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COSY Conference
The next COSY Conference will be held on Thursday 29th May 2008 in Holytown Church at 7 pm.
Our COSY groups have become part of the life of our congregation and a focus for much of our life and work and witness. Someone recently was under the impression that the COSY plan had been the suggestion of the minister. However, that is most certainly not the case! The COSY plan emerged from a series of discussions held by members of both Kirk Sessions and Congregational Boards early last year. A Steering Group was set up in January 2007 to organise our plan of action. That led to a Sunday lunch in February and an evening conference session in March for Elders and Board members. Following that Conference a small committee was formed to analyse the results of our discussion - that analysis led to the proposal that we set up 4 COSY Groups to look at Caring, Outreach, Support and Youth Work. Our first COSY Conference was held in June of last year and we were greatly helped by Brian MaCauley, a colleague of one of our elders. Brian has a lot of experience in facilitating such meetings and he helped us begin to work out our vision statements and Action Plan. It has been a long process but a very worthwhile one - especially since it has come directly from the discussions and decision of those in our congregation who have been involved in it. Let's keep working on our COSY Plan - with our 'Vision Statement' and our 'Promise to Each Other' it gives us a real focus for the future.'
COSY Bereavement care team
One of the proposals that came through our COSY Caring Group was a bereavement care team. The aim of this team is to let people know that we are thinking of people at a time of loss. We aim to pay a visit maybe 4 to 6 weeks after a funeral and then to visit again on the first anniversary of a bereavement. We take appropriate cards with words of encouragement on each of these visits. However, it is important to say that we are not providing any kind of bereavement counselling. We want to support people if we can and let them know we are thinking of them. Sometimes it can help to talk sometimes it can help to know that you are remembered.
However, we are desperately in need of more helpers for our Bereavement Care Team. We meet 5 or 6 times a year to plan our work and decide what needs to be done and what visits need to be made. If we have a reasonable number of people on the team, then that reduces the number of visits each person has to pay. We are looking for men and women - so if you would be willing to consider helping, please have a word with lain.
The next meeting of the Bereavement Care team will be on Thursday 17th April at 7.30 pm in the Manse.
Lunch at Wrangholm
One of the ideas to emerge from the Outreach group within COSY was the lunch held at Wrangholm after the Easter morning service in New Stevenston. Lovely homemade soup was served followed by cakes, biscuits and tea and coffee. It was nice to see some folks from Holytown sharing in the fellowship on this special day. I'm sure everyone who came along enjoyed this event and I do hope any future initiatives of this nature will be well supported.
Evening praise celebration
The next Evening Praise Celebration will be on Sunday 27th April at 6.30 pm. We hope that this will be in the Church Hall rather than the Church. A cup of tea or coffee is available after the service and an opportunity to chat with one another. If you have not already been to one of these services we hope you will come to the next one.
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