The village celebrated the Church at the Centre of the Community, at a week long festival that ran from 21st- 28th October, the aim was to produce a week that would encapsulate something for every age group. The festival itself started with a Family Harvest Festival service followed by lunch in the Church.  There were various exhibitions that ran throughout the week, and from Monday to Friday a series of talks on subjects ranging from maps to bellringing was presented by a group of local residents.

There were historical talks by experts, including the County Archivist Peter Durant - and Geoffrey Tyack, who is the author of the recently updated, Berkshire Pevsner Guide. These talks covered aspects of life in the village from times gone by.    Also on display were church registers of baptisms, marriages and burials, from1554 to present day and other interesting items from the archives. Two silver chalices of 1576 and 1675, normally held at Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, were displayed and used at the Communion Service on Sunday the 28th of October.

This years Gift Festival ran from Sunday the 21st of October right through the week and on into the following Sunday where-upon, our honoured guest, The Rt. Revd. Stephen Cottrell (The Bishop of Reading) joined us, at his own request, for the finale of the festival - "Songs of Praise". Our objective in this Gift Festival is to draw people to their beautiful medieval church, by providing special services and events which we hope they will find appealing. The bottom line is that we wish to ensure that the church is a place where people really want to come to and enjoy - and to make it clear that the church really is for everyone.

Our week started at 12 noon on Sunday with the Harvest Festival Service after which we all enjoyed lunch in the Church. This part of the festival will ultimately be covered as a separate item and listed under Harvest Festival on the main All Saint's home page. All other events featured during the week are hereby presented for your enjoyment. A very big thank you to all who worked so hard to make this a memorable week, and of course to all who came and supported the festival so keenly.

 

 

 

Photos : Ken Tarbox