Bailgate News – Summer 2025

We start the week with Sunday Worship and Sunday School for the children. Bailgate will celebrate 145 years of worship, fellowship and service to the community on 1st June with a special anniversary service led by Rev. Wing Commander Ian Brown OBE.

There are three bible study groups which meet at various times through the week, one at Bailgate and two in members’ homes. On Monday afternoons we welcome Toddlers with their carers to come and enjoy playing in the hall. On Tuesday there is Luncheon Club for folk who live on their own in the Bailgate area. An excellent lunch is prepared by a small team and is much appreciated along with the conversation that goes with it. This is often followed with a short Taize meeting attended by some of the Luncheon clubbers. On Wednesday evening we host one of the Night Light Crisis Cafes. Also on Monday and Wednesday the uniformed organisations seem to fill the building, the girls on Mondays and the boys and some girls on Wednesdays. (It was great to see the Scout Group represented at the Annual Saint George’s Parade at the Cathedral.) On Thursday morning a prayer group meets in the Well (at the front of the church) followed by a coffee morning welcoming all visitors. In the evening we exercise our vocal chords and practise the hymns for the following Sunday as well as learning new ones. The choir recently led an Own Arrangement singing hymns and choruses we hadn’t sung for some time. The ladies also led an OA using Margaret Roe’s useful scripts presenting the lives of the women of the bible, which was well received. A recent addition to our meetings has been the dementia café, Bailgate Buddies which meets once a month on Thursday afternoons. Although small in number at the moment, the group is steadily growing. Thanks to the hard work of the Bailgate gardening group we have a lovely redesigned community garden which was opened last year and a BBQ was enjoyed. You will often see someone from Bailgate sitting there in the sunshine eating a lunchtime sandwich.

There are many groups who hire rooms at Bailgate for various meetings. The Bailgate Preschool uses our rooms every day. The charity Safer Families have an office on the premises, we hope to find out more about what they do at one of our OA services in the near future. The popular Lincoln Flower Club has been meeting in our hall each month for 50 years. Our excellent church organ is used for organ recitals by well-known local and visiting organists on the first Thursday of each month, with money raised for charity. There is a newly formed WI group, Towns Women Guild, a dance school and an International Women’s Meeting. Keep fit and Yoga classes and various choirs and music groups including a Renaissance Band also meet. The hall is occasionally used for children’s parties. The Country Market provides hospitality in the lounge every other Saturday with crafts and delicious homemade jams and baked items.

We are forever thankful for our beautiful church and those who organise the use of its many rooms, for those who keep the Victorian building in good order and manage at the same time to balance the books. With God’s help we will continue his work at Bailgate for many years to come.