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Bidding Farewell

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Rev’d Jon Garde, and his wife Rosemary, will soon be moving to the Isle of Man for Jon to take up his new presbyter appointment.
Jon’s ministry has been a blessing to the Scotland Circuit. While we will miss them, we wish him and Rosemary every blessing in this new adventure.
There will be a special ‘farewell’ service held on Sunday 26th July at 4pm in Moray Coast Methodist Church (Portessie).

The Gathering

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The Scottish Methodist Gathering starts on Friday 11th September.

  • Activities on Friday include a ceilidh and a lecture about the art collection.
  • On Saturday, there  is an opportunity to learn about climate change, hear about mission and consider music within the context of worship – there’s even the opportunity to write a hymn!
  • There will be a separate programme for young people, with specific events on Saturday – including support from the Youth President.
  • Sunday has a busy morning including looking at the new missional working which is being created in the District together with the service which will be live streamed.
There is no charge to attend. You can come for one, two or all the days.
Grants are available for those people (especially young) for whom the expense of accommodation is too great.
If you have any questions, please contact: scotmethgathering@gmail.com

Connexional Economic Justice

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Can you help to build more economic justice across the Methodist Church? A working group looking at how the distribution of resources for mission and ministry can be fairer, and more in line with our justice-seeking across the Connexion, is hosting online listening sessions to hear your thoughts.

The first session is on Thursday 23rd July 2026. Read more about it, choose a different session, or register for a place.

Scottish Local History Forum : Submissions for Journal

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The Scottish Local History Forum is seeking contributions for a special issue of its journal, Scottish Local History, which will focus on church history and heritage.
While church heritage has been given publicity by recent and potential closures, we don’t wish to focus only on churches at risk. The Forum promotes local history in its widest sense – the people and places that have contributed to Scottish history and heritage. Churches and their congregations have played a huge role in our heritage and we would like to promote and celebrate that in this special edition of the journal. We would therefore welcome contributions on any aspect – on a specific theme as well as individual churches, their congregations or contents.
Articles can be any size up to 5000 words and shorter notes are also welcome, as are photographs. Articles should be referenced where appropriate but will not be peer-reviewed. Further information on submitting an article is available on the Scottish Local History Forum website, which also contains a contact form for specific editorial questions.
Ideally contributions should be received by mid-October for publication in January 2027, but later contributions could be included in further issues of the journal.
The forum encourages wide participation in this project from people of all backgrounds and from all parts of Scotland so please feel free to publicise this invitation as widely as possible.
It is important that anyone planning to submit an article notifies the forum well in advance. If you are interested in submitting an article or want to know more about this initiative please contact Jan Polley.

Palestine

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The voices of Christians in Palestine have been heard by the Conference as they received the Kairos II document as part of the Mission Committee presentation. The document was created in response to the events in Gaza following 7 October 2023. It was launched last year as A Moment of Truth: Faith in a Time of Genocide and calls for justice and an urgent, global Christian response.

A Notice of Motion was put forward asking for a study resource to be produced based on Kairos II that can be used in churches. It also asked for the President of the Conference to write to the UK Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary and the governing bodies of other jurisdictions in which the Methodist Church in Britain has a presence, urging them to uphold international law and to take the actions outlined in the Time To Act campaign. The President, the Revd Mark Slaney, along with All We Can and Christian Aid, is supporting the Time to Act Campaign.

Read more about Kairos II

Online Communion

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Following five years of deliberation, it was generally agreed at the Methodist Conference that online celebrations of Holy Communion should be permitted in the Methodist Church. However, this will not come into force until the matter has received approval from the Synods.

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Methodists in the UK Respond to Venezuela’s Humanitarian Emergency

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The death toll in Venezuela following last week’s back-to-back earthquakes is mounting, with more than 2,000 people dead and many more injured.

Christian Aid is one of the partners of the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), which has launched an appeal this week to help provide emergency aid to survivors of the earthquake.

Read more

Donate to the DEC Venezuela Appeal

Methodist Conference

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The Methodist Conference is being held in Telford from 25 June to 1 July.
This is the governing body of the Methodist Church. Meeting once a year, it provides a forum for prayerful reflection and decision-making on issues that shape the life of the Church, as well as matters that impact the wider community, the nation and the world.You can find the full agenda for the Methodist Conference and the reports that are being discussed here:
Read full details of the Conference

Follow the Conference live
All public sessions of this year’s Conference will be live-streamed as usual. See the live-streaming schedule here.

For churches wanting to take part in Sunday’s Reception into Full Connexion and Conference
Worship, the Order of Service is now available here.