All along we have been endeavouring to honour both the letter and the intention of the restrictions with integrity.  

Constant contact with diocesan leadership who are getting their advice directly from the government.

It should be noted that at this point the government is wanting all work to continue as much as possible (describing all work as ‘essential’), and this includes the work of churches.

Staff and regular volunteers producing an online live stream service or pre-recorded service (or the youth and kids ministry equivalent) is considered by the government to be ‘work’ and not a public meeting.  Any people who are not part of that production are not permitted to be present, and those who are must maintain strict social distancing.  

In addition we are also making sure that all rooms on site have limits on who can be in them to maintain 4m2 distancing, and no more than 10 people will be allowed to be present in any room at any time, even in a room as large as our church building.  That is why we have reduced the size of the bands to a maximum of 5 (including singers) and cut down to one Bible reader and one prayer person. You will also observe that we are using two locations for our live stream this Sunday (the church building and the crypt) to limit numbers present in any one place. 

• We are expecting contact to be restricted further soon so that even our current live-stream will not be able to continue and so have pre-recorded many songs prior to the tightening from last Thursday so that when the time comes that all social contact is prohibited we can still produce services by individuals filming their sermons/prayers etc. in their own home and the whole package being edited together with the pre-recorded music.

Weddings and funerals have restrictions placed on them.  Funerals are still allowed to have guests (to the limit of 10 present) but weddings at this point are restricted to the bare minimum needed to make the wedding legal: the couple, the celebrant, and two witnesses.  This is likely to be an emotionally distressing restriction for those directly impacted in these two areas so please be praying for God’s peace and comfort on those whose funerals or weddings will be very different to what they had planned or desired.