This letter covers not only two months, but possibly the fullest two months in the Church’s year. As you read this, Advent will be about to start; by the time you read my next letter, we will not only have observed the season of Advent, with all its anticipation and preparation for Christmas, but Christmas and Epiphanytide as well, and be looking forward to Candlemas at the start of February – the feast day which closes the forty-day Christmas celebrations.

For the poet T.S. Eliot, "April is the cruellest month", but for many people, it might seem more appropriate to ascribe that dubious accolade to November. For, as the leaves fall and the year slowly dies, this month can be one of painful recollection and remembrance. We look back on the year which is now all-too-surely fading, and lament mistakes made and opportunities lost. And inevitably, as death is in the air, we recall those whom we have loved who are now no longer with us.

As I write this, it is seven years to the day since the Reverend Dean Henley came to the parish as Team Vicar with special responsibility for St George’s and Badshot Lea. By the time you read these words, it will be his last day here; indeed, he may well have already departed for pastures new.

It is interesting that when church-going people travel away from home they often seem to gravitate to a church. Often it is just a case of popping in to have a look as there may be some historical or architectural feature to admire. Sometimes a visit happens to coincide with a service or event at the church. Occasionally we might consciously organise our travel arrangements so that we are there for a particular service or concert.

Many readers will know that for the past three years or so I have been training as a Counsellor and Psychotherapist at Roehampton University. The course has been challenging in many expected and also unexpected ways.

I don't know exactly how long it's been since I was last on the dodgems.  It must have been over ten years ago.  Hull Fair - the largest travelling fair in Europe, no less - used to take place every year at the end of our street in Hull, and we used to take our boys.  I have a vague memory of taking a turn on the dodgems with them one year at least.