No-one knows just how many trees the Church of England has on its land.  It has some 10,000 churchyards, and many often provide the only, ‘green lung’ within a community and rare habitats for a wide range of biodiversity.

The Church is responsible for a large number of trees which, like churches, need managing. The often great age of churchyards, and the long term protection they offer, means many of these trees are particularly important, and others have the potential to become so. The longer protection offered by churchyards means they often contain ‘veteran’ trees – those with ancient characteristics – and as such hold particular importance ecologically and culturally. This natural heritage is often managed by people with little specialist arboricultural or interpretation experience.

Whilst churchyard yews are well known for their great age, there are many other species which provide a wealth of value to local communities. They may hold the secret to fighting threats to trees such as ash dieback and those affecting chestnuts, elms and oaks suggests David Shreeve, Environmental Adviser to the Archbishops’ Council. “If you’ve a variety of elm for example, which has not been affected by disease, perhaps there is something special about them that make them resistant,” he explains. “Churchyards may be the Noah’s Ark for trees.”

Two free churchyard trees conferences supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund are being held this autumn. Aimed at archdeacons, clergy, churchwardens, DAC Secretaries and Diocesan Environment Officers, friends groups, tree officers and all those involved in the care of churchyard trees. They will promote greater awareness of the importance of churchyard trees and encourage maintenance, future growth and interpretation with the support of the community.

The conferences will be held in Liverpool Cathedral on 6 October 2016 and St John’s Waterloo on 2 Nov 2016 and feature leading churchyard and arboriculture experts who will discuss the support and management churches can use to protect the future of churchyard trees.

Both events are being organised by The Conservation Foundation in association with the Church of England’s Environmental Working Group, Mission and Public Affairs, Cathedrals and Church Buildings along with Caring for God’s Acre and The Charter for Trees, Woods and People.

Those interested in attending for the free conferences can register at:

www.conservationfoundation.co.uk/churchyardtrees

And if you do go, please let us know!

With thanks to Nigel Winser of Chadlington for informing us of this event

What is a Credit Union?

Below is an update from our friends from the Charlbury Refugee Action Group

How you have brought more help to refugees here and in Calais

First some brief bad news. (Good news is in the remaining paragraphs!)

👎 Refugees in camps in Calais are running out of food, at the same time as their numbers increase daily. It’s partly donor fatigue, but partly that needs are becoming increasingly acute elsewhere.

☀️ But the good news is that we have been able to help, thanks to your fundraising and contributions. One member found £30 in the street and gave it to CRAG! Another member has set up a standing order to CRAG for £25 a month. While the Strings and Pipes group at Charlbury baptist church very kindly donated the proceeds from their recent concert. As this was given through the church, it was possible to add gift aid, with the result that £375 came to CRAG.

☀️ All this has replenished our funds, so at the weekend we shall be sending £500 to Calais Kitchens, who distribute food packages to people who self-cater, in particular mothers and children, as well as supplying food to the several free kitchens in the camp. It’s a drop in the ocean, but many drops do make an ocean.

☀️ This week local refugee support groups were asked if anyone could help arrange an emergency trip for a father and his two children to visit his wife and a third very sick child in hospital in Southampton. CRAG came up trumps. Thank you Sophie!

☀️ The Adopt-a-Room scheme to furnish homes for a further four refugee families arriving in Witney this summer was an immense and immediate success, thanks to stalwart work by Luci Ashbourne and the Witney group. Thanks also go locally to Charlbury Quakers; Liz Soar and friends; Brigid Avison, Angela Gwatkin and other members of three local meditation groups; and Churches Together in Charlbury. Groups and individuals in Hook Norton and elsewhere played a major part too. It is wonderful to see so many caring people contributing in so many ways to help make these families feel truly loved and welcome.

☀️ One of you has asked if he can add gift aid to a donation to CRAG of £500. The short answer is no, as we are not a registered charity. But we have suggested several charities working in Calais and Greece to whom payments can be made online and where the donor can add gift aid. This is invaluable, as his £500 immediately grows to £625. For more details, see our last newsletter.

Another answer to this question is that subject to certain restrictions, churches are able to claim gift aid on money given to them, and then donate that money to other causes which are not themselves charities (such as CRAG).

👉 That’s all for the moment. Please keep in touch at www.facebook.com/charlburyrefugee and remember — your help is always needed! Email us at charlburyrefugee@gmail.com with your ideas and suggestions.

Angela and Jon

Posted on 6th July, 2016

To the clergy and people of the Diocese of Oxford

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

Thank you for your various messages of welcome and for your prayers following the announcement of my nomination as the Bishop of Oxford. It’s an enormous honour and privilege to be appointed to this role and I look forward very much to serving the communities of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire in the coming years.

My Confirmation of Election as Bishop of Oxford will be held on 6thJuly. I am due to pay homage to Her Majesty the Queen later in July and resume my place in the House of Lords.  I will continue to meet with the senior team in Oxford and plan for the autumn.

Ann and I hope to move to the new See House in Kidlington at the end of August and I will be working to a normal diary in the diocese from early September.  My inauguration is set for Friday 30th September in the Cathedral.  There will then be four Welcome Eucharists at which I will preside and preach, one for each Archdeaconry:

I would like to meet as many people as possible over the first few weeks in post so please put one of these dates in your diary and I look forward to seeing you there.

I hope to visit the parish clergy of the Oxford Area in October and November.  I am also planning a series of Deanery Days from November to July to begin to get to know and to listen to the whole Diocese.  During those visits I look forward to engaging with lay people and clergy and getting to know the wider community as well as the church.  I also look forward to being out and about across the whole Diocese Sunday by Sunday.

You can discover something about me in advance from the Diocesan website, should you wish to do so.  I was formed as a parish priest in Halifax.  I was shaped as a thinker and writer in Durham and through travelling the country as Archbishops’ Missioner.  I have been forged as a Bishop in Sheffield and South Yorkshire, seeking to recall the Church here and elsewhere to the mission of God.

I’m conscious I will have a much to learn in my early years in Oxford.  Please pray for me: for the gifts of humility, wisdom and gentleness for this new ministry.  Pray in the words of the ordinal that my heart may daily be enlarged to love this great Diocese to which God has now called me.

I’m looking forward very much to working with Bishop Colin, Bishop Andrew and Bishop Alan in the coming years and with the rest of the senior team.  I’m conscious that the Diocese owes a particular debt to Bishop Colin for his care and leadership during the long vacancy.

Based on the listening I have done so far, I will focus my ministry across the whole Diocese in three areas in the early years: on engagement with children, young people and young adults; on enabling lay discipleship in the world and on engaging with the poorest communities across the Diocese. These priorities are not a new Diocesan strategy.  That may emerge over time.  They are initial themes for my own engagement with the whole Diocese and I look forward to taking them forward with you.  .

I believe that the Christian faith and the Christian church will become ever more central in the life of our nation and the world in the 21stCentury as people seek again for meaning, for values, for purpose and for hope.

God has called the Church to be a community of mercy and kindness, reflecting the nature of Jesus Christ and telling the good news of his love.  Together we are called to be a community of missionary disciples: faithful, united, hopeful, creative and rejoicing in God’s grace.

I look forward very much to meeting you, to knowing you and being known and to working with you,

In Christ

+Steven Oxford

Email: bishop.oxford@oxford.anglican.org
Twitter: @Steven_Croft
Blog: http://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/

Sometime between Sunday 3 and Tuesday 5 July, lead thieves stripped three-quarters of the lead from the south aisle of Chadlington Church. It was clearly a highly professional job – not only did they smash the security lights around the church they were also very neat! Mercifully, the weather has been kind and the roof has been made weatherproof whist we make arrangements for its replacement.

Please be very vigilant around all our churches and report anything out of the ordinary.  Chadlington is the fourth church to be hit in this Deanery in recent months.