary of "9/11". 

On behalf of the PCC

The Reverend W R Hanford (Chairman)
March 2003

St Mary the Virgin EWELL PARISH CHURCH
Vicar's Review of the Year 2003

There is the formality of an Annual Report these days, but it is naturally fairly clinical in what it says, even though there is sometimes space to expand some of the entries, as is the case this year with the two important items about the External Affairs Committee and the Children's Support Group.  Both those items deserve close perusal.  However, my own Review of the Year, although not ever a complete one, does go some way to making the picture fuller.  A lot goes on here; a lot has happened in the past twelve months; a lot of hard work has been done by many people, and yet (as ever) the word 'many' covers the reality that too much is being done by too few.

I thank all who have laboured so hard in the past twelve months in a whole variety of areas.  The fact that I propose to single out four this time is emphatically not meant to say that other contributions are of lesser worth, but sometimes there are aspects of particularly devoted service should be made more widely known.  Into this category I first put our retiring churchwarden, David Hill.  He has brought a shrewd and incisive mind to the job, and has that ability to cut through to the heart of many a thorny problem with speed and precision.  He has given us four years of loyal service as churchwarden, and although he will still be involved in the central area of work here, he will now be relieved of a major chunk of responsibility.  He is a busy man, and is Chairman of the Governors at ECS, and has several other areas of interest.  We can only be grateful for all the additional work he has done for St Mary's, and to thank him for his distinguished four years in office.

Then there is David Slattery, the custodian of the churchyard, who has done such a magnificent job there.  It has never looked so good.  His role there is varied, for there are many occasions when he exercises a pastoral ministry to those who visit the churchyard.  His love of the job is revealed in the delightful articles he has given us about the churchyard in EPN.  We are all much in his debt for the great service he has given to St Mary's in this and in so many other ways.

I then wish to pay tribute to David Crick, who, quite frankly, has held the choir together during the long inter-regnum period, when we were without a Director of Music.  It is true that it was in one sense a team effort, but undoubtedly it was David who has made all the necessary decisions, done vast amounts of telephoning, e-mailing, and basically held the thing together.  Without him it might well have all fallen apart.  During the interregnum he has ensured that three of the choristers were able to achieve their Dean's Awards of the RSCM.  He has been in St Mary's choir for somewhere around 35 years, and he has a great love for St Mary's and its music.  It is little short of the miraculous that standards have been maintained - even if they have in one sense plateaud - during this time.  I shall say something else about the music later on, but this is the moment to express our appreciation for all the hard work done in one area of St Mary's by someone who leads a very busy and varied life.

The fourth person is Lloyd Mullen, who with Promilla edits EPN.  Here again it is the case of someone who regularly, month by month, co-ordinates the material for the printer, and who gives us some particularly thought-provoking comments in his editorial page.  This is not a half-hour job-, it is regular hard work, month by month, done out of love for God and his Church.  I recently received an out-of-the-blue handwritten note of appreciation from the Archdeacon who had been reading a particular number, and who clearly finds our paper worth reading.  It is in many ways different from the traditional parish magazine, and more serious in style than some. (I once inherited a parish magazine which contained the Vicar's letter and a monthly recipe.) There are very considerable problems about distribution, which will need some hard thinking quite soon.  No paper can please everyone, which is why some take the Times and some take the Sun, and we only have one paper on offer here.  However, it is a distinctive one, and Lloyd's contribution to our work here cannot be measured, but in terms of how we present ourselves and the gospel we owe much to Lloyd's indefatigable labours in producing our parish paper every month.

Perhaps this is also a convenient point for me to mention that Mrs Ethel Luxford, who has been cleaning the church and church hall for the past 40 years has now retired.  She and other members of the family have sometimes had a difficult time in doing this very necessary work, particularly in the hall, and we are grateful for all these years of service.  The cleaning arrangements are being reviewed at the present time.

And so to other things.  We have, actually, welcomed some new regular members of the congregation in the past year, and the rather anodyne statistics about the Electoral Roll have some bearing on this.  On the other hand we have lost through death several well-known members of the parish family, most in fact in recent months.  Among these we must recall Maggie Crabtree, Dorothy Parkinson, John Mitchell, Mabel Dexter, Philip Allen, William Scott, Jonathan Campion, John Beams and Margaret Finch.  Barbara Davis, the wife of our former Vicar, also died recently; her ashes will be interred with Fr Paul's on Thursday 3 April after a Requiem at 1130.  They were all faithful worshippers here, and many were active in St Mary's in a whole variety of ways.  May they rest in peace.

There have been several changes of office during the past twelve months.  Graham Cannings has succeeded Malcolm Pitstow as Tower Captain.  We have a new Church Architect in the person of Daniel Goldberg.  We have a new Director of Music in the person of Julie Ainscough.  Miriam Massey has taken over as Clerk and Treasurer of the Ewell Parochial Trusts, and Joyce Saunders is now our parish representative with Churches Together in Ewell.  Most recently, of course, there is Dr David Dance, who will be taking over from David Hill during May.  He and Gilda Everson will undoubtedly make a great team.  Gilda has come to grips with the job very quickly, and has now been in post for a year.  I am most grateful to her for all that she has done in a whole variety of ways, not least in connexion with the Children's Support Group.

The past year has seen one big change, and that was the location of the Village Fair (called a Jubilee Fair last year) at Ewell Castle School instead of at Glyn House.  Rosemary and Mike Henson took over the Fair last year, and did us proud.  The new venue seems universally popular, and although ECS has taken over Glyn House there are no catering facilities there any more, so the days of Glyn House as the venue for the fair are now over.

Events in the past year have included two 'royal' occasions; there was a congregation at an early Eucharist on the day of the Queen Mother's funeral and the ringers rang a quarter-peal.  It was interesting that nearly all the choral music in the Westminster Abbey service was in the repertoire of our own choir.  Our own Golden Jubilee Mattins included some of the music from the coronation rite.  HM Lord Lieutenant for the County of Surrey was with us for morning service on 6 October.  The last 'royal' note will be on Palm Sunday, since our new window is 'Jubilee' as well as 'Millennium.'

It was good to have a hymn-writing competition at Candlemas, and we had two splendid entries from Promilla Mullen and Eve Myatt-Price, each very different from the other.  Both were used on Candlemas Day, and join the collection of locally produced hymnody.  Margaret Humphries has also written a splendid hymn for last year's service 'Pets be Praised.' (Edith Vincent has a hymn in A Hundred Hymns for Ewell as a result of an earlier competition; who else is going to try now?  What about something for St Peter and St Paul which falls on a Sunday this year?) The text of all the new hymns, other than my own, will appear in EPN in due course.

The mention of Candlemas reminds me that we have not had the procession to the west window (which depicts the Candlemas scene) for about three years, mainly because there are various ways of 'doing' Candlemas.  I mention this because we have recently taken the decision to close the gallery to the general public in the interests of safety.  There are technical issues involved, too complicated to go into now, but if anyone wishes to enquire further about this, then I suggest a word with Mr George Jarrett, who is Chairman of the Estates Committee, would be the best thing to do.

I had better say something now about the music side of things here.  I have already paid tribute to David Crick for his work during the interregnum.  It was an extraordinary time, looking back, with several knife-edged situations, and with frequent occurrences of my own doubling-up at the console.  We are grateful to Timothy Burke, Jonathan Holmes and Peter Reeve for their invaluable help during this period.  Jonathan Holmes, whose virtuoso playing has been a constant delight, will be staying on with us as Sub-Organist.  We now welcome Julie Ainscough (who used to be Tim Burke's teacher) as Director of Music, and she has been in post since Advent.  She comes to us with great experience, and is a highly qualified professional musician, with a large teaching practice.  The choir is finding that there are now new areas to be explored, and several parts of their repertoire which have not been used for some time are now coming back into use.  The setting by Andrew Millington, commissioned for St Mary's 150th anniversary, has already made a comeback.  It will be a busy and hard-working time until Easter, particularly on Palm Sunday this year, but in the term after Easter the plan is to ease off a bit, and to concentrate on some of the more basic aspects of things.  Recruitment is now being actively pursued, and down some new avenues.  We are hopefully in for a time of confident reconstruction in an area for which this particular church has long had a good reputation. The esprit de corps of the choir remained intact during the long period without a Director, and it was good that during this period the first Old Choristers' Reunion took place, a very successful occasion, and one which may well be repeated on a regular basis.  I must pay tribute to the work of the Friends of St Mary's Music, who have worked so hard to raise money through various events and sponsorship.  In the past year there has been the delightful concert by the Camerata da Chiesa, the splendid organ recital by Jonathan Holmes, and the recent concert by the Ewell Castle School Big Band.  The Director of Music and the Sub-Organist will both be giving recitals this year, one in May and one in the autumn, and these are being publicised in professional musical journals for the first time.  It is time our magnificent organ was more widely known in the recital and recording world.  There are also plans for another programme of lunch-time organ recitals.

We shall be hosting the Epsom Deanery Confirmation here in May, and I hope that we shall be producing some candidates from St Mary's.  It is always nice to be confirmed in one's own church, and it doesn't happen here every year.  So, if anyone knows of someone who might possibly wish to be confirmed, would he or she arrange for the person to be in touch as soon as possible, because the count-down time is quite short.

And finally the Window.  There is not really much more that I can say at this point which is not already known, but I hope that everyone will try to make it a 'Church Day' on Palm Sunday, and that no-one will be going to Majorca or off to see Auntie Flo.  This is one of those rare occasions when something very special is happening in the parish, and which will have long-term effects.  The Garden of Remembrance will be a facility for the people of Ewell for many years to come; the Window will be a sign of the confidence and hope of the Christians in this place at this time.  Those who have contributed to the window will receive a formal invitation to the proceedings.  About twenty clear panes (at f 15 a time) are still available; they do not have to be sold, because all the costs are covered, but it might be good if every single one was bargained for.  The box is once more in the Welcome Area today.  The visit of the Bishop is always a heart-warming ion, for Bishop John and Lydia always manage to make people feel special (not all bishops can do this; I can think of plenty of surly exceptions), and the buffet lunch will be a chance for us to enjoy a good time of Christian fellowship together.  I particularly hope that a good number will stay on for the afternoon service, in order to get on to that particular wavelength of devotion which is unique to Holy Week and Easter, as we travel with Christ along the way of sorrows which is the path to glory.  It will mean quite a long time at St Mary's, far more than the usual hour-and-a-bit Sunday stint.  However, I am quite sure that it will be a wonderful and memorable day, and I hope everyone will find it so.

I said 'finally' in connexion with the window, but the Window will be full of flowers, and that reminds me that a word of appreciation is also due to our flower ladies, who produce our lovely displays week after week.  It was recently pointed out to me that they have between them over 230 years of life, and although they are carrying on quite happily they could do with some assistance from somewhat younger members of the congregation who might care to learn the ropes.  A note to this effect appeared two or three times in the Weekly Notes, but it elicited no response.  Might I make this plug once again?  Enthusiasm is all that is needed, and being female is not a requirement.

This year I complete forty years in the ordained ministry.  I was made deacon in 1963.  Half of my ministry has been exercised in this parish- As I reflect upon this time I am aware that St Mary's Ewell has moved on in many ways over that period, and so for that matter has the Church of England.  The parish family here at present is a warm and friendly one, and there is a general sense of pulling together.  As far as I am aware there is no real sniping going on.  I am always ready to meet to discuss issues which cause concern to individuals, and people should always feel that they can moan to me if they wish. (I might or might not agree with them, but at least they will know that I know how they feel.) Our finances are not in an ideal state, with our income from stewardship and collections falling below the exorbitant demands of the Diocesan Quota, before we spend anything on St Mary's.  It is clear that this side of things must be revisited as a matter of urgency, if we are to maintain the worship and ministry here, and hand on to later generations a church in good repair.  There are plenty of things to do with mission and outreach which still need to be addressed- Yet for all that St Mary's remains a place where the word of God is preached, the sacraments administered, and where God's people come to receive his grace to grapple with the problems of life.  'The lot has,' as the psalmist said, 'fallen unto us in a fair ground,' and here at St Mary's we have a church that actually looks like one, with a particular style of worship which is distinctive in this area, and with a Christian community which supports one another in good times and bad.  We can look ahead in faith and confidence.

W.R.H.
16 March 2003