Our representatives attended the zoom meeting for Worship venues chaired by Director for Public Health Croydon and are heeding their advice:
There has been an exponential rise in cases in Croydon, although on the positive side, there have been no outbreaks in places of worship.
At this point, we intend to go ahead with all planned services, but we MUST strictly obey all the rules.
As the Public Health Director said “We are all rubbish at not mingling”.
We must show that we are not rubbish at not mingling. So again, we must emphasize the rules:
- It is against the law to interact with anybody who is not in your household or your bubble.
- You may not go within 2 metres of anybody who is not in your household or your bubble.
- You may not enter the Church until there is 2 metres between you and the person/group in front of you.
- You may not pass anything to anybody who is not in your household or your bubble – Sadly this means that one of the St Mildred’s traditions of handing out Christmas Cards to one another in Church has to be abandoned for this year.
- Only the choir can sing – it is illegal for members of the congregation to sing.
- When you arrive in Church you must go directly to our seats and remain there until asked to leave by the Churchwardens. For both Carol services and Christmas morning, you will have been allocated seats. When asked to leave, please do so promptly with a smile, without chatting to anybody including the Churchwardens.
- These rules apply to all the Christmas services.
- All the doors must be kept open while there are people in Church, so if you feel the cold, be prepared.
- This is all very dictatorial, authoritarian, maybe you think unnecessary, but if you had listened to the Director of Public Health, very necessary.
- We need EVERYBODY’S support so that we can make these Christmas services as safe as it is possible to be.
Info on our services including which ones are live streamed,
