There are services open for people to attend every day at St Matthew's. On every day except Mondays and at different times of the day there is a celebration of Holy Communion. In addition to the service of Holy Communion there are also prayer services including Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer. Opportunities for Meditation are available weekly. These services and others provided for special occasions including those for national celebrations or traumatic events are open to all. The church of St Matthew's is also there for individuals to spend time in silent prayer and contemplation. Please refer to the timetable elsewhere on this site.

What is prayer?

Prayer is the language, method, medium, style, form, and the manner with which we find for ourselves talking and relating to God. It can be very different from one person to the next. I have a book on my shelves entitled Who we are is how we pray. The subtitle of this book is Matching Personality and Spirituality. The point being that people express themselves differently in their relationships with others and that is also true in our relationship with God.

In Christian prayer as with all things Christian we start with Jesus and the lessons he taught us about prayer.

Jesus taught that prayer is more than just a bunch of words. It embraces all that we are and how we lead our lives and our relationships with others. Our attitudes, values and priorities in life should be expressed and are fed by our prayer life.

Evelyn Underhill (1875-1941) was a person of deep prayer and an Anglican writer of great scholarship. Writing on prayer she said:

We offer ourselves, one way or another, to try to work for God. We want, as it were, to be among the sheepdogs employed by the Good Shepherd. Have you ever watched a good sheepdog at work? He is not an emotional animal. He goes on with his job quite steadily; takes no notice of bad weather, rough ground, or his own comfort. He seldom or never stops to be stroked. Yet his faithfulness and intimate communion with his master are one of the loveliest things in the world. Now and then he looks at the shepherd. And when the time comes for rest, they are generally to be found together. Let this be the model of your love.

What is Holy Communion?

The Rev'd. Graeme A Brady in his series entitled Anglican: Faith, History and Practice of the Anglican Church Wrote:

On the night before he died, Jesus arranged a final meal with his twelve disciples. During the meal he took bread and wine, he gave thanks, and he shared the bread and wine with the disciples.

So far, nothing was out of the ordinary. He had followed a normal and everyday Jewish custom.

But then Jesus gave his own explanation of these actions. As be broke the bread he said, This is my body which is given for you. And as he shared the cup he said, This is my blood of the new covenant which is shed for you.

Jesus used the occasion and the action to give an explanation of his imminent death. He said that his body would be broken and his blood would be poured out and that in dying God would make a new covenant with his people.

He also said, Do this in remembrance of me. The English language does not convey the real meaning of what Jesus said. A better translation would be, Do this as a recalling of me; do this to enter into my Life, Death and Resurrection.

Fr Brady continues on the question of the meaning of the Holy Communion:

When we celebrate the Holy Communion, we who have been baptised into Christ are being fed on the life of Christ who is present in the sacrament. In the sacrament we become participants in the Life, Death and Resurrection of Jesus.

We are there when they crucify the Lord. We are there when they lay him in the tomb. We are there when he rises from the dead and when he is glorified at the right hand of God.

We share his Life, Death and Resurrection and in that sharing we are fed.

The service of Holy Communion is known by several titles. Each title serves to express a different aspect of this wonderful sacrament.

+ HOLY COMMUNION speaks of our fellowship with God and each other.

+ THE LORD'S SUPPER reminds us that this is the meal that Jesus shared with his disciples and with us at all times and in all places.

+ THE EUCHARIST is derived from a Greek word eucharistia which means âthanksgiving'. In this sacrament we give thanks to God for all that he has done for us in Jesus Christ.

+ THE LITURGY is another word derived from the Greek and is a compound of the word people (laos) and the word for work (ergon) meaning literally, the work of the people. In this service we offer up to God all that are to his glory.

+ THE MASS is a medieval title probably deriving from a phrase at the end of the Latin service: Ite missa est, meaning Go, you are dismissed.

What is Morning and Evening Prayer?

These services are structured forms of liturgy consisting of passages from the Bible and interspersed with prayers of special meaning. During weekdays these services are conducted at 8.30am and 5.00pm respectively. These and the other services provide for a rhythm of prayer each day and we extend an invitation to all to join us.