St Nicholas Leicester 2004

During 2004 St Nicholas continued with its recently introduced pattern of worship replacing the 1100 Eucharist with one at 1830. This has been much appreciated by people - though for one or two the change of time proved difficult.

Numbers attending the Eucharist have increased slightly but the quality of our worship is something which more than makes up for the lack of quantity in our congregational numbers. Our congregations regularly have a higher percentage of men and of young adults than would be found in most churches. Most Sundays we welcome visitors to Leicester who come to share in our worship, and we exercise a special ministry of welcome to such people from many countries of the globe - China, Poland, Iran, Iraq, the Lebanon, Sri Lanka and France to name but a few.

The Quality of our worship is facilitated by our musical tradition and by the faithfulness of our organist and small choir. This choir has been enhanced on several occasions by the Leicester Liturgical Choir, who have enriched our worship with their music, especially on great feast days.

We shared in the celebration of the Feast of Corpus Christi with people from St. Mary de Castro and St. Andrew's, Jarrom Street. During the year we hosted, on one occasion, the monthly ecumenical prayer service organised by Churches Together in leicester City Centre, of which Canon Barry is the Chair. We also joined St. Margaret's and the Cathedral congregations for the celebration of Ascension Day at St. Margaret's. We shared a joint Harvest and Michaelmas celebration at St. Margaret's Church.

Throughout 2004 we have been very aware of the work of the Bishop's Commission on City Centre Churches. We made a powerpoint presentation to the Commission, emphasising the quality of our worship, our commitment to a full involvement with the plans for the regeneration of the Waterside area and the eagerness to embrace change to further the work of proclaiming the Kingdom. This commitment was expressed in the light of recent developments regarding the de facto dismantling of the Holy Spirit Team Ministry and the breaking (against our wishes) of historic links with the chaplaincies at both the University of Leicester and Demontfort University. A meeting was held with the Archdeacon of Leicester concerning these latter points.

During 2004 the debate in the wider Anglican Communion continued about the nature of the Church and, in particular, discussions regarding sexual orientation. At St. Nicholas we expressed our desire to be a Church community in which all people will be made to feel welcome irrespective of who they are or what they are. We see this as an essential element of our mission. This is well reflected in our refurbished website, which reflects the high standards we wish to proclaim as a Church. Our public image has been further enhanced by the installation of two new noticeboards.

I would like to express my thanks to all who have contributed to our Church life over the past year. It is always difficult to mention individuals by name - someone is bound to be left out. I would, however, especially like to thank our Wardens, Christine Ahronson and Mark Ingle, our Treasurer, Anne Beck and Director of Music, Ian Imlay.
These officials, and others as well, contribute to the richness of our life in a whole variety of ways - thank you to every one.

Canon Barry Naylor
Priest responsible for St. Nicholas Leicester