Church Council

Guiseley Methodist Church                

Minutes of the Church Council Meeting 22nd October 2024

  1. Revd Roger Smith opened the meeting with prayer, and welcomed all attendees (listed at end of these Minutes).
  2. There was a special welcome for TM who has kindly agreed to become our new Church Treasurer, and for KR who has retired from that position. Our thanks and best wishes to them both.
  3. Minutes of the last meeting had been circulated and were signed as accepted.
  4. The ‘Waking up to God’ discussions had been successful, with a good variety of paricipants. The final discussion is on 7th November at 2.30pm.
  5. Circuit

The Circuit Stewards’ report had been received, outlining plans for future multi-church groups – the Eastern Group and the Western Group – to make better use of time and talents available. Presentations about these plans will be given soon, with opportunities for discussion. The stationing process is about to start and must be finalised by June.

  • Reports

a    Finance including annual accounts: KR reported that we are in a healthy position, income has been satisfactory and so has interest on our accounts. However gas and electricity bills are much higher and so we are asked to review our financial giving if we can. Having  voted not to increase our church’s annual donations this year,Council was happy to approve the accounts and presented Keith with a token of thanks for all his work over the past ten years.

b    Gift Aid: RN’s report was received and accepted, and Council thanked Rfor the work he does in this respect.

c    Property: Tony expressed our gratitude to L and P for all the hours they have spent working in and looking after the kitchen. ’Cleaning the kitchen’ has now been added to the rota of cleaners but again, we always need more help so please encourage people to join the rota. Discussion about buying small tables due to the difficulty we now have in putting up the long ones. GB has offered to organise the sale of the staging, which we no longer use. When the staging has gone from the cupboard we can store a trolley and seven smaller tables which council agreed to purchase. Council also agreed to purchase the car park barriers outlined by the property team, in order to reduce stress placed on the wedding and funeral stewards. RG is working on improving water pressure for the ladies’ loo. It was agreed that we should pay for the next battery needed for the defibrillator (about £300).

d      Eco church: Discussion about boxes for recycling blister packs. A box costs £200 from the recycling charity, they collect it when full and reycle the contents. Then we have to buy another box.  SO will approach local charities and businesses for donations to buy more boxes, as people like to donate their blister packs and boxes fill up very quickly. Catherine Mouncey kindly offered to sponsor another box in the meantime.

e      Pastoral care: A Pastoral team meeting is due shortly, we feel we do have very good pastoral care with regular connections and cards.

f       Safeguarding: The report was accepted. Circuit training team is running more courses shortly, SM will contact those who will be eligible.

g      World Church and Mission in Britain: These reports were accepted. We are grateful to Y and C for their work  in these areas of our witness.

h      Children’s worker and Activity organiser: These reports were received and Council thanked Jean and Hester for all their good work. Some of Guiseley Primary school will be coming to share in  “What’s the story?” before Christmas, and Jean continues to conduct short services at both Ghyll Royd and Primrose Court. Thanks also to SO and JS for their successful ‘Murder Mystery’.

I       Leadership team: this small group continues to meet regularly to cover some of the more intricate matters of church life.

m     Worship including Christmas services: If anyone needs details of our circuit preachers these can be obtained from Roger.  The Methodist Church website offers many resources for Christmas, Council agreed to use the liturgy with candles offered. Our church details can be included in this website (for anyone who is seeking a local Methodist Church).  S or R can initiate this. There will be the usual pattern of services at Christmas, and leaflets about the children’s Nativity will be ready for the Primary school when they come (SO) and information will be shared with the uniformed organisations (Roger).

7          Any other business

                        Stationery: PB agreed to continue monitoring and ordering this.

8          Date of next meeting TBA