Services during lock down – January 2021

As you probably know the government is advising people to stay at home, and the Mayor of London has asked places of worship to close and has declared a major incident due to the severity of the pandemic in our city.

At present a decision on whether to close for public worship is made at the parish level, and the Bishop of London has written to all clergy saying that she would support whatever decision seemed right for each parish. Our partner parish Holy Innocents has decided to close to public worship and put all the services online, but after consultation with our churchwardens and PCC lay vice-chair, Holy Trinity will, for the time being, remain open for public worship. However, given that our Sunday and Tuesday services will continue to be available on zoom, I am asking everyone to think very carefully indeed about the risks involved before deciding to attend in person. If you do decide to attend, please ensure you wear a face covering which covers your nose as well as your mouth (unless medically exempt), sanitise your hands immediately on entry to the church, and maintain social distancing at all times.

In order to further minimise the risk of infection transmission, there can no longer be any singing during the Mass, the service will be shortened slightly to reduce the amount of time people spend in the church building, and a main door of the church will be open throughout the service to increase ventilation. This last measure will obviously result in the church being colder than usual.