20 March 2016
14:22 | 
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Palm Sunday commemorates the entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem, where he rode into town on a donkey as crowds of people gleefully greeted him and spread out palm branches in his path. Our morning service reflected this.
The service started with the blessing of our palm crosses, we then processed around the outside of the church with palm crosses in hand. A token group of people represented the crowds welcoming Jesus as he approached Jerusalem.
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| Jesus told two of His disciples to go into a nearby village and bring a donkey that would be waiting there |
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| Some of the people waved branches of palm trees, a sign of victory |
During the service we had a dramatic reading about our Lord's passion.
The anthem for this week was O Saviour of the World by Arthur Somervell. The words appear in the little-used Office for the Visitation of the Sick in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer, taken originally from an older Roman Rite, and have been set to music by many composers over the years. Arthur Somervell was one of the leading figures in the English music renaissance of the 1890s-1900s: among his many works is Maud, a song cycle formed from Tennyson's eponymous poem, which today is best known for the song at the end, Come into the garden, Maud.
The communion hymn was Let all mortal flesh keep silence the words are a translation by Gerard Moultrie. There is no date for the Byzantine liturgy from whence the text has been taken. The tune's earliest written version is 17th century, but is is probably far older. This French melody was arranged by Ralph Vaughan Williams.
