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On 10th November Sport England Lottery Fund granted Girton Parish Council the sum of £328,292 to assist us in financing the Recreation Ground Development.  This means that after 2¼years of planning and designing we will be able to start on the project in January 2000. 

Just to remind you the project consists of the following:
1.      Extension of the recreation ground by purchasing 10 acres of land at the side of the existing recreation ground.
2.      Demolition of the existing pavilion and building a new multi-purpose pavilion up to current requirements, including disabled access and an activity room available for hire.
3.      The formation of an all-weather multi-use games area to the far side of the existing tennis courts, which will consist of a sand filled synthetic grass surface with an approximate size of 35m x 32m. This will also be floodlit.
4.      The formation of an artificial grass cricket wicket, adjacent to the existing cricket wicket.

Along with the Lottery grant we have also secured a grant of £50,000 from South Cambridgeshire District Council and £30,000 from the Football Association. We have also had financial commitment from the Academy of English and all the village sports clubs.  It is important to remember, with all this funding in position, the actual 
project will cost the parish less than it would just to upgrade and carry out essential repairs to the existing pavilion.

Work will start early in January on the new pavilion with an anticipated programme of work lasting 30 weeks.
The Multi-Games Area will be started during late Spring, giving a finishing time to coincide with the finishing of the pavilion. The new cricket strip will be installed in readiness for the new cricket season.

The 10-acre field has already been prepared and seeded. We have been lucky that the weather conditions this spring and summer have allowed the grass to establish itself. 

Planting of hedging and trees will be done over a two-year period, with the first planting being carried out during the next few months.

This project has only got so far because of the full support of the Parish Council, along with our District Councillors. It should be noted that a considerable amount of work has been undertaken by the Recreational Ground Development Committee, which consists of Parish Councillors and representatives of the village sports clubs and other interested villagers.

Well done to everybody concerned!

Noel Knights
Chairman of Girton Recreational Ground Development Committee
 

Message from St Andrew's

Do you work with children in the church? Would you like to talk about it? Build your skills? Share your good ideas with others? Learn more about what you are doing?

This course will start in January, date to be finalised, and will be held in the North Room.  This will be run as an ecumenical course and members from other churches are warmly invited to participate. The course is due to start on Monday 10th January 2000 at 7.30pm.  Each session will last 2 hours and subsequent course session dates are as follows:  Jan 17th, Jan 31st, Feb 7th, Feb 28th, Mar 13th, Mar 27th, Apr 3rd and Apr 10th.  The course is designed to accommodate anyone who has an interest of children in the church and is not exclusive to teachers or ministry leaders. The course pack will cost £17.95 but there is no cost for the training itself. Gill Ambrose, Childrens Work Resource Advisor from the Diocese of Ely, will be the course leader. Gill brings with her a wealth of experience in this field and so this is a wonderful opportunity for Girton.

For more details please contact Jackie Marshall Tel:573797
 

Message from the Baptist Church

At the time of Jesus' birth, everybody was on the move because the Roman emperor, Caesar Augustus, had decided to hold a census and consequently people were travelling to their home town to be registered.  Thousands of  travellers were criss-crossing the Roman world, snarling up the highways and making profits for all the inn keepers along the way.  For two ordinary individuals, Joseph, a carpenter in the northern town of Nazareth, and his pregnant wife Mary, it meant a journey of over sixty miles south to Bethlehem.  What a powerful man the emperor was, that he could cause so much movement, but really it was all part of God's plan, a small piece of a giant jigsaw, that would move a young woman, pregnant with a special son, so that he would be born in the town of Bethlehem.

Shepherds too went travelling on that first Christmas Eve, although at the start they had no idea that they were going to journey that particular night.  They had been doing their usual task of quietly looking after their sheep in the fields around Bethlehem, when suddenly an angel stood before them with tidings of great joy, good news for them!  For them in David's town that very night was born a baby who was to be the Saviour of the world.  So the shepherd's got up and went into town to see what was happening and found everything exactly as the angel had said.

Wise men took camels out on the road that first Christmas.  They travelled a very long way, yet when they began they had no idea where they were going to end up.  They knew what they were looking for though, guided by a star they were searching for a king.

There was one more person travelling to Bethlehem that first Christmas; Jesus.  As a baby he was travelling inside his mother, but his whole journey was really much longer, for before Jesus was here as a human, he was in heaven with God the Father.  Jesus, God's son left all the glory and splendour, all the majesty of heaven to be born in a stable in a little town called Bethlehem.

In many ways life is a journey, but where will it end?  Jesus promises his followers that it will end with him in heaven.  On our own we cannot get there, but if we look for Jesus as the wise men did, come to trust him and accept him as our Saviour, as the shepherds did, and believe his words that he is the way, the truth and the life, then our journey will have an end with our King in heaven.
Phillip Staves

"And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father"    John 1 verse 14