ST. OSWALD’S LADIES GROUP MAY REPORT
For our May meeting the Ladies Group met in the Parish Centre. Our speaker was Jane Webber
who gave us a most interesting talk on her work as Schools Christian Worker representing all the
schools across the Oswestry, Ellesmere and surrounding district.
Jane is obviously passionate about working with young people and supporting them in making
positive life choices. She is involved in various types of Collective Worship, Christian
Unions, Lessons and workshops, prayer and reflection space, mentoring and after school clubs.
The Schools Christian worker project is funded by generous donations from local churches and
individuals. They are not supported financially by any large organisation or institution. Occasionally
they fulfil the criteria for grant funding from charitable foundations. If you would like to donate or find
out more about how you can support them please contact alistair.nurden@gmail.com or visit
www.scwp.org.uk.
Our afternoon tea will be held at the Orangery, Derwen College, on Monday July 1 st . The cost will be
£13. If paying by cheque please make payable to St. Oswald’s Ladies Group. Glenda Evison will be
collecting payment at our next meeting on Monday June 3 rd when we welcome Sue Blower, Official
Town Crier for Montgomery, to be our Speaker.
Horatio’s Garden Midland Centre for Spinal Injuries in the Robert Jones & Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic
Hospital, Gobowen, Oswestry SY10 7G is opening in support of the National Garden Scheme on
Saturday 1 June 12 - 4 p.m. Adults: £5 Children Free: Tea, cakes and plants will be available.
If you would like further information about our meeting or would like to join us please contact me
either by e mail ann_sagar@btinternet.com or speak to me in church. Subscription for the year is
£15. We meet in the Parish Centre at 2.30 p.m. on the first Monday of the month, except bank
holidays when we meet on the second Monday.
Ann Sagar
ST OSWALD’S LADIES’ GROUP MARCH MEETING
June, our Chairman, welcomed Father Phil who conducted a shortened Parish Eucharist for
Lent. 26 ladies attended and enjoyed his service. Father Phil talked about his ministry at
Gatwick and Heathrow Airports part of which included visits to the Immigration Detention
Centres. He described the different immigrants the majority of which were desperate
people wanting to start a new life. Prior to Heathrow he was at Gatwick and described an
amusing episode when he was Chaplain for the day to the visiting Archbishop of Canterbury.
As always a light hearted talk by Father Phil but giving a lot of careful thought to those who
heard him.
The Annual General Meeting was then conducted, Glenda, our Treasurer, had presented
the Financial Statement at the previous meeting and other reports were taken as read. The
Committee was re-elected en bloc. The subscription for the coming year will remain at £15.
Under Matters Arising it was confirmed that the £1 entrance charge suggested last year had
been dropped.
Babs Bone then proposed that after Liz Jermy’s talk on the Oswestry and District Food Bank
that the Ladies’ Group make a donation of £100 every quarter for the coming year to the
Food Bank. June proposed a donation of £100 to the children’s ward garden appeal at the
Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Hospital be given. These two proposals were agreed.
On behalf of the Group June presented me with a very nice plant and card as I am leaving
Oswestry. I have written almost all the reports for the Ladies’ Group since 2015.
Thank you to the Ladies’ Group for many splendid and thought provoking meetings and to
the Committee for their arrangements and speakers.
Our next meeting will be on Monday 8 th April at 2.30 p.m. in the Parish because of the Bank
Holiday being on the first Monday of the month when we will hold a beetle drive.
Ann Boulton
ST OSWALD’S LADIES’ GROUP February meeting.
June opened the meeting with a prayer and a moment of silence. We then said the proper
Lord’s Prayer followed by The Grace. June received apologies for absence and then read
out notices of forthcoming events and asked anyone to bring Palm crosses to church for Ash
Wednesday. She also said that the Ladies’ Group would be providing the Lent Lunch for 11 th
March and asked for help. Help is also needed on Saturday 9th March for posies for Mothering
Sunday. Please contact her or Ann Sagar.
Unfortunately, Glenda will be away for our AGM at our next meeting and therefore gave out
the accounts for the past financial year in advance.
June then welcomed Elaine Leek, one of our members to speak on volunteering at the
Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Hospital, affectionately known as “the Orthopaedic which has
a worldwide reputation and started at Baschurch beginning of the twentieth century. Elaine
belongs to the League of Friendswhich was started in 1961 to
provide equipment, amenities and help having raised over £20 million since 1961. The current number of Friends is over 150.
Elaine then described her work with the Spinal Unit Patients are usually in for a long time and Elaine is part
of a roster of Friends who take a drinks and goods trolley round
which can take about one and a half hours. It is not just giving drinks but helping them with the receptacle usually with a straw – even to dunking their biscuits – she described the
difficulties of dunking a custard cream! She also described the difficulties of helping
patients with their meals. The food at the hospital is excellent and the Chef was runner up
in the NHS Show of the Year. She also described the new beautiful Horatio’s Garden for
spinal patients.
Elaine gave a light but thought provoking talk and made us realise how lucky we are to have
such a hospital on our doorstep. Well done, Elaine, for volunteering and if anyone would
like to volunteer either with the Friends or with the Veterans’ Orthopaedic Centre then
forms are on the website. June thanked Elaine for her talk which was very much enjoyed.
Our next meeting will our Annual General Meeting on Monday 4 th March at 2.30 p.m. in the
Parish Centre. Father Phil will preside at an informal Eucharist prior to the meeting and give
a talk on ‘work in his previous parishes’.
Ann Boulton
ST OSWALD’S LADIES’ GROUP
On a very cold Monday we were a depleted group to hear a lively and interesting talk by Dr
Dawn Milner.
June welcomed the ladies with a prayer and a reading and we all said The Grace together.
Apologies were received and members reminded that the next meeting will be on Monday
February 5 th in the Parish Centre at 2.30 p.m. when we welcome Elaine Leek who will speak to us about her voluntary work on the Spinal Injuries Unit at the Orthopaedic Hospital in Oswestry.
Dawn’s talk was called My Nutrition Journey and she described how, in her seventies, she had had health problems and, because of her knowledge as a General Practitioner, took herself in hand and has had a whole food plant-based diet for the last
three years. She said that many health problems could be reversed by nutrition. We all listened intently and were impressed by the whole concept. Dawn gave a most interesting
talk and we picked up a few tips but most ladies felt that they did not have Dawn’s knowledge and experience. If you would like to learn more Dawn has suggested contacting her by e mail -
dawn14milner@gmail.com.
June thanked Dawn for her talk to us.
We are always pleased to see new members at our monthly meetings in the Parish Centre.
If you would like further details please contact Ann Sagar, Honorary Secretary, either by e
mail ann_sagar@btinternet.com or telephone 01691657903 or in Church.
Ann Boulton
DECEMBER MEETING AT THE DERWEN
We gathered for our Christmas Lunch to make a full Orangery at Derwen College with a lot of festive chatter and a lot of Christmas jumpers. Ann Sagar provided a typed slip of what we had pre-ordered as people nearly always forget!
June welcomed everyone and Jassica encouraged us to sing “All good gifts
round us ...” She then said a formal Grace thanking God for the Derwen
and its work and the fellowship of the Ladies’ Group and including a prayer for so many of the wrongs in this world.
It was interesting that the Tom Smith crackers we pulled contributed to the Trussell Trust which supports our own Food Bank here in Oswestry. Not all ladies wore their crowns!
We had a delicious meal and afterwards June thanked Glenda for organising the lunch and Glenda thanked the Derwen for providing our Christmas meal and the staff for serving it.
An enjoyable start to Christmas festivities.
Our next meeting will be in the Parish Centre on Monday January 8th at 2.30 p.m. when Dr. Dawn Milner will be our speaker - .‘My Nutrition journey’.
Happy New Year to everyone.
Ann Boulton
NOVEMBER MEETING
June opened our meeting telling of Mair Bowen’s sudden death and we stood in silence to
remember her. She had been the Treasurer of the Ladies’ Group for many years. June said
a special prayer for Mair and we all said The Grace together.
June then introduced Liz Jermy, Manager of the Oswestry and Borders Food Bank. Liz had
spoken to us before and regretted that in the following years the Food Bank had grown
from helping a few hundred people when it started in 2011 to an estimated 8,000 this year.
Liz thanked St Oswald’s for the continued weekly contributions and also from the Place of
Welcome. (Gifts can be left in the Church porch and on the Vicar’s driveway.)
The Food Bank has now extended to next door,
No. 58 Beatrice Street, as a Support Centre to
help with debt, budgeting, advice and form
filling with members of the CAB and
Samaritans and other help. Those receiving
food parcels are not expected to be receiving
food for a long period of time and hopefully
will get help with families’ finances and
circumstances so that help is not needed. She
described the work of the collection of food and its distribution and the work of the
volunteers. A lot of thought is given to the food given out and sometimes vouchers for the
town’s supermarkets are given too. It must be remembered that it is not easy to pay for
the heat to cook so it must be easy to heat.
There were a lot of questions afterwards and Liz answered carefully. One comment was
how our generation had benefitted from Domestic Science teaching which has stayed with
us all our lives.
It must be a lifeline for so many and it is good to hear of the work of volunteers. Glenda
gave £200 from the Ladies’ Group towards Christmas hampers.
Chris Abram then told of an exhibition of a Knitted Bible coming to St Oswald’s next year
and asked for volunteers to support.
On 4 th December we will meet at the Orangery, Derwen College, for our Christmas Dinner
12 for 12.30 p.m.
Ann Boulton
OCTOBER MEETING
June welcomed Father Phil to a Harvest celebration. We started with the first two verses of
“Come you thankful people come” and then Father Phil said he would be giving us a quiz
which elicited a few groans.. It was a fairly simple verbal quiz and we all called the answers
out and felt good.
We had prayers, readings,and poetry all about Harvest. Father Phil told us that the
celebration of Harvest as we know it today was Victorian initiated by The Reverend Robert
Hawker from Cornwall in 1843. From the Middle Ages the celebration was known as
Lammas when each farmer made a loaf from one sheaf of wheat.
Lammas was marked with fairs and feasting and thanksgiving
proclaimed and beer, wine, cider and whisky were made from
hedgerow produce and drunk..
We closed with the last two verses of the hymn. Thank you Father
Phil – and we could hear you!
We held a moment of silence to remember our long-standing
member Janice Allport. She was so proud when her daughter,
Natalie as Chairman of Oswestry in Bloom, spoke to us recently. Janice will be missed.
June then read out notices for forthcoming events and Glenda gave us details of our Christmas lunch at the Derwen. She will be taking details and collecting money at our next
meeting. Glenda also told us of her annual NSPCC Coffee Morning on Saturday, 4 th
November which will be at the Memorial Hall.
Our next meeting will be on Monday 6 th November at 2.30 p.m. in the Parish Centre when
we welcome Liz Jermy from Oswestry Food bank to speak to us.
Ann Boulton
SEPTEMBER MEETING
ST OSWALD’S LADIES’ GROUP July meeting.
Twenty six ladies and guests from the Ladies’ Group visited the very special church of St Peter at Melverley on the bank of the River Vyrnwy near to where it joins the River Severn. We explored thoroughly and then listened to a
talk on its history by Sue Gittins. She described how it was made from oak from the nearby forest with wattle and daub without any nails.
(An eagle eyed member of our party spotted a nail in a beam but it was still attached to Christmas decorations so it didn’t count!)
The church is uncomfortably close to the River and in 1990 the bank gave way. With no foundations to the church which was built around 1400 (the previous one having been burned to the ground by Owain Glyndwr) underpinning had to be done and the church was lifted with car jacks all round. That must have been a picture. While work was carried out, an old wooden pax was found in a wattle and daub panel.
Sue described the traumas of the work and the tremendous fund raising needed. We can only imagine the act of faith to undertake such a monumental work to give us the church we have today. We enjoyed tea and cake and a lovely day. Bet it’s cold in the winter though!
There will be no meeting in August but we will meet again on Monday September 4 th in the
Parish Centre at 2.30 p.m.
Ann Boulton
(Pax:- "A painted, stamped or carved tablet with a representation of Christ or the Virgin Mary, which was kissed by the priest during the Mass ("kiss of peace") and then passed to other officiating clergy and the congregation to be kissed." (Wiktionary)-Ed