Church News & Events
SERVICES AT ST MARY'S CHURCH, CUSOP
Our services are always welcoming so please join us if you can!
Sunday 30th March: Mothering Sunday : Celtic Holy Communion at 9.30am for all ages followed by refreshments
Monday 14th April : Compline at 7pm - a short reflective service
Sunday 20th April: Easter Day Family Communion at 11am followed by Egg Hunt
Sunday 18th May - Holy Communion at 11am
Lent Lunch
Tables were full and we had a steady stream of guests at our Lent Lunch tucking into leek and potato, apple and parsnip (again very popular) and lentil and tomato soup. When we counted up the donations, amazingly, they were almost identical to last year! However, we surpassed our target when we received some late donations and the final total was an incredible £650.00 !! This has now been sent to St Michael’s Hospice, Hereford.
A few days after the Lunch, I bumped into Mat Fellows, CEO of St Michael’s, and he was so grateful for our efforts. Local fundraising is at the heart of the Hospice as it boosts morale as well as giving essential financial support.
A very big thank you to everyone who came to the lunch and for your generous donations. Thank you everyone who made soup, served our customers, washed up, and tidied up at the end. It was a fantastic team effort and lots of people have said how much they enjoyed the lunch. Well done, everyone!
Tea at Three – Thank you, Val!
At our last “Tea at Three”, yet again, it was dreadful weather with wind and lashing rain. Nevertheless, we had a really pleasing turnout (of men and women!) for our Singalong with Val. It was a jolly and entertaining afternoon with extra chocolate cake to take home! A HUGE thank you to Val for playing so brilliantly! We sang a new assortment of songs including some Beetles’ numbers which was great! That’s our last “Tea at Three” for the season as the days are now longer and we can hopefully enjoy some sunny Sunday afternoons in our gardens.
Well Done, Cusop Mothers’ Union!
There were fabulous numbers for the special Lady Day Service at the Village Hall when Cusop MU welcomed members who travelled quite some distance from other parts of the Diocese and even members from over the border turned up!
Revd Penny Littlewood, Mothers’ Union Chaplain, had designed a lovely service that was led by Revd Luci and Jean (Lindsay) played the keyboard as skilfully as always!
The Cusop team had prepared the most lavish tea of sandwiches, delicious cakes and much, much more. They had obviously worked really hard and given up so much time to prepare such a wonderful spread which everyone thoroughly enjoyed whilst seated in the sunny conservatory. It was such a friendly and welcoming atmosphere and everyone was touched by Cusop’s warm hospitality and kindness. It may have been hard work but how lovely that Cusop MU gave such enjoyment and pleasure to others!
Hereford Food Bank
A recent report from the Food Bank states, “Unfortunately, January 2025 was busier than January 2024 and we are expecting a similar increase in February 2025. We are seeing a lot more families who are saying their income is insufficient to meet the cost of essentials. We are also providing food to more pensioners than we have previously.
A positive is that the referrals for those who are homeless is decreasing. There has been a lot of work with other agencies to signpost to ensure those who are street homeless can access hot food provision and appropriate support. “
With the Easter holidays on the horizon, please give generously. Volunteers pick up items every Wednesday morning at 11.30am from Cusop Church and Cusop Village Hall. Thank you so much to everyone who has donated.
Icon Cards for Sale at Church
At our Harvest Festival, it was lovely to welcome Eva and Petro, a Ukrainian couple living in Hay. They are both iconographers and have very generously donated some of their Icon Cards to be sold in aid of Cusop Church. Thank you, Eva and Petro.
Yew Tree Cards for Sale at Church
Archie Miles, renowned photographer happened to be in our churchyard one day. He was so impressed with our magnificent ancient yew trees that he took photographs and asked our permission to print cards. We said, "Yes please!" The cards are now for sale in the church.
Caring for God’s Acre
Our volunteers continue to impress! At the end of one session , a robin was sitting on top of a pile of elder saplings and brambles as if to say, "Well done!" A large area around the apple trees was cleared and helpers tidied up neglected graves. With the Quinquennial Inspection imminent, gullies were cleared of debris and grass cuttings, and the garden next to the porch weeded and pruned back.
At extra ad hoc sessions, we’ve managed to cut and rake a fair proportion of our meadow areas. We have also added extra wire protection around the apple trees as the bark has been badly damaged by pesky grey squirrels.
A HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who has helped at these sessions. Without you, our churchyard would not look so beautiful. It’s unbelievable how many people visit and find joy in our churchyard!
We love new volunteers so if you would like to join our friendly group in the New Year, please contact celiacundale@aol.com: Tel: 07790- 925616.
Charitable Giving
The PCC aims to donate 10% of its operating income to outside causes. In 2023, we donated a total of £1,402.20, equivalent to 13.4% of operating income. Donations were made to the following charities:
St. Michael's Hospice - March £500
December £182
Turkish/Syria Appeal March. £300
Hereford Food Bank January £182.20
October £163
Messy church October £50
Hereford Churches Tourism £25
Stone Seat Celebration
Sandwiched between soaking wet and gloomy days, we were blessed with perfect weather for our Stone Seat Celebration! We had a great turnout including four well-behaved dogs. Thank you to everyone who came and supported the event. It was an opportunity for us to show our appreciation to Robert “Tush” for constructing such a beautiful Stone Seat at the back of our Bee and Butterfly Garden from where visitors can either admire distant views of Mousecastle or the flowers and herbs in the garden alive with buzzing bees and butterflies.
Robert was thanked and presented with a gift. He explained how he had sourced the stone from different places in our area which makes it a real “Community Stone Seat”. A very big thank you to Sue, Keith, Larry, Pauline, Angela, Jeremy and Caroline who presented singalong songs and a selection of poetry. It was hugely entertaining and great fun!
Our thanks to everyone who contributed to the fabulous spread of sandwiches and cakes and helped serve cups of tea and wash up afterwards. The churchyard is such a wonderful venue for these friendly and happy events!
Banner – “Crown Him Lord of Life”
Walking into the church, you will now see a fabulous banner that was designed by Lis Charles and made by a small group of worshippers many years ago. The banner has been at the back of the church, unnoticed, for a very long time. We’re delighted with its new position so that visitors when entering the church can’t fail to appreciate it and read the Christian message.
Launch Party for our Information Boards
Our Launch Party was a happy and joyous occasion! The sun shone down as we welcomed thirty Year 6 pupils from Eastbrook Primary School in Dagenham who were quite spellbound having just arrived from a traffic jam on the M25 to the bliss and beauty of our churchyard! The pupils and teachers from Trewern were a splendid addition to our party and there was a great turnout from our local community!
The Party was an opportunity to tell everyone about why our ancient church is so special and how the churchyard is a haven for wildlife encouraging a wide variety of flora and fauna. We hope that the Boards will act as a springboard for visitors of all ages to explore and enjoy our church and churchyard.. The teachers at Trewern are delighted with them and will regularly be using the Boards as a teaching resource..
It’s been a challenging project and there were lots of people to thank in public especially our artists, Lizzie Harper and Alison Alcock, also Keith Hodgetts and Caroline Hafner, John Wilks and Cusop History Group who helped design the boards, Shelley Signs from Shrewsbury who made them, Danny Tong and John Buckwell who so carefully installed the boards and OTM who mowed the grass and cut the hedge perfectly in time for the party. Our thanks also to the Heritage Lottery Fund for giving us a grant covering a large part of the cost.
It was a great moment when the children excitedly unveiled the boards to a countdown! Lizzie, who drew the illustrations for the Flora and Fauna Boards helped with the unveiling. She hadn’t seen the boards previously but was delighted with them. We then had some fabulous entertainment from Keith, Sue and Larry, and refreshments were served. It was a very happy and memorable occasion!
Flower and Cleaning Rota
A HUGE thank you to all our wonderful helpers who do such an amazing job! Our beautiful church always looks clean and welcoming and that’s all because of their hard work and commitment. We are truly grateful.
Plan of Graves in Churchyard
A new and updated plan of all the graves in the churchyard is now in the church for visitors who are searching for their relatives’ memorials. There is also an alphabetical list of all memorials for quick reference. Our thanks to John Wilks who produced the original version of this as previously, there was no accurate record. We’re also very grateful to Jane Weaver who has photographed every memorial individually.
All donations for churchyard maintenance gratefully received!
It costs Cusop PCC over £1000 a year to have the grass mowed in our churchyard. We don’t receive any grants towards this even though the whole community benefits from the wide open space in our beautiful churchyard which is incredibly popular with dog walkers, young families and people of all ages.
One sunny day, I met two ladies laying a tablecloth and sharing coffee and cake together in the open air. It’s thanks to our wonderful God’s Acre volunteers and the grass cutting regime that we can keep our costs down to £1,000 but it is still a lot of money. If you would like to make a donation towards the costs of maintaining our churchyard, please place it in the Donation Box inside the church by the main door or contact Celia Cundale, Churchwarden, or our Treasurer, Malcolm Darbyshire.
Any donation large or small will make a difference. Thank You!
Churchyard Flowers
As part of our Eco Church programme, we do not allow artificial flowers or oasis in the churchyard, “Fresh flowers are encouraged as the symbol of the gift of creation and the brevity of life. Artificial flowers, e.g. silk or plastic flowers, are inappropriate”. (Diocesan churchyard regulations) It’s wonderful how everyone has taken this on board and the PCC would like to sincerely thank you for this. Thank you for helping to keep our churchyard beautiful and for being kind to nature.
ECO CHURCH
Brown Long-Eared Bats
We’re so grateful to Paul and Jane Smith and other local bat enthusiasts who identified brown long-eared bats in the darkness of Cusop Church . A year ago, we participated in the “Bats in Churches” project identifying the presence of bats and their entry points into our church. Our feedback to the project was part of a national survey showing the distribution of bats in churches. We thought our bats were most likely common pipistrelles so were delighted to hear that our church is home to the rarer brown long-eared bat.
The brown long-eared bat certainly lives up to its name ; its ears are nearly as long as its body! Otherwise, it’s a medium size bat measuring 3.7-5.2cm long with a wingspan of 20-30cm and weighing 6-12grams. It has greyish-brown fur and a relatively slow, fluttery flight.
As with all UK bats, it’s nocturnal, only coming out at night to feed on midges, moths and other flying insects. It has an incredible sense of direction thanks to echolocation, which it uses to hunt prey. Brown long-eared bats roost in holes in trees and old buildings. In the summer, females form maternity colonies and have just a single pup each. Our wonderful volunteers who clean the church will be glad to know that they hibernate over winter between November and April thus causing less mess in the church!
Apple Tree Project
The project has been admired by all who visit our churchyard. It’s wonderful that it’s become a real community effort and there are so many people to thank for giving up their time and offering their skills.
Thank you to all those who took wood chippings and made generous donations to the church. A special thank you to Julian Smith for removing a large, ivy- infested trunk and Andy Fryers and John Hanson for helping to transform the area into an attractive and comfortable home for the apple trees. The trees were carefully planted by ten masked volunteers supervised by Ainsleigh. A huge thank you to Ainsleigh and the Marches Apple Network for all their expertise and help with this fabulous project.
As always, our very grateful thanks to our loyal volunteers who excelled themselves with the planting and then continued working in the churchyard weeding and clearing unwanted brambles.
It has been a joy to see children hugging their trees and faces lit up with smiles on seeing the trees planted which have become beacons of hope for the future. Thank you again to all who have helped with this inspirational project.
Celia Cundale
Support and Care
If you would like to talk to someone, there are people who are there to listen. Life doesn’t always go to plan, for all kinds of reasons, such as illness, grief, change of circumstances, relational issues or loneliness. As a church community we are here to offer you support, a listening ear and prayer, whatever it is you’re going through. Our pastoral visiting team are good listeners and have all undergone safeguarding checks and training. Please contact:
E mail: pastoralvisitors@gmail.com
Telephone: 01981 501032
Cusop Church is an Eco Church
“He saw all that he made and it was good”. God loved his creation and it’s our responsibility to care for it.
God loved his creation and it’s our responsibility to care for it. At Cusop Church, we’ve been guided by the wonderful charity , Caring for God’s Acre, and thanks to the hard work of local volunteers, we’ve been able to follow a conservation programme for over 15 years. This includes a grass cutting regime so we have meadow areas where wild flowers and grasses can flourish. The increasing diversity of plants that now grow encourages not just pollinators like bees but a whole range of species of insects and minibeasts.
We have bird and hedgehog boxes, a fabulous Bug Hotel and four enormous compost heaps! We know our churchyard is a haven for wildlife as we’ve found toads, slow worms and fascinating beetles on our taskforce days and we must protect these animals.
One autumnal morning, we went “hunting” in the churchyard and found thirty-five species of fungi. We love memorials made from natural local stone as it encourages different kinds of lichen that are so important for our ecosystem. A lichen survey revealed an incredible seventy-nine species of lichen in our churchyard with the oldest natural stone memorials “being home” to the rarest lichen. We’ve now signed up to Eco Church and that’s inspired us with new projects including planting eight apple trees which are all Herefordshire varieties.
If we added up the acreage of all churchyards it’s a massive amount of land. If at least some of this land is carefully managed to encourage wild native plants and animals that would increase biodiversity and make a significant difference to our environment.
Every single organism plays a role in our ecosystem from the tiny bee that pollinates the wild flowers to the huge ancient yew which provides a home and food for wildlife.
God wants us to protect the glory, beauty and diversity of his creation so please let’s do it!
Welcome Booklet
In conjunction with Cusop Village Hall and the Parish Council, Cusop Church has produced a Welcome Booklet and we have already started delivering this to new residents living at Bookers Edge. The booklet contains a wealth of useful information about amenities and activities in and around Cusop. If you want to view it, log onto www.cusop.net and you’ll find it on the Useful Links page under Home. Our thanks to Alison Matthews for setting up this link on the village website. If you know anyone who would like to have a printed copy of "The Welcome Booklet", please contact Celia Cundale (01497-820396).
