Good evening lovely people,

How is your week going? How are you?

This week has been one in which I’ve tried to make headway on some of those outstanding larger tasks, the sort of things that hang over us and seem too difficult. We all have jobs like that don’t we? What I have found, which is pretty sad really, is that when I pluck up the energy and make the space to sit and tackle the monster jobs, they are never ever as bad as I think they are going to be, and, even better, they rarely take as long as I worry they might!! Yet, I never learn and time and time again I accrue a little pile of these jobs. Please tell me I’m not alone?!

As well as the job list, I have also been into school, visited some of you, and had a couple of meetings within the diocese that have been fascinating. So the balance hasn’t been too bad really 🙂

After two very busy weekends things are a little clamer for a few weeks, although I am aware that the schools are exceptionally busy at the moment. Year 6 children are taking part in lots of special events as part of their transition to senior school, and it would be good to hold them in our prayers. 

Finally, please can I alert you to a special thing happening – here is the notice which will be read in churches on Sunday – 

The future of our churches

Diocesan Vision Workshop – for everyone

9:30am – 12:30 Saturday 15th July 2023

This is a vitally important workshop for us all being led by Archdeacon Ian and Archdeacon Stella at St Cadoc’s, Raglan.

This workshop is for all of us, laity and clergy, and it is essential that each of our churches is well represented as we work with the archdeacons to implement the Diocesan Vision and particularly begin to understand the opportunities for the future for each of our local worshipping communities. If we want our churches to have a future we need to start thinking very seriously about the mission and ministry of each one of them, their future viability and sustainability, and put in place positive actions to build and grow the Kingdom of God. This is the first of two sessions the Archdeacons are facilitating for us, the second will be on Saturday 30th September, so please put the dates in your diary, share this information with the rest of your congregation, and let’s make sure we all come along and begin this important work for the future of our churches.

Time to close the computer, tidy my desk, and look forward to a day of rest and recuperation tomorrow. Thank you for your care and all that you do. Please don’t hesitate to be in touch if you need anything.

With love,

Sally xxxx

— 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area Diocesan Newly Licensed Ministers Officer
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Good evening lovely people,

Another busy week is flying by, rather more meetings and desk work than I would choose but all good stuff, and still plenty of opportunity to be out and about. 

What a wonderful weekend we had last week – ordinations and then the amazing service in Raglan. Those of you who were there don’t need me to tell you how uplifting and encouraging it all was. We have another special weekend to look forward to this Sunday, with the licensing of our new team vicar – Rev’d Sue Davies-Fletcher. The service is in St. Peter’s Church, Goytre and begins at 10.30am, followed by a lunch in the village hall, Thank you to those who have offered to supply cake, you did us proud last weekend! The bishop will be presiding at this service and it promises to be a real celebration. I hope to see you there.

I’ve been thinking a lot over the last few weeks about the importance of recognising what we are good at, celebrating it, and being joyful about what we have rather than worrying about what we don’t have. It’s a work in progress for me to keep in that mindset – it’s so much easier to find the things to moan about isn’t it? However, I do think we have a lot to be thankful for and much, as churches, to celebrate. There’s a little turn of phrase I find helpful, to do with adopting “an attitude of gratitude”. I am making a concerted effort to ensure that when I pray I am giving thanks for things as well as asking for stuff. God is happy for us to ask him for things, but equally, I am sure he likes it when we thank him too! Who doesn’t like to be thanked?!

So please, pray with me, and let’s all give thanks for the little things as well as the big ones. But also, please dont hesitate to ask me to pray with you and for you. You know I am always happy to do so.

With love,

Sally xxxx

— 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area Diocesan Newly Licensed Ministers Officer
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Good evening friends,

I hope you are all keeping well?

This weekend sees the ordinations of our lovely people – Sarah Rosser and Bill Savage (amongst others you may know). Sarah will be ordained priest and will celebrate her first mass (Eucharist) on Sunday at 10.30am in Raglan Church. Bill will be ordained deacon in the same service on Saturday and will then deacon for Sarah on Sunday in Raglan. This is such a special time for them both and at the moment they are on their preordination retreat. Ordination is perhaps a strange concept for those who are not called to it, but it is a setting apart of the person, so that God may use them differently within the church. It’s not a higher place, just a different place, and with it come different expectations and different responsibilities. 

One of the most important thing we can do for those who are ordained is pray for them. You know I pray for you all, every day, but knowing that people are praying for me is especially uplifting and encouraging. So please do pray for Sarah and Bill as they enter the next chapter of their relationship with God. I am sure he will bless them and they in turn will bless us.

In other news, there was a wonderful celebration at St. Mark’s Goldtops last night, acknowledging and encouraging all those who are using their gifts and skills as lay people in our churches. For you are the very backbone, without who there wouldn’t be a church. Bishop Cherry spoke wisely and with deep gratitude for every single parishioner amongst us, and she is right to do so. We are all called by God. Everything that we do for the church we do for God, and without each and every one of us there would be no church. So whilst we celebrate the ordinations, let us also celebrate everyone who is part of our congregations for all that they do and how they are. Thank you!

I shall look forward to seeing many of you over the weekend and hope you enjoy it all as much as I know I am going to.

If you need me, you know where I am.

Much love,

Sally xxx– 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Good evening everyone,

I trust all is well with you? I am well and truly on the mend now, thank you for your prayers, your care, and your patience.

Sometimes I have stuff to tell you, sometimes I don’t, today I have a request – 

A friend, Nick, is going to be taking specifically requested items to Ukraine in a couple of weeks and asked me for your help. He is specifically collecting prescription glasses that people are no longer using, and I wonder whether you have any please? There will be a box by the font in Usk church for you to drop them off if you have any spare, and you can be sure they are going to be very useful and get directly to people who need them. If you would like to make a financial donation to Nick’s trip then please drop your offering into the wall safe in the church  in Usk and we will ensure that Nick receives it all. Please note, no other items are being collected or requested so please only leave us your glasses, nothing else!

Secondly, can I put out a final call for any cake offerings people might be willing to promise for either Sarah Rosser’s service on 25th June in Raglan, or Sue Davies Fletcher’s service on 2nd July in Goytre. It’s not too late and any donation will help the parties go well  – churches march on their stomachs don’t you think?

Last, prayer! It’s just not possible to pray too much and so I’d like to share this short writing with you, that I’m finding huge right now, please join me in praying it, for all of us. It sort of sums up my prayer life right now – the messiness and the deep heart that comes with that. Let me know what you think 🙂

Much love to you, and you know where I am, Sally xxxx

Neither I nor the poets I love have found the keys to the kingdom of prayer and we cannot force God to stumble over us where we sit. But I know that it’s a good idea to sit anyway. So every morning, I kneel, waiting, making friends with the habit of listening, hoping that I’m being listened to. There, I greet God in my own disorder. I say hello to my chaos, my unmade decisions, my unmade bed, my desire and my trouble. I say hello to distraction and privilege, I greet the day and I greet my beloved and bewildering Jesus. I recognise and greet my burdens, my luck, my controlled and uncontrollable story. I greet my untold stories, my unfolding story, my unloved body, my own body. I greet the things I think will happen and I say hello to everything I do not know about the day. I greet my own small world and I hope that I can meet the bigger world that day. I greet my story and hope that I can forget my story during the day, and hope that I can hear some stories, and greet some surprising stories during the long day ahead. I greet God, and I greet the God who is more God than the God I greet.

Hello to you all, I say, as the sun rises above
the chimneys of North Belfast.

Hello.

in the shelter – pádraig ó tuama

— 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Good evening friends,

And just like that it’s June! A late letter this week after a lovely day. For weeks I have had today in my diary – a day that Will and I had set aside to spend time in some of our churches praying and resting in our sacred spaces. It’s all too easy for us to get caught up in the doing, and not spend a little bit of time being. I quite often try to set aside time to do this but things always seem to get in the way. Today they did not! We managed to spend time in six of our churches, each of them was a joy and offered some very special time. So today we prayed for people, for communities, for hopes, and for concerns. You were prayed for and God’s presence was felt in every space and every prayer. 

As we went around the churches I was reminded of how hard so many of you work to ensure our churches and churchyards are well kept. Thank you. 

The next week or so is the Churches Unlocked Festival. The website is here – https://www.churchesunlocked.org/

There are dozens of churches across South Wales taking part, in our diocese and the Diocese of Llandaff. I hope you will be able to take the chance to visit and join in with some of the activities that are going on. So much time and effort has gone into this festival, hoping to bring together churches and their communities. Almost every moment of the planning has been in the care of people like yourselves, unpaid folk who love their church. It’s really rather special!

I’ll finish this evening with a blessing suitable for any time but especially suitable as we approach Trinity Sunday – 

May the eyes of the Father watch over us, keeping us and ours ever in his gaze.

May the arms of Christ hold us close and surround us each moment of our lives with his care.

May the wings of the Spirit shelter each of us and enfold all our days and our nights with God’s peace. 

Amen.

With love, (you know where I am)

Sally xxxx

— 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Dear friends,

I do hope you are enjoying this glorious weather? I’m thinking of sorting out my summer wardrobe, so please do blame me if it begins to rain any day now and we enter a new ice age – it will be my fault as I sit in my shorts and t-shirt!!

What news do I have for you this week? Well, it is just one week until the Churches Unlocked festival begins. The website is here – https://www.churchesunlocked.org/

Many churches are included, along with four of the churches in our Ministry Area – Mamhilad, Bettws Newydd, Llanover, and Llangybi. There will be a more general leaflet coming out about all the events but I have included the leaflet for Llangybi as an attachment here. It’s going to be a lovely festival and everyone is welcome to anything or all events. (Hard copies of this leaflet will be in the church and other local places next week).

We had our first Ministry Area Council meeting for the new committee this week. It was a good meeting with a healthy balance of stuff about processes and administration, and planning things that are missional and celebrating the life of our churches. Please can I ask you to pray for all those who take on roles that are beyond their own church community, providing essential insight and gifts to the bigger picture. Thank you 🙂

Finally, let us all remember to pray for all those young people currently sitting exams – GCSEs and A Levels. I don’t know about you but I remember sitting these (or their equivalent) and thinking that they were the most important thing in the world! At the time they possibly were, but maturity has taught me that there are plenty of other things that are also important! My prayers are that they can study well, and demonstrate their brilliance, whilst keeping well.

And so to close – tomorrow I will finish my assignment, closing my year of study, and then on Sunday I shall look forward to seeing some of you in church. Monday is a Bank Holiday – woohoo! What ever happened to Whitsun? 

Love and prayers for you all,

Sally xxxxx

— 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Dear friends, faithful people,

Another week rolls by, full of time with you, services, visits, meetings, and chance encounters. There has also been the endless stream of emails and some service preparation, but I’m really not complaining, I feel very blessed and privileged to be able to do all of this with you.

It is Ascension Day today – forty days after Easter, during which time Christ has been making appearances to his disciples and others, trying to help them understand the story, the truth, and now, today, having demonstrated the resurrection, he ascends to heaven to be with God. A tradition has developed over recent decades, encouraging us to make the time from now, until Pentecost (two Sundays time) a period of concentrated prayer, asking for the Holy Spirit to come and give us growth in the church. A quick Google search will tell you more, but I invite you to join me in praying over the next 11 days, that we will see our friends and family grow in faith, and our churches become better havens for those who are in need of spiritual care, and those who are lonely and searching for comfort. 

My prayers for you over the coming season are for a growth in your relationship with God, for your faith to grow and blossom, and for you to understand better the plan that God has for you. I love it that our faith continues to grow with us throughout our lives, just as our fingernails and hair do. We can always learn something new about God, and ourselves. 

That said, I wonder whether there is anything that you’re wondering about, or questions you have that I can be part of? I’m always excited to talk with people who are wondering 🙂

I’ll finish this week with another round of thank yous. Such an important word and possibly one that we don’t use often enough. So – thank you to all those of you who use your gifts and skills in our churches and communities but don’t think anyone notices. I hope that I do see your efforts and your contribution. I notice linen, churchyards, clean paths, tidy spaces, I know who is caring for our money, and who is visiting people. I see that pat testing happens, that flowers are refreshed, that gift aid is collected and that our buildings look welcoming. None of those things happen without you, so thank you. 

If you have a burning desire to try your hand at something that you see might enhance our church life in any way, including all those things that we do with each other, please don’t hesitate to be in touch.

And now it’s time to close the computer and get ready for a day of resting and recharging (for which read – studying and writing, I have an essay due in!)

With love to you all, Sally xx– 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Good evening lovely folk, 

What a crazy few days – this is the first time today that I have sat at my desk! 

I was really concerned by the weather earlier this week and know that some of you have been affected by water coming into your properties. I’m so sorry. Please get in touch if there is anything that you need. I can certainly email and ask for stuff if there is anything you need, and you are of course assured of my prayers.

While it was hailing and raining in biblical proportions I was in London, at the Buckingham Palace Garden Party. What an honour to be invited. You may be shocked to know that I went in formal attire – black cassock and cincture (sash belt) and really looked the part for you all! The food was lovely, the atmosphere was very special and I even got to meet a few amazing people that I either haven’t seen for ages or have only ever seen from a distance! A very memorable day. I came back down to earth though when I opened my emails – over thirty all needing a reply, I’m sorry if you are waiting.

Today I ran the first prayer bead session in St. Peter’s Goytre. It was a lovely afternoon and I do hope some of you will be able to make it to the ones in either Usk (Monday 10am) or Raglan (Tuesday 10am). No need to let me know if you are coming but I hope you can make it!

Right. Apart from a prayer request I’m going to leave it there – I still don’t have a sermon for Sunday and I need to get on with that! 

The prayer request – I’m aware that there are several people coping with transitions at the moment – either as parents, working people, students, or those with health issues. Please can we pray for smooth paths, gentle change, and peace for all that is happening? 

If you need prayers, please let me know, it is my pleasure to do that for you all.

Much love as always,

Sally xxxx

— 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429

Good evening friends,

May! How did that happen?! And it is the Coronation weekend, with plenty of activities going on in our communities, with an extra Bank Holiday. I hope you are going to find something lovely to do over the next few days. I’m off to London for a couple of days on Monday so have swapped my day off next week to make best use of the time. I hope that doesn’t inconvenience anyone too much?

What else do I want to share with you? I’m struggling to think of anything to be honest – things seem to be ticking over quite well at the moment, which is probably a silly thing to say! 

The Churches Unlocked Festival plans are progressing well – Llanover, Bettws Newydd, and Llangybi Churches are involved from our Ministry Area. It promises to be a very special time and you can find out more here – https://www.churchesunlocked.org/st-cybis

And don’t forget our special time of prayer from Ascension through to Pentecost, as part of the Thy Kingdom Come project. We have three sessions you are welcome to attend to make a set of prayer beads ready to pray – Thursday 11th May 2.30-4.30 in St. Peter’s Goytre, and Monday 15th May, 10-noon St. Mary’s Usk, and Tuesday 16th May, 12-noon, St. Cadoc’s, Raglan. You are welcome to attend any that work for you.

Before I sign off, I’d just like to assure you that I am aware of the many many regular activities that tick over week by week and month by month, that just seem to happen. I know that this isn’t actually the case and that many of you are quietly getting on with all sorts of big and small things that ensure a regular pattern to church life, that stretches well beyond Sundays. Thank you so much for all that you do. Good stewardship requires us to make use of all our gifts – time, talents, gifts, resources, and money. I am so glad for all that you do, and I pray for you all, and all that you do. If you have a hankering to explore something that you don’t think we are doing well enough, or that is new, please don’t hold back – there’s always room for a conversation!

And now it’s time for a little gin and tonic to start my rest day tomorrow.

With love and prayer for you all,

Sally xxxx
— 
–Please note I will not usually reply to emails received on Fridays as this is my rest day. If you need me urgently please send me a voicemail on my mobile number. Thank you for your understanding.

	Rev’d Sally Ingle-Gillis
	Vicar, Heart of Monmouthshire Ministry Area
	Monmouth Diocese
	07813 264429