Busy festive weekend for church

He was just one of the many reasons why the morning saw a host of visitors of all ages, shapes and sizes in St Peter’s Community Centre for the church’s Christmas fair which has been an annual event for at least 50 years and was opened this year by Bexhill’s Mayor, Cllr Stuart Wood.

Stalls selling home-made cakes and sweets, Christmas decorations and cards, vegetables, plants and flowers, as well as a wide variety of useful items, helped to raise more than £3,000 for charities CMS and USPG.

These are both church organisations mainly working in the developing world on educational, health and other projects. Funds were also raised for the Church Urban Fund, helping projects in our inner cities.

Appropriately named elves, Hollie and Robyn, ushered children in to see Santa and games such as Splat-the-Rat, puzzles, a lucky dip and tattoo table kept them occupied while mums, dads and grandparents shopped at the stalls or chanced their luck at tombola and the raffle. MP Greg Barker put in an appearance after addressing the Climate Justice for Africa meeting at the church earlier in the day.

And Sunday evening saw the Old Town busy again when Churches Together in Bexhill, congregations from all denominations in the town, packed St Peter’s church for the Advent procession with a carol service and readings. There is more to come at the Christmas service of nine lessons and carols on Sunday December 18 and Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve and a family Christmas service the following morning.